online diary of Richard Corbett MEP

July 2004

Thursday 1 July

Agree with my colleague Linda McAvan on how to operate in our constituency for the coming years.With only two Labour MEPs to cover the whole region, it is sensible to make an informal geographical split for certain purposes, such as working with local authorities and handling constituents' cases. Last time, there was a three-way split, which must now be re-organised.

For this purpose, Linda McAvan and myself agreed on a split that divides the region more or less equally and with a clear demarcation line: the M62 and the Humber estuary. I will be first port of call for constituents above that line, and Linda below it.

Friday 2 July

The phones are hotting up ahead of the first meeting of the Socialist Group, which Labour MEPs belong to. The new leader is likely to be Martin Schulz, the German MEP who was famously attacked by Silvio Berlusconi in a debate last year. But there is disagreement on who should be the Group's candidate for President of Parliament. The President (speaker), once elected, has to be neutral as between Groups, but speaks for the Parliament as a whole. It is likely that there will be a large majority behind having a Socialist President for the first half of this Parliament and a Christian Democrat for the second.

Who should be the Socialist candidate? The EPLP has proposed Terry Wynn, but three other names are in the ring: Hannes Swoboda from Austria, José Borell from Spain (Catalonia) and a new Member from Slovenia.

Saturday 3 July

Off to Canterbury to speak at an academic conference at the University of Kent on the impact of the new Constitution on the EU's legislature i.e. on the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament. Most academics, at least, seem keen on the new Constitution, considering it to be a significant improvement on the current treaties, though some consider it not to be federal enough! Indeed, I gather some federalists intend to campaign against ratification of the Constitution, seeing it as a reaffirmation of a Europe of states.

Take an hour out to visit Canterbury and learn a bit about its history. Tourism has always been its main industry whether catering for travellers from the continent on their way to London, pilgrims coming to visit the shrine of Thomas Beckett, or, in more recent times, the more modern versions of tourism. For a hundred years or so after the arrival of the Huguenots, it was a bilingual French-English city and even today, French language church services are given in a chapel in the cathedral. Another aspect of our European heritage!

Sunday 4 July

So who would have thought that Greece would win the European football championship? Apparently the odds were 125-1 against at the start - but I know of no-one who actually placed a bet on them.

Monday 5 July

The first meeting of the members of the Socialist group in the newly-elected Parliament. Greek colleagues have a hangover from celebrating their team's victory in the European Championships the previous evening, while Portuguese colleagues are somewhat depressed (though we reassure them we know how it feels!).

We elect Martin Schultz as the new leader of the Socialist group. Martin was already well known within the Parliament, but only to a wider audience last year when Silvio Berlusconi went over-the-top in attacking him in a Parliamentary debate, saying that he reminded him of a leader of a concentration camp - a totally unfair description, as anyone who knows Martin would testify.

We also elect the Bureau for the Group, including my colleague Linda McAvan as Treasurer. The four candidates to be the Socialist group's nominee for President of the European Parliament (see last Friday's entry) make a presentation and answer questions for an hour and a half. Terry Wynn makes by far the best presentation, but the question and answer session is more evenly balanced. The vote will be first thing tomorrow morning.

In the evening I have dinner with Klaus Hänsch, former President of the Parliament, Josep Borrell, possibly the next President, Anne van Lanker, Elena Paciotti, and Pervanche Berès at the flat of Odilia Henriques, a Socialist Group official. Those present were all involved in the drafting of Europe's new Constitution. The one I know least is Borrell, who represented the Spanish Parliament in the constitutional Convention; he appears to be a charming and articulate character with sensible views on most subjects. But it will not be easy for him to become President of the Parliament as a new Member, despite his long ministerial and parliamentary experience.

Tuesday 6 July

The Socialist group votes on who should be its candidate for President of Parliament. Hannes Swoboda and Franc Horvat both withdraw, leaving it as a straight fight between Borrell and Terry Wynn. Borrell wins by 117 votes to 66: a not unexpected result given that he had the support of the entire Mediterranean block (French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and Greeks) as well as the Danes and the Austrians. Terry picked up the bulk of the rest, but given the election results (where we didn't do as well as we had hoped in Germany, Britain, Sweden, Poland and the Czech Republic, but very well indeed in Spain, Portugal, France and Italy), there is now a marked southern dimension to the Socialist Group.

