The leader of the EU Parliament's the Liberal Group, which has a pivotal swing vote, has said tonight that the incoming EU Commission president would probably lose a vote to confirm his team tomorrow.
Graham Watson was speaking to reporters after a meeting with President designate Jose Manuel Barroso.
The parliament will vote tomorrow on whether or not to accept the whole 25-member Barroso commission.
The new team has been dogged by controversy because of comments by the nominee for justice commissioner, Rocco Buttiglione, on homosexuality and marriage.
Mr Watson said he would personally vote for Mr Barroso, but his group would reject the new commission by a two-to-one majority.
An informal poll of 78 of the 88-strong Liberal group showed that 50 planned to vote against Mr Barroso's team while 23 would vote for it, with five abstaining.
One of the Strasbourg parliament's largest groupings, the socialists, earlier said it will vote to reject the commission to prevent Mr Buttiglione from taking up his post.
Earlier today, Mr Barroso made concessions in a bid to prevent the rejection of the new commission.
He promised to create an EU fundamental rights agency to fight all forms of discrimination and to offer new EU-wide legislation outlawing discrimination on grounds of gender or sexual orientation.
However, he continued to reject calls to drop his nomination of Mr Buttiglione.
