Affirmative action in favour of minorities is provided in the Italian law on the election of the Italian representatives to the European Parliament. A list of candidates proposed by parties or political groups of the French-speaking minority of Valle d’Aosta, of the Germanspeaking minority of the Bolzano province and of the Slovenian-speaking minority of FriuliVenezia-Giulia is allowed to join another list of candidates of the same constituency with the purpose of sharing the distribution of seats assigned to this second list. Every voter has the right to express three individual preferences – including one for a candidate of the minority list. After the allocation of the seats to the lists, the candidates of a list or of joined lists are elected according to their number of preferences. However, when no candidate of the minority list is elected, the one with most preferences is proclaimed elected instead of a candidate of the other list if he or she obtains at least 50000 preferences.