MEPs: "SCRAP STRASBOURG - ONE SEAT IS ENOUGH"
February 19, 2005 12:00 AM
The MEPs used this week's Strasbourg session to pitch a camp and demonstrate in the snow outside the parliament building.
The 500 mile round-trip journey betwen Brussels and Strasbourg represents a huge cost to the European taxpayer. Twelve times a year, 732 MEPs with 2000 assistants and many hundreds more parliament staff take to the road. They are followed by huge lorries that carry 3500 trunks packed full of folders and papers necessary for a week's work. The costs total more than 200 million Euros per year.
Fiona Hall is a member of the Campaign for Parliamentary Reform, which is a cross-party group of MEPs committed to securing a single seat for the European Parliament. But national governments also have to be convinced, as meeting in Strasbourg is written into the EU's treaties and can only be changed by a unanimous vote of member states.
Ms. Hall commented:
"The Strasbourg buck stops with national governments. They bear ultimate responsibility for this needless cost and waste. They must find an amicable way to end the Brussels-Strasbourg circus."
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