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Thursday 19 January 2012

Lib Dem MEP resigns

Lib Dem MEP Diana Wallis for Yorkshire has announced she's standing down from the European parliament for "personal reasons". Many people are seeing it as sour grapes after she failed to be elected to the presidency of the Parliament. 


Mrs Davies is now likely to be replaced by her husband, who was second on the list for the Lib Dems at the last European elections. Mrs Wallis will formally announce her decision on Friday but the news about her resignation was given to parliament's new president Martin Schulz yesterday.


Leading the criticism of Wallis was her party colleague Chris Davies, who was among those who nominated her for the presidency. Saying "I am appalled and feel betrayed by her decision. To stand for election for the presidency one day and then resign the following day is quite unbelievable" he has also said "There will be some people who will regard this as quite unprincipled." 


On the fact Mr Wallis is likely to succeed his wife Mr Davies said "He is not guaranteed to succeed her but it is likely to do so. The problem is that this will leave a very bad taste in the mouths of a lot of people. "It will serve to reinforce the 'gravy train' or 'jobs for the boys' image many people have of MEPs."


There has been some support for Mrs Wallis. Sarah Ludford, another UK Liberal MEP, who said, "She will be a loss to parliament because she did a lot of good work on transparency and the statute. "I did not expect her to do any better in the presidency election and I think her vote was respectable, especially as she was not the official ALDE candidate."

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