5.30 Off to Luton airport. I bid goodbye to other regular travellers I may not see again when the flights change in September. I finish off the blog for last week on the plane. We get to Basle approximately on time, car is there and so Austrian MEP Johannes and I get to the Parliament just before noon (11 am UK time). Being first in I unpack my trunk and all the other stuff we have locked in the cupboard (my mini fridge got stolen last year). Having unpacked I investigate emails and other correspondence. Check through the amendments that other Groups have filed on the van den Burg report.
15.30 Go down to Group. Nothing hugely relevant to me but I am keeping a watch out for things popping up from various committees other than my own. I get 1 minute to speak on the van den Burg report and they forget to give me time on TRIPS (but I see the Secretary general who says he will fix it, so that will be another one minute)
17.30 Our UKLib Dem delegation meeting (LDEPP). We exchange views about items coming up for votes where we may have to fight our corner in Group. Possible controversies are on postal services, the report on the employment green paper and the one that has been constantly on my desk, the van den Burg report on the financial services white paper. The biggest problem we have however seems to be how can we get all twelve of us in one place to have our photo taken.
18.00 I leave LDEPP early to get to Working Group A to discuss the van den Burg report. Those of us there reach an agreed line on the various amendments in from other groups and I get agreement to ask for a split vote to take ‘investment banks’ out of a paragraph that flags up the consolidation of firms offering financial services to large listed companies, especially in the field of audit, Credit rating and investment banks. I think the statement is true about audit firms (less than a handful that can do the big audits) and credit rating agencies, but there is not the same order of concentration with investment banks and that dilutes the point we are making about audit firms. Margarita is not there, who is the shadow, and I point out that she may have a differing view on a couple of points. However, everyone there agrees the lines that Wolf and I want to take.
19.00 Back to the office, paperwork and working out how much I can squeeze into one minute on the financial services report. The shorter the speech the harder it is. I take the opportunity to leave ‘early’ at 20.30.
Monday, 9 July 2007
Thursday, 5 July 2007
Busy Weekend Ahead!
9.00 In to the office. All I am doing this morning is clearing my desk and getting the midday Eurostar as I have a meeting in London. On Eurostar work on my speech for Friday, which means I have missed my blogging time again. Getting into bad habits. Tomorrow morning we are presenting the Eurostar petition at Downing Street, then I have my speech, then another meeting. On Saturday I am in Maidstone. Pity it is not Sunday as I could have caught the Tour de France at the same time.
Wednesday, 4 July 2007
Solvency II and Collective Actions
9.00 Group meeting. Rather irritatingly I have to leave before the employment bit. However proxies have been arranged but I am not sure we have enough people there to cast them all.
10.00 I go on a bit of mystery tour in the Journalists’ part of the Parliament building. Looks much swisher than our bit!! Eventually find the seminar. I have to start it on my own then Pervenche Beres arrives. We talk about Solvency ll, private equity, hedge funds and the Euro. We are filmed by Spanish TV.
12.30 Back to the office and collect a few papers then down to the lunch that I am hosting on collective redress in Europe.
13.00 Lunch with the European Justice Forum. We talk about collective actions, how not to have the pitfalls of the US system. I think it is useful. My input mainly seems to be getting the message over that the Parliament is probably more interested in consumer redress aspects than in encouraging company on company actions. There is some mention of the recent developments in Australia, which may not have gone as intended. I will need to follow this up.
15.00 Back to the office and to pack my trunk for Strasbourg. Then I do some more work on what to say on Friday. I think I have too much now but will edit it down on Eurostar tomorrow. Carol leaves to get Eurostar back to UK, then Alan leaves. I hope he has had a flavour of what goes on. Probably easier to follow as it was a Group week. I am just getting ready to leave when Peter Price turn up to talk about Solvency ll, so end up leaving at about 8pm.
10.00 I go on a bit of mystery tour in the Journalists’ part of the Parliament building. Looks much swisher than our bit!! Eventually find the seminar. I have to start it on my own then Pervenche Beres arrives. We talk about Solvency ll, private equity, hedge funds and the Euro. We are filmed by Spanish TV.
