EPLA and committee preparations

9.30 Arrive in office because I travelled to Brussels yesterday, as always seems to be necessary on our Bank holidays. This month we are having a second committee week so it is a little unusual, presumably because of the constituency weeks. This morning has been kept free for me to review again the legal services opinion on EPLA, which we are discussing this afternoon. However, the deadline for ECON committee amendments to the report on the financial services white paper is upon us at noon tomorrow so we start on that first. The draft report contains too much of the usual ‘rant’ against hedge funds and I have decided that it would be useful to draw attention to the difference between Europe, where there is already registration required and regulation of the mangers and brokers, and the US which remains predominantly unregulated. This adds a new dimension.

I then update my Berlin speech text with what I actually said as some people have been asking for it. Finally I settle to work on EPLA and write an outline of what I want to say in JURI about the opinion. I am assuming that the legal services will respond to the paper that I previously circulated so I can now introduce further points which I will need to give them in writing. Really I have too much that is specialist, and I worry that some will not be able to follow it, but it needs to be said so that everyone understands that a lot of the points made in the opinion are extreme views and debatable.

14.00 Go to the ECON prep meeting for our group. We review upcoming votes tomorrow, nothing controversial except for how to fix excise duty where we have free votes. I will have to miss votes because things that I am shadowing are being voted in JURI at the same time.

15.00 I go to the JURI meeting. We discuss EPLA. My points seem to go down well. We then vote on the JURI opinion on the financial services white paper. Two of my four amendments are passed.

17.00 I look in on the end of the ECON committee meeting then return to the office to complete work on votes for tomorrow in JURI and on the ECON amendments on the white paper. Leave at 8.00pm