To recall, the Lisbon Treaty provides that the European Parliament shall be composed by 750 MEPs, plus the President, and that “No Member State shall be allocated more than ninety-six seats.” The European Elections took place in June 2009, before the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, consequently the Nice rules have applied and 736 MEPs were elected. The European Council, in December 2008, agreed, in the event of the Lisbon Treaty entering into force after the June 2009 European Elections, that the number of MEPs should rise 736 to 754 until the end of the 2009-2014 legislative period and that transitional measures shall be adopted to that effect. The European Council decide in June 2009, on the allocation of the 18 seats to be added to the 736 seats among 12 Member States: Bulgaria 1, Netherlands 1, Spain 4, Austria 2, France 2, Poland 1, Italy 1, Slovenia 1, Latvia 1, Sweden 2, Malta 1, and the UK 1.
On 1 December the Lisbon Treaty entered into force allowing 751 MEPs. Whereas there would be 18 additional seats to 12 member states, Germany loses 3 seats, hence Germany would have 96 instead of 99 MEPs. The new 18 MEPs and allowing the 3 German MEPs to continue their mandate till the end of the current legislature, would, as mentioned above, raise the number of MEPs from 751 to 754. Consequently, an amendment to the Lisbon Treaty is required to allow number of MEPs to increase until the end of this legislature.
Spain which presently holds the EU’s presidency and is entitled to 4 additional MEPs, last December, under article 48 TEU, presented to the Council a proposal for the amendment of the Treaties. The proposal amends the Protocol (No 36) on Transitional Provisions, concerning the composition of the European Parliament. The Council agreed that new “transitional provisions on the composition of the European Parliament until the end of the 2009-2014 parliamentary term” are necessary in order to “allow those Member States whose number of Members of the European Parliament would have been higher if the Treaty of Lisbon had been in force at the time of the European elections in June 2009 to be given the appropriate number of additional seats and to fill them.” They have, therefore, agreed that the 18 seats will be added to the 736 existing seats, allowing, in this way, the number of MEPs to exceed the maximum number of Members provided for in the Lisbon Treaty.
The Council submitted the proposal to the European Council which has decided to proceed with it. Hence, it has informed the European Parliament and the Commission of the proposed treaty amendment. It is important to mention that under article 48 (3) the European Council may decide by a simple majority, after obtaining the consent of the European Parliament, not to convene a Convention. The European Parliament’s Constitutional Affairs Committee has recently endorsed the Council’s proposal to amend the Lisbon Treaty allowing the European Parliament to be composed of 754 MEPs for this parliamentary term. Moreover, the Committee agreed that a convention is not necessary to discuss the treaty amendment as an Intergovernmental Conference would be sufficient. The European Parliament is likely to endorse the Committee’s recommendations in May. The European Council will have to decide, after consulting the European Parliament and the Commission, by a simple majority a decision in favour of examining the proposed amendments. An IGC will be therefore convened to revise the Lisbon Treaty. The Spanish EU presidency is keen to start negotiations before the end of its presidency in June. Obviously, such amendments would only enter into force after being ratified by all the member states in accordance with their respective constitutional rules.
However, the European Parliament has agreed to grant observer status to the 18 MEPs till the Lisbon Treaty amendment is ratified and entry into force. Consequently, those MEPs would not have full MEP rights, basically, they have no right to vote in committee meetings or plenary sessions. Nevertheless, as reported by the European Parliament’s magazine they “will be entitled to annual salaries, plus tax-free allowances for every day of their time "in limbo" in Brussels” and they will be able to “claim back business class travel and staff and office allowances.” Moreover, it has been estimated that the virtual MEPs would cost taxpayers around €30m. This is another Brussels’ ludicrous waste of money.
In the meantime, the 12 Member States have to designate their future MEPs. All Member States but France have decided before the European elections on what basis their new seats would be allocated. France is planning to nominate the 2 MEPs from the 'Assemblée Nationale', however this breaches the Treaty rules whereby MEPs are elected by direct universal suffrage.
