Brussels, 01/10/2004 (Agence Europe) - Opening the work of the plenary session of the Committee of the Regions (CoR) on 29 September in Brussels, President Peter Straub announced that the next plenary session of the CoR, to be held in Brussels on 17 and 18 November, will be a celebratory plenary session for the CoR's tenth anniversary. On this occasion, it will welcome as speakers the former President of the European Commission, Jacques Delors, and the future Commission President, José Manuel Barroso, as well as the Presidents of the Council and of the European Parliament. Mr Straub also announced that, on 19 and 20 May 2005 in Wroclaw (Poland), a summit of towns and regions will be held, at which the CoR plans to highlight the role played by regions and towns in the new Europe and to bear witness to the successful process of decentralisation in the various Member States.
Peter Straub then put to the vote the seating arrangements for local and regional representatives in plenary. The choice was among repartition by alphabetical order, as at present, or by political groups, as at the European Parliament. With 111 votes in favour and 65 against, the elected members voted for repartition of their seats in plenary according to the EP system, with a majority following the Committee's vice-president, Albert Bore of Britain, who felt it necessary to give the assembly a political hue. "When we defend political projects, we defend our regions", Spanish national Pedro Sanz Alonso (EPP-ED) insisted, pointing out that members should not forget they are political decision-makers and must therefore sit as political groups
Others, on the other hand, would like to keep the current system in place. The CoR is a "territorial chamber", the Basque elected member Jose Maria Munoa Ganuza (UEN-EA) said. Others, like Seamus Murray of Ireland (UEN-EA), remarked on the practical difficulties of seating according to political group, as some regions' "alternates represented different parties".