Glenn Bedingfield was yesterday elected as a Member of the European Parliament and successor of Joseph Muscat, who relinquished his seat to become Opposition Leader in the House of Representatives.
Being elected on the first count with 62 per cent of the votes, adding to nearly 20,000 votes, Mr Bedingfield surpassed Lawrence Joe (Wenzu) Mintoff who achieved 20 per cent of the votes, and Robert Micallef, who won 17 per cent of the votes. Another one per cent of votes were non-transferable.
The quota was 20,477 votes, half the number of votes Dr Muscat had achieved in the 2004 MEPs election.
Mr Bedingfield was one of four candidates chosen by MLP delegates during an extraordinary general conference held on 18 November 2003. Back then, MEP candidates had to win 70 per cent of valid votes from delegates during the conference. The other chosen MEP candidates were John Attard Montaldo and Louis Grech (today MEPs), as well as Dr Muscat.
During another extraordinary general conference held on 27 February, 2004, Labour Party delegates chose another four candidates – Robert Micallef, Lawrence Joe (Wenzu) Mintoff, Joe Debono Grech and Owen Bonnici.
Robert Micallef and Dr Mintoff were the only other candidates who submitted their nominations for yesterday’s casual election.
Speaking to journalists at the counting hall yesterday, Mr Micallef pointed out that candidates chosen during the second extraordinary general conference had less chance of making it to the European Parliament since the other four candidates had already been campaigning for two months and delegates had already chosen whom to support. Thus, the second group of candidates faced difficulties to conduct their pre-electoral campaign.
In comments to The Malta Independent soon after Mr Bedingfield was confirmed as Dr Muscat’s successor at the European Parliament, he thanked all those who had shown confidence in him. He also expressed his strong will and commitment to take up this role “with commitment, responsibility and loyalty”.
“Dr Muscat will be giving me a handover,” thus he is expected to build on Dr Muscat’s work.
Mr Bedingfield explained that it will not be easy for him to substitute Dr Muscat but he was “committed, willing and determined to transmit the Maltese voice at the European Parliament.”
Meanwhile, he planned “to launch a project by which he would get certain issues across Parliament.” This included themes which directly concerned the Maltese public such as “the right for medial care for everyone, issues on irregular migration, as well as the environment.”
The full agenda, he promised, would be announced in the future.
In the meantime, he was “looking forward and hoping that my commitment will be renewed on 6 June next year,” the date of the next MEP election.
Mr Bedingfield expected to have a “smooth transition” from Dr Muscat’s office to his. While keeping Dr Muscat’s staff, Mr Bedingfield was planning to increase his workforce and include “Mario Cutajar, who will be leading the secretariat.”