Brussels briefing
Ex-Luxembourg prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker appeared not to be convinced that even if his centre-right political group the European People’s Party takes most seats in the European Parliament election, that he will be crowned president of the Commission.
“The elections are there to send out a clear signal, and that must be if the EPP wins then Juncker is in,” he told the congress in Dublin, among much talk of him being just a place holder for someone else.
Who knows? With Taoiseach Enda Kenny giving the most rousing speech of the day he might yet end up in Brussels despite his protests that he would miss Ming and Mick Wallace too much.
The two pharmaceutical giants Roche and Novartis were fined €180m in Italy for blocking the sale of Avastin, an eye treatment that was cheaper than their product, Lucentis.
Favouring the more expensive drug cost the Italian state €600m a year.
BEUC, the pan-EU consumer body, says it believes similar practices are happening in other countries too and wants the European Commission to launch an investigation.
EU Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly made her contribution to the upcoming European Parliament elections, asking for the public’s “EU wish list”.
She lined up the presidents of the three EU institutions to engage with the 300 people who attended, and they talked about democratic deficits and the disconnect with citizens.
Ms O’Reilly — who is up for re-election by the new MEPs later in the year — said that people need to know what they are voting for, and know their voice is heard.
The term “maritime tourism” might sound a bit too industrial to be fun, but it covers boating, yachting, surfing, swimming, lazing on the beach and eating sea food in near-by restaurants.
The European Commission has focused attention on its potential to create new jobs in addition to the 3.2 million that it already employs, generating €183bn a year.
Donegal-based MEP Pat ‘the Cope’ Gallagher says the Tourism Minister should immediately get cracking on a new strategy for which he can harness EU money from a number of funds.
EU citizens need to be kept in the dark for their own protection seems to be the belief of those in charge in of the institutions.
The number of requests for documents turned down by the European Commission (17%) and the European Council (21%) increased by around 50% between 2011 and 2012 while the Parliament’s rate of 5% remained the same.
The most common reason was “the protection of the decision-making process” despite the Court of Justice ruling that publishing the names of countries and their proposals is not harmful to the process.
The protection of international relations was the second most common reason given by the Council. The Parliament is pushing for the revised rules to deliver greater openness.
Everyone is used to the north of Italy trying to divorce the south, but now Venice and the Veneto region around it is muttering about breaking away from the lot.
A vote is to be held on March 16 on the issue of going back to the region’s historical independent status.
The regional government and 166 town councils support the idea and now it will be the turn of the 3.8 million voters to take part in a referendum through e-voting — a first for Italy.
The latest polls according to Plebiscito, which promotes referenda, shows that two thirds favour going back to the independent status they held for more than 1,000 years up to 1797.
The theft of items such as rare and old books and the taking of the illustrations and maps they contain is a very hidden world — the thefts often take years to discover and are often insider jobs.
So it took a two-year investigation to hunt down a Hungarian gang who specialised in the theft of rare and valuable maps leading to the arrest of 11 French and Hungarian members and more than 400 antique maps.
They stole maps to order, worth millions of euro, from national archives, libraries and cultural institutions all over Europe. Europol is still involved trying to find exactly who ordered and bought the works as well as what exactly was stolen.
Generally, people believe that the gender gap is being closed as more women have careers. But a look at how much time the sexes spend watching TV, playing sport, looking after children and the house tells a different story.
The OECD has an interesting list of stats that show women spend up to four times as long doing housework and looking after household members as their men-folk. Only in Japan do women spend longer watching TV.
Generally, men spend more time playing sport while women get in a few more minutes of sleep each night. Personal care is more a personal issue, with French women and Italian men topping the list to perfect that bella figura.
