Graham's blog entry Friday 1 February 2008

Published on Fri 1st Feb 2008

I watch very little television, but I imagine that the biggest EU news my constituents will have found on their screens was about Gordon Brown's "sub prime" (in both senses) summit in London on Tuesday. Brown and Sarkozy both sought a 'camera moment' to suggest they are on top of the financial crisis: Angela Merkel went along to stop them doing anything too stupid (women are essential in politics as in every other area of life); Romano Prodi said his government had followed textbook financial discipline and it had cost him his job, and Barroso was there to give the impression that other EU states were represented. The meeting achieved very little other than a communiqué calling for more transparency in big-ticket financial transactions. It is typical of the mess the UK's EU policy is in.

While our Foreign and EU Affairs ministers met in Brussels to discuss Serbia and Kosovo, I spent Monday in Luxembourg meeting the leaders of the Democratic (Liberal) Party and government ministers. Our party did rather badly at the last general election there, but has elected a new leader and may be able to come back strongly. Christian Democrat Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker is probably in his last term of office: but he is a brilliant strategist and may well be the first person to occupy the new post of full-time President of the EU's Council of Ministers. I discussed a range of current affairs issues with him and other issues later with his justice minister and likely successor Luc Frieden.

High Representative for Foreign Affairs Xavier Solana came to Parliament on Wednesday to make statements on Iran and on Gaza. I could not help feeling that the EU's foreign policy is too much influenced by America's. We need to develop our own, since our interests do not necessarily coincide. With a major speech to make that evening at the College of Europe in Bruges, I left the job of replying to my colleagues. Chris Davies spoke very well for us on Gaza and Annemie Neyts on Iran.

The Commission's presentation to Parliament's industry committee of the Telecoms legislation it published in November was not warmly received, with its proposal to create a pan-EU regulatory body proving particularly controversial. There is a strong German lobby against it and my guess is that it has little chance of being approved even at first reading in the 15 months remaining in this Parliament. If it secures a first reading it will be with heavy amendment. I regret this, since I think it would help drive down the costs of telecoms service provision.

The British Conservatives plumbed new depths of anti-EU sentiment this week when MEP Daniel Hannan (also a journalist on the Telegraph) compared a procedural vote in the House to a vote in the German Reichstag in 1933. In so doing he was effectively equating the EP's German President (Speaker) with Adolf Hitler. The President had put to a vote a ruling which would stop political groups abusing parliamentary procedures to disrupt business, because at the last session UKIP MEPs had demanded a roll call on every single vote and the right of reply on every item of business (at considerable cost to the taxpayer, moreover). Preventing deliberate wrecking tactics cannot be compared to the deliberate anti-democratic practices of the Nazis in Germany; and Britain's stock in the EU, already trading at low levels, took another big hit. I have yet to hear that David Cameron has dissociated himself from Hannan's remarks, but I trust he will.

The Cornwall Sustainable Energy Partnership was in Brussels on Tuesday for a conference with other peripheral regions doing similarly innovative work. I addressed them on work in the EP to promote sustainability in energy generation. For this and other news, see my website www.grahamwatsonmep.org Or the ALDE group's website http://alde.europarl.europa.eu.

I will be in London today, in Bournemouth for a LibDem supper this evening and in Street for a Wells constituency lunch tomorrow, where I introduce guest speaker Baroness Ros Scott. Please come along and join me if you can.

Next week there is no EP business in Brussels or Strasbourg, so I will write again on 15 February.