European Union

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Ministers of Foreign Affairs from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and from the EU meet in Brussels on 16 and 17 July 2018. "Building bridges and strengthening our partnership to face global challenges" is the theme of the meeting. At the end of the meeting, EU and CELAC ministers are expected to adopt a declaration.

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Further information
Nato summit: "I know there is a commitment from the Europeans”
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Delegations

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

item 5: Special report no. 15/2018 by the European Court of Auditors on EUCAP Sahel: Strengthening the capacity of the internal security forces in Niger and Mali
Presentation by Bettina Jakobsen, Member of the European Court of Auditors responsible for the report
Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Banque postale v ECB
Economic policy
The General Court annuls the decisions of the ECB refusing to allow six French credit institutions to exclude from the calculation of the leverage ratio certain exposure connected to French savings accounts

Curto v Parliament
Staff Regulations of Officials
The General Court orders the European Parliament and the EIB to each pay €10 000 in damages to members of staff who have suffered psychological harassment

The next AFET meetings are scheduled to take place on:

Wednesday, 29 August 2018, 09:00-12:30 and 14:30-18:30, room JAN 2Q2
Thursday, 30 August 2018, 09:00-12:30, room JAN 2Q2

Further information
Information for visitors
Draft agendas
Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

More of Britain’s exports and imports go to and come from the EU Single Market than any other area in the world. It’s our most important, most lucrative, most vital international market for transacting business, upon which our country’s wealth depends.

Nearly half of our exports go to the EU Single Market, and just over half of our imports come from the EU Single Market. Nowhere else in the world comes anywhere close to that. Nowhere else in the world can get anywhere close to that.

① Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership so we can trade with the rest of the world. But that’s nonsense.

We trade with the rest of the world now. The EU does not stop us.

② Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because other areas in the world are growing faster than the EU. But that’s nonsense.

We trade now with faster growing economies. The EU does not stop us.

③ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership so that we can strike our own trade deals with other countries. But that’s nonsense. 

Through the EU, we benefit from the best trade deals, because the EU as a club of 28 countries has the size, the muscle and the clout to negotiate the best trade deals for its members.

On its own, the UK won’t be able to strike deals anywhere near as good as, let alone better than, the ones we already have now through the EU. It will take us many years to replace excellent EU trade agreements with inferior ones.

④ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because we don’t need free movement of goods, services and capital across the EU. But that’s nonsense. 

Easy, borderless, tariff-free trade across our continent is vital for British businesses and British jobs. If we lose frictionless access to our biggest and best customers and suppliers across our continent, our economy will seriously suffer.

⑤ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they particularly don’t like free movement of people. But that’s nonsense. 

Without free movement of people across the EU’s Single Market, our services industry, upon which 80% of the UK’s economy depends, will slump.

Without free movement of people, British businesses will lose easy access to workers across our continent, to do the jobs that Britain simply doesn’t have enough Britons to do.

What’s more, our workers will lose easy access to the world’s biggest and best jobs market. And Britons will lose the right to live in other countries across the EU on preferential terms.

⑥ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they don’t like EU rules that govern trade across the EU. But that’s nonsense. 

Without a common rule book covering safety, quality, guaranteed standards and business practices, chaos would ensue between businesses across our continent. Vital protections of workers and consumers in Europe would be lost. The safety of our continent’s people and environment would be put in jeopardy.

⑦ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they want the UK to make its own laws and rules. But that’s nonsense. 

Most laws for our country are already made in our country.

But rules and laws covering how we transact business across our continent need to be agreed by countries across our continent.

In the EU, the UK has a say and votes on those rules and laws. Outside the EU, we’ll have no say and no votes on those rules and laws, but we’ll still be subject to them, and just as affected by them. 

CONSIDER THIS: The UK currently benefits from two single markets. Our country’s single market. And our continent’s single market. They both operate in the same way and on the same principles.

Free movement of people, goods, services and capital between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland form the basis of our union of the four countries of the United Kingdom. It’s our single market. It’s the glue that keeps us together.

Enabling people, goods, services and money to move without borders or restrictions across the United Kingdom is what makes us a functioning unity. It’s helped to make the UK one of the world’s richest and most successful countries, with common standards, values and history.

Free movement of people, goods, services and capital work together. They cannot be separated without causing discord and disorder across our nation.

