Eurobloat #0114 • October 2019
October was a busy month for the Union: it agreed to let one nation leave, refused to let two more in, told a court that one country's libel law may now govern the whole of cyberspace, and handed down sacred scripture on the subject of the pre-ticked checkbox. The empire is in fine fettle.
Folly of the Month: A national court in Vienna may now censor the entire internet
On 3 October the Court of Justice ruled in Glawischnig-Piesczek v Facebook that a single member state's court can order a platform to hunt down and delete not only an offending post but everything "identical" and "equivalent" to it, and to do so worldwide. So the Austrian definition of a rude word about an Austrian politician can now, in principle, be scrubbed from screens in Tokyo and Toronto. The judges who warned for years that there must be no "general monitoring obligation" then ordered exactly that, draped in the word "specific", and waved away the small question of who decides what counts as "equivalent". Brussels spent a decade lecturing the world about a free and open internet, then ruled that the most censorious courtroom in Europe gets to set the global standard.
1. France discovers the off switch and Brussels calls it a betrayal
At the 17 to 18 October summit, France, backed by the Netherlands and Denmark, blocked the opening of accession talks with North Macedonia and Albania, with Macron noting that Albania is the second largest source of asylum seekers arriving in France. A member state used its veto to slow enlargement and control migration, and the entire commentariat treated this exercise of sovereignty as a scandal rather than the system working as designed.
2. The Union solemnly approves Britain leaving
At the same summit the European Council endorsed the withdrawal agreement and the political declaration, formally blessing the United Kingdom's orderly departure. After three years of warning that leaving was impossible, unthinkable and economically suicidal, the twenty-seven shook hands on the paperwork that proved otherwise.
3. The Grand Chamber rules on the correct way to tick a box
On 1 October the Court of Justice handed down its Planet49 judgment, decreeing that a pre-ticked checkbox does not amount to valid consent for cookies. Thirteen judges of the Union's highest court convened to establish that a box the user did not tick is a box the user did not tick, a finding that has since blessed the continent with a popup on every single website you will ever visit.
4. Parliament rejects the President's hand-picked Frenchwoman
On 10 October MEPs threw out Sylvie Goulard, Macron's nominee for the powerful internal market and industry portfolio, over a fake-jobs inquiry and her lucrative sideline advising an American think-tank. The Elysee cried "political game", which is a remarkable complaint from a man who had just vetoed two countries' futures the following week.
5. Brussels writes ten regulations on how to fix a fridge
On 1 October the Commission adopted a package of ecodesign rules dictating that makers of washing machines, dishwashers, fridges, lamps and televisions must keep spare parts available for years and design products to be repairable. A perfectly sensible idea that somehow required ten separate implementing regulations and the full machinery of Brussels, because nothing says "circular economy" like a wardrobe of paperwork on the precise repairability of a toaster.
6. Twenty-eight foreign ministers cannot agree to disagree about Turkey
On 14 October the Foreign Affairs Council, faced with Turkey's invasion of north-east Syria, proved unable to agree a single EU arms embargo and settled for each capital limiting its own sales. The common foreign and security policy, that great instrument of European weight in the world, managed to produce twenty-eight separate policies on a war happening on its own doorstep.
7. Draghi turns the money printer back on as his own board mutinies
At his final meeting on 24 October Mario Draghi defended the restart of bond-buying, a decision so contested that half a dozen national central bankers had publicly dissented and Germany's Sabine Lautenschlaeger resigned in protest before the month was out. When the people running the central bank cannot stomach the central bank's policy, perhaps the policy is the problem, but the printer kept printing all the same.
8. Parliament's answer to a slowing economy is to spend more
On 23 October MEPs adopted their position on the 2020 budget, rejecting the Council's modest cuts and voting to push spending up for their preferred priorities. The Commission had proposed a rise, the Council trimmed it, and Parliament, that famous guardian of the taxpayer, decided the only acceptable direction for the number was further up.
9. MEPs award a human-rights prize while courting the jailer
On 24 October Parliament awarded the Sakharov Prize to the jailed Uyghur scholar Ilham Tohti, a deserving choice and a fine sermon against Beijing's repression. The same Union spent the year deepening its trade and investment talks with that very government, proving once again that Brussels can hold a medal in one hand and a chequebook in the other without the slightest discomfort.
Enjoyed this post?
Well, you could share the post with others, follow me with RSS Feeds and/or send me a comment via email.
Tags
Category:
Year: