Over the last two years, the Tories have been repeatedly attacked by their political rivals for consorting with alleged homophobes and anti-Semites in the European Parliament.

Yesterday, David Cameron hit back claiming that not all of Labour’s friends in Europe were without controversial views. But, did he get his facts right?

The Claim

In response to regular critic Denis MacShane, the Prime Minister told the Commons:

“In the last parliament while the honourable gentleman [Denis MacShane] was putting all of his points, Labour was allied to the Polish Self-Defence party whose leader Andrei Lepper said ‘Hitler had a really good programme.’

“That’s their allies in the European parliament. I think we’ve heard enough.”

Full Fact decided to find out if that was the full story.

The Analysis

The Polish Self-Defence of the Republic party (PSD) is a nationalist party whose leader is known for his controversial remarks, including this one about Hitler.

Mr Cameron was on shakier ground when he suggested that Labour were formally allied to the party which Mr Lepper leads.

The British Labour party is a member of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, the second largest grouping of national parties in the European Parliament.

The Polish PSD party won six seats in the 2004 European elections and initially its members sat as independents. However, the MEPs of the party went in several different directions afterwards.

Of the six MEPs, four later joined the Union for Europe of the Nations group. In 2008, one of this group then decided to join the liberal grouping in Europe of which Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats play a leading role.

In 2004, two of their MEPs decided, six months after joining the Parliament, to join the Socialist grouping. Bogdan Golik stayed in this group until 2009, while the other left again soon afterwards.

So, the members of one party, during the course of a Parliament ended up in three different groupings, across the political spectrum.

The PSD party never joined the Socialist grouping, which is a formal alliance of over 30 national parties.  The link between Labour and the PSD is therefore only based on one of its MEPs remaining linked to the party for any length of time. On this basis one could just as easily link the Prime Minister’s coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, to the views of Mr Lepper.

The Socialist group in Europe strongly rejected Mr Cameron’s claim. Their head of communications, Tony Robinson told Full Fact:

“The European Parliament's Socialists and Democrats, formally the Socialist Group, have never been allied with the Polish self-defence party. Any such suggestion is wrong.”

While Mr Robinson acknowledged that members of that party had joined the group he insisted that this was in an individual capacity and not as representatives of their party.

"At the 2004 European election, the party won several Polish seats and its MEPs sat as independents. Two of these MEPs, acting as individuals, not as members of their party, joined our group. One of them left after a short time and one remained.

 "At no time did we have any discussions or relationship with the Polish self-defence party," he said.

Full Fact contacted Dr Richard Whitaker, a Lecturer in European Politics at Leicester University, to assess the significance of a PSD MEP’s membership of the Socialist grouping.

Dr Whitaker said that the membership of a PSD MEP in the Socialist grouping was not insignificant but stressed the wider point that European allies with some uncomfortable political views was a reality for all parties.

“The Socialist Group had a decision about whether to accept them [the Polish Self-Defence MEPs] or not and they have chosen to accept them, so it is not completely insignificant.”

“The general point is that the political systems in central and eastern Europe are quite different, in particular the views of quite a lot of the politicians on social liberalism.”

“It is difficult for any of the political parties to say that none of their allies in the European Parliament have any views that might be seen as problematic by some in the British political scene.”

Conclusion

The Prime Minister was within his rights to highlight that the Conservatives are not alone in having European colleagues with sometimes uncomfortable views.

However, he overstepped the mark to suggest that Labour were formally allied to a party whose leader has sympathies with Hitler. The PSD party found its MEPs in three different political groupings in the last European Parliament, including one with the Liberal Democrats.

Given their presence across groups it seems fairer to conclude that the PSD MEP was in the Socialist group as an individual rather than his presence reflecting an endorsement of the leader’s more extreme views.

Full Fact contacted Downing Street and we are awaiting a response.

By Tim Swain