Open Europe press summary: 16 February 2009

Europe

New poll: 51% of Irish would vote Yes in second referendum on Lisbon Treaty;
Poll prompts calls for early referendum date
The Irish Times reports that Irish support is growing for the Lisbon Treaty with a further swing to the Yes camp in recent months as the country's economic situation has deteriorated. An Irish Times/TNS mrbi poll shows that 51 per cent would now vote Yes, with 33 per cent saying they would vote No, and 16 per cent undecided. The Irish Independent notes that the potential Yes vote has gone up eight points in the past three months, while the No vote has dropped by six points in the same period. EUobserver notes that analysis of the results suggests it is farmers and middle-class voters who have shifted their opinion towards a Yes since the referendum in June last year.

The article notes that the Irish government is debating whether to bring the date of the second Lisbon Treaty referendum forward to capitalise on the swell in support. The Irish government is reportedly thinking about running it on June 5, the same day as the local and European elections, where a large turnout would be guaranteed. According to EUobserver, Fine Gael MEP Colm Burke has called on the government to hold the poll in April. "The current economic crisis has brought home to people, up and down the land, how vital is Ireland's membership of the European Union," he said.
Irish Times Irish Times: Collins Irish Times 2 Irish Times: Leader Irish Independent Irish Independent 2 EurActiv EUobserver Focus

Sweden to hold 6,000 Council 'working group' meetings during EU Presidency
The Swedish Ambassador to the EU, Christian Danielson, has announced that there will be 6,000 Council meetings in Brussels during its Presidency of the EU in the second half of this year. According to the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, Mr Danielson told business representatives in Brussels last week that: "6,000 meetings in different working groups will be held in Brussels during the Swedish Presidency." He said, "The preparations consist mostly of planning meetings and coordinating with the current Czech Presidency."

The 'working groups' are those which prepare meetings of the Council, such as the 'Police Cooperation Working Party', the 'Working Party on Olive Oil' or the 'Working Party on Youth'. Reporting the story, the News of the World noted that, because the EU institutions are in recess during August, this means there will be 6,000 meetings over five months, which means an average of around 60 a day. Open Europe's Lorraine Mullally was quoted saying, "These secret meetings of bureaucrats will be costing taxpayers millions of pounds a year. What possible justification can there be for this enormous waste of time and money?"
Confederation of Swedish Enterprise Open Europe blog

Günter Verheugen Verheugen has "absolute understanding" for legal complaints against EU Treaty
In an interview with Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, Vice-President of the European Commission Günter Verheugen has expressed "absolute understanding" for the legal complaints launched in Germany against the Lisbon Treaty, saying that it is important not to transfer competences to the European level without there being improved "democratic quality". He warned that "the Commission, the Parliament and the Council must be cautious not to take things from democratically elected member states that cannot be taken away." He also said, "The German Parliament has rights in EU politics which it is not using sufficiently".

Meanwhile, in an interview with German daily Handelsblatt, the President of the German liberal party FDP in the European Parliament, Silvana Koch-Mehrin, said: "if the EU itself applied for membership of the EU, it would be refused. The reason would be: no democracy". She added: "Meanwhile more and more competences have been transferred to the EU level, without the EU structures having become more democratic".
Presseportal DPA Handelsblatt Koelner Stadt-Anzeiger

In House Magazine, Open Europe's Mats Persson argues that the Government has not effectively controlled regulation emanating from the EU, and that in an economic downturn voters will expect politicians to take a better grip.
House Magazine

Open Europe's Stephen Booth appeared on the VoxAfrica television channel discussing the potential for the African Union to increase cooperation across the continent and what could be learnt from the experience of the EU.
No link

Foreign workers did not undercut local wages in Lincolnshire, report claims
A report published today by arbitration service Acas has found that wages that were paid to foreign workers at the Lincolnshire oil refinery did not undercut British employees, as claimed by unions, reports the Independent. Acas also found no evidence that the law was broken when a subcontractor hired workers from Italy and Portugal. The article notes that ministers fear unions want to use the controversy to win a legal right to strike under EU law, without the threat of being sued for damages, to uphold industry agreements, meaning a fundamental change to the industrial relations laws that were brought in by Margaret Thatcher.
Independent

EU Commission to re-introduce controversial set-aside subsidies for farmers
Environment Secretary Hilary Benn will today announce that the EU Commission plans to re-introduce its set-aside scheme for farmers. This scheme requires farmers to leave land uncultivated in order to discourage over-production. In order to head off criticism from farmers that the move will damage their productivity and pose a threat to jobs, Benn is expected to propose two options: one a mandatory minimum level of set-aside land with incentives for bigger areas, and another which would be "wholly voluntary". Environmental groups have welcomed the move, arguing that the land set aside serve as habitat for wildlife, particularly birds.
Guardian

Twelve "dubious organisations" on official Commission's list of lobby groups
Le Figaro reports that there is a "climate of paranoia" at the EU Commission since the discovery last week of 12 "dubious" organisations on the EU Commission's official list of lobby groups which results in them being able to influence the legislative process. One such organisation is British firm Fare Banks Ltd, with a turnover of 250 million euros, which Le Figaro suggests is run by Italian politician Gennaro Ruggiero, who is close to Silvio Berlusconi's governing party Forza Italia.

