Eurobloat #0135 • July 2021
July was the month the European Commission decided that thirteen sweeping proposals, eight of them rewrites of existing law and five of them brand new, was the correct response to a warming planet, that your text messages should be scanned for your own good, and that ten thousand euros was quite enough cash for one person to handle. More Europe, as ever, was the answer to every question nobody asked.
Folly of the Month: A new tax, an old fantasy, and the biggest legislative dump in history
On 14 July the Commission tabled "Fit for 55", which it proudly described as its largest ever legislative package. Tucked inside were two prizes for the centralisers: a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, which is a tariff on imported cement, steel and fertiliser dressed up as climate policy, and a revised Energy Taxation Directive that hands Brussels a firmer grip on how member states tax fuel. A bloc that cannot agree on a budget without a summit running past dawn now proposes to police the carbon content of foreign aluminium and to harmonise petrol duty across twenty-seven capitals. The genius of it is that the new border tax solves a problem the EU's own emissions scheme created, and the bill lands on consumers either way.
→ taxation-customs.ec.europa.eu
1. The ECB discovers that 2 per cent is better than slightly less than 2 per cent
On 8 July the Governing Council unveiled its first strategy review since 2003 and arrived at a symmetric inflation target of 2 per cent, replacing the old aim of "below, but close to, 2 per cent". Eighteen years of deliberation to move a comma, and just in time for the inflation that was about to make the target look quaint.
2. Your private messages, now open for inspection
On 6 July Parliament passed a derogation from the ePrivacy Directive so that providers may scan emails, messages and chats for child abuse material. The cause is unimpeachable and the precedent is poison: Brussels has now formally established that the contents of your correspondence are a suitable subject for automated machine inspection, and the campaigners promising a permanent, mandatory version were already sharpening their pencils.
→ edri.org
3. A new agency, and a ceiling on your own cash
On 20 July the Commission proposed a fresh European authority for anti-money-laundering, the inevitable AMLA, complete with powers to fine, and a hard cap of ten thousand euros on cash payments across the Union. Nothing says trust in the citizen like a new Brussels supervisor and a legal limit on how much of your own money you may hand over without an official taking an interest.
4. The Court tells Poland how to run its courts
On 15 July the Court of Justice ruled in Case C-791/19 that Poland's disciplinary chamber for judges was incompatible with EU law and ordered it suspended. Whatever one makes of Warsaw's reforms, the spectacle of a Luxembourg court dictating the architecture of a member state's judiciary, on pain of fines to follow, is centralisation in its purest robe-and-gavel form.
5. The combustion engine sentenced to death by 2035
The same 14 July package set new car emissions at a 100 per cent cut by 2035, which is the polite Brussels phrasing for banning the sale of petrol and diesel cars outright. A continent that cannot keep its own chargers compatible has decided exactly which technology every motorist must buy fourteen years hence, and called it choice.
6. The open border meets Lukashenko, and blinks
On 2 July Lithuania declared a state of emergency as Belarus funnelled migrants across its frontier in retaliation for EU sanctions, with daily crossings smashing records and Vilnius beginning a razor-wire fence. The bloc that lectures member states on welcoming arrivals discovered, the moment a hostile neighbour weaponised those arrivals, that fences and Frontex officers are rather useful after all.
7. The recovery billions begin to flow
On 13 July the Council gave the green light to the first disbursements from the joint borrowing scheme, unlocking pre-financing for a dozen member states from Spain to Slovakia. Common debt, raised by Brussels and parcelled out by Brussels, was sold as a one-off emergency: history suggests the emergency will prove remarkably durable.
8. A papers-please app for the whole continent
On 1 July the EU Digital COVID Certificate went live, an EU-wide QR-coded pass declaring whether you had been vaccinated, tested or recovered before you were permitted to cross a border. More than two billion of these would eventually be issued, building the habit of producing a digital credential on demand into the muscle memory of half a billion people.
9. A gold standard for green bonds, set by the people who set standards
Also on 6 July the Commission rolled out its Renewed Sustainable Finance Strategy, including a European Green Bond Standard so that Brussels could decide which investments count as virtuous. A bloc that already grades its own members now proposes to grade the planet's capital markets, voluntarily for now, which is how these things always begin.
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