Farmer glee at hasty exit

IRELAND’S farming community wrung their hands in glee with the news that EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson is to leave Brussels.

He was never anything other than the “prince of darkness” to those involved in agriculture who saw him as selling them out in the now parked WTO trade talks.

The man who twice was forced to leave British cabinet positions gave no inkling of the plan to rejoin his old adversary Prime Minister Gordon Brown over the past few days.

He appeared to have left Brussels without a backward glance, and yesterday by late afternoon Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso had still not been informed officially that he was losing one of his chief members.

President of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association, Jackie Cahill, expressed the views of Irish farmers when he said, “Mr Mandelson had systematically set out to cynically sacrifice Europe’s farmers in an attempt to serve the interests of the European financial, hi-tech and engineering sectors in the World Trade talks. That he had failed was due more to good fortune than anything else.”

But there are now concerns about his replacement.

Fine Gael MEP Máiréad McGuinness said, “One would hope that whoever replaces him will have a better vision for the role of agriculture and food production in the EU and globally.”

Had the Doha round succeeded in July Mr Mandelson’s would have been assured of a place in EU history, but instead he is likely to be best remembered for his rows with the French especially, who accused him of overstepping his WTO mandate.

From the beginning, Mr Mandelson formed an alliance with the other free marketeers of the Commission, internal market commissioner Charlie McCreevy and Competition chief Neelie Kroes.

With a reputation for refusing to suffer people he disliked, his well-respected Danish head of cabinet was replaced by the secretary general, David O’Sullivan.

His spokesperson for the past four years has been another Irish person, Peter Power whose handling of the often tetchy and frequently unpredictable commissioner was considered masterly.

Before taking up the post of trade commissioner, Mr Mandelson was well known in Ireland, having taken over the Northern Ireland Secretary’s job from the popular Mo Mowlan.