Brussels Briefing
Labour MEP Phil Prendergast was disappointed when she failed to convince fellow MEPs to insist on tougher rules on loans to protect consumers.
The EU wants to extend consumer protection for loans to low-value and or short- term loans often offered online and by SMS. Last year a survey found 70% of websites offering such loans misled customers and failed to provide key information.
But her fellow members on the internal market and consumer protection committee of the parliament were not convinced. They wanted to extend banks’ ability to give out loans across borders, but dragged their feet when addressing consumers’ problems, she said.
Is Britain waking up to the potential of adopting the EU’s Robin Hood tax?
Ernst & Young estimates it would be worth €26bn a year to the UK — but most of this money will go elsewhere. At least 60% of the revenue the Financial Transaction Tax would raise would be from the City of London — since 75% of these transactions are linked to it.
But if the UK, like Ireland, refuses to take part then the money will go to any of the other countries involved in a transaction that have adopted the tax. These countries will get their own share plus the share of any country not signed up to the tax.
Irish fishermen are delighted with the latest decision of the European Parliament’s fisheries committee to make changes that will give them more freedom to fish off the North- West coast.
Donegal MEP Pat the Cope Gallagher’s report got unanimous support during the week for technical changes, such as the kind of nets that can be used, fish to be caught and area to be fished.
Environmentalists Oceana were not as happy with the talks on future financing of fisheries, with one committee wanting to reintroduce subsidies eliminated 10 years ago to build new boats and pay for new engines.
This despite European Commission and Court of Auditors’ studies, and fishermen themselves, finding them a waste of money.
With youth unemployment at historic levels of 5.5m throughout the EU, Ireland hit on a sure fire winner when Social Protection Minister Joan Burton said the Youth Guarantee would be an EU Irish presidency priority.
The idea of offering every youth a job, training or further education within four months is proving popular with other states too who are coming up with suggestions as to how to make it work.
But French president François Hollande and Austrian chancellor Werner Faymann want to use the Financial Transaction Tax to fund it. The problem for Ireland is that it does not want to adopt this tax.
One in 50 Europeans has some kind of congenital birth defect — about 13m people — but the kind of treatment and if you receive any can depend on where you are born.
MEP Seán Kelly hosted a debate of leading health experts that said a child born in one country could automatically receive comprehensive treatment dealing with all aspects of their problem, while a child in another country with the same condition may not get minimum professional care and suffer greatly all their lives.
Treatment could be more co-ordinated across EU borders, the debate heard.
EU leaders are bound to be jumpy at the summit on Thursday and Friday. The elephant in the room will be Greece — again — but the country must wait until the beginning of November for the final decisions by the troika and the Greek government.
Everyone knows that if Greece doesn’t get extra time — the IMF confirms two years — and more money, then the game is up. It could mean more haircuts with the ECB taking one on its holdings, too, or other solutions may be put forward.
Germany wants all requests handed in at the same time so it can get them through in one deal in the Bundestag.
Of course if all the careful choreography over Greece goes awry, Spain and Italy could find themselves effectively cut off from the markets and rushing for the safety of a bailout. Such a situation would not help Ireland.
Usually it’s just the Americans and the Germans that are cross at companies using Irish tax arrangements to reduce the amount of tax they pay them.
But now they have been joined by Britain, which is taking issue with Facebook and other web companies that operate out of the UK. It says its sales are processed in Dublin — a point referred to in the European Commission’s assessment of Irish labour productivity. It points out that this is not because Ireland has amazingly productive workers but because the “final fix” is carried out in Ireland, where companies put a massive value on it and cut tax liability elsewhere.
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