Democratic and Republican Left
The Democratic and Republican Left (French: Gauche démocrate et républicaine, GDR) is a French parliamentary group in the 13th Assembly elected in 2007.
This is the first time since the 1958-1962 legislature that the Communists have been unable to form an exclusive group of Communist deputies.
Such a group requires 20 deputies. The Communists have demanded that the threshold be lowered from 20 to 15 deputies to form a parliamentary group. The threshold had already been lowered in 1988 from 30 to 20.
A similar group of leftist parties had been created in 1997, the Radical-Citizen-Green group composed of Left Radicals, MDC, and Green deputies.
Members and Leadership
It gathered 15 Communists and 4 affiliated Communists and PCF dissidents, 4 Greens, 2 Left Party members, and 1 Martinican separatist.
Today it has a total of 25 members, making it the third largest parliamentary group in this Assembly behind the UMP and Socialist-Radical-and Citizen group.
The leadership of this group should be rotating every 20 months, the current leader is the Communist Jean-Claude Sandrier.
In November 2008, former PS deputy Marc Dolez joined the group. Dolez is a founding member of the Left Party.