European Union

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

What does the EU have to do with ‘sport diplomacy’? In a post published on this site fifteen months ago, I reported on the reflections of a high-level group that was set up by Commissioner Tibor Navracsics in 2015 and that produced a report with a series of recommendations in June 2016.

Since then, the idea has gathered an almost surprising momentum. As early as November 2016, the Council formulated very explicit conclusions on what should be understood by ‘sport diplomacy’, and in May 2017, a Work Plan for Sport 2017-2020 fixing priorities was approved.

All this and more was discussed yesterday, 6 December, in a stimulating seminar organized by the Commission’s Sport Unit in Brussels.

Discussing what makes sense in sport diplomacy.

My major personal takeaway is the slow slide into irrelevance of the ‘soft power’ concept, which has been discussed so often in connection to sport mega-events, from the London Olympics to the Brazilian World Cup or the ‘Chinese (football) dream’.

But the European Union does not need to ‘use’ sport for ‘gaining soft power resources’. The power it wields in external relations is soft by definition. And the EU is at its very best when it plays its modest but efficient role as ‘enabler’, stubbornly promoting a set of values that it wishes to stand for.

The times are changing: the future of sport diplomacy does not lie in high-cost, high-risk mega-events with a huge, but ephemeral, mass media echo and a short-term impact on the ‘Nations Brand Index’. It lies in decentralised, low-cost people-to-people actions, in projects on a modest scale that change people’s lives for the better in a sustainable way (not only for the beneficiaries but also for the enablers, by the way!).

Its success will be based on the credibility and coherence with which values like civil society empowerment, volunteering, gender equality, social inclusion in all its forms are embodied and spread. It will be nurtured by the sharing of one’s own (not so distant) learning curve in matters of good governance, sustainable development, or anti-discrimination. It will be implemented but what Europe already does best: facilitating people-to-people dialogue across borders of all kinds.

It is remarkable that even a national endeavour like the Paris Olympics 2024 seems to have intuitively and enthusiastically understood this: if sport is not ‘made for sharing’, as their lovely slogan claims, and does not aim at making a change for others, rather than only for oneself, it’s not worth it.

Against this backdrop, it is only logical that the ERASMUS+ programme has been identified as the most appropriate, almost obvious, tool for enhancing sport diplomacy actions that are carried by federations, associations, higher education institutions or other actors of civil society with the intention to provide help and assistance to those who are in need of it and to engage in intercultural dialogue.

David Blough presenting one of many (very) good practices.

There is no lack of concrete, convincing examples. Preparing young coaches in countries that do not have adequate training structures, bringing school drop-outs back into education, empowering girls through football, facilitating the integration of refugees in their host society, raising awareness on disabilities and creating organization capacity to address them, building capacity for a new generation of young leaders for the sports movement itself – you name it.

After all the shambles and scandals around large international sport bodies and dubious mega events, the EU kind of sport diplomacy has a promising window of opportunity ahead. If promoted in a modest, but sustained and coherent manner, sport diplomacy can become an extremely positive contributor to the European Union’s external relations. Little by little, step by step, a good idea is making its way.

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Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

The next AFET meeting is scheduled to take place as follows:

Monday, 11 December 2017, 19:30 - 21:00, Strasbourg, LOW N1.4.

Further information
Information for visitors
Draft agendas
Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

On 11 December, the Foreign Affairs Committee, together with its Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Committee on Development, will meet this year's Sakharov Prize laureates, the democratic opposition and political prisoners in Venezuela. The Venezuelan opposition will be represented by Antonio Ledezma, who recently escaped from his house arrest in Venezuela, and relatives of a number of political prisoners.
The Sakharov finalist Lolita Chavez as well as Bethlehem Isaak - daughter of the second finalist Dawit Isaak - will also participate in the meeting.

The award ceremony will take place in the plenary on 13 December. The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought is awarded each year by the European Parliament to honour individuals and organisations defending human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Further information
Watch the meeting
Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Sometimes one has the impression that everyone involved in European politics is a big fan of Douglas Adams: certainly, as far as Article 50 goes, each new day brings absurdity piled upon absurdity.

The last week has made this point better than most, with the sudden rush to agreement on Monday then brutally undercut and a new stasis emerging.

It’s easy to be very negative about it all – confirming as it seemingly does – everything you thought was wrong with everything.

But for once I’d prefer to stress the positives from the latest batch of events, in the spirit of goodwill to all.

The most obvious positive to take away from it all is the capacity of both sides to demonstrate flexibility and movement in their positions.

Prior to the start of last week, there had been little evidence for this. The British government had stuck to its vague pronouncements that didn’t cohere, while the EU seemed to be on a loop in restating its principles and red-lines.

