The first victim of EP reform

The uphill struggle to reform the European Parliament has claimed its first victim. Graham Watson, leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe group, has stepped down from membership of the Parliamentary reform group that is chaired by German Socialist MEP Dagmar Roth-Behrendt. Watson was frustrated that one of his pet projects, holding eight extra plenary sessions in Brussels a year, was rejected after a rearguard action by French members of the centre-right EPP-ED and their allies. They wanted to head off what they saw as creeping efforts to move the Parliament out of Strasbourg to rest exclusively in Brussels. Watson was one of only two group leaders on the reform group, along with Greens/EFA president Monica Frassoni. He will be replaced by Silvana Koch-Mehrin, a vice-president of the ALDE group and leader of the German Liberal MEPs.