Angel, who declined to divulge the location or name of the hotel, nor the MEP affected, told POLITICO he raised the case as an example to showcase “the need to establish a procedure for handling hygiene-related issues that may arise during official missions involving Members or colleagues.”
Such a procedure would allow hygiene complaints to be swiftly flagged to Parliament’s travel agency and could lead to problematic hotels being removed from the accommodation options offered to lawmakers.
The hotel was in Strasbourg, where lawmakers, assistants, officials, lobbyists and journalists converge each month for the European Parliament’s plenary session, according to two people briefed on the matter, granted anonymity to discuss the sensitive incident. One of the people said the hotel was not included on the travel agency’s recommended list.
The episode is not the first time Strasbourg accommodation has landed Parliament in uncomfortable territory. In 2021, then-Parliament President David Sassoli was hospitalized with pneumonia after contracting Legionnaires’ disease around the time of a stay in a Strasbourg hotel. Sassoli died the following January.
The latest incident marks another unwelcome footnote to the long-running debate over Parliament’s monthly migration between Brussels and Strasbourg. The arrangement, enshrined in EU treaties, has for years drawn criticism from lawmakers who argue it is costly, cumbersome and environmentally wasteful. The EU’s auditors estimated in 2014 that maintaining Parliament’s second seat costs taxpayers €114 million annually.
“Parliament expects accommodation used for official missions to meet appropriate standards of quality, safety and hygiene,” said a Parliament spokesperson, granted anonymity in line with the institution’s rules.
“When a complaint is received, it is assessed by the competent services and, where necessary, raised with the travel provider and the hotel concerned to prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future,” they added.