Graham's blog entry 16th March 2007

Published on Fri 16th Mar 2007

The European Union celebrated a success and lamented a failure this week. The success was the tearing down of a wall in Ledra Street in Nicosia, Cyprus (or Lefkosa, if you prefer) which may be one of the three such events predicted by Nostradamus (Berlin is widely held by fans of Nostradamus to be another). Overnight from 8 to 9 March the Cypriot government destroyed it, challenging the Turkish troops to withdraw and allow free passage. The failure was that of Finnish negotiator Matti Ahtisaari to secure agreement on the independence of Kosovo. The Serb and Albanian communities are so far apart it was not possible and the ball is now back in the court of the United Nations.

There was another quite important success in the European Parliament, another sign that Parliament is sometimes able to resolve issues which divide the Council of Ministers and escape the Commission. We agreed a deal with the Commission and the German presidency of the EU on the thorny issue of 'modulation' or allowing member states to use CAP subsidies for environmental schemes rather than payments to farmers for crop production. The compromise package will now go to the ministers of the 27 member states for approval, allowing the UK and Portugal to cut the amount they pay to farmers in price support and put the money into agri-environment schemes instead. Gordon Brown will be delighted: South West farmers rather less so. Our (LibDem) agriculture commissioner Mariann Fischer-Boel came hotfoot from the talks to the dinner I host for our Commissioners on the Tuesday night of each Strasbourg week to announce the news.

Another Libdem Commissioner, Bulgarian Meglena Kuneva, used the same occasion to brief us on her new Consumer Protection Strategy. She told us she wants a shopper in Birmingham or Bristol to feel as comfortable buying a digital camera from a website in Berlin or Budapest as they would in their own High Street. Her plans for the next five years include tougher laws on timeshares, cross-border consumer credit arrangements and better legal protection for shoppers. She will seek to update EU laws to these ends.

Parliament's main debate this week was on the Berlin Declaration, a document to be adopted in Berlin by our heads of state and government on 25 March - the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, the EU's founding treaty. It was a strange debate, since no draft is yet available, but if you would like to know what I made of it please follow the link in the 'related links' section at the bottom.

I was quoted the following day in newspapers all over continental Europe but, as usual, not in the UK. Even on the Open Skies package of aviation laws, a major step forward in freeing up transatlantic air services, the only programme on which the BBC wanted to interview the MEPs involved was BBC World.

I took part in the first meeting of the EPs working group on reform of the House on Wednesday. This working group will meet 25 times over 12 months and should turn us into a much more serious institution. At least, I'm prepared to invest time to help make sure it does.

The main decision of the European Commission this week was the approval of a package of legislative proposals on harmonising taxes; not tax rates, but the tax base (ie. which goods and services are taxed). It would gradually raise minimum excise duties on fuel but allow reduction of VAT in some areas. It has to go to the member states and come to the EP for approval.

This morning I will be at the South West Regional Assembly meeting, this evening talking to Hillingdon Borough LDs in West London and on Saturday going to Paris to appear with Segolene Royal on the France Europe Express TV show. With luck I should make it home in time for lunch on Sunday.

Related Link:

my speech.