ANALYISIS:A low turnout of 43% combined with rising unemployment has boosted fringe parties on the far left and the far right in certain EU states, writes JAMIE SMYTH in Brussels.
GOVERNMENTS ACROSS Europe have suffered heavy losses in the European elections with many voters backing fringe parties in the face of the worst economic crisis since the second World War.
Initial forecasts also show that voter turnout in the elections hit a record low of 43 per cent despite a major publicity drive to persuade people to vote.
Exit polls released ahead of official results last night showed coalition governments in Austria, Hungary, Greece, Latvia, Ireland, the Netherlands, all facing significant losses. But the existing centre-right majority in the European Parliament will remain intact following a very poor performance from the main Socialist parties in France, Germany and Britain.
Centre-right parties won 39.5 per cent of the vote compared with 36.6 per cent in 2004, securing 291 of the European assembly’s 736 seats, pollster Kapa Research estimated.
The polls showed the European Socialist Group taking 26 per cent of the vote, down from 27.6 per cent five years ago.
In Germany, the biggest EU state, which elects 99 MEPs, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party and its Bavarian sister party CSU are on course to win the biggest share of the vote at 38 per cent. This is a six and a half percentage point decline on the 44.5 per cent it won in 2004.
The Social Democrats, who share power with the CDU in a grand coalition government, won 21 per cent of the vote, just below the 21.5 per cent in the last election. The big winners in Germany were the Liberals, who won 10 per cent and the Greens, who are on course for 12 per cent of the vote.
In France the Socialist party led by Martine Aubry is on course to suffer a devastating defeat, attracting just 17.5 per cent, down from the 28.9 per cent it won in the 2004 elections. In contrast, Nicolas Sarkozy’s ruling UMP party managed to buck the trend of government suffering at the hands of the electorate and should get 28 per cent, up from 11.6 per cent in 2004.
Britain’s Labour party was also on course for a historically bad result in the elections, with prime minister Gordon Brown fighting to save his job amid fears that the party could slip into third or even fourth place in the poll.
“It’s hard to fathom that the centre-left can’t make the running out of a crisis linked to globalisation. But the main Socialist parties in the five biggest EU countries are either suffering because they are incumbents in government or bitterly split,” said Hugo Brady, analyst with the Centre for European Reform.
A record low turnout in the elections at 43 per cent combined with fast-rising unemployment across Europe and declines in living standards has also boosted fringe parties on the far left and the far right in certain EU states.
In Latvia former Communist leader Alfred Rubiks, who spent several years in jail for plotting a coup in Latvia in the early 1990s, was elected as an MEP. His far left Harmony Centre party, which traditionally supports Russian speakers, is forecast to win up to 20 per cent of the vote.
The far right Party for Freedom led by controversial critic of Islam Geert Wilders has won four out of 25 Dutch seats. This ranks the party, which was only founded in 2005, second to the ruling Christian Democratic Appeal.
In Austria the far right Freedom Party, which was founded by the late Jörg Haider, doubled its vote to 13.1 per cent and is on course to elect two MEPs.
Exit polls from Bulgaria and Hungary also forecast that the far right Ataka party and the Jobbik party are on course to elect MEPs to the parliament.
However, the drift towards the far right was not replicated in every member state, with the Belgian far right Vlaams Belang party forecast to see its vote drop to 13.9 per cent from 23.16 per cent. Jean Marie Le Pen’s National Front also saw its vote dip to 6.5 per cent, down from 10 per cent in 2004.
Voters also provided a major boost to the Green Party in the big member states, which benefited from an anti-establishment vote. In France the Greens doubled their share of the vote to almost 15 per cent while in Germany support for the Greens held firm at 12 per cent of the vote, which should enable the party to return the same number of 13 MEPs to the parliament.
These results could boost the Green group in the parliament, which currently has 43 members but may expect to reach or surpass 50 MEPs.
One of the biggest concerns prompted by the results is the record low turnout, estimated at just 43 per cent.
This marks the sixth time in succession that turnout has fallen since elections to the European Parliament began in 1979, when 61per cent of the public turned out to vote.
The decline in turnout comes in spite of a multimillion euro publicity campaign before the elections, which included billboard campaigns in all EU states, advertisements on MTV and even a public message beamed from space by a Belgian astronaut commanding the International Space Station.