Charles Tannock MEP has obviously kicked off an important debate. Crucial contributions, that a casual reader might miss as they are some way down the thread, come from two MEPs who have experienced what leaving the EPP without another group to go to means.
First, Roger Helmer:
"Charles says he's happy to form a new group, but unwilling to sit outside a group in the interim. That's a bit like saying you're happy to go to France, but you won't cross the Channel.
[...]
We've now tried this ploy at least four times to my knowledge, and we risk losing all credibility, like the boy who cried wolf. We should show our commitment by leaving the EPP first, and then forming a new group. The non-attached are not a group in any real sense, and we should be no more "sitting with extremists" than we are now (some members of the EPP are pretty dodgy).
Charles agonises about our ability to move amendments during the short interregnum before the new group was started, but I respectfully suggest that he's focussing too closely on internal parliamentary matters that leave voters cold, and failing to see the big picture."
Then Dan Hannan:
"Leaving the EPP-ED and becoming an independent (that is, a Conservative without pan-European party affiliation) is the single best thing I've done. The day I left the EPP, a staff member from the Non-Attached Group came to my office to say: "What can we do to help you, Monsieur?" At first, I thought I had misheard. For nine years, the EPP had blocked almost everything I tried to do, even things as petty as speaking in debates and booking rooms for visitors.
Now, as an independent, I have more staff, I have more campaigning resources, I can speak in the debates I want and join the committees I choose; I am no longer frustrated at every step by EPP staffers who see thwarting British Tories as their contribution to European unity.
Supporters of the EPP ought to be honest: theirs is an ideological commitment to a group whose doctrines they share. Christopher Beazley, for example, has the integrity to admit that this is why he remains attached to the Christian Democrats: it was why - greatly to his credit - he refused to sign the commitment to leave the Group, and is standing down at the next election.
Those who pretend that there is a logistical advantage in remaining with the EPP are, I'm afraid, being disingenuous. The resverse is true: the EPP takes our financial allocation and then spends it on campaigns for deeper integration.
Sitting as independents is a perfectly feasible option, and may well be a necessary transitional phase towards forming a large new Group. For the truth is that we have a credibility problem with other anti-federalist parties, having repeatedly messed them around on this issue. Until they see us leaving the EPP, they won't believe us."