Member of The European Parliament
Hannan was first elected to the European Parliament in 1999.
A year after his first election, Hannan courted controversy when he appeared to be using the Conservative Party's central office as headquarters for a campaign to persuade Danish voters to block the introduction of the European Single Currency; however, he was able to show that the campaign was actually being run from his Westminster flat.
In his first term, he served on the Committee on Fisheries and the Delegation for Relations with Afghanistan.
He was re-elected at the top of his party's list for the South East England constituency in 2004.
Hannan led the campaign to withdraw the Conservatives from the European People's Party–European Democrats (EPP–ED) group in the European Parliament and form a new anti-federalist group. Hannan welcomed David Cameron's promise during Cameron's successful 2005 leadership campaign to withdraw: even promising to leave the EPP–ED unilaterally if the party didn't.
In April 2009, he criticised an EC Directive that would end the exemption in British law for religious groups to discriminate on grounds on conscience.
In April 2008, Daniel Hannan was elected to the top position of the Conservative list for the 2009 European elections in the constituency of South East England, and in June 2009 he was re-elected to the European Parliament.
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