The plenary session opened in Strasbourg on Monday at 17.30, a move which Parliament President Jerzy Buzek said was an obligation under the Parliament’s Rules of Procedure.
"A number of colleagues also suggested that the Plenary Session be moved from Strasbourg to Brussels but as the airports in both cities remain closed, there was no objective justification for such a last minute change," the Parliament president wrote in a letter to MEPs.
The volcanic ash cloud from Iceland apparently gave new inspiration to several MEPs to advocate for the single seat of the Parliament in Brussels. Other, more diplomatically, insisted that the French state had obligations to make the journey “feasible”, at least by the state-owned SNCF. However, SNCF workers are on a prolonged partial strike and train travel remains chaotic.
"I really don't wish to be rude or offensive to French friends and colleagues, but it would be incredibly helpful if the French government and political community in general, could carry through their championing of the obligation to have the travelling circus to Strasbourg by trying to ensure that state-owned transport operators make that journey at least possible," wrote MEP Sarah Ludford (ALDE, UK) in an e-mail to colleagues.
"Air France already dropped direct London-Strasbourg flights, which is OK since the rail option is both greener and normally feasible. But it does mean that in both usual and especially in unusual times, we are hugely dependent on state-owned SNCF," Ludford lamented.
The decision to move the vote for the May plenary session was taken to answer concerns from MEPs from the more distant EU “periphery” that decision-making would be unfair without their participation.
"With large delegations of MEPs from countries not so far from Strasbourg - 5-10 hours by car or train - the required quorum may exist even Monday afternoon. However, I insist that voting under such circumstances would be undemocratic as many will be missing for reasons they are not responsible of," MEP Renate Weber (ALDE, Romania) wrote to fellow MEPs.
"It is more than enough that many of us will not be present in the group meetings to discuss the draft resolutions of SWIFT, PNR, cyanide ban... But to proceed with the vote in our absence would be too much," Weber said.
MEPs wrote hundreds of emails to each other, and as some parliamentarians lamented, the flurry of comments on the Strasbourg session reached the level of spamming.
"If all those who participated in this MEP chat room thus far invested the same amount of creativity in getting home at the end of last week as getting back to Parliament this week, we would find almost as many colleagues as usual in Strasbourg," MEP Michael Gahler (EPP, Germany) wrote.
Today Parliament will debate the wider issues surrounding the airspace closures and their impact with Commission President José Manuel Barroso.
