Statement by Julian PRIESTLEY, former Secretary-General of the European Parliament and Director of campaign for Socialist Candidate. He reacts to the European Elections 2014.

Brussels

statement

European election

2014 European elections (T)

PRIESTLEY, Julian (UK)

election night 2014 (T)

European Elections 2014: statement by Julian PRIESTLEY, former Secretary-General of the European Parliament and Director of campaign for Socialist Candidate

SOUNDBITE (English), Julian PRIESTLEY, former Secretary-General of the EP, "I still waiting for a lot of results, but what seems to me clear is that is that the final results is gonna be close and therefore that would be an opportunity for parliamentary leadership to discuss how to proceed and be confident that the socialists side have increased his position and they will be a significant decrease in the number of EPP MEPs. And it also seems in the larger countries in the EU there has been an increase in the number of voters going to poles."

SOUNDBITE (English), Julian PRIESTLEY, former Secretary-General of the EP, "There are negotiations as they are in any parliament and we are more interested really in putting together the maximum support for change in Europe, so that the Europe we have now, we really work to improve and reform. And ours is the reform project and we will cooperate, the S&amp;D will cooperate with all those who want to make a real and meaningful change in Europe so that Europe benefits his citizens."

SOUNDBITE (English), Julian PRIESTLEY, former Secretary-General of the EP, "The situation in Belgium is quite very different because they are voting at the same time the national and regional elections and I'm not quite sure to what the citizenship is telling about Europe in Belgium. In France clearly the success of Marie Le Pen is very disquieting and means that all these people who are committed to an alternative vision of Europe but still within the EU have to increase their efforts to explain their alternative project. But in other countries you know, there was a lot of talk about the rise of very strong extremists members and actually it hasn't been materialised and we are hopeful that the long majority MEPs a clear majority of MEPs will be supporting either Martin Schulz or Jean-Claude Junker. We of course hope that is our candidate who is in lead."