Greens In EU Parliament Spike From 50 To 71 In Elections, About Same #s Now As Far Right

Europe’s Greens, big winners in Sunday’s European elections, will use their newfound leverage in a fractured parliament to push an agenda of urgent climate action, social justice and civil liberties, the movement’s leaders say.

“This was a great outcome for us – but we now also have a great responsibility, because voters have given us their trust,” Bas Eickhout, a Dutch MEP and the Greens’ co-lead candidate for commission president, told the Guardian. “Our voters, especially the younger generation, for many of whom we are now their first choice, are deeply concerned about the climate crisis, and they are pro-European – but they feel the EU is not delivering. They want us to change the course of Europe.”

Riding a surge of public concern over the climate crisis, Greens achieved double-digit scores in several countries, finishing second in Germany – where they doubled their previous score – and Finland and third in Luxembourg and France.

With their tally of MEPs surging to 70 from 51 in the last parliament, the Greens group will have roughly the same clout in the 751-seat assembly as the far-right populists led by Italy’s interior minister, Matteo Salvini – and a much better chance of using it.

EDIT

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/28/greens-eu-election-mandate-leverage-climate-policy