Italy's new MPs grope round the corridors of power

ROME (Reuter): Italy's parliament took on the air of the first day of school yesterday as hundreds of new and mostly younger members felt their way around the corridors of power once occupied by a disgraced old guard.

"You'll find the best place for a good signal for your mobile phone is that corner over there," one veteran told a freshman in the 630-member Chamber of Deputies on the first day of Italy's 12th legislature.

Learning where cellular telephones work best, where the bathrooms are, and the quickest route to the coffee bar were among the routine tasks the 452 novices had to tackle before they got down to the business of politics.

Most of the new members of the chamber belong to the center- right "Freedom Alliance" which media mogul Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia (Go Italy) movement forged with neo-fascists and Northern League federalists.

They replace a generation of politicians banished to oblivion by a two-year corruption scandal.

One-fifth of the members of the outgoing parliament are under investigation for corruption and Mafia links and 26 of them risk being arrested after losing parliamentary immunity.

"Finally there are some fresh faces in here," said Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of the wartime fascist dictator, who began her second term as a neo-fascist deputy.

But the ghosts of the political dinosaurs who held court in the same smoke-filled foyer outside the chamber floor appeared to be the last thing on the minds of the confused novices.

First, the members of the legislature expected to lead Italy to a "Second Republic" had to deal with practical matters -- like signing up for magnetic cards to vote electronically.

"It's very natural to be confused in here," said Carole Beebe Tarantelli, a leftist first elected in 1987. "The building is very old and is like a labyrinth. I remember I took an awfully long time to find my way around."

She was interrupted -- "Do you know how to get to the committee meeting room without waiting for the elevator?" asked new deputy Pino Arlacchi, a sociologist and Mafia expert.

She led him up an august marble stairway in the 17th century palace built on the site where ancient Romans cremated their dead, but the meeting was over by the time they got there.

"Excuse me if I don't recognize you, Your Honor, but what is your name," a reporter timidly asked a new member, addressing him with the title "Onorevole" (Your Honor).

"No problem. I don't know your name either," said Giuseppe Rossetto, a newcomer for the Northern League.