Lunch with Claude Moraes to discuss how we can contribute to the Fabian Society's deliberations on the European Constitution. They are envisaging a series of seminars and conferences.

Late afternoon, EPLP meeting to examine what other posts in the Parliament we should put forward EPLP candidates for. We had intended to go for Vice President of the Parliament, probably with myself as candidate, but the relative sizes of each national party within our group mean that this will be difficult. If we got it, then our chances of also getting a Committee Chair would diminish. We decide to give priority to trying to secure chairmanship of the Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee, failing which the Vice Presidency will be our next priority rather than the Chairmanship of another Committee.

Wednesday 7 July

The group discusses its strategy for voting on the candidates proposed for President of the European Commission. The leading candidate is Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, presently Prime Minister of Portugal.

Despite its name, Barroso's Social Democratic Party sits in the centre-right EPP-ED Group in the European Parliament, not with Labour in the Socialist Group. So at first sight our decision seems simple: a centre-left group ought to oppose a centre-right Commission President.

But things aren't quite that simple. Firstly, Barroso was chosen unanimously by the Council, meaning he has already been approved by nine socialist Prime Ministers. Secondly, there has already been a concession to the Socialists: along with Barroso, the Council has proposed Spanish socialist Javier Solana as the EU's foreign affairs representative. And thirdly, the European Commission is always a coalition, with Commissioners of Christian Democrat, Liberal and Socialist persuasions. This will not change, no matter who we elect as President.

For these reasons, the Socialist Group intends to focus on obtaining a number of promises from Barroso about the policies he intends to follow, and the programme of his Commission.

If the undertakings we receive are not satisfactory, we will oppose his nomination, but if we are satisfied, we will support him.

Barroso can definitely count on the support of the centre-right EPP-ED, which is the largest Group in the Parliament, but the Liberals have not yet indicated how they will vote. If they oppose his nomination, the votes of the Socialists will be crucial.

Thursday 8 July

Morning flight back to Leeds Bradford airport and work in the constituency office on correspondence for the remainder of the day.

Friday 9 July

More constituency work in the office, where I also interview a young student who will be doing her year abroad at Strasbourg University next year and who wants to come in and help in the office in the parliament building during the parliament sessions. She is articulate and sounds very capable and we soon agree that she will start in September.

In the evening with my wife, Anne, and my assistant, Lol, to eat with the Reverend Paul Flowers at Mumtaz restaurant in Bradford: a celebrated landmark that started as a small restaurant with just a couple of tables twenty years ago and has now broadened into a massive restaurant and food catering company employing a significant number of people in the district. The food is delicious.

Saturday 10 July

Off to the races at York, courtesy of ITV Yorkshire who have a box. Along with four MPs and one other MEP from all the mainstream parties, we enjoy a nice meal and sparkling conversation, interrupted every half hour or so by the need to rush out onto the balcony to watch a stampede of horses going by. Curious phenomenon!

Sunday 11 July

Shipley CLP garden party, or rather what would be a garden party, were it not pouring with rain - turning it into a house party. Nonetheless, a merry time is had by all and when Chris Leslie MP drew the raffle, I actually won one of the lesser prizes - some smelling salts!

Monday 12 July

Brussels again: a final week of preparatory meetings before the first sitting of the new Parliament next week. The issues are major and minor, varying from whether we support Barroso as President of the Commission to who will sit on which Parliamentary Committee and sub-committee.

Tuesday 13 July

Barroso, the candidate proposed by the European Council for President of the Commission comes before the Socialist Group. He performs quite well, especially in answering difficult questions. If elected, he will certainly be no Jacques Delors but is likely to be better than Santer or Prodi.

Lunch with Herman van Rompuy, former Deputy Prime Minister of Belgium (and the man who would have taken over as P.M. had John Major not vetoed the appointment of Jean Luc Dehaene as President of the Commission ten years ago). He gives me some wonderful insights into Belgian politics, which is helpful to me in my role as the Labour Party's liaison member for Belgium.

