THE WEEK THAT WAS... (Feb. 19, 2013)

Recently European Council President Herman van Rompuy presented the deal agreed by the 27 EU Heads of States and Government for the multi-annual EU budget deal 2014-2020 to the Conference of Presidents (read: the political group leaders) of the European Parliament. Not an easy job for him!

Only Martin Callanan, leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists group (ECR), was rather positive .He thanked Van Rompuy for his work towards delivering this agreement and said ‘the deal is not perfect’. The Euro-sceptic Callanan blamed French President Hollande: ‘the socialist Hollande showed that his priority was not in fact a growth strategy for Europe, it was a growth strategy for French cows.’

Illustrating that spending 40% of the budget on farming in the 21st century was ‘madness’.

Guy Verhofstadt, leader of the EP Liberals, had a complete different opinion about the budget deal: ‘Sorry M. Van Rompuy but this is a budget of the past, not the future, a budget for less Europe, not more Europe!’. And that is exactly the problem: the europhile Verhofstadt always wants more money for more Europe.

Where will the money for (more) Europe come from? The news last week was that the Eurozone economy had shrunk in the last quarter of 2012. It seems that the economies of net-contributing memberstates (the ones that have to pay the bill) including Germany are slowly going down as well. In the meantime it is not only Europoliticians like Verhofstadt who are asking for more money for ‘Europe’ but the austerity-fatigued member states in the south who want cash as well (calling it ‘solidarity’!).

Didn’t you hear people at the top saying that the worst of the crisis is over? May be it is. When setting the bar exceptionally low…