100 absentee MPs hit with fines

National Assembly issues almost €100,000 in fines to MPs who do not attend commitee meetings

THE NATIONAL Assembly has fined 100 French MPs for failing to attend enough meetings, new figures have claimed.

MPs are fined €355 for each time they do not turn up to committee meetings without justification - but the full list of sanctions is not made public by the Assembly.

However, campaign group Regards Citoyens has published its annual league table based on a trawl through the Journal Officiel.

Hauts-de-Seine MP Patrick Balkany comes top of the list. Regards Citoyens says he did not attend any of the 33 meetings for committees on which he sits and was fined €4,615.

He has disputed the findings and says he was excused for four absences in May because of a spine operation.

Nord MP Michel Delebarre came next, with 30 absences and a €4,260 fine, and third place went to Saône-et-Loire MP Arnaud Montebourg, one of the candidates in the Socialist party presidential race, missing 29 meetings at a cost of €3,905.

In total, 101 out of 577 MPs were sanctioned in the past year, bringing in a total of €95,142.

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