Wednesday 14 July

To London to give evidence to the House of Commons Modernisation Committee. This Committee, chaired by Peter Hain, is looking at how to improve the workings of the Westminster Parliament, many of whose procedures come from medieval times - which is fine for pomp and ceremony but not always ideal for effective scrutiny of the government.

Today the committee wants to know the views of myself, Chris Huhne MEP (Lib Dem), Tim Kirkhope MEP (Conservative) and John Whittaker (a new UKIP MEP) on how to improve scrutiny of European matters. I make five suggestions:

• Not to treat EU matters as "foreign policy": the overwhelming majority of what the EU does is about domestic policy: environment, consumer protection etc.
• To follow the model of the national Parliaments in Nordic countries which require ministers to appear before the relevant Parliamentary Committee prior to their departure of any meeting of the EU Council of Ministers in order to explain what is on the agenda, what positions they intend to take and listen to the views of the members.
• To introduce a system of scrutiny of the transposition of European legislation into domestic law. When this is not done by legislation, but by statutory instrument, there needs to be strong Parliamentary scrutiny over the government. This could help counter Whitehall's tendency to "gold-plate" European legislation by taking the opportunity to bolt on extra bits of their own.
• To hold meetings of the EU scrutiny committee in public: in this age of openness and transparency it is astonishing that this committee still meets behind closed doors (unlike all European Parliament committees which meet in public).
• To involve, where appropriate, MEPs in their work in order to draw on their detailed knowledge and expertise. They should, of course, not vote in the House of Commons Committees, but they should be invited to attend and speak on appropriate subjects.

These ideas give rise to a lively discussion and are, in the main, welcomed. Curiously, the UKIP MEP remains totally silent until invited to speak after some time, at which point he says that he's not particularly interested in improving EU legislation as, in his view, there shouldn't be any such thing and the main task was to get Britain out of Europe. When invited to comment on how, until that happened, Parliamentary scrutiny could be improved, he can't respond. So much for UKIP's contribution to democracy!

After a quick cup of tea with one of the Labour members I then go off to the French Ambassador's residence in Kensington Palace Gardens for a reception to mark the French national holiday. A couple of hundred are there, but for the first twenty minutes scarcely anybody I know (though it's strange to see arch-europhobe Norman Lamont there - possibly the worst Chancellor of the Exchequer ever). I realise that the Westminster Village is focused on the Butler Report and the Prime Minister's statement following it, and almost all MPs, political journalists and so on have stayed in the Palace of Westminster rather than venturing out, even during their lunchbreak. In the end, Denis MacShane MP, Minister for Europe, does his duty and turns up. We have a good natter about what was happening in the European Parliament regarding the Presidents of the Commission and of the Parliament and then he kindly gives me a lift in his ministerial car afterwards.

I do a lengthy interview for Radio Quebec in Canada on the Butler report and how it was, as they put it, that Tony Blair has escaped unscathed yet again.

Thursday 15 July

By-election day in Leicester and in Birmingham. The pundits are predicting that Labour will lose both seats. In the end, with Labour retaining one seat and the Liberal Democrats taking the other. Another terrible night for the Tories.

But all this is actually overshadowed in a news bulletins by the extraordinary programme broadcast by the BBC showing internal meetings of the BNP. Thanks to an undercover reporter, we see senior BNP figures making the most outrageous racist comments and admitting to perpetrating acts of violence and wishing to kill Muslims. Hopefully, this will be an eye-opener for the thousands of people who did, sadly, vote BNP.

Friday 16 July

Office day - that is once I've tracked down where DHL has its headquarters as somebody has been misguided enough to send me a package to my home address by courier. It inevitably arrived when I was out and now I have to go chasing after it.

In the office I meet Ellie Price, a young student from Sheffield who has come in to do some work experience. Interestingly she speaks fluent Norwegian, Danish, German and is going to teach herself Russian later this year!

The other big news of the day is that UKIP has already lost one of its MEPs. Ashby Mote has been forced to resign from the Party after revelations that he is being prosecuted for benefit fraud.

So the bunch of MEPs who turned up in Strasbourg last week claiming loudly that their main aim in life was to combat waste and fraud, but before they even formally take up their seats, one of them is charged with fraud himself!

