The European Union has been trying to get rid of roaming charges for mobile phones for years, first for calls and for SMS, and then subsequently for data. One aspect of it is a so called “Fair Use Policy” – i.e. under what terms I can continue to use my […]
“Was it really a year since the last one?” you’re perhaps asking yourselves. Yes, just as Brussels eases itself back to work after the summer break, Jean Claude pops up to tell everyone why everything is going swimmingly (or not) depending on your point of view. This year Juncker’s State […]
Time since polls closed in the UK’s EU Referendum Time since the UK triggered Art 50 at approx. 1200 BST on 29th March 2017 Time the UK still has in the EU – NOW WITH Article 50 EXTENDED TO 31 OCTOBER Time the UK still […]
Oh TTIP. That great hope to rescue the transatlantic alliance. Or that scary fear of deregulation. Or both. Or neither? Juncker is worried, apparently. The Commission is putting pressure on the USA, supposedly. New Austrian President Van Der Bellen says he is against it. Merkel and Obama say they are […]
So Austria does not have a right wing populist President. Alexander Van Der Bellen defeated Norbert Hofer by 31000 votes, or 50.3% to 49.7% – summary of the result from Der Standard here. But that was too close for comfort. It’s also not enough to point out that Van Der […]
On 10th May at 1030 CET I am giving a lecture entitled “EU or Großdeutschland: the German influence in the European Union” at the Europe2Day Forum at the University of Trieste campus in Gorizia. This a bit different to my usual lectures about online communications in the European Union, but […]
People who work in European Union politics in some way often bemoan the EU’s communications problem. Their classic diagnosis goes something like this: If only people would search out the facts about the European Union, people would better understand that the European Union does work in their interests, and that […]
Matteo Renzi has an idea: train Eurocrats in Italy, as a way to boost Italy’s influence in the EU. Possibly a good idea. He wants that place to be Santo Stefano. That’s a really bad idea. Yes, nearby Ventotene was where Altiero Spinelli was imprisoned, and where he penned the […]
For the first time in the academic year 2015-16 I am a member of the faculty of the politics department at the College of Europe in Bruges. My own MA is from the College of Europe (in 2003-04) and it is good to be back there as a teacher this […]
At the height of the Eurozone bailout crisis, Alexis Tsipras went to address the European Parliament. Why bother with that? was the cry of sceptical journalists who have never paid attention to the European Parliament. 887000 viewers of Guy Verhofstadt’s response show that this was a worthwhile political exercise – […]
Obergrenze. It’s the word of the moment in Germany – namely should Germany set an upper limit on the number of refugees that it can take in 2016. CSU leader Seehofer wants to set it at 200000. The Austrians have agreed one (but there are questions if it can work), […]
Ska Keller retweeted this from Spiegel Online journalist Markus Becker earlier: Polish government requested names of all accredited journalists from @EUparliament https://t.co/2ofkNXxq2k #PiS #Poland — Markus Becker (@MarkusBecker) January 21, 2016 The insinuation is that – having purged the Warsaw press, the government of Poland is about to try to […]
