You’ve all read Eurosceptic claims that the European Parliament has no powers or simply “rubber-stamps” EU legislation. It’s one of those lies that they hope will gain currency by constant repetition.

So it was interesting to see their strategy undermined by no less a person than Nigel Farage’s partner as co-leader of UKIP’s Group in the European Parliament, Jens-Peter Bonde MEP. In a recent article in EU Observer he wrote:

“This week the European Parliament made a difference. We gave our Yes to a compromise regulation on fluorinated gases (F-gases) raising general standards and at the same time allowing Denmark and Austria to continue their bans on the use of F-gases…. the European Parliament proposed changing the proposal for total harmonisation into a minimum-regulation allowing countries to keep and insert stricter rules.”

Not only that, he admitted that the small groups in the EP can make a difference, something Eurosceptic MEPs generally deny, saying: “The amendment was proposed by Dutch MEP Hans Blokland and myself on behalf of our little group. It shows that members from small groups have the same possibility to influence legislation as MEPs from bigger groups”.

Indeed, the European Parliament is not a rubber-stamp parliament. It has no in-built automatic majority, unlike many national parliaments. To pass a proposal or an amendment, you need to build your majority case-by-case through explanation, persuasion and negotiation with colleagues from different parties and countries. As Bonde pointed out in his article: “We could not have won the battle without cross party cooperation.”

In short, if you get stuck in, work hard at talking to others and arguing the merits of your case, you will succeed. Perhaps we can now look forward to a change of attitude of the UKIP MEPs and see them actually doing some work and not just turning up only at votes to oppose everything without even reading the content.