Parties in the European Council between January and April 2004

Prior to 1 May 2004 the European Union had fifteen members. On that date ten new member states were admitted. This article describes the party affiliations of the leaders of each member-state represented in the European Council from the beginning of 2004 until the 1 May. The list below gives the political party that each head of government, or head of state, belonged to at the national level, as well as the European political alliance to which that national party belonged. The states are listed from most to least populous. More populous states have greater influence in the council, in accordance with the system of Qualified Majority Voting.

During the period in question only two changes of government occurred: in Greece and Spain, and taken together these left the overall balance of party affilitions in the Council unchanged.

Contents

Summary

Party 1 January 2004 10 March 2004 27 April 2004
# QMV # QMV # QMV
European People's Party 7 44 8 49 7 41
Party of European Socialists 4 29 3 24 4 32
European Liberal, Democrat, and Reform Group 3 11 3 11 3 11
Alliance for Europe of the Nations 1 3 1 3 1 3

List of leaders (1 January 2004)

Member-state Votes Leader National party European party
Germany 10 Gerhard Schröder SPD PES
France 10 Jacques Chirac UMP EPP
United Kingdom 10 Tony Blair Labour PES
Italy 10 Silvio Berlusconi Forza Italia EPP
Spain 8 José María Aznar López PP EPP
Netherlands 5 Jan Peter Balkenende CDA EPP
Greece 5 Costas Simitis PASOK PES
Belgium 5 Guy Verhofstadt VLD ELDR
Portugal 5 José Manuel Durão Barroso PSD EPP
Sweden 4 Göran Persson SAP PES
Austria 4 Wolfgang Schüssel ÖVP EPP
Denmark 3 Anders Fogh Rasmussen Venstre ELDR
Finland 3 Matti Vanhanen Centre Party ELDR
Ireland, Republic of 3 Bertie Ahern Fianna Fáil AEN
Luxembourg 2 Jean-Claude Juncker CSV EPP

Changes

Affiliation

Date Member-state Leader National party European group
10 March Greece Kostas Karamanlis New Democracy EPP
27 April Spain José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero PSOE PES

See also

External links