A 5,500-SIGNATURE petition aimed at forcing the Irish Government to clean up a toxic dump was handed to the European Parliament yesterday.

MEPs went bananas today – voting to a restore a European ban on the sale of wonky fruit and veg.

Eurocrats and Europe’s governments are heading for a New Year showdown over plans to block a routine pay rise for thousands of highly-paid EU civil servants.

LIFE IS anything but dull for Gael Kakuta; leaving one’s country of birth, learning a new language and trying to establish a fresh life and career at such a young age is difficult enough for any teen but to then hit the international headlines at the centre of potentially one of the biggest football contractual stories since Bosman is probably something he could have done without.

In the real world, there is no way the Conservatives would spend their first months in power expending political capital on a referendum on Europe if Lisbon had already been ratified. As a political priority, Britain’s debt crisis puts Europe in the shade. But can they just hack the treaty? That seems unlikely too

Another blessing for the Government is the fact that what you might call the moderate, pro-European but anti-Lisbon camp is largely leaderless. For all his egomania, Declan Ganley was a key factor in swaying undecided voters not to give their assent to a document they either felt they didn’t understand or suspected was deliberately obscure.

The European Commission was accused today of abdicating its responsibility - for letting an EU government ban wild animals from circuses.

The European expenses scandal is just symptomatic of a much wider malaise, of course. For 14 years, the EU’s own auditors have refused to sign off on the accounts, so uncertain are they about their reliability. So why, having listed just some of the EU’s many obvious flaws, should you make the effort on Friday?

Belgian police were this afternoon hunting an armed robber who carried out a raid on a bank inside the European Parliament’s headquarters in Brussels.

THE pint of plain remains your only man, despite the best efforts of some Eurocrats to turn it into something other than pint-sized.

THE good news is that Europe’s leaders have made the issue of jobs their top priority as they gather in Brussels tomorrow.

Curvy cucumbers and nobbly carrots will be back on sale in the shops from next July if, as expected, more than two dozen laws banning imperfect-looking fruit and veg are scrapped

IS Environment Minister John Gormley putting the cart before the horse?

Irish people should not allow faceless Eurocrats to shape their future in the new Reform Treaty, former MEP Dana Rosemary Scallon said today.

DAIRY commodity prices will be 40% higher in the EU for the next decade, compared to the last one, predicts the European Commission.

IT IS time to admit the Milk Quota Exchange was a backward change, and return to the drawing board.

Euro MPs today called for European-wide rules governing professional football - from stadium security and television rights to financial management and the training of young talent.

ONLY the EU and the Council of Agriculture Ministers could come up with a scheme to pay out €145.6 million to Greencore and sugar beet growers, on condition that the Mallow sugar plant is demolished.

YOU can now go on the internet to find out how much money individual food processors and farmers in 13 of the 25 member states get from the EU.

An Irish woman was appointed to the top job in the European Union civil service today.

FRANCE and the Netherlands have rejected the EU constitution and the British prime minister, Tony Blair, is getting cold feet.

ABOVE all else, the blocking of the latest round of grant aid by IDA Ireland to Intel’s latest project in Leixlip, Co Kildare, highlights just how sensitive an issue inward investment is to this economy.

Undaunted by sceptics and clashes with MEPs over the appointment of his team, the new EC chief said today he was determined to lead a strong executive and build a competitive Europe.

Revolving doors on prisons were a real fascination in this country just a decade ago. Now the concept appear to have been transferred to a European context.

A £1bn (€1.56bn) plan to plug the European brain drain was today launched by the Brussels Commission.

Multi-national food firms are battling to protect their sauces from EU rules which discriminate against anything which fails to pass a little-known European ‘‘lump test’’.

One of Europe’s oldest airlines is hours from going bust.

The European Commission has launched an attempt to force banks to cut huge customer charges for moving money around the EU.