Archive for March, 2009

The cowardly EU

Posted by Bruno Waterfield in Economic crisis, EU on March 23, 2009

I am back from my holidays and a blogging hiatus to find that  EU finds it easier to rally behind a mindless G20 Obama love-in on fiscal and bank bailouts than it is to hold a summit on preserving jobs.

EU heads of state and government have decided to run away from cancel a Prague meeting, originally scheduled for May 7, which aimed to bring together national leaders with businesses and trade unions.

Only last week, the European Commission President José Manuel Barroso was insisting that it would be a “fundamental error” not to hold the summit.

“Our public opinion would not understand, it would be unacceptable that EU leaders meet at the highest level and that they discuss the problems of the banks and not social problems. That they discuss the problems of the financial sector and not that of employment. That would be really unacceptable,” he said on Mar 18.

Oh well.

Nicolas Sarkozy was the first to beat the retreat at an EU summit last Thurs night as back home over a million French citizens took to the streets in demonstrations against his administration, the most unpopular in over 50 years of the French Fifth Republic.

The French President was insistent that he would rather not face the music at a summit that was bound to become a Mayday focus for international protests and growing social discontent.

“Mr Sarkozy was most emphatic that he did not wish to provide French people or trade unions with another opportunity to protest,” said one official close to talks.

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Update: Over on main EUobserver news, Honor Mahony quotes a Czech official, who says: “A number of countries felt it would raise too optimistic expectations before the European elections.”

Is it unreasonable to expect EU leaders to do something about unemployment?

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More hypocrisy in the European Parliament

Posted by Bruno Waterfield in European elections, Secrecy on March 11, 2009

Euro-MPs have commendably voted for new rules making it easier to get legislation related European Union documents into public view.

But, inevitably, sadly, predictably and hypocritically the same MEPs have decided that the same openness should not apply to how they spend their expenses.

This is a great pity as the proposals, drafted by Michael Cashman, are a major improvement on the current secrecy status quo.

The hypocrisy – to make sure Euro-MP expense accounting is exempt – is already being used by opponents of greater access to documents, especially the European Commission to discredit openness.

It was the EPP – that’s the European Parliament’s largest centre right grouping, including the Tories – that tabled the amendments to ensure that MEPs’ financial accounting could remain top secret.

The PES – the second largest, Socialist, grouping, including Labour – agreed, partly as a trade off to preserve the proposals. The Liberals in Alde voted against, to their credit.

Tory and Labour Euro-MPs decided that their expenses would remain exempt from public interest requests under existing rights and privileges contained in the “Members’ Statute”.

Article Six of this EU legislation states “(1) Members shall be entitled to inspect any files held by Parliament. (2) Paragraph 1 shall not apply to personal files and accounts.”

This is the catch all privilege that is currently used to hush up wrong doing by MEPs by preventing any scrutiny of how they spend their allowances.

Here is the amendment, number 115, from Hartmut Nassauer on behalf of the EPP:

“The definition of an overriding public interest in disclosure shall take due account of the protection of the political activity and independence of Members of the European Parliament, in particular with regard to Article 6(2) of the Members’ Statute.”

“Justification. With a view to protect the political activity and the independence of members, the Members’ Statute provides that personal files and accounts of a Member of the European Parliament are not accessible by other Members of the European Parliament. As the Members’ Statute is directly applicable Community law, other legal acts must respect its provisions and cannot allow circumventions. Therefore it seems appropriate to include the specific nature of these documents in the definition of an overriding interest.”

This amendment means that accounts or financial disciplinary measures, such as demands for MEPs to pay back money back, will not be counted as documents even though such information would be on the basis of the parliament’s rules and procedures.

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