http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articlearchive.php Recent Press Articles from St Ives Liberal Democrats en-GB St Ives Liberal Democrats http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/ Prater Raines Ltd http://www.praterraines.co.uk/ (c) 2010 St Ives Liberal Democrats 2010-03-10T05:42+00:00 United Kingdom http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000064/grahams_blog_friday_5_march_2010.html I am particularly pleased to see that the President of the European Parliament used new powers to dock the allowances of UKIP's Nigel Farage MEP, who refuses to apologise for having last week insulted gratuitously the new President of the European Council. It is thanks to an initiative I took in the last parliamentary mandate that such powers exist. 2010-03-05T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000063/grahams_blog_friday_26_february_2010.html As I write (Friday afternoon), Barroso has his new team of Commissioners together at a meeting in Bruges to discuss the new Commission's economic strategy. They are due to agree it by 3 March. It will then be discussed in the Council of Ministers and in the European Parliament before the end of March. There is little I can report about it at this stage other than to say that the main discussion initially will be less about what to do than about who should do it and how, ie. How much should be left to each member state and how much should be done collectively at EU level. The sub text reads 'can we trust the Greeks to sort out the mess they are in?'. 2010-02-26T11:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000062/grahams_blog_friday_12_february_2010.html Ukraine was not on our agenda this week, but the MEPs who observed the presidential elections there believe them to have been free and fair and hope that prime minister Julia Timoshenko, the losing candidate, will accept the result and step down. Many Liberals would prefer the victors of the orange revolution to have been returned to power, but we must accept the verdict of the electorate. 2010-02-12T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000061/grahams_blog_friday_5_february_2010.html Relations with the US were on the agenda in Brussels this week. Hilary Clinton is upset that the European Parliament's justice and home affairs committee voted yesterday to reject the latest proposal for a regime governing bank account data transfer to the US (to help them fight crime). The matter will have to come to the floor of the House before a final decision can be reached, but I think we will follow the committee's advice. And Barack Obama has upset the EU by letting it be known he will not attend the six-monthly EU-US summit planned for this Spring. He is too busy with other business. 2010-02-05T12:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000060/grahams_blog_friday_29_january_2010.html I made an error in last week's blog, for which I apologise: Luxembourg's prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker is no longer also finance minister. He ceded the role to political ally and former justice minister Luc Frieden at the end of July last year, but I had missed it. (Government reshuffles in Luxembourg don't always hit the headlines.) 2010-01-29T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000059/grahams_blog_friday_22_january_2010.html Last week I reported on problems with the Commissioner-designate from Bulgaria. This week she stood down after it became clear the MEPs would not approve her. The Bulgarian government has since nominated a lady called Kristalina Georgieva, currently a Vice President of the World Bank. She will come before us next week for consideration for the development aid portfolio which was also proposed for the candidate we rejected. This means we will not vote the investiture of the new Commission until 9 February, two days before the 27 heads of state and government meet to discuss the EU's economic situation. 2010-01-22T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000058/grahams_blog_friday_15_january_2010.html Happy New Year! The European Parliament's year kicked off with a series of 'hearings' in Brussels this week of the persons designated to be members of the new European Commission. One of them, Rumiana Jeleva of Bulgaria, was given a rough ride and may fail to be approved. She was a MEP in the last parliament and since earlier this year has been her country's foreign minister; but we were not much impressed by her and there are serious doubts about whether she has been honest in her declaration of financial interests. My sense is that MEPs are not looking for a fight with the Council of Ministers about who the 27 governments have nominated: but being a European Commissioner is a prestigious and well paid job carrying serious responsibility and we are not gong to allow them to appoint monkeys. 2010-01-15T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000057/grahams_blog_friday_18_december_2009.html This week we voted the European Union's budget for next year. The talks between Parliament and Council (the national government representatives, in this case the finance ministers) have not been easy, but eventually we reached agreement. From the part of the budget which is non-compulsory expenditure Liberal Democrats are particularly pleased to have secured funding to help rape victims in the Congo, for cross-border investigative journalism and for a sustainable development programme for the Baltic. The promise of aid to developing countries to help mitigate the impact of climate change is currently a thorn in the flesh, since the figure was agreed between the European Commission and the Council without reference to the European Parliament, which is a co-legislator on budgetary matters. If we are unable to find it from the budget we have agreed, the member states will have to find the money separately. 2009-12-18T10:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000056/update_from_copenhagen_tuesday_15_december_pm.html Greetings from Copenhagen! 2009-12-15T19:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000055/update_from_copenhagen_tuesday_15_dec_am.html Again in a long queue in the freezing cold outside the conference centre. Despite media headlines about yesterday's disorganisation they seem to have learned little. 2009-12-15T09:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000054/update_from_copenhagen_monday_14_dec_am.html Greetings from the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference! 2009-12-14T21:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000053/update_from_copenhagen_monday_14_dec_pm.html After a brief suspension in the negotiations, talks are now tentatively underway again. 2009-12-14T17:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000052/update_from_copenhagen_monday_14_dec_pm.html After a brief suspension in the negotiations, talks are now tentatively underway again. 2009-12-14T17:00+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000051/grahams_blog_friday_11_december_2009.html As the non-governmental organisations and policy advisers gathered in Copenhagen for the impressive array of meetings and briefings which precede next week's arrival of the government ministers, climate change also dominated this week's European Council (summit) meeting in Brussels. Heads of state or government of the 27 EU countries met on Thursday afternoon and spent long hours overnight trying to reach agreement on how much money the EU will put on the table to help poorer nations cope with the effects of climate change. As I write this morning, they are about to resume: no deal has been reached yet. 2009-12-11T09:30+00:00 http://www.stiveslibdems.org.uk/articles/000050/grahams_blog_friday_4_december_2009.html Well, Barroso caught people on the hop last Friday lunchtime - as he did early in August 2004 - by announcing much earlier than expected the portfolios he wishes each Commissioner to hold. British sniping at Frenchman Michel Barnier getting the internal market and financial services brief ('ruling the City of London' in the words of the tabloids) and French carping at the relatively inexperienced Catherine Ashton being put in charge of foreign and security policy simply go to show how little we have progressed since Agincourt. They also betray a fundamental misunderstanding of how collegiality in the European Commission works. In my view Barroso has made by and large good choices, though some of his nominees face a tough grilling in their parliamentary hearings in January. None of the 14 returning Commissioners gets the same portfolio as last time. Some new portfolios have been created, eg. climate change and justice and fundamental rights. Of the 27 there are eight who publicly declare themselves as Liberals, four men and four women, and another two men who are known to be but prefer not to 'come out'. 2009-12-04T08:30+00:00