12.30 Back to the office and collect a few papers then down to the lunch that I am hosting on collective redress in Europe.
13.00 Lunch with the European Justice Forum. We talk about collective actions, how not to have the pitfalls of the US system. I think it is useful. My input mainly seems to be getting the message over that the Parliament is probably more interested in consumer redress aspects than in encouraging company on company actions. There is some mention of the recent developments in Australia, which may not have gone as intended. I will need to follow this up.
15.00 Back to the office and to pack my trunk for Strasbourg. Then I do some more work on what to say on Friday. I think I have too much now but will edit it down on Eurostar tomorrow. Carol leaves to get Eurostar back to UK, then Alan leaves. I hope he has had a flavour of what goes on. Probably easier to follow as it was a Group week. I am just getting ready to leave when Peter Price turn up to talk about Solvency ll, so end up leaving at about 8pm.
Tuesday, 3 July 2007
TRIPS, Working Groups and Meetings
8.00 I am at a working breakfast on alternative dispute resolution. I am the first speaker, which works quite well because I am able to cover some of the basic discussion on the mediation directive that we had with the incoming Portuguese presidency. Again I toss in class/collective actions and the question of whether ADR could eliminate the need for court class actions. A question of whether that satisfies the ECJ (who say consumers must have right of redress) without infringing human rights, which I suppose it may not if there is an individual right to court still.
9.30 Into the office and paperwork. I have not had any detailed feedback on the amendments to the van den Burgh report that I launched last week. I gather that Margarita has spoken to Wolf, so let’s see what happens in Group.
11.00 There is a meeting of the European Federalists to discuss the outcome of the European Council. I take Alan along so he can listen in. I thought they might be saying something to us about their thoughts, but by the time I get there it seems the other way around, so I say how it looks from the UK perspective. Leave early in order to get to working group on TRIPS.
11.30 Working group. I say my bit about the TRIPS matter. I still think that the sooner we ratify the better, but obviously others think prevarication gives more opportunity to make a fuss. Not that it will make a great deal of difference. I am asking for speaking time on this next week.
12.10 My individual meeting with the working Group. We go through mainly the financial portfolios I am dealing with and their relevance to individuals: which of course is quite a lot as long as there is more than one sentence to explain it in. The easy approach is to hang it around the Equitable Life enquiry and the need to have good pension planning, which gets us into equity and mortgages and so on.
12.45 LDEPP meeting with Nick Clegg. A general exchange of views about things European and whether we need a referendum on the treaty. I say I have changed my mind: I used to think, when we asked for a referendum on the Euro, that it meant we would proceed to have sensible discussion. However all that has happened is that it has swept sensible discussion under the carpet – the same was true as a result of calling for a referendum on the Constitution, never any detailed discussion. So there should not be a referendum and if people do not like it then they should insist that Europe is talked about when we have General Elections. It is not a side dish or a ‘how to have a free kick’. The most powerful part of the EU legislature, the Council, our Government Ministers, are elected at General Elections, so about time it was an issue then.
14.30 Working group A. The van den Burg report. About two thirds of my amendments are agreed as is. After a bit of a battle we agree there are ways to compromise on the rest. Then we have a bit of a ding dong about a proposed amendment from Margarita, backed by Wolf. It is all about objecting to foreign (Chinese and Russian) investment in hedge funds. I started off gently with free market principles, which did not get me far enough, eventually did the words protectionist populism really fall from my lips? Anyway, amendment not being tabled as a result. Carol thinks it was all very instructive for Alan to listen to me arguing my case.
15.30 Office and papers. I have a look at my notes for speaking on Friday and we collate some information for tomorrow when I appear to have agreed to do a seminar session with some Journalists on economic committee subjects. Some compromise texts on van den Burg go back and forth.
17.30 Group Meeting. We are able to give the good news that we have agreed on our van den Burg amendments. Several of us get annoyed that we are not discussing an Employment paper that we have all turned up for because the lead person can not be there. I have just been checking out Liz’s proposed amendments and they are fine. I shadowed this on ECON.
