BRUSSELS — French MEPs were out in force at a committee meeting Wednesday to support a vote in favor of beefing up the European Parliament’s premises in Strasbourg by renting 15,000 square meters of office space from the French government.
After failing to convince the EU to buy the Osmose building outright, the French government is arranging to buy the building and then lease it to the Parliament for €700,000 per year on a 99-year contract. Acquiring the Osmose building will set the French state back €53.5 million.
Though broadly seen as a cheap deal for the EU institution, the French rental offer was loudly rejected by the Socialists and Greens groups, whose lawmakers argued the extra space is unnecessary, badly adapted to the Parliament’s needs, and an attempt to get the EU to purchase the building through the back door because under the terms of the deal, the Parliament can buy it at any time.
Latvian S&D MEP Nils Ušakovs tried unsuccessfully to kibosh the vote before it took place by arguing that the Parliament’s legal service is yet to finalize its analysis of the French contract. An EU official from the Parliament’s legal service confirmed this is the case during the meeting.
“I don’t believe we need this building and I don’t think it’s the right priority,” German Green MEP Rasmus Andresen said before the vote was held.
Though the vote had promised to be a close-run affair, 26 MEPs voted in favor, just 11 MEPs voted against and three abstained, teeing the Parliament up to sign the French contract.
The center-right EPP and French-dominated liberal Renew group were strongly in favor of the deal.
The total cost of the lease to the Parliament, including all sorts of upkeep, energy and security costs, will be €1,910,000 per year from 2025 onward, Renew’s Belgian rapporteur Oliver Chastel said. “This building is huge. It can house 700 people, it’s got a lot of office space,” he said, adding that over 70 percent of its heating will come from renewables.
Of the 26 MEPs who voted in favor, nine were French and seven of them are not even full members of the budget committee, having been drafted in at the last minute. David Cormand, a French Green, and Pascal Durand, a French Socialist, broke ranks with their groups to back the deal. French Renew MEP Fabienne Keller, who voted in favor, is a former mayor of Strasbourg.
The only French MEP not to vote in favor was the S&D’s Pierre Larrouturou, who told POLITICO: “Given the budgetary constraints that are weighing on us I don’t think that renting or acquiring a new building is a priority.”