TIME LINE FOR THE EUROPEAN ELECTIONS

22 September 2013 :  German elections

February 2014: The European political parties will nominate Presidential candidates. The Lisbon Treaty clearly expressed the concept that the President of the European Commission would be elected by the European Council to reflect the outcome of the European elections. So far, the European party candidates, the EPP (Christian Democrats), the PES (Socialists), the ALDE (Liberals) etc, have all announced that they intend to nominate a candidate for President of the European Commission. European parties are in the process of writing a manifesto for various party federations that will participate in the European elections.

April 2014:  Last European Parliament plenary session. From that period on, it will go into an election period.

May 2014: If European elections are on the 22nd or 21st of May 2014, then the UK elections will take place on the 22nd whereas for countries like Belgium, the elections will be held on Sunday the 25th.

June 2014: Between the 2nd June and  26th of June party groups in the EP will be formed following the European election. At the end of June, the European Council, the 28 Heads of state or government, will nominate the President of the European Commission. At the end of May and throughout June, meetings of the parliamentary party groups will take place along with a process of intensive coalition formation which is not only about the position of the Commission President but also about 27 other Commissioners, the Presidency of the European Parliament for the first two and a half years and in the second two and a half years, plus the Vice-Presidency of the European Parliament, the Committee Chairs and also the President of the European Council.

2nd. July 2014: First session of the newly elected European Parliament,. the Parliamentary President, the Vice-President, the Quaestors, the Committee Chairs etc. will all be elected

14 thru 17 July 2014 : Second session of the European Parliament . At this session, there will be the elections of the President of the European Commission.

August 2014 : Choice of the Commissioners by incoming President and formation of the new College of Commissioners.

September 2014 : Confidential hearings will take place in the European Parliament in the first two weeks of September as currently scheduled

October 2014: Formal investiture of the European Parliament. The new European Commission once voted by the Parliament in October enters into office in the 1st of November 2014.

End of Year : The election of the President of the European Council will happen at the end of 2014 .

The positions to fill in 2014

• 751 members of the European Parliament;
• The President of the European Commission;
• 27 Commissioners for the member states;
• The President of the European Council, Herman Von Rompuy’s replacement whose mandate comes to an end on 1 December 2014;
• 2 Presidents of the EP for the first and second two and a half years;
• A permanent President of the Eurozone
• 20 European Parliament Committee Chairs or 22 if you include the two sub-committees in the European Parliament as well;
• 14 European Parliament Vice-Presidents out of the 751 newly elected members;

Thus, a phenomenal number of positions to fill during 2014, which for the public sector means who is going to be influential in the new Europe. The new political landscape that will happen in 2014 is going to be important for all of us and will require that we become familiar with the new personalities.