9.30 Into the office and paperwork. I have not had any detailed feedback on the amendments to the van den Burgh report that I launched last week. I gather that Margarita has spoken to Wolf, so let’s see what happens in Group.
11.00 There is a meeting of the European Federalists to discuss the outcome of the European Council. I take Alan along so he can listen in. I thought they might be saying something to us about their thoughts, but by the time I get there it seems the other way around, so I say how it looks from the UK perspective. Leave early in order to get to working group on TRIPS.
11.30 Working group. I say my bit about the TRIPS matter. I still think that the sooner we ratify the better, but obviously others think prevarication gives more opportunity to make a fuss. Not that it will make a great deal of difference. I am asking for speaking time on this next week.
12.10 My individual meeting with the working Group. We go through mainly the financial portfolios I am dealing with and their relevance to individuals: which of course is quite a lot as long as there is more than one sentence to explain it in. The easy approach is to hang it around the Equitable Life enquiry and the need to have good pension planning, which gets us into equity and mortgages and so on.
12.45 LDEPP meeting with Nick Clegg. A general exchange of views about things European and whether we need a referendum on the treaty. I say I have changed my mind: I used to think, when we asked for a referendum on the Euro, that it meant we would proceed to have sensible discussion. However all that has happened is that it has swept sensible discussion under the carpet – the same was true as a result of calling for a referendum on the Constitution, never any detailed discussion. So there should not be a referendum and if people do not like it then they should insist that Europe is talked about when we have General Elections. It is not a side dish or a ‘how to have a free kick’. The most powerful part of the EU legislature, the Council, our Government Ministers, are elected at General Elections, so about time it was an issue then.
14.30 Working group A. The van den Burg report. About two thirds of my amendments are agreed as is. After a bit of a battle we agree there are ways to compromise on the rest. Then we have a bit of a ding dong about a proposed amendment from Margarita, backed by Wolf. It is all about objecting to foreign (Chinese and Russian) investment in hedge funds. I started off gently with free market principles, which did not get me far enough, eventually did the words protectionist populism really fall from my lips? Anyway, amendment not being tabled as a result. Carol thinks it was all very instructive for Alan to listen to me arguing my case.
15.30 Office and papers. I have a look at my notes for speaking on Friday and we collate some information for tomorrow when I appear to have agreed to do a seminar session with some Journalists on economic committee subjects. Some compromise texts on van den Burg go back and forth.
17.30 Group Meeting. We are able to give the good news that we have agreed on our van den Burg amendments. Several of us get annoyed that we are not discussing an Employment paper that we have all turned up for because the lead person can not be there. I have just been checking out Liz’s proposed amendments and they are fine. I shadowed this on ECON.
Monday, 2 July 2007
A day of meetings
10.00 Off to Heathrow. Flight delayed. Arrive at my office around 3.30. Edith is there going through Eurostar petition things with Carol. We are presenting this at Downing Street on Friday Morning. I also have a work experience student, Alan, in my office this week. He has red hair too – seems the trade mark of my office.
17.00 A delegation from the European Committee for Interoperable Standards arrive, billed as discussing the anti-trust complaint about Microsoft. However I am more interested in dealing with interoperability away from hard cases, so we end up having a wide ranging discussion.
18.30 Reception for a policy working group from the Lib Dems. Useful networking and exchange of information. I have a formal session with them tomorrow so I am not going to the dinner tonight and I can read up on alternative dispute resolution ready for tomorrow morning.
17.00 A delegation from the European Committee for Interoperable Standards arrive, billed as discussing the anti-trust complaint about Microsoft. However I am more interested in dealing with interoperability away from hard cases, so we end up having a wide ranging discussion.
18.30 Reception for a policy working group from the Lib Dems. Useful networking and exchange of information. I have a formal session with them tomorrow so I am not going to the dinner tonight and I can read up on alternative dispute resolution ready for tomorrow morning.
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