Parliament votes for more staff and more money
MEPs vote to increase their staff allowances, pleading a heavier workload under the new treaty.
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The European Parliament’s budgets committee voted yesterday (27 January) to increase MEPs’ monthly allowances for assistants by €1,500 and to hire 150 extra staff to deal with the extra workload created by the Lisbon treaty.
The majority of MEPs on the committee voted to support the proposals from the Parliament’s leadership – the president and vice-presidents – at a cost of €13.3 million this year. But they could not agree on where to make compensatory savings in other areas of the Parliament’s spending. The increase will mean that the Parliament will exceed the ceiling of 20% of the EU’s total administrative budget in 2010, with its share increasing to 20.2% even with savings made elsewhere. This year, the Parliament’s budget will be €1.6 billion.
Extra powers
MEPs from the biggest political groups argue that the extra funds are needed to help them deal with the new powers they have gained with the entry into force of the Lisbon treaty, especially the need to hire expert staff to advise them on technical areas.
Klaus Welle, the Parliament’s secretary-general, defended the proposed increase when appearing before MEPs on the budgetary control committee on Tuesday (26 January). “With Lisbon, the Parliament has to ask where it concentrates its resources. We have to use our powers of scrutiny and control, but we’re not as well equipped as we should be. We need to concentrate our resources on legislative activity,” he said.
The €1,500 increase in allowances for assistants was opposed in the committee by MEPs from the far-left European United Left (EUL) group, the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group and the Eurosceptic Europe of Freedom and Democracy. Miguel Portas, a Portuguese EUL MEP, called increasing the allowance by €1,500 “absurd”. But he added that MEPs “need more staff”. Lajos Bokros, a Hungarian member of the ECR, said they could not defend increasing the allowance by €1,500 at this point.
The committee agreed to negotiate with the Parliament’s leadership over where to make savings and will hold another meeting on 8 February to agree the revised budget for 2010 before a vote in plenary on 10 February. One Parliament source said that MEPs wanted the increase for staffing agreed so that they could start hiring in May.
But privately some MEPs warn that agreeing to the increase now could put the Parliament in a difficult situation in negotiations with the Council over budget changes to deal with the effects of the Lisbon treaty. If the Parliament votes itself a new budget that exceeds the 20% ceiling, the Council would in turn find it easier to call for substantial increases in its own budget.
They complain that the Council has already increased its administrative budget for 2010 to pay for the new president of the European Council and his staff.
The new European Commission will, when it takes office, have to propose amendments to the EU’s 2010 budget, to take into account the effects of the Lisbon treaty.