Sir Julian Priestley was Secretary-General of the European Parliament from 1997-2007, having been an official there since the 1970s. In this book he looks at a series of key battles - all of which he witnessed at first hand - that contributed to the development of the Parliament's powers and influence. The battles selected show Parliament engaged in a struggle not only to expand its formal institutional powers, in areas such as the budget, legislation and appointment, but also to command respect and recognition from the other European institutions. The author vividly demonstrates the complex interplay between politics and personalities in the Parliament and how internal political divisions at times proved a critical factor in determining outcomes. This book complements the Publishers' textbook on the Parliament's powers and procedures, "The European Parliament", by Richard Corbett MEP, Francis Jacobs and Michael Shackleton (7th edition, 2007).