SOUTH WEST FIRST 
LETTER FROM STRASBOURG
November 2003
SOMBRE
MOMENTS
The
session opened with a minute’s silence for those who died in the
accident to the gangway to Queen Mary 2, under construction in St Nazaire,
and the dead in the bombed synagogues of Istanbul.
And, with a depressing symmetry, we closed on Thursday with a
further minute of silence for the victims of the suicide bombers of the
British Consulate in Istanbul (although we did not know the full extent of
the number of casualties, we knew it was very bad news).
POLITICAL
COMPROMISE!
In
the absence of a magic wand to wave and solve all the problems that impel
people to do these awful things to other people, I suppose the least one
can do is carry on with business as usual as a sign that violence must not
carry the day. However I
cannot help reflecting that eventually some political solution must be
found and yet, almost without exception, it always seems like a partial
surrender to terrorism. Certainly
the so-called peace process in Northern Ireland has a whiff of Blair
bluster before bowing to IRA demands.
SECURITY
MATTERS
Monday
evening is taken up with a special meeting of my ITRE (Industry, External
Trade, Research & Energy) Committee.
We had to vote on a series of amendments to a Commission proposal
for a co-decision (European Parliament and Council) regulation
establishing the European Network and Information Security Agency. Oh no, you may well groan, not another agency, but this one
has a relatively modest budget for it’s first five years, a role that is
primarily advisory to the Commission and Member States and will deal with
an important and rapidly changing aspect of modern life.
MEASURED
RESPONSE
Tuesday
morning saw me working on the amendments to my Second Reading report on
the Measuring Instrument Directive. That
means, in practice, drafting text in the light of discussions with both
the Council and the Commission and in close co-operation with the
Socialist’s shadow rapporteur. This
sounds bad in the context of our British way of doing things, but it must
be remembered that there is no government or opposition at European level.
In this instance with a complex, technical proposal there is little
left/right disagreement whereas the main topics for debate concern what
powers may be exercised by the Commission or the Member States and what
say the Parliament has in the long-run.
To have the support of the two big groups in the Parliament puts
the Rapporteur in a stronger negotiating position.
A
BIT OF BOTHER
The
best theatre of the day came with a bit of a spat in the hemicycle between
the Italian President of the Commission, Mr Prodi, and the President of
our EPP-ED (European People’s Party- European Democrats) Group, Hans-Gerd
Poettering. Prodi has been
widely reported as organising to run a list of candidates against
incumbent Prime Minister Berlusconi in Italy’s next general elections.
POETTERING
v PRESIDENTIAL PARTY POLITICS
Presidents
of the Commission, are, of course, supposed to be above party politics
while in office and yet Socialist MEPs seemed to think what Prodi was up
to was perfectly acceptable and heckled Mr Poettering as he robustly
criticised Prodi for compromising his office.
The only good thing that can be said about Prodi is that he is all
talk and no do, but I suspect he is itching to get back to Italian
politics where he hopes people will pay him more attention!
CURRENT
AFFAIRS
In
the evening I attended a dinner debate of the European Energy Foundation
on the topic of blackouts. It
was a pretty technical discussion from which I learned a new phrase,
“phase angle”, about the synchronisation or not of current and voltage
while realising I have plenty more to learn about the operation of
electricity transmission systems on the continent.
I remain more firmly convinced than ever that it would be madness
to phase out and not replace nuclear capacity which provides around a
third of our electricity in Europe.
TRADE
AND ENERGY MEETINGS
On
Wednesday, I had another full day of meetings starting with the Trade
group discussion with Commissioner Lamy about what next in the WTO (World
Trade Organisation). Then I
met representatives from UKAEA (Atomic Energy Authority) to discuss ITER,
the next step in the nuclear fusion reactor research and development
programme. Then I met a group
of industry people from the American Chamber of Commerce in Europe to
discuss the REACH (Registration,
Evaluation and Authorisation
of CHemicals) proposals and the
future for hydrogen technology.
BACK
TO THE DRAWING BOARD
There were two votes of particular interest that
day. First was a re-run of my
achievement in September rejecting a Commission proposal for a directive.
For procedural reasons, the matter was referred back to the
Committee where we duly voted to reject and then brought back to Plenary
for a final vote. It was not
a recorded vote but a call for a check yielded the result – 524 voting
with 367 in favour of rejection, 151 against and 6 abstaining.
An absolute majority of over 314.
SUPPPORT
FOR STEM
CELL RESEARCH
The second was on a report
with the innocuous title “Integrating and Strengthening the European
Research Area”. The real
subject was stem cell research, whether it should be funded out of the
European research budget and under what constraints.
The Rapporteur preferred none at all, but a majority of members
under a pro-science and pro-cures for Parkinsons etc voted down all his
fundamentalist amendments and in favour of regulated research.
PLAYING
HOOKEY AND.......
I did lots more but don’t have space to tell all.
I will admit to watching French TV on Thursday morning for a
certain rugby match in which the All Blacks beat the French convincingly.
.........THE BEST NEWS
And the
week ended in the best fashion imaginable with England winning the rugby
World Cup. What a
cliff-hanger and what an achievement beating the Aussies at home!
Who’s whingeing now? I
love it.
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