Mess with just one of the four freedoms and our union of the UK would come undone. Not only business and employment would be affected, but peace and stability would be put at risk if we could not have the freedom to move, to do business, to trade, to send money, without friction, across and between our four countries of the UK.

It’s the same with EU. The EU functions as a cohesive single market of 28 countries, just as the UK functions as a cohesive single market of four counties. 

The EU Single Market is the glue that keeps European nations together. It has helped to make Europe the richest and most successful continent on the planet, with common standards, values and history.

The UK’s Single Market, and the EU’s Single Market, both represent significant achievements. They work. 

But there’s one vital difference.

Free trade between the four countries of the UK is vital to our smooth functioning as a nation. But doing business with each other doesn’t make the UK significantly richer.

To do that, we need the UK to export our goods and services (and we export far more services than goods).

Doing frictionless trade with other EU countries makes Britain richer. Exports to the EU bring us prosperity. 

If we lose borderless, lowest-cost trade with our most important customers and suppliers right on our doorstop, Britain – and Britons – will be poorer.

Our exports to the rest of Europe bring us wealth. Yes, exports to countries outside the EU also bring us wealth.

We need both. In the EU, we have both.

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Britain needs the EU Single Market

→ Why leave & lose when we can stay & win? – Please shareBRITAIN NEEDS THE EU SINGLE MARKET – VIDEO & ARTICLEBy far, more of Britain’s exports and imports go to and come from the EU Single Market than any other area in the world. It’s our most important, most lucrative, most vital area for transacting business, upon which our country’s wealth depends.Nearly half of our exports go to the EU Single Market, and just over half of our imports come from the EU Single Market. Nowhere else in the world comes anywhere close to that. Nowhere else in the world can get anywhere close to that.① Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership so we can trade with the rest of the world. But that’s nonsense. We trade with the rest of the world now. The EU does not stop us. ② Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because other areas in the world are growing faster than the EU. But that’s nonsense. We trade now with faster growing economies. The EU does not stop us.③ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership so that we can strike our own trade deals with other countries. But that’s nonsense. Through the EU, we benefit from the best trade deals, because the EU as a club of 28 countries has the size, the muscle and the clout to negotiate the best trade deals for its members.On its own, the UK won’t be able to strike deals anywhere near as good as, let alone better than, the ones we already have now through the EU. It will take us many years to replace excellent EU trade agreements with inferior ones. ④ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because we don’t need free movement of goods, services and capital across the EU. But that’s nonsense. Easy, borderless, tariff-free trade across our continent is vital for British businesses and British jobs. If we lose frictionless access to our biggest and best customers and suppliers across our continent, our economy will seriously suffer. ⑤ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they particularly don’t like free movement of people. But that’s nonsense. Without free movement of people across the EU’s Single Market, our services industry, upon which 80% of the UK’s economy depends, will slump. Without free movement of people, British businesses will lose easy access to workers across our continent, to do the jobs that Britain simply doesn’t have enough Britons to do. What’s more, our workers will lose easy access to the world’s biggest and best jobs market. And Britons will lose the right to live in other countries across the EU on preferential terms. ⑥ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they don’t like EU rules that govern trade across the EU. But that’s nonsense. Without a common rule book covering safety, quality, guaranteed standards and business practices, chaos would ensue between businesses across our continent. Vital protections of workers and consumers in Europe would be lost. The safety of our continent’s people and environment would be put in jeopardy. ⑦ Brexiters claim we should abandon EU membership because they want the UK to make its own laws and rules. But that’s nonsense. Most laws for our country are already made in our country. But rules and laws covering how we transact business across our continent need to be agreed by countries across our continent. In the EU, the UK has a say and votes on those rules and laws. Outside the EU, we’ll have no say and no votes on those rules and laws, but we’ll still be subject to them, and just as affected by them. CONSIDER THIS:The UK currently benefits from two single markets. Our country’s single market. And our continent’s single market. They both operate in the same way and on the same principles.Free movement of people, goods, services and capital between England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland form the basis of our union of the four countries of the United Kingdom. It’s our single market. It’s the glue that keeps us together.Enabling people, goods, services and money to move without borders or restrictions across the United Kingdom is what makes us a functioning unity. It’s helped to make the UK one of the world’s richest and most successful countries, with common standards, values and history.Free movement of people, goods, services and capital work together. They cannot be separated without causing discord and disorder across our nation.Mess with just one of the four freedoms and our union of the UK would come undone. Not only business and employment would be affected, but peace and stability would be put at risk if we could not have the freedom to move, to do business, to trade, to send money, without friction, across and between our four countries of the UK.It’s the same with EU. The EU functions as a cohesive single market of 28 countries, just as the UK functions as a cohesive single market of four counties. The EU Single Market is the glue that keeps European nations together. It has helped to make Europe the richest and most successful continent on the planet, with common standards, values and history. The UK’s Single Market, and the EU’s Single Market, both represent significant achievements. They work. But there’s one vital difference.Free trade between the four countries of the UK is vital to our smooth functioning as a nation. But doing business with each other doesn’t make the UK significantly richer. To do that, we need the UK to export our goods and services (and we export far more services than goods).Doing frictionless trade with other EU countries makes Britain richer. Exports to the EU bring us prosperity. If we lose borderless, lowest-cost trade with our most important customers and suppliers right on our doorstop, Britain – and Britons – will be poorer. Our exports to the rest of Europe bring us wealth. Yes, exports to countries outside the EU also bring us wealth. We need both. In the EU, we have both. • Words and video compilation by Jon Danzig. Video by the European Parliament.• Please re-Tweet, and follow Reasons2Remain on Twitter.twitter.com/Reasons2Remain/status/1017491541949059073********************************************► Watch Jon Danzig's 50-minute video: 'Can Britain Stop Brexit?' Go to CanBritainStopBrexit.com********************************************• To follow and support Reasons2Remain just ‘like’ the page, and please invite all your friends to like the page. Instructions to ensure you get notifications of all our stories:1. Click on the ‘Following’ button under the Reasons2Remain banner2. Change the ‘Default’ setting by clicking ‘See first’.********************************************• Please rate Reasons2Remain out of 5 stars. Here's the link: facebook.com/Reasons2Remain/reviews/********************************************• Follow Reasons2Remain on Twitter: twitter.com/reasons2remain and Instagram: instagram.com/reasons2remain/********************************************• Explore our unique Reasons2Remain gallery of over 1,000 graphics and articles: reasons2remain.co.uk********************************************• Reasons2Remain is an entirely unfunded community campaign, unaffiliated with any other group or political party, and is run entirely by volunteers. If you'd like to help, please send us a private message.********************************************• © Reasons2Remain 2018. All our articles and graphics are the copyright of Reasons2Remain. We only allow sharing using the Facebook share button. Any other use requires our advance permission in writing.#STOPBREXIT #EXITBREXIT #PEOPLESVOTE