The news comes after the start of an initiative in June 2008 to increase transparency on the lobby groups that operate at the EU Commission level and which the Commission believed illustrated the transparency of its work, notes Le Figaro. Erik Wesselius, spokesman for Alter EU, which is an organisation specialising in the surveillance of EU lobby groups, has stated that "the fact that 12 dubious organisations could be on this list discredits the process and sheds light on the absence of control of lobby groups by the Commission."
Figaro

G7 calls to avoid protectionism;
Munchaü: Expect damage to the single market from "narrow-mindedness" of EU leaders
The G7 summit in Rome over the weekend ended with a pledge to avoid protectionism, but a leader in the FT argues that "Surplus countries, notably Germany, call for resistance to protectionism, while doing next to nothing to sustain the demand on which the continuation of liberal trade depends."

Wolfgang Münchau, writing in the FT, argues that, "As a result of the extraordinary narrow-mindedness of Europe's political leadership, expect serious damage to the single market" and that he is "no longer so sure" that a break-up of the eurozone is impossible.

Writing in European Voice Alexandre Polack, Policy and Campaigns Manager for ActionAid, argues that the row over the Buy American clause in the US economic stimulus package exposes European double standards about conditioning its own aid to the developing world. Polack argues that large proportions of development aid from some EU countries are often tied to procurement of their own goods and services, or the hiring of costly international consultants to provide technical assistance. The economist Jeffrey Sachs is also quoted saying that he is concerned that aid is "excessively directed towards the salaries of consultants from donor countries rather than investments in recipient countries".
Independent Telegraph FT FT: Leader IHT Guardian BBC European Voice WSJ Independent 2 European Voice 2 FT: Munchau

Sarkozy threatens NATO summit boycott over seating plan
EUobserver reports that French President Nicolas Sarkozy has threatened to boycott April's NATO summit, unless he is allowed to choose where he sits at the conference table. Despite the established rules whereby seating is arranged by alphabetical order, Sarkozy has reportedly insisted he should be seated next to NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

France and Germany are co-hosting the April summit in Strasbourg and Kehl, during which Paris is expected to announce its return to NATO's military structures, after reportedly securing two senior command positions.
EUobserver

Parliament pushes for deforestation credits in Emissions Trading Scheme
A European Parliament resolution due to be debated today suggests earmarking some of the revenue from emissions trading to boost EU policy on tackling deforestation, notes EurActiv. Hungarian MEP Péter Olajos who is co-author of the resolution said that "the reason we started this is because every year, thirteen million hectares of forest will disappear, which is equal to the territory of Greece" and added that recent talks in Parliament had also made clear that the EU's target of halting biodiversity loss by 2010 was "unrealistic."

Meanwhile, La Tribune reports that the Commission is to publish criteria in June along which national plans will have to work to increase the amount of bio energy they produce. Paul Hodson, head of the unit working for Transport and Energy at the EU Commission, explained that national projects would have to indicate whether European states would use imported or locally-produced biomass and what mechanisms would be put in place to build up such a market.
EurActiv EurActiv 2 La Tribune

Commission criticised for 'smear' campaign against journalists
AFP reports that European press groups have condemned the European Commission for "smearing" all journalists by identifying them as potential spies in an internal security letter. "A number of countries' information seekers, lobbyists, journalists, private agencies and other third parties are continuing to seek sensitive and classified information from the commission," the letter warned.

"This sort of loose talk ends up smearing everyone working in journalism by casting a cloud of suspicion over them," said European Federation of Journalists General Secretary Aidan White. He added, "Security concerns are one thing but this sort of comment puts journalists at risk and makes their job of scrutinising public officials and the work of the commission more difficult."
No link

Evans-Pritchard: Collapse of eastern Europe could "shatter" banking systems
The Sunday Telegraph reported that IMF Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn has warned that a second wave of countries will require a bailout from the IMF. In a separate article in the paper, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard warned that the debt crisis in eastern Europe could "shatter the fragile banking systems of Western Europe", because they are so exposed. He goes on to quote an analyst from Danske Bank warning that "There are accidents waiting to happen across the region, but the EU institutions don't have any framework for dealing with this. The day they decide not to save one of these one countries will be the trigger for a massive crisis with contagion spreading into the EU."

The IHT reports that the Euro is to face further stress this week as more banks and corporations report their earnings, with many of them are exposed to vulnerabilities in eastern Europe.

The ratings agency Moody's has subdivided its triple-A countries into three categories to reflect the status of government bonds, with the US and UK in the second ranking of "resilient", according to the WSJ.
IHT Guardian WSJ Telegraph: Evans-Pritchard Telegraph

Libertas Germany will present its candidates for the European elections on 2 March in Berlin.
SN

Euractiv reports that the opening of national inquiries into the decisions that led the British and Dutch governments to support the US-led invasion in Iraq could be a factor in this year's race for top EU jobs. Those potentially affected could include former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, and European Commission President José Manuel Barroso, who was then Prime Minister of Portugal.
EurActiv

On Saturday the Telegraph reported that the number of Eastern European migrants working in the UK has fallen by 35,000.
Telegraph

The European Commission has halted plans to curb online piracy following pressure from telecoms companies and consumer organisations.
EurActiv

UK

A Comres poll for the Independent on Sunday had the Conservatives on 41 percent, 16 percent clear of Labour on 25 percent, with the Liberal Democrats on 22 percent.
Independent Mail

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