European Parliament

The European Parliament is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union. Its membership consists of directly elected Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), who represent constituencies in each of the countries of the EU. The number of representatives per country is roughly determined by population, but the exact numbers were negotiated in treaties.

The organisation is based in both Strasbourg, France (for official legislative procedure) and in Brussels, Belgium (for unofficial or negotiative stages). While Brussels is the main seat for most other European Union offices, European law requires that the parliament sits 12 times a year in Strasbourg, which is also the seat of the other legislative body of the Union; namely the Council of Europe. The cost of having two seats for the parliament is significantly higher than were there a single seat, with an estimated pricetag of €203million of extra travel expenses. This extra cost, due to the perceived bureaucracy of the EU, has led to large amounts of criticism for the organisation.

The European Parliament was first established in 1958; as the legislature of the (then) European Economic Community, the predecessor to the European Union. At this time, however, the representatives were not elected, instead appointed by their national governments. Even at this point, the parliament met in both Brussels and Strasbourg, and was criticised for its bureaucracy.

The responsibilities of the parliament include regulating the budget of the EU and monitoring the actions of the European Commission. The legislature's power over bugeting is not complete, however, with the much-criticised farm-subsidies under the Common Agricultural Policy (which takes up £60billion [$120billion] of the budget) being negotiated instead by ministers outside of the democratic process. Currently, 80% of the subsidies go to just 20% of farms across the EU.