"We burn for our cause"

What was that saying again? If you've got a grandad, send him to Europe. For decades, this or similar jokes were made about the fact that the European Parliament was mainly made up of MEPs who had long since passed the zenith of their political careers. In this context, it is worth recalling a statement by former CSV minister Erna Hennicot-Schoepges, who once complained at a press conference a long, long time ago that her party had deported her. "Ech sin am Europaparlament, net well de Wieler dat wollen esou hun, mee well meng Partei gemengt huet, ech wier ze al, fir an der Regierung ze bleiwen, an elo sin ech di jengst vun der CSV-Fraktioun" ("I am in the European Parliament, not because that's what the voters wanted, but because my party thought I was too old to stay in government and now I'm the youngest of the CSV group"), said the feisty former CSV president and ex-minister.

Well, times have changed. If you look at the lists of the parties running on 9 June, you will find very few grandpas – and not a single grandma. In the case of the Greens, who we are the first to visit as part of our new series in the run-up to the European elections, only François Bausch would qualify as a grandad in terms of age, but not even we would dare to call a thoroughbred politician like Bausch a grandad.

However, the Green European list is not led by long-serving minister Bausch, but by the top candidate duo Tilly Metz and Fabricio Costa, with Metz currently representing her party in the European Parliament, while Fabricio Costa is a parliamentary assistant for the déi gréng. They will also be joined by co-party president and former MEP Djuna Bernard, former MEP Chantal Gary and the former president of the Centre pour l'égalité de traitement, Patrick Hurst.