MEP expenses overhaul set for collapse

A deal to reform the European Parliament’s pay and perks regime looks set to collapse on Monday.

A decision by the Irish EU presidency to enforce unanimity voting rules on a proposed overhaul of the MEP pay and expenses system is expected to prompt a German veto.

The failure of EU foreign ministers to push through the proposal would scupper any chances of reforming the current and much-criticised system before the June European elections.

And it may even blow the result of years of hard-fought negotiations completely out of the water.

Irish ambassador Anne Anderson admitted on Friday that “if we don’t sort this out now then the opportunity will have escaped us for quite some time to come.”

Over the last few weeks, Berlin has strongly protested against the deal thrashed out in December by MEPs to introduce a common salary along with expenses reimbursed at cost value.

Austria, Sweden and France have now also stated their objections to the plan, which they believe will be difficult to sell to voters.

Most other member states, while conceding that the proposed reforms are not ideal, are willing to support the plan.

But Berlin, which is currently pushing through harsh domestic social reforms, has protested that the cost hike incurred by paying MEPs more would be unjustifiable to German taxpayers in the run-up to the June European elections.

MEPs this week made a last-minute attempt to salvage the package by proposing to drop the article on taxation which would remove the requirement for a unanimous vote.

In this case, the package would automatically revert back to a compromise forged under the Belgian EU presidency which would tax MEPs at a national rate.

But despite being the closest since the 1960s to clinching a deal, the Irish have insisted that the question of taxation is an “integral part” of the package and that unanimity must come into play.

An Irish spokesman said the presidency was relying on advice from the Council’s legal services, admitting that the package was now at Berlin’s mercy.

“It’s up to the Germans to change their minds,” he said.

The new deal to be voted on Monday would give many MEPs a generous pay rise to €8,600 per month but it would be combined with an expenses system based on actual costs and backed up by receipts.

The existing expenses regime, often criticised for being untransparent and open to abuse, was originally conceived to close the huge gap in salaries between MEPs from different countries.

Currently MEPs earn the same as their national parliamentarians, awarding the highest paid Italian members with almost €12,000 per month, four times the wage of their Spanish counterparts.

With the enlargement of the EU to 25 members, the divergence of salaries would reach new extremes, with Hungarian MEPs walking away with just €800 per month.

Berlin has protested that the funding of the regime lacks clarity, arguing that it could cost German taxpayers an additional  €82 – 100 million annually.

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