Posted by Reasons2Remain on Thursday, 12 July 2018

The post Britain needs the EU Single Market – article and video appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

will take place on Thursday, 6 September, 9:00-12:30 in Brussels.

Organisations or interest groups who wish to apply for access to the European Parliament will find the relevant information below.

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EU Finance Ministers of the eurozone meet on 12 July 2018 in Brussels to be briefed on the outcome of the June Euro Summit and on issues related to deepening the EMU on which Ministers will work until the next Euro Summit in December.

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A meeting of NATO Heads of State and Government is held on 11 and 12 July 2018, in Brussels. Against the background of recent challenges in the transatlantic relationship, the EU seeks to continue the good collaboration on security and defence between the two organisations.

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The Goldman Sachs Group v Commission
Competition
The General Court confirms the fines of over €300 million that the Commission imposed on the main European and Asian producers of (extra) high voltage power cables for their participation in a worldwide cartel

You do what you can, but that doesn’t mean success

At times this week it’s been hard to tell whether the flapping sound one can hear is that of England trying to avoid the build-up of excessive expectations, or of hard Brexiters fanning the flames of their ire.*

Since Friday’s Chequers meeting, numerous individuals have been working themselves up into states of apoplexy about things that have been rather self-evident for many months.

Probably the most emblematic comment came from Maria Caulfield in an interview with her local radio station yesterday, where she announced that a key reason for resigning as Vice-Chair of the Conservatives was that it has become apparent that Chequers was not the final deal, but merely a gambit in the Article 50 negotiations.

Given that no one had pretended otherwise, the biggest question is why this took four days to filter through.

