The Five Star Movement’s move to join the radical left group, The Left, is already bearing its first fruits. For the first time, the Five Star Movement will have the presidency of a parliamentary commission, a subcommittee to be precise, the one for fiscal issues, but it is still a prestigious position. The role will be held by the delegation leader, Pasquale Tridico, who spoke of a “very important” step for the Movement, recalling that the M5S with its eight deputies is the second largest delegation in the group after the French of La France Insoumise (Lfi), and promising to work in a “very coordinated and collaborative way” with all the other members of the radical left group.
An unexpected result if you consider that the membership had arrived claiming that there would be six months of trial, to allow for mutual observation, in order to evaluate whether the ‘marriage’ had been only one of convenience or a real political choice. In an interview with uisjournal.com Tridico had explained that this time, unlike joining the Efdd group with Nigel Farage in 2014, joining The Left was a “clearer, more coherent, more programmatic, more mature” choice.
“The M5s is progressive, in Italy a Popular Front like in France against the right”
Two coordinators
Two members of the Five Star Movement will also be coordinators in two parliamentary committees, which means that in those meetings they will speak on behalf of the group and that they will coordinate (precisely) the work of their colleagues. Mario Furore will be coordinator in Juri, where in fact for The Left he is the only representative together with the French Arash Saeidi of Lfi. But in any case this means that he will represent the radical left group in all discussions on legal affairs in the Chamber.
More weighty is the choice of Dario Tamburrano, who returned to the Parliament of Brussels and Strasbourg after his first experience in the 2014-2019 legislature, who will be coordinator in the Itre commission, the one that deals with Industry, research and energy and in which the members of The Left are 12. “The work of this commission will be crucial to confirm the objectives of the Green Deal on the correct direction and for an ecological transition that is socially fair”, declared Tamburrano, promising to work “against any policy based on greenwashing and to affirm a European electricity market that is transparent, convenient for all citizens and free from fossil and nuclear sources”.
The 5 Stars with the radical left: how they went from Farage and Salvini to Carola Rackete
Giuseppe Conte’s party wanted to get out of the limbo of the Non-Inscribed to which it had been relegated in the last legislature. Being in the non-inscribed meant having almost no political agency. By joining a group, however, the possibilities of obtaining roles of varying importance in the organization of the Chamber increase, of managing legislative procedures in person and having more speaking time. Even simply making a request to put an extraordinary discussion on the agenda is much easier if you are part of a political family and there are also economic advantages for the parties.
Next steps
What will happen in the legislature remains to be seen, but the Movement seems to be going in the right direction and has already placed three of its men in important roles, at least for a group that is in opposition and that in any case, with its 46 members, is the third smallest in the Chamber, after the far right of the Europe of Sovereign Nations (25 members), and the Non-Inscrits (33). When in 2014 the Movement founded the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy (EFDD) together with Farage, it was initially included in the sanitary cordon that prevented it from aspiring to any office.
It took a long time to gain the trust of colleagues and it was only towards the end of the second half of the legislature that the cord was broken with the candidacy and surprise election of Fabio Massimo Castaldo, who was chosen to replace the resigning German liberal Alexander Graf Lambdsorff. It is difficult (but not impossible) that they will manage to obtain a position of such prestige again, but the 5 Stars have certainly started the new legislature on the right foot.
