The north-south Euroscepticism divide

As Right-wing parties across the continent find themselves in pole position ahead of European elections later this year, could there be more tearaways from the European Union? A new report from the European Council on Foreign Relations has surveyed 17,000 voters in 12 European countries, gauging their views on EU membership and the insurgent Right. If there’s one striking takeaway, it’s that Euroscepticism seems to be making more of a splash in Northern Europe, compared to its southern neighbours such as Italy, Spain and Greece.

In the Netherlands, 63% of voters classed as “far-Right” claimed that the leader of their country’s principal far-Right party wanted to take it out of the EU, a figure matched by respondents overall. The figures were over 50% for Austria, Sweden and Germany — all located either in Northern or Central Europe — whereas the sunnier climes of Portugal and Greece felt that their Right-wing leaders were happier maintaining a relationship with Brussels.

The report names the politicians in question, but its definition of “far-Right” might not be a universally accepted one. Besides the familiar names of Geert Wilders and Viktor Orbán, Italian Giorgia Meloni is chucked into the basket of deplorables, despite her time in office frequently being characterised as straightforwardly conservative or centre-right, including by liberal establishment publications such as the Economist. One dreads to think what they’d make of that awful Rishi Sunak…

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