I’m in Brussels for 36 hours and have just been on the panel at Edelman | The Centre’s event about whether social media can help bridge the gap between the EU and its citizens. I’m not sure any of the
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Category: EU Politics
An interesting fortnight for cross-Channel rail travel plans, but we haven’t heard the end of this yet
On October 7th Eurostar announced a £700 million investment plan to purchase 10 new 16 car e320 trains from Siemens that will run from 2014, and from 2011 onwards upgrade the interiors of its existing 28 trainsets. Following that DB
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Public intellectuals on Twitter – where are the Brits (or even the Europeans)?
Attending Personal Democracy Forum, re:publica and other equivalent events has – both directly and indirectly – opened my eyes to the writing and thinking of a whole group of US public intellectuals. I’ve had fun meeting Jeff Jarvis, have heard
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An overview of the EU Budget (go on, give them some Youtube views)
The European Commission has put together the smart video above about the EU budget. Clearly professionally filmed and produced, I wonder whether it will it will convince anyone about the merits of the budget? Yes, OK, it’s 1% of EU
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Rubbish airlines league table – Viking, you win
There’s nothing quite like sitting for 5 hours in an uncomfortable seat with a fat, tattooed lump of a man reclining the seat in front of you, forcing a sharp ridge of protruding aluminium into your shin. The distance between
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European Social Democracy: The Path Back To Power (what the panellists should have said)
I’ve just sat through a largely uninspiring panel at Labour Conference entitled “European Social Democracy: The Path Back To Power”, organised by FEPS and EPLP. Roger Liddle chaired in his charming but rather bumbling manner, and the panellists were Philip
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David Miliband is a better fit for another international job – a job in the EU currently held by another Brit
James Kirkup on the Telegraph Blog has raised the interesting idea that David Miliband, pipped to the Labour leadership by his brother, might leave UK politics for the IMF. Kirkup says the info on this comes from Bagehot in The
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A new Germany-EU discourse
I heard a short speech in Berlin yesterday evening by Ulrike Guérot from the European Council on Foreign Relations at an event organised by Europa Union. The essential gist of her presentation was that, now, 20 years on since the
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Barroso bullshit bingo
At Bloggingportal we came up with the idea of having a laugh at the expense of our esteemed President, Jose Manuel Barroso with his “State of the European Union” speech by playing bullshit bingo. The entire speech is now available
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Oh, so Citzalia is all my fault
Aahmed ElAmin, one of the developers of Citzalia (whose words were followed hook, line and sinker by The Guardian) has penned his own side of the story at a website entitled The Royal Gazette. Odd location, and his approach to
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Why EU taxation is actually a good idea
Budget Commissioner, Janusz Lewandowski, has said he will present some options next month for how direct EU taxes could work. The story is covered by the BBC. Cue a load of instant complains, howls of derision etc., particularly from Brits.
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Campaigning for a PES primary
What should the Party of European Socialists do in 2014 to avoid a repeat of 2009’s disastrous European Parliament election results, and the mess over the dithering prior to 2009 that resulted in the PES not selecting a candidate to
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