KEEP TRACK OF DEVELOPMENTS IN THE EU INSTITUTIONS WITH OUR MOVERS AND SHAKERS COLUMN

is the editor of Dods People EU and the European Union and Public Affairs Directory

More than a year after Brexit, the European Parliament announced this week that the joint assembly between British and EU lawmakers has been approved. The assembly’s main responsibility will be to monitor the EU-UK trade and cooperation agreement with 35 lawmakers from each side.

The European People’s Party will have nine seats, the Socialists & Democrats will have eight seats. While the two groups finalise their choices for the assembly, Renew Europe picked MEPs Nathalie Loiseau, Liesje Schreinemacher, Jordi Cañas, Barry Andrews and Hilde Vautmans for their five seats while the Greens/ EFA appointed MEPs François Alfonsi, Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield, Bas

Eickhout and Terry Reintke for their four seats. The European Conservatives and Reformists Group and Identity and Democracy Group will get three seats each. Finally, the Left group has selected MEPs Chris MacManus and Sira Rego for their two seats and there is one seat available for a non-affiliated MEP.

Elsewhere in the Parliament, Romanian MEP Dacian Cioloș, leader of the Renew Group has stepped down after winning his party’s elections. Cioloș will focus on leading his party as he aims to “win the presidential, local and parliamentary elections” after the no-confidence vote that took place this week. A couple of Renew members have shown interest such as Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld who announced that she wanted to become the leader of the group while the Group’s French MEPs have given Stéphane Séjourné the task of finding a suitable candidate. The group will organise elections in the coming weeks.

In Commission news, Mechthild Wörsdörfer is the new Deputy Director-General for Energy (ENER) while Patrick Child is the new Deputy Director-General for Environment (ENV).

Finally, in national news, Yannick Jadot has been selected by France’s Greens as their presidential candidate for the 2022 election. In Sweden, Magdalena Andersson, Minister of Finance, has been nominated by the Social Democrats to lead the party. She will replace outgoing Prime Minister Stefan Lofven and in November face a parliamentary vote to become head of the government.