2004 European Parliament election in the United Kingdom

Background

Electoral system

The United Kingdom elected 78 Members of the European Parliament using proportional representation. The United Kingdom was divided into twelve multi-member constituencies. The eleven of these regions which form Great Britain used a closed-list party list system method of proportional representation, calculated using the D'Hondt method. Northern Ireland used the Single Transferable Vote (STV). As a consequence of the 2004 enlargement of the European Union, the number of seats allocated to the United Kingdom was fewer than in 1999.

It was the first European election to be held in the United Kingdom using postal-only voting in four areas: the North East, North West, Yorkshire and the Humber, and East Midlands regions.

Regional seat allocations

A combination of the effects of the Treaty of Nice and the 2004 enlargement of the European Union meant that the number of seats allocated to the United Kingdom for the 2004 election was reduced from the 87 MEPs allocated for the 1999 election to 78 MEPs.

As a result of the successful challenge of Matthews v United Kingdom before the European Court of Human Rights in 1999 residents of Gibraltar, voted in the European Parliament election for the first time, as part of the South West England region.

1 Includes Gibraltar, the only British overseas territory which was part of the EU.

Results

Main article: Results of the 2004 European Parliament election in the United Kingdom

Turnout for all the regions was 38.2% on an electorate of 44,157,267 (43,084,598 in Great Britain and 1,072,669 in Northern Ireland). The Conservatives and Labour both polled poorly. The Conservatives, although getting a vote share 4.1% greater than Labour, experienced their lowest vote share in a national election since 1832. Labour's vote share was its lowest since 1918. Labour's decline in votes was regarded as being largely due to widespread public dissatisfaction about the Iraq War and (as with the Conservatives) the increased popularity of UK Independence Party (UKIP). UKIP saw a large increase in support, increasing its number of MEPs from 3 to 12, drawing level with the Liberal Democrats, who themselves had increased their representation from 10 to 12 seats. UKIP polled higher than the Liberal Democrats to push the latter into fourth place.

Turnout was lowest in Scotland, which did not hold local elections on the same day. In Scotland, Labour topped the poll, followed by the Scottish National Party (SNP). The Conservatives' share of the vote declined by 2 per cent, making it the region with the smallest swing against them.

Wales was the only region were Labour increased its share of the vote compared to 1999. The Conservatives managed to make gains pushing Plaid Cymru into third and whose share of the vote fell by 12 percentage points relative to 1999. Similarly UKIP narrowly beat the Liberal Democrats into fourth place. Wales was the region where the Green Party polled their lowest share of the vote.

United Kingdom

:All parties listed.

†Loss/gain figures for seats are losses/gains versus the 1999 notional result, as the number of MEPs overall fell.

Great Britain

Summary of the election results for Great Britain

:All parties listed.

†Loss/gain figures for seats are losses/gains versus the 1999 notional result, as the number of MEPs overall fell.

Gibraltar

Main article: 2004 European Parliament election in Gibraltar

Gibraltar participated in the United Kingdom's election for the first time in 2004 as part of the South West England constituency. Gibraltar is a British overseas territory (BOT) and therefore is under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of the United Kingdom but does not form part of it. Gibraltar was however part of the EU, the only BOT to be so included. Following however, the result of the successful challenge of Matthews v United Kingdom before the European Court of Human Rights in 1999 residents of Gibraltar were given the right to vote in the European Parliament elections. The British government decided not to give Gibraltar its own seat due to its small electorate of just over 20,000 which would have meant with just one seat Gibraltar would have been over-represented by about 30 times the average.

None of the main Gibraltar political parties contested the election, so voters chose from United Kingdom party lists. However, Lyana Armstrong-Emery of Gibraltar's Reform Party had a place on a joint list with the Green Party. In addition both the leader of the Conservative Party, Michael Howard, and his deputy, Michael Ancram, campaigned in Gibraltar.

Turnout in Gibraltar was 57.5%, higher than the 37.6% for the South West England electoral region as a whole. The Conservative Party polled over two-thirds of the Gibraltar vote, with no other party exceeding 10% support.

Northern Ireland

Turnout in Northern Ireland was 51.2%. Sinn Féin beat the SDLP in the polls and took its first Northern Ireland seat. Sinn Féin also won a seat in the corresponding elections in the Republic of Ireland. Sinn Féin and the DUP increased their shares of the vote relative to the 1999 European Parliament elections, while the shares for both the SDLP and the UUP fell. This was also the final election in which a Unionist candidate topped the poll in Northern Ireland. Jim Allister of the DUP and Bairbre de Brún of Sinn Féin were elected in the first round while Jim Nicholson of the UUP was elected in the third stage, after the votes of the other candidates were reallocated.

Summary of the election results for Northern Ireland

MEPs defeated

Labour

• David Bowe (Yorkshire and the Humber)
• Bill Miller (Scotland)
• Brian Simpson (North West England) - returned to the European Parliament in September 2006 and defended his seat in 2009.
• Mo O'Toole (North East England)
• Mark F. Watts (South East England)

Conservative

• Jacqueline Foster (North West England) - was reelected in the 2009 election.
• Alexander Macmillan (South West England)
• Roy Perry (South East England)
• Ian Twinn (London) - only took seat on 21 October 2003 after the ill-health resignation of Lord Bethell.

Plaid Cymru

• Eurig Wyn (Wales)

Aftermath

Both Tony Blair and Michael Howard faced criticism for their results with then Secretary of State for Health John Reid calling the results "disappointing" for Labour and "disastrous" for the Conservatives.

Shortly after the election UKIP's Robert Kilroy-Silk, who was credited with raising the profile of the party during the election, was interviewed by Channel 4 television about leadership ambitions, Kilroy-Silk did not deny having ambitions to lead the party, but stressed that Roger Knapman would lead it into the next general election. However, the next day, on Breakfast with Frost, he criticised Knapman's leadership. After further disagreement with the leadership, Kilroy-Silk resigned the UKIP whip in the European Parliament on 27 October 2004. Initially, he remained a member, while seeking a bid for the party leadership. However, this was not successful and he resigned completely from UKIP on 20 January 2005, calling it a "joke". Two weeks later, he founded his own party, Veritas, taking a number of UKIP members, including both of the London Assembly members, with him.

UKIP formed a new European Parliament Group, Independence/Democracy which was co-chaired by Nigel Farage and Hanne Dahl.

Notes

References

References

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