MEPs delay budget talks

Date: 05/06/1997

By Rory Watson

SUGGESTIONS that Strasbourg should host only 11 plenary sessions of the European Parliament next year have angered French MEPs and caused unexpected delays to approval of the institution's 1998 expenditure forecasts.

French deputies fear that confirmation in the spending plans of just 11 sittings would weaken Strasbourg's status as the Parliament's official headquarters.

They also argue it runs counter to a political agreement between EU leaders that the Alsatian capital should host 12 sessions a year.

The draft 900-million-ecu budget will now be examined by Euro MPs at the end of the month after French members successfully prevented this sensitive question being discussed in Brussels last week during their country's parliamentary election campaign.

The postponement means that the issue will now only be discussed by MEPs after EU leaders meet at their two-day summit in Amsterdam on 16-17 June to complete their Intergovernmental Conference negotiations and draw up a revised treaty.

The parliamentary initiative was led by senior French Christian Democrat MEP Nicole Fontaine, who asked her group to press for discussion of the draft budget prepared by British Socialist member John Tomlinson to be postponed on the grounds that a large number of French Euro MPs were away campaigning in the country's election.

The rearguard action surprised many MEPs since Tomlinson was merely following the practice of the previous two years by recommending that the budget contain just over 10 million ecu for the 11 Strasbourg and seven Brussels sessions, while putting aside an additional sum for a possible 12th Strasbourg sitting.

Fontaine's move was supported by the European People's Party, the Union for Europe and Europe of the Nations Groups, where French members are prominently represented and, despite Socialist opposition, was narrowly carried by 130 votes to 104 with 24 abstentions.

The delay merely means that the draft budget will be discussed in its present format during the next Brussels mini-session opening on 25 June.

In the meantime, France is hoping to use the IGC to anchor in the EU treaties the political agreement reached by Union leaders in Edinburgh in December 1992.

It also intends to use the opportunity to strengthen the original wording which spoke of “12 monthly plenary sessions” and allowed additional sittings in Brussels.

The draft treaty article Paris has tabled states: “The number of plenary part-sessions held there [Strasbourg] each year may not be less than 12. Exceptionally, the European Parliament may hold additional plenary part-sessions in Brussels.”

Meanwhile, France is awaiting a ruling from the European Court of Justice on its legal fight to defend Strasbourg's position. After MEPs decided to hold just 11 sessions in the city during 1996, Paris challenged the decision before the ECJ.

Although no date has been set for a final judgement, the Court's advocate-general has delivered an opinion supporting the Parliament's action.