AN EAST Lancashire Euro-MP is calling on Tony Blair to take over his parliament -- or at least one of them!

Chris Davies wants an end to the monthly movement of the European Parliament between Brussels and the French city of Strasbourg.

He says the second parliament building is used by MEPs for only four days each month and stands empty for more than 300 days each year.

It costs European taxpayers £100 million each year to pay for the building and to move around 3,000 staff and officials each month.

But Euro-MPs have no power to end what he describes as 'the travelling circus' because the arrangements for the parliament to meet in Strasbourg 12 times a year were made by former prime minister John Major and ratified by the British Parliament.

Mr Davies said: "Euro-MPs now have more influence over the making of many laws than backbench domestic MPs at Westminster and the powers of the European Parliament are growing all the time.

"Yet the despite the fact that a huge majority of MEPs want to change the ridiculous travel arrangements, we are forced to continue because the Prime Minister has not pushed for change.

"It is ridiculous that taxpayers' money should be wasted by having two separate places to meet when we have a perfectly good parliament building in Brussels at the heart of the European institutions."

The Euro-MP says that a possible compromise to compensate French dignity would be to use the Strasbourg building to host the meetings of European prime ministers that take place every three months.