The apparent clarification on finances helped to open this up: the UK committed more clearly to honouring the large bulk of current liabilities, including the RAL (which makes up most of these), which removed one of the biggest blocks in the road. More importantly, the finances was the most fungible of the Phase I issues and the most pressing for most of the EU27, so it set a positive tone for what might come next. The money was thus both important in itself and as a marker of intent, not to mention signalling that the UK might come round much more to the EU’s position than the other way around.

Even if citizens’ rights was still stuck on the role of the CJEU – something that will be coming back before long – the second key development was a consensus among the negotiators that a statement of intent on the Irish border would be enough to move this latter topic on to ‘sufficient progress’.

This matters because the underlying difficulties of resolving the border question remain as stark as ever. The incompatibility of the EU’s single market, the Good Friday Agreement, the common travel area, UK territorial integrity and UK withdrawal from the single market/customs union has no solution in purely formal terms. Even the UK’s vagueness about ‘technical solutions’ couldn’t really address this point, as Dublin had made repeatedly clear.

Importantly, Phase I is the point at which Ireland has the most leverage, especially since the rest of the EU appeared to stand squarely behind it: to let the UK get away with what it had offered previously would be to risk losing any chance to pin it down, as the agenda moved on.

The compromise then was to work on a statement of principles that would apply whatever the outcome – i.e. including a no-deal scenario – to keep the border open and the GFA operative. With some linguistic fancy footwork on ‘regulatory alignment‘, it was possible to carve out a bit of space whereby the EU could claim no regulatory gap – so removing on key arm for needing a hard border – and the UK could claim it had its own regulatory process – albeit one that one have to very closely follow EU rules.

Put differently, the EU moved on form – from a detailed plan to a detailed set of principles – while the UK moved on substance – effectively tying themselves into the EU’s preferences and regulation.

This compromise seemed to work well enough for all the principals to sign off on it, right up to the point that the DUP raised their objections. But this shouldn’t obscure that the movement took place at all. It now sets the agenda for the work going on right now.

And this is the second big positive to take away: everyone’s working very hard for a deal.

Of all the counter-productive language since last June, ‘no deal is better than a bad deal’ has been the most problematic (and the one producing the firmest response from experts).

Every since Monday afternoon, when the wheels came off the compromise deal, figures on all sides have been very keen to stress the positives. The May-Juncker press conference was very brief, but couched entirely in such language, while briefings on all sides kept to the script too. While it would have been tempting to stick the boot into the DUP, the Irish government has made repeated positive noises about the chances of salvaging a new text this week or next, and appears determined not to rock the boot for May.

Just as important has been the language in the UK. With Davis distracted by the impact assessments this week – which also says something about the British situation – it was May taking the lead and again pushing the line that agreement was still possible. While it might be understandable, given her position, it was also apparent that most of her party wasn’t trailing the ‘no deal’ line and that Labour was challenging her competence, rather than the substance of what she had negotiated.

Most importantly in all of this is the Douglas Adams point about deadlines. Yesterday had been set by the EU as the last date to get text agreed in time for the EU27 to discuss prior to next week’s European Council. That has now drifted out to at least tomorrow and possibly early next week. Moreover, Leo Varadkar’s statements also open up the possibility of a special European Council early in the new year, should things not pan out, so that Phase II doesn’t have to wait until February.

Taken together, the impression is that Article 50 is still a going concern and that all sides are serious about making it happen. Certainly, the UK still has tremendous problems with its internal politics, but the fact that it could move as it did should give cause for some positivity about it all.

But a final word of caution. This past week also suggests that the outcome of Article 50 is now likely to be only one of two outcomes: either a deal very largely on EU terms, or a complete lack of agreement. The middle path of a more tailored deal looks less and less probably now. That might sound good to some, but the polarisation of outcomes also raises dangers, especially as and when Phase II opens.

The post Brexit silver (dead)lining playbook appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

López Pastuzano
Area of Freedom, Security and Justice
A decision may not be adopted to expel a third-country national who is a long-term resident for the sole reason that he or she has been sentenced to a term of imprisonment of more than one year

Coca-Cola v EUIPO - Mitico (Master)
Intellectual and industrial property
Coca-Cola may oppose the registration of the sign ‘Master’ which uses the same font as its own for the marketing of beverages and food products

Today in Parliament, Prime Minister Theresa May said of Brexit, “The negotiations are in progress and very good progress has been made in those negotiations.”

Did you notice her nose grow an inch?

We can’t believe anything this government tells us.

The Brexit negotiations are going disastrously wrong. Did Mrs May fly to Brussels on Monday just for a free lunch? No. It was one of the most expensive lunches in British history.

She went there expecting to announce a deal had been struck with the EU to enable Britain to proceed to discussing a new trade agreement post-Brexit.

Apparently, everything had been resolved: the issue of EU citizens living here, British citizens living there, the amount owing to the EU, and that thorny issue of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic Ireland.

So, had Mrs May achieved the impossible on the border issue?

