page_title: Party of European Socialists
section_title: European Council and Council of Ministers
hierarchical_section_title: Party of European Socialists / PES in the European institutions / European Council and Council of Ministers
caption_attribution_description: English: european council
context_page_description: The Party of European Socialists is a social-democratic European political party.
  The PES comprises national-level political parties from all member states of the European Union plus Norway and the United Kingdom. This includes major parties such as the Italian Democratic Party, the British Labour Party, the French Socialist Party, Social Democratic Party of Germany and the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party. Parties from a number of other European countries and from the Mediterranean region are also admitted to the PES as associate or observer parties. Most member, associate and observer parties are members of the wider Progressive Alliance or Socialist International.
  The PES is currently led by its president Sergei Stanishev, a former Prime Minister of Bulgaria. Its political group in the European Parliament is the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats. The PES also operates in the European Committee of the Regions and the European Council.
context_section_description: Party-alignment at the European Council is often loose, but has been the basis of some intergovernmental cooperation. At present seven countries are led by a PES-affiliated leader, who represents that state at the European Council: Spain (Pedro Sánchez), Portugal (Antonio Costa), Malta (Robert Abela), Denmark (Mette Frederiksen), Finland (Sanna Marin) and Sweden (Stefan Löfven).
  The makeup of national delegations to the Council of Ministers is at some times subject to coalitions: for the above governments led by a PES party, that party may not be present in all Council configurations; in other governments led by non-PES parties a PES minister may be its representative for certain portfolios. PES is in coalition in the following countries: Czech Republic, Germany, Italy and Luxembourg.
caption: The states of the European Union by the European affiliations of their leaders, as of 25 August 2020
  Does not account for coalitions. Key to colours is as follows:   European People's Party/EPP Group (11) (AT, BG, CY, DE, GR, HR, HU, LV, RO, SI, SK)    Renew Europe (ALDE, EDP, LREM) (7) (BE, CZ, EE, IE, FR, LU, NL)    Party of European Socialists (6)  (DK, ES, FI, MT, PT, SE)    Independent (2) (IT, LT)    European Conservatives and Reformists Party (1) (PL)
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