Since I continue to dislike explanations that centre on stupidity, the best argument is that Caulfield’s move was part of a bigger programme of resistance within the party.

My view is that David Davis’ resignation on Monday wasn’t part of that resistance, at least not in the sense of being coordinated. He’d waited over the weekend, to allow many Cabinet colleagues to dip their hands in the blood of the deal, via op-eds and interviews, and his media activity on the day pointed to a desire to limit damage, be positioning himself as unable to support a deal that had Cabinet support.

If he’d really wanted to go to town on this, then he’d have walked down the Chequers driveway on Friday and stuck multiple knives into May, right there.

For Davis, this was probably the last realistic moment from him to step aside on a principled basis, given the apparent direction of travel: the explicit reaffirmation of collective responsibility on Friday was just as important as the text itself.

Once Davis left, Johnson had to make a quick decision about whether to follow. As many noted at the time, he wouldn’t look great whatever he chose (stay and look weak-willed; leave and look opportunistic), but given that his diminished base rests on his triumph in the referendum, departure was always going to be on the cards.

For now, Johnson is keeping his powder dry – either for today’s White Paper, or for a longer-term assault from the backbench later in the year, a la Churchill [sic] – which has meant that immediate scope for further Cabinet resignations is minimal, especially with Fox being brought onside with vague commitments on his department having a purpose.

Indeed, this week has underlined the strength and the weakness of resigning. If you play it right (think Howe), then you can make a huge impact; play it wrong and nothing really happens, except you’re now on the outside.

With Cabinet more locked down, attention moved to other positions of responsibility: this was the point where Caulfield and Ben Bradley moved to hand in their notices. That played to the internal party gallery, but outside has been of minimal interest. Plus, you can only resign once, so this was never going to be a long-term strategy.

Instead, the focus has now moved once more to where the hard Brexit grouping has most power: the chamber.

Last night saw the coordination of Tory and Labour MPs to move amendments to the Customs Bill. The aim is to find language that Labour will find attractive enough to support together with Tory rebels** that would either severely limit or even collapse the Chequers model.

While this approach has the merit of a more substantial base, it runs into several problems.

The first is that Labour might not play ball. The party’s position on whether or not to support the government through Article 50 changes daily, so it would be a foolish politician that sought to put any great stock in any one of those positions.

Secondly, defeat might simply underline the limits to hard Brexiters’ power within the Commons, and even within the Conservatives. Failure on this front of the campaign might risk exposing the ERG as a paper tiger.

And finally, even if successful, the effect of the amendments might be different to that intended. Kate Hoey’s amendment to prohibit any border in the Irish Sea might be meant to stop the backstop arrangements applying across the entire UK, but it also opens a door to a much softer form of Brexit based around an EEA model. Which isn’t what she wants.

All of this is symptomatic of where we now are in the Article 50 process.

The difficult decisions and compromises that have very obviously been needed are now actually starting to be made: that’s why some of the noises off this week have been so heart-felt. May’s approach of ambiguity and vagueness had some value in keeping people on-board, but ultimately it had to see some resolution down to a more fixed and partisan structure, not least because that will be essential in getting to an agreement within Article 50.

Thus today’s White Paper will be essential in that move.

And there is no doubt that we will hear much more flapping in the days to come.

* Flames of Ire will be the name of my death metal band, by the way, when I get around to setting one up.

** Not the same kind of rebels so bitterly castigated by hard Brexiters last time around, when they worked with Labour on amendments to the Withdrawal Bill.

The post It’s coming home to roost appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Tjebbes and Others
Citizenship of the Union
Advocate General Mengozzi proposes that the Court should rule that the automatic loss of Netherlands nationality, which leads to the loss of citizenship of the EU, for minors living outside the EU is incompatible with EU law

Banger
Citizenship of the Union
Where an EU citizen returns to his Member State of origin, that Member State must facilitate the entry and residence of the non-EU partner with whom that citizen has a durable relationship

Austria v Commission
State aid
The General Court confirms the decision by which the Commission approved the aid provided by the UK in favour of the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station

Length of video : 147'
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Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP

Length of video : 186'
You may manually download this video in WMV (2.2Gb) format

Disclaimer : The interpretation of debates serves to facilitate communication and does not constitute an authentic record of proceedings. Only the original speech or the revised written translation is authentic.
Source : © European Union, 2018 - EP