European Elections 2009
The European Parliament is made up of 736 Members elected in the 27 Member States of the enlarged European Union. Since 1979 Members of the EP have been elected by direct universal suffrage for a five-year period. The last elections to the European Parliament were held in the 27 member states of the European Union (EU) between 4th and 7th June 2009. The majority of Members were elected on Sunday 7th June, but because of traditional polling days varying from country to country according to local custom, some countries held their elections in the three preceding days:
- Thursday 4th June: United Kingdom (including Gibraltar), Netherlands (including Aruba and the Netherlands Antilles)
- Friday 5th June: Ireland, Czech Republic (day 1)
- Saturday 6th June: Cyprus, France (for part of Outre-mer), Italy (day 1), Latvia, Malta, Slovakia, Czech Republic (day 2)
- Sunday 7th June: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy (day 2), Lithuania, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Sweden This was the first European Parliament election that Bulgaria and Romania participated in at the same time as the other member states. When they joined the EU in 2007, they held elections for Members of EP outside the normal electoral calendar.
The Members exercise their mandate in an independent fashion.They are grouped by political affinity and not by nationality, there are currently 7 political groups in the European Parliament:
- Group of the European People's Party (Christian Democrats) (EPP)
- Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament (S&D)
- Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE)
- Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance (GREENS/ EFA)
- European Conservatives and Reformists Group (ECR)
- Confederal Group of the European United Left - Nordic Green Left (GUE/ NGL)
- Europe of Freedom and Democracy Group (EFD)
25 Members are needed to form a political group, and at least one-quarter of the Member States must be represented within the group. Some Members do not belong to any political group and are known as non-attached (NA) Members.
| Political group | Number of seats | Score in % |
| EPP | 265 | 36 |
| S&&D | 184 | 25 |
| ALDE | 84 | 11.4 |
| GREENS/EFA | 55 | 7.5 |
| ECR | 54 | 7.3 |
| GUE/NGL | 35 | 4.8 |
| EFD | 32 | 4.3 |
| NA | 27 | 3.7 |
Diána Horváth