Austria’s Social Democrats have opted for experience and will likely reappoint their MEPs currently serving in the European Parliament to stand again in the June 2024 EU elections as the party continues its path of domestic rejuvenation.
The five (SPÖ) members in the European Parliament will likely not go anywhere, as all have been reappointed to run by a party convention on Sunday.
The coming election would show “that the SPÖ is back, that we are winning trust and elections!” said Andreas Schieder, who received 89.9% of the vote and will turn 55 next year.
His running mates include Evelyn Regner, currently vice-president of the European Parliament, and Günther Sidl, best known for co-negotiating the hard-fought F-gas regulation. Hannes Heide, an MEP specialising in culture and budget policy, is also set to return to Brussels.
One new face guaranteed to make it to Brussels is Elisabeth Grossmann who said she will run on a platform of making Europe more social. Claudia Arpa, is the current leader of Austria’s second chamber and is vying for a sixth mandate – which she will have to fight for.
The SPÖ is working to rejuvenate itself domestically, with maverick Andreas Babler, re-elected as party leader on Saturday with 88% of the vote. Little of this rejuvenation can be expected from the EU delegation, given the familiar faces chosen by the old leadership.
Babler himself said that the EU elections were “the most important elections for the social democrats” because the bloc itself was a social democratic project of strength in unity.
(Nikolaus J. Kurmayer | Euractiv.de)
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Source: euractiv.com