Just two days before last year’s referendum, she warned that if Britain voted for Brexit, it was “inconceivable” that there would not be a new hard border with Ireland.
She told the BBC on the eve of the referendum:

“If we are out of the European Union with tariffs on exporting goods into the EU, there would have to be something to recognise that between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

“And if you pulled out of the EU and came out of free movement, then how could you have a situation where there was an open border with a country that was in the EU and had access to free movement?”

How on earth was she going to fix something that only last year Mrs May said was unfixable?

Easy peasy! Just enable ‘regulatory alignment’ between Northern Ireland and the EU.
What does ‘regulatory alignment’ mean? Who knows? Who cares? Clink of glasses. Tuck into the main course.

Oh hold on, the DUP – the small Northern Ireland party that graced Mrs May with the favour of staying in power after last June’s disastrous general election (well for a small consideration of just £1 billion pounds, so easily plucked from Theresa’s famous ‘money tree’) – were having none of it.

With a thunder face, Arlene Foster, the DUP leader, stormed onto our TV screens, with her tiny entourage of MPs, to rule out any move “which separates Northern Ireland economically or politically from the rest of the United Kingdom”.

‘Will you be staying for dessert, Theresa?’ ‘No, Jean-Claude, I had better get home’.
‘But we’ll have to make an announcement to the media’. ‘Ok, but let’s keep it short.’ ‘Will 45 seconds be ok?’ ‘Yes, of course’.

No leading questions from the UK media. Nothing new there.

The DUP now has the real power over the UK’s future relationship with the EU. Mrs May… she just has empty words, and a nose that grows longer by the day.

Did you watch the five o’clock nose (sorry, news)? David Davis the Brexit Secretary, told Parliament that the 58 Brexit impact reports that he’s been boasting about for over a year don’t actually exist.

Like a naughty boy, Mr Davis had been summoned to the Commons Committee for Exiting the European Union to explain why he hadn’t produced full details of the sector-by-sector Brexit impact reports that Parliament had voted he must disclose.

“There is no systematic impact assessment,” Mr Davis replied.

An incredulous Hilary Benn, the Labour MP who chairs the committee, asked Mr Davis if the government had carried out any forecasts on the possible impact of Brexit on the automotive, aerospace or financial services sectors.

“The answer’s going to be no to all of them,” Mr Davis replied.

Asked by Mr Benn whether there had been ANY economic assessment of the impact of leaving the customs union, Mr Davis replied:

“Not a formal, quantitative one.”

Mr Benn said that the Brexit Secretary’s admission was “quite extraordinary”. Mr Davis said it wasn’t (he would say that, wouldn’t he? Does it matter any more what he says?)

In December one year ago Mr Davis told the same committee that:

“We are in the midst of carrying out about 57 sets of analyses, each of which has implications for individual parts of 85% of the economy. Some of those are still to be concluded.”

He added:

“We’ve got a lot to do, but that’s one of the reasons we are taking our time to get prepared on all fronts. That’s why our 57 studies cover 85% of the economy. Everything that’s not affected by international trade.

“So, we are aiming to get ourselves into a position where we can negotiate within the Article 50 process.”

Oh, his nose looked long then. It’s looking longer today.

Mr Davis is not in any position to negotiate anything.

The bottom line is that he and his department have not done any substantial analyses on the impact of Brexit.

He and his Brexit boss and fellow ministers are so intent on getting us out of the EU, that the details matter not one jot to him, or them.

That’s why the government has no vision, no plan, no blueprint, no manifesto for Britain after Brexit. They have not got a clue what Brexit will mean for Britain, and have not bothered to do any meaningful research to find out.

They are running the country blind, because they have blind faith that Brexit is going to be oh, so wonderful.

There are calls now to hold Mr Davis in contempt of Parliament. Surely that’s a mistake?

The entire government should be held in contempt of Parliament. They are running the state whilst being enemies of the state.

The current government is not acting in the best interests of the country.

Brexit was sold to the nation using a pack of lies. And now Brexit is being imposed on the nation using a pack of lies.

I nose that. You nose that. And they nose that.

This government must go. Nothing could be worse than the incompetent, imbecilic, inept gang of charlatans now running Britain to the ground.

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ERRATUM to the report on the Annual report on the implementation of the Common Security and Defence Policy
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Michael Gahler

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

The energy transition known as the “Energiewende” in Germany is key to Europe’s economic success in the future. It is not just about putting up wind farms and solar panels in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions: it is also about using energy storage to create smart energy and transport systems, that will no longer be dependent on burning the fossil fuels of coal and oil. The knowledge gained by the implementation of the energy transition in Europe, will itself become an export commodity to countries such as China and India, which are desperate to move away from polluting coal fired power stations, not only to fight climate change, but also to improve the air quality for their own citizens.

There is some resistence to EU environmental protection regulations from those “Bundesländer”, federal states in Germany, that have traditionally depended upon coal for employment. In an article of 22nd August 2017 published on the website of www.tagesschau.de entitled, “Braunkohle