“We should go beyond that. On some issues, I think that they [the far right] are relatively sane. On some other issues, there’s insanity,” he added, while insisting a majority of votes in Parliament will involve the mainstream parties.

Since the 2024 EU election, the EPP has repeatedly passed legislation with support from right-wing and far-right groups, particularly on migration and green policy — topics where the centrist groups have the widest gaps between them — sidelining its traditional centrist and center-left partners. 

Liberals and Social Democrats are now pushing for binding, coalition-style commitments among the three centrist forces to prevent the EPP from turning to the far right.

“We need to step up also our game in the center … if we don’t find compromises within files, we have to find it across files,” said René Repasi, head of the German Social Democrats in the Parliament, who was taking part in the panel debate with Aaltola. “We need to not to dilute everything in compromises, but give everybody their wins, and that is the point: You need to have this in an agreement with a binding governance structure that includes many other members than simply the leaders in order to increase ownership.”

However, Aaltola pushed back against the idea, arguing that the Parliament’s political reality is more diverse. “That’s kind of a Soviet election result type of politics, there’s always going to be diversity,” he said. “That’s what democracy is all about, and so we cannot hammer out that coalition agreement that would be millimeter tight, and no voter will buy it from us.”

Renew Europe Vice Chair Gerben-Jan Gerbrandy, who was also on the panel, argued that centrist unity is essential to tackle Ukraine, geopolitics, climate change, and the cost-of-living crisis, warning that fights over the far-right firewall are distracting from more pressing concerns for EU citizens.