Elections have just taken place in Sweden and Austria, with very differing fortunes for centre-left parties. In Sweden, a resurgent right managed to win a narrow victory. The ‘Nya Moderaterna’ have a dynamic young leader – sounds a bit like Cameron and the Tories? In Austria, the left fared better, […]
President of the European Parliament Josep Borrell, when talking about the Strasbourg seat of the European Parliament, last week stated that the “historic dimension [of Strasbourg] cannot be perceived in the same way in ‘some Nordic country’ which did not participate in WWII” (news story from EUObserver here). What a […]
What is going on at Tory party conference? I can understand the electoral appeal of trying to move a party to the middle ground, but the Tories seem to be trying to be greener than Labour, all nice and cuddly, and tough and hard nosed too – see David Davis’s […]
I’m in a state of complete confusion at the moment. I seem to be spending far too many hours each day doing something but not with any plan or with any discernable results. I pottered off to an Italian lesson this morning and had a decent debate about EU enlargement […]
Via Claes and Helena, I’ve been asked to answer a bunch of questions about what my political views are and how I come to believe in what I believe in presently. So here goes… 1. Your political ideology? Socialism (or social democracy? – don’t necesarily believe in all the tenets […]
Mats Engström has written a good piece at Opendemocracy about the Swedish election result, and highlights some of the tensions that will appear for the Alliance when trying to manage to govern. In the meantime, European Commissioner Margot Wallström has emerged as a front runner to follow Goran Persson as […]
Thanks to this post from DJ Nozem, I’ve come across this amusing press release from DG Agriculture of the European Commission entitled ‘CAP Reform: Commission proposes new banana regime’. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry! With all the criticisms always being levelled at the EU about its lack […]
OK, I’ve made a start – I’ve been to my first Swedish class. It was run by a very camp Croat – Casper – who learnt Swedish from peacekeeping troops in the Balkans before moving to Sweden to study… Oh, and the courses are at Westminster University – they seem […]
As has been widely trailed [see EUObserver here], the European Commission is today due to give the go-ahead for the EU membership of Romania and Bulgaria. It’s not all good news though; for Bulgaria there are still areas of concern such as the justice system, the fight against corruption and […]
While Presidential hopeful Nicolas Sarkozy has been in the limelight all summer, French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin has resurfaced to give a speech about – among other things – EU energy policy [story from EUObserver here]. De Villepin is quoted as saying: The liberalisation of energy markets is not […]
I must admit that I have been astounded by the amount of people that have found this blog thanks to searches for matters relating to the European Commission concours. My original post about the issue has – by 25th September – amassed no fewer than 47 comments! It seems that […]
One of the things I have to get to grips with in my new flat is the change of borough – I’m now in Southwark having previously been in Lambeth. It’s hard to tell in London where one borough ends and the next starts if you travel around, but it […]
