Two interesting developments to note from my travels outside Brussels this month. First, at the beginning of the month our political group travelled to Rome for an audience with the Pope. His Holiness received us in a large room in the Vatican, and      spoke for about 15 minutes, emphasising, inter alia, the importance of family life. He is only the second German Pope in the history of the Papacy, and many German MEPs had come especially to hear him. All the more remarkable therefore that he spoke to all of us entirely in English, with the final blessing in Latin. There was no simultaneous translation. It was a good illustration of how English has become the world language, which everyone is expected to understand. The actual arrival of the Pope in the room, incidentally, was the only thing, possibly in the world, that made the Italian MEPs put down their mobile phones, which otherwise appear to be welded to their ears.

 

Nothing daunted by this linguistic monopoly, we spent Easter learning German in Leipzig. I went out one day to be faced by a huge demonstration of doctors from all over Germany. They were protesting against their low levels of pay, and against their consequent need to go to another country to work.  One banner said simply “See you in London”. There were some British students among them, with the Union Jack being flourished by a British Asian girl.

 

The main topic this month has been the EU budget. The Parliament has finally reached agreement with the Council of Ministers (all 25 EU governments) on the budget for the period 2007-2013. Parliament negotiators managed to secure the addition of another € 4 billion (£2.6 billion) on top of the €862 billion (£580 billion) agreed by EU governments in December, having gone into the talks seeking €12 billion (£8 billion). There was a great deal of wailing and gnashing of teeth among integrationist and expansionist MEPs because Parliament didn’t get what it wanted, but the Council of Ministers was never likely to agree to much additional money in a period when, in many countries, budgets are under pressure to finance employment programmes.

 

The money added by the Parliament’s efforts is expected to go to research, educational programmes and such environmental programmes as LIFE, which has supported nature conservation in the South West (for example, restoration work at Marazion Marsh and at bird reserves on the Somerset levels). But as a whole the period 2007-2013 will see less EU spending going on in the Objective 2 parts of the South West (inner Bristol, north and west Devon, Torbay). Projects here will lose out to Eastern Europe in a predictable switch of EU spending. Cornwall looks set to continue its high priority as an EU Objective 1 sector, and I hope we can find worthwhile things to spend the money on.

 

The other budgetary issue came up at the end of the month after it had been revealed that the city of Strasbourg was raking off a previously undeclared portion of the rent it receives from the Parliament for onward transmission to the pension fund that owns the Strasbourg building. MEPs have to go to Strasbourg twelve times a year for the Parliament’s plenary sessions as a result of the 1992 “Edinburgh agreement “ (thank you, Mr Major) against which MEPs mounted an unsuccessful legal challenge. The arrangement was ratified in the Amsterdam Treaty of 1999 (thank you, Mr Blair). Most of us hate the disruption and the difficulty of getting there. Once there we operate in a building designed by a manic-depressive architect whose favourite colour, for the lifts and stairwells, was black.

 

So it was not surprising that we voted by 591 votes to 3 not to sign off the European Parliament’s budget for 2004 (one of the years when the rake off was operating) so our investigations remain open. We did however sign off the Commission's 2004 budget and obtained an undertaking from the Member States that they would make an annual return of the audits and controls they operate. The Court of Auditors has said many times that it cannot verify sound financial management completely with the existing control systems in the Member States.

 

One aspect of the EU budget that is being mismanaged entirely due to a national failure is the new Single Farm Payment to farmers. These are running very late, possibly because we have another malfunctioning government department, DEFRA. On 12 April the government wrote to the Commission asking for an extension until the mid-October of the deadline for paying the SFP; under current rules the Court of Justice would fine the government if it fails to make all 2005 payments by 30 June this year.

 

One possibly good idea that surfaced in the Parliament this month was the eCall system. A parliamentary report endorsed the idea of introducing this, in the hope of having it installed in all vehicles by 2009. These would then use satellite technology to alert the nearest emergency services to the exact location of a vehicle in the event of an accident. Proponents believe it could save up to 2,500 lives a year. Whatever the case for it, there is a dispute between the Commission and the car industry on how much the system would cost, and MEPs want a proper cost/benefit analysis carried out. One problem might be whether eCall could judge the severity of the accident. If I back gently into a row of unattended supermarket trolleys in Sainsbury’s car park would eCall mean that all the emergency services turn up?

 

John Prescott always was an unattractive bully. He was nominated from the Commons to be a Member of the European Parliament in the late1970s. It was said of him that he was the only Labour MEP ever to have “killed a Commissioner” (which may recommend him to you). This was because in 1976 he made a very aggressive, and, at the time, sensational speech attacking the Luxembourg Commissioner Albert Borschette for his failure to act on information about oil company payments to Italian government ministries. Borschette had a heart attack that night and never resumed his duties as a Commissioner. People linked the two events. I pass the “Borschette building” when I walk to the Parliament every morning. I am sure Prescott has forgotten him.

  

  

Caroline Jackson MEP