The original blog: commentary about everything except transport
I have been repeatedly criticised on Twitter this morning by @PaulMBrady65 for saying I am a federalist, but refusing to vote for a federalist party in European elections. Here is a quick explanation why (I can’t easily get the nuance
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It creeps up on you with alarming regularity… is it really a year ago that we last played every EU nerd’s party game, Barroso Bullshit Bingo? Anyway in just 2 days – on Wednesday at 0900 CET – our beloved
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Steve Bell’s Guardian cartoon has William Hague in the barrel of a tank’s cannon approaching the Embassy of Ecuador in London – reference to the robust wording of the British Embassy in Quito’s letter to the Ecuador government (excerpt here).
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The European Parliament has introduced some new and essentially sensible rules, asking MEPs to declare their financial interests and business dealings prior to their time as MEPs. This is important, as the what a MEP did prior to being elected
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Back at the end of the 1990s one of the supposed strengths of the Britain in Europe campaign was that it brought together leaders of both industry and politics to create a broad coalition that would have eventually campaigned for
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Another day, another European Commission web communications mess. Today it’s “Science: It’s A Girl Thing” and this video. The website for the initiative is here, and reactions that range from The New Statesman to the very rude tweets. This is
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So Ed Miliband today weighs into the UK debate on immigration. Others are better placed to express the overall problems with this. I am instead going to focus on one small aspect of Miliband’s comments, namely this point at the
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A month ago I announced publicly that I no longer had any intention of putting my name forward for the European Parliament election list for Labour. I made the right call, and nothing that has happened since then makes me
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Labour’s website lists 115 MPs and Lords* in the Shadow Cabinet and shadow teams that assist them. Yet which of those people is responsible for internet politics for the party? I ask this because the SPD in Germany has such
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An old article in Helsingin Sanomat about Alexander Stubb was entitled “Alex Stubb is too smart to make trouble”. That was in 2008 when he was appointed as Finland’s Foreign Minister. Now in his guise as Minister for Europe and
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The main reason I am at WEF Istanbul is to contribute to and learn from the sessions on the future of the European Union. The first such session was at the start of Tuesday afternoon – a panel entitled “The
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Scandal! Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, pays no tax! How can this be when she’s lecturing more Greeks to pay tax!?! Story from The Guardian here. Sony Kapoor, so often the voice of reason throughout the Eurozone crisis
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