MEPs count cost of a common salary

Date: 15/10/1998

By Rory Watson

ALL MEPs newly elected to the European Parliament next year would receive the same annual salary under plans being examined by the institution's legal affairs committee.

The figure currently being considered is a gross amount of some 5,700 ecu per month, the weighted average of the total gross payments currently made to all the Parliament's 626 members. This would be paid from the EU budget and would be subject to Union, rather than national, tax.

The figure is considerably higher than the salaries currently earned by many sitting MEPs, who are paid by their own governments at the same rate as their counterparts in the national parliament. But it is well below the amount received by Italian, Austrian and German deputies.

The scheme is being put forward by German Socialist MEP Willi Rothley as a way to break the deadlock over Euro MPs' salaries and professional allowances. He wants the idea of a common salary paid out of the EU budget for all MEPs to be included in the draft parliamentary statute he is now drawing up.

To make this is as palatable as possible both for governments and for those like the Italians who could end up worse off, Rothley is likely to recommend introducing the new system in two stages.

The common salary would apply to all new MEPs and to those re-elected next June who chose to move from the national to European rate. During the five-year life of the next parliament, an independent body would be invited to determine a fair rate of pay for Euro MPs, with the aim of all members being paid the same amount from 2004.

There are advantages and disadvantages in this two-stage approach. Governments would gain financially by no longer having to pay their MEPs' salaries, but would find it difficult to explain to their own national deputies why, in the majority of cases, they should earn less than their European counterparts.

Most MEPs would benefit, although the prospect of two different rates of pay within the same national delegation is likely to go down badly with new members from those countries with more generous wage levels.

Although the salary is the most contentious element of the proposed new statute, which would have to be approved by EU governments before coming into force, it is by no means the only ingredient.

Rothley's draft will contain a number of basic principles such as MEPs' rights to independence, immunity and refusal to give evidence in certain circumstances, and set out their entitlement to material help in carrying out their duties.

The German MEP is also laying emphasis on the need for transparency in members' financial dealings and is considering setting out in a detailed annexe the salaries of members, committee chairmen and women, vice-presidents and presidents as well as clear rules on allowances.

It is even being suggested that any outside income earned by MEPs from either the private or public sector could be taken into account when determining how much they should receive from the parliamentary purse.

A new sense of urgency is being injected into the work on the statute by Parliament President José María Gil-Robles, who is keen for MEPs to adopt a draft proposal in time for him to be able to present it to EU leaders at their Vienna summit in December.

To meet that deadline, the way has been cleared for the legal affairs committee to hold extra meetings over the next few weeks so that it can complete its draft by mid-November and this can be adopted by the full Parliament at its Brussels mini-plenary session on 2 December.

But MEPs will first have to decide what route to take in reforming the way their travel allowances are paid. While some argue this should form part of the statute, which cannot be finalised before next May at the earliest, others maintain the rules should be changed as soon as possible.

If a working group of vice-presidents under Gil-Robles cannot agree on reforms by next Monday (19 October), then this contentious problem will, in all probability, be decided by parliamentary back-benchers when they vote on the 1999 EU budget three days later.