Follow the money

There has been another robbery in the European Parliament, the third in recent times. The robbers are not after ideas – the Parliament has only one: further integration while paying themselves as much as possible – but cash.


I am reminded of the American bank robber Willie Sutton, who, when asked why he robbed banks, is supposed to have replied: ‘that’s where the money is’.

The way to do it.

Congratulations to the people of Slovakia who, according to Agence France Presse, have instituted a system whereby MPs are paid less according to the size of the budget deficit, at a rate of double the deficit percentage. So the current proposed deficit of 7.8% would see their pay reduce by 15.6%.

An ideal system for the European Parliament.

Ghost MEPs: pay, pay, pay

The interesting tale reaches us of the Ghost Members of the European Parliament. The Lisbon Treaty provided for more MEPs (can't have enough, can you?) as from 2014. Spain will get four new seats; Austria, France and Sweden will get two more; Bulgaria, Italy, Latvia, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia and the UK one more each. Germany will lose three.

As from 2014.

But hear this: the new ones can come in immediately, unable to vote but collecting their salaries, attendance allowances, travel perks etc whilst the outgoing three stay on too, so as not to upset their pensions.

Not a bad job, all that money and no resposibilities. You could carry on, zooming round Europe on Business class flights, collecting four years of a decent salary, probably half a million over the period, doing no work, then decide not to stand come the 2014 elections. Yes please!

And France has fiddled the rules so that their two aren't elected by universal suffrage, as is required in the Treaty. In fact not elected at all, just mates of M. le President. Merci, monsieur.

I am sorry to bang on about it but this is just another example of the political class running things and feathering their own nests at our expense. We want less of this, not more.

European Parliament: Babel

Splendid scenes in the European Parliament as Enzo Rivellini, an MEP from Southern Italy, addressed the chamber in the Neapolitan dialect. This completely floored the translation team, who were unable to do their job and even Italian members were left scratching their heads.

Unfortunately we shall never know what he said.