The next European Commission led by Jean-Claude Juncker is set to be confirmed by the European Parliament on Wednesday.<br /><br />The vote by MEPs will take place in Strasbourg after the last two candidates completed their parliamentary hearings.<br /><br />Slovenia’s Violeta Bulc and Slovakia’s Maros Sefcovic join the rest of Juncker’s nominees.<br /><br />A last-minute reshuffle was needed after the resignation of former Slovenian prime minister Alenka Bratusek.<br /><br />It comes after Jose Manuel Barroso gave his last speech to MEPs as Commission president.<br /><br />But it was far from a full house as he lauded the EU’s response to the the eurozone crisis.<br /><br />“We were in fact very close to default, i mean with a less polite word: to the bankruptcy of some of our member states. And look where we are now: Portugal and Ireland exited the program, successfully. Ireland is now one of the fastest-growing countries in Europe.”<br /><br />The former Portuguese prime minister, who took his country into the US-led Iraq War, is set to stand down at the end of October.<br /><br />The Juncker commission opens a new chapter and closes another, our correspondent Margherita Sforza says.<br /><br />She adds that after 10 years in the job, José Manuel Barroso leaves a controversial legacy.<br /><br />To his centre-right allies, he was a solid custodian of the EU executive during a time of crisis.<br /><br />But left-wing parliamentarians say he was too ‘pro-free-market’ and didn’t do enough to protect Europe’s so-called ‘social model’.
