Parliaments in renewed EU - EP and NP: competitors or allies?

The European labyrinth of inter-parliamentary relations among institutions and bodies at EU, national and international level has been increasing complex in terms of relations and influence on policy making at whatever level. If there is consensus about the idea that democracy requires parliament to play a major role, however emerges a dissensus about the proper place for parliamentary control at the national or European level (Wessels and Katz 1999: 4). The PN have been involved into European policy making through treaties'' amendments and reforms, through stronger coordination among institutions and timely information from the European institutions. Since the late eighties and with the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, NP have consolidated their role. During the nineties a set of proposals have been discussed and in particular have found in the European Convention the arena to confront different options: Chamber of NP, more control power at EU level to NP, completely NP alienation from EU policy making system. After the entry to force of Lisbon Treaty and in general in the last decade, inter-parliamentary relations between PE and PN acquire a new empirical relevance on the changing relationship between representative institutions and potentially the effectiveness of policy making at EU level, drawing a control role for the national chambers. What does kind of relationship exist between the parliamentary institutions of the EU system?Are EP and NP allies to including elements of democracy into the system or rather competitors to hold a predominant role in the name of an assumed primacy of the representative nature of each? This paper focus on the evolution of NP role in the EU system and in particular on the EP perception of the relations among parliamentary institutions