” “"Keeping the 2008 budget on the same level as the 2007 budget", limiting expenses and avoiding waste, improving services "to encourage the legal activity of MPs", accomplishing "a more consistent communication, approaching citizens, above all, through the regional and local media": the European Parliament started meditating on the community budget long ago, until it adopted the report of Finnish MP Ville Itälä during the plenary session in Brussels ending yesterday. In that text, it is written that "the budget of institutions went up by about 18% in the last four years". It should remain unchanged in the next year, according to Members of Parliament’s hopes, "since no important events are scheduled, such as extensions or adoption of new official languages, which would justify an increase". The Hemicycle contests the "geographic dispersion" of the Parliament (which relies on three headquarters: Strasbourg, Brussels and Luxembourg), as well as "the implied supplementary costs, in terms of current expenses". Just in 2005, the staff missions in the three places of work cost 12.8 million euros. Furthermore, the report invites to encourage the visits of groups of citizens to the headquarters of the European Parliament.” “
