The Mote factor

Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty (ITS), the far-right political group in the European Parliament, is dispatching a letter to Winchester Prison to ask the disgraced MEP Ashley Mote for his account of the events which led to him being jailed for nine months. Some of the ITS's 23 MEPs are in favour of expelling him from the group, but at a meeting last week (18 September) they decided to wait for his reply. “We have to hear what happened. Our information so far is just what we have seen in newspapers,” said a group official. Mote was imprisoned for dishonestly receiving more than £65,000 (€96,000) in income support and housing and council tax benefits. But getting the request through the prison postal system could take a while, so the group is not expected to come to a conclusion for some time. A delay might suit ITS which faces a big test on 25 November when Romania holds its first elections to the European Parliament. Thanks to the Partidul România Mare (PRM), ITS currently has six of the 35 Romanian MEPs, but opinion polls are putting the PRM at below 5%. Parliament rules state that a minimum of 20 MEPs representing one-fifth of the member states are needed to form a political group. So ITS might need Mote, even if he is still in prison.