So, one down, eleven to go. Judging by their behaviour in the previous Parliament and the constant internal splits and rows, it will be amazing if there aren't further UKIP casualties during the lifetime of this Parliament.

And I wonder when the press are going to start exploring in detail the links between UKIP and the BNP.

End of the day to Rotherham to join a local Labour party social event with my fellow Labour MEPs and Denis MacShane MP, Minister for Europe who is also the local MP. Pies and peas for everyone plus a quiz and a raffle which I and my colleagues draw. A nice lively event with over 100 present.

Monday 19 July

To Strasbourg for the inaugural session of the new Parliament. Discussions already well under way on which group gets the chair of which committee etc.

In the evening is the monthly meeting of the Labour Members for Europe. An interesting debate which includes how the new UKIP members will affect the Parliament. However, as they say themselves, they intend to do nothing, so it is hard to imagine what impact, if any, they could have. If they intend to do nothing, how will they represent the constituents who elected them?

Tuesday 20 July

The new Parliament assembles and elects a Spanish socialist, Josep Borrell, as President. With 388 votes, he defeats Polish Liberal Bronislaw Geremek (208votes) and French Communist Francis Wurtz (51 votes).

The British media, however, focus on the antics of our new UKIP MEPs. Having initially said they would not serve on any Parliamentary committee, they have now changed their minds in order to "obstruct and delay" the Parliament's work.

Godfrey Bloom has announced he's standing for the Women's Rights committee - where, he says, he will campaign for the rights of men. He will hardly have ingratiated himself to his future colleagues on that committee when he stated that "no self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would ever employ a lady of child bearing age"! He also told journalists that he wanted to deal with women's issues because "I just don't think they clean behind the fridge enough".

Mr Bloom is supposed to be a businessman. How many of his female clients would actually purchase anything from a man with such views? Come to that, how many women would have actually voted for him had he made his views known before the election?

UKIP has joined with some other eurosceptic groups, notably the far right League of Polish Families, in a political group which they call "Independence and Democracy", with the acronym ID. I suggest they should actually call it "Independence and Democracy In Our Time", as this would form a more memorable and appropriate acronym.

In the evening I go to events hosted by the BBC, the CBI and the ETUC respectively to mark the beginning of the new Parliament.

Wednesday 21 July

Breakfast meeting with Inigo Mendez de Vigo, the Christian Democrats' co-ordinator and spokesperson on constitutional questions. I have been, and am likely to be, as the Socialist Group's spokesperson on these affairs. We discuss the likely workload of the Constitutional Affairs committee over the coming years when member states will be ratifying the new constitutional treaty.

Going into the chamber, I bump into Gerry Collins MEP, the former Irish Foreign Minister who introduces me to Bertie Ahern, the Irish Prime Minister by saying "meet a Kerryman": he remembered that my great grandmother on my mother's side came originally from Castleisland in Kerry and this was enough to turn me into an honorary Irishman for the benefit of the Irish Prime Minister!

Today we had debates in succession on the report back of the Irish Council Presidency, notably on achieving agreement on the constitution, and then the programme of the Dutch Presidency with Harry Potter look-a-like Prime Minister Bolkenene presenting their programme.

In the afternoon I explain to the constitutional inter-group how this word "federalism" is completely distorted from its continental meaning when it is used by the UK media (who think federalism means centralism) before going to the Socialist Group meeting at which we decide what position to take on the candidacy of Barrosso for President of the Commission. The Group decides by an overwhelming majority to vote against him whilst recognising the right of minority delegations to vote in favour or abstain. The minority comprises between a quarter and a third of the Group.

Do an interview with the BBC World Service Radio on the subject of Barrosso's selection.

Thursday 22 July

Parliament elects Barrosso as President of the European Commission by 413 votes to 351. Having elected a Spaniard as President of the Parliament and a Portuguese as President of the Commission, I reflect on how Spain and Portugal are taking over the citadels of power... Liverpool and Chelsea.

I have lunch with some French MEPs keen to hear how a Labour government has managed to get unemployment to such a low level and obtain record economic growth. In the afternoon to the constitutive of my main parliamentary committee, the Committee of Constitutional Affairs, where we elect the German Social Democrat Joe Leinen as Chair.