We live in a new austerity world and a much more critical look must be taken of all public expenditure.  It is important that the European Parliament has regular contact with third country parliaments.  However, these contacts should be effective and cost-effective.  15 MEPs, representing the parliament’s political groups and a number of Member States, [...]

Guy Verhofstadt, president of the European Parliament (EP) Liberal Democrats and former Belgian prime minister, briefed the European Policy Centre today on his vision for Europe. In his view the main underlying issue at stake is whether the EU uses the ‘Community method’ or intergovernmentalism.  The Union will only progress if it reduces its intergovernmental [...]

The seventh session of the Informal European Parliament Dialogue on China took place at the European Parliament on 13c April and was organised by the Brussels Institute of China Contemporary Studies (BICCS).  The Dialogue was attended by some 60 MEPs, European and Chinese diplomats, think tank analysts, academics and others.  Elmar Brok MEP and Reinhard [...]

The German Constitutional Court judgment is likely to provoke parliaments in other Member States to seek ways of controlling their governments when acting in the EU Council.  Were they all to choose the Danish model, the consequences for Council negotiations would be dramatic.    There is a need anyway for national parliaments to buy in [...]

A few reflections on last week’s European Parliament Election results:   ·              The results are broadly as expected, with the centre-right clear winners, the centre-left clear losers, and the extreme right and euro-sceptics doing well.  ·              In comparing the sizes of the old groups with the current sizes of the new groups, the reduction of [...]

Commission   Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen considers that late payments by public authorities are “intolerable” and lead to SMEs going bankrupt.   How right he is.  However, the Commission is one of the worst offenders, with its cumbersome and arcane rules.  The European Ombudsman has opened a new investigation into the timeliness of payments by the [...]

The following letter has just been published in the European Voice:   The European Voice editorial ‘Next Commission president must be appointed in June’ (19-25 March) refers to “the centre-right governments , which are likely to have a majority of MEPs in the next European Parliament and therefore to appoint the next European Commission president.” [...]