The true reasons behind the proposed new rules on Groups

It was not a surprise to see the Telegraph print this story on my proposal to raise the threshold needed to form a political group in the European Parliament, nor dress it up as a sinister plot to “eliminate Eurosceptics”.

My proposal, which was discussed in the Constitutional Affairs Committee yesterday, was a response to concerns that, currently, just 20 MEPs (only 2 1/2% of members in the European Parliament), drawn from a fifth of the member states, can form a political "Group" and obtain significant extra resources such as staff and money.

My proposal is to raise the number of MEPs needed to form a group to 30 (4%), with a quarter of member states represented - still lower than the percentage required to form a Group in most national parliaments.

The Telegraph and some blogs have swallowed Nigel Farage's line that this is is a direct attack on UKIP as there are currently just 23 members in their Independence & Democracy Group. But my proposal, if adopted, would not come into effect until the next parliament. By then, UKIP and its allies will surely either have more seats (their view) reaching the new threshold, or fewer (my view) meaning they won't even qualify under the current rule. In any case, MEPs who do not sit in a Group are guaranteed all the normal parliamentary privileges and cannot be silenced.

Farage flatters himself that he and the pipsqueek remanents of UKIP are my target. No, the true purpose of the rule change is to diminish the chances of creating - and giving taxpayers money to - a neo-nazi style far-right Group. Already last year, we saw the debacle of the Independence Sovereignty & Tradition Group, when the far-right managed to cobble together 20 MEPs from a mixture of fascists, holocaust deniers and xenophobes (including Ashley Mote, elected as UKIP) to become eligible for a million euros of funding in 2007. The ramshackle nature of the group was exposed when they collapsed this year after several Romanian MEPs left it following deogatgory comments about Romanians from their colleague Alessandra Mussolini.

Maybe Nigel Farage supports giving money to neo-nazis, but I don't. Certainly, dressing up my proposal as an attempt by the two big Groups to squash the small ones is nonsense.

On the contrary, my proposals actually include a provision that would help small Groups. Previously, smaller groups could often be held hostage by a few MEPs or even individuals who know if they leave the group it would collapse. It was the former leader of UKIP's Group, Jens Peter Bonde, who drew my attention to this problem. I have attempted to address it in the way he suggested, by proposing that if an existing Group loses members and falls below the threshold of 30, they can continue to exist for two years. This would actually help smaller groups work better and give them more stability, as they would not have the fear of collapse continually dangled over them.