Fury over cancelled plenary

Date: 18/07/1996

By Rory Watson

THE European Parliament issued its second challenge to the French government in a year this week when it narrowly voted to cancel one of the dozen plenary sessions earmarked for Strasbourg in 1997.

In an ill-tempered vote which later turned to farce, MEPs decided by just one vote to delete one of the two October sessions from next year's calendar.

As recriminations flowed, maverick French MEP James Goldsmith entered the chamber after the vote. His rare appearance in Strasbourg prompted British Conservative MEP Edward McMillan-Scott to issue an ironic welcome to the leader of the Europe of Nations Group and to suggest that if Goldsmith had arrived 30 minutes earlier, he could have swung the result in France's favour.

France is already involved in a lengthy legal battle with the Parliament in the European Court of Justice (ECJ) after MEPs decided last October to hold only 11 meetings in the Alsatian capital this year.

That move infuriated Paris. It argued that the decision broke the agreement reached at the Edinburgh European summit in December 1992 that “the European Parliament shall have its seat in Strasbourg where the twelve periods of monthly plenary sessions, including the budget session, shall be held”.

Explaining his government's hurried recourse to the ECJ, French European Affairs Minister Michel Barnier stressed then that it wanted confirmation from the EU judges “of Strasbourg's unassailable position as a seat of the Parliament”.

After yesterday's vote, MEPs will now meet 11 times in Strasbourg next year and hold seven two-day sessions in Brussels - one fewer than this year.

Despite the 1992 agreement, the Parliament has hardly ever managed to hold 12 plenary sessions in Strasbourg. It does not meet in August and there has been less need in recent years for the second session in October, originally set aside for consideration of the Union's annual budget.

There were only 11 sessions in 1993 and just ten the following year when the June meeting was cancelled because of the European elections.

While French, Spanish and some German MEPs yesterday strongly defended Strasbourg's claim to a dozen sessions, other nationalities voted to reduce the number.

For some, the thought of having to travel to Strasbourg twice in one month alongside all their other meetings was too much to contemplate. Others considered that Brussels was a more practical place to do business and argued that the Parliament should be able to determine its own internal procedures.

“This is an important signal to France and to the European Court of Justice. If we are not sovereign in this, in what are we sovereign?” asked McMillan-Scott, a strong supporter of Brussels' claims.

But the Alsatian capital was saved from another blow when MEPs failed to support moves led by Liberals and Socialists to end Strasbourg plenary sessions on Thursdays instead of Fridays in future.

The initiative was tabled after increasing complaints over the high levels of absenteeism recorded on Fridays. The issue came to a head in March, when a surprise call for a quorum revealed that fewer than the necessary one third of the 626 MEPs were present in the chamber to vote on a resolution on the transport of radioactive waste.

A similar attempt last year to end the practice of conducting Strasbourg plenary business on Fridays was also defeated.

But the vote provided British Labour MEP Terry Wynn with the opportunity to compare MEPs' support for the Friday meetings with their actual presence.

“When we voted on a Wednesday last year, 298 members voted to keep Fridays. But two days later, only 143 MEPs turned up. By 9.10am, only 56 were voting and by 10am, their numbers had fallen to 35. This year 332 voted to keep Fridays and we will be conducting a similar exercise,” he said.