Talks planned after MEPs reject statute

Date: 06/05/1999

By Gareth Harding

MEPS have put themselves on a collision course with EU governments by rejecting all the changes made to their proposed common statute by the Council of Ministers.

Representatives of the European Parliament and the Council will now attempt to thrash out a compromise before the June Euro-elections.

But given the problems that EU governments had in arriving at the compromise deal put to MEPs this week, officials from both sides said they doubted a deal could be struck quickly.

The Parliament will also be hindered by the fact that it is deeply split on the issue, with Socialists and Christian Democrats following the hardline stance adopted by the assembly's legal affairs committee last week whilst Greens, Liberals and dissident Socialists voted to accept most of the changes called for by the Council.

The resolution adopted by the Parliament yesterday (5 May), at its last plenary session before the elections, attacked the Council for breaching MEPs' treaty powers by rewriting the statute and noted that there were "fundamental differences of opinion" between the two bodies over the rules to govern members' pay and expenses.

In particular, MEPs were angry that governments had raised the age at which they could collect their pensions from 60 to 65, that they would be required to produce receipts for all office expenses and that member states would be able to levy a top-up tax to ensure Euro-deputies do not pay less than their national counterparts.

Both sides agree that members should be paid the same across the Union and that travel expenses should be properly accounted for. But rather than chip away at the Council's text, the assembly opted to reject all the proposed changes and retable the draft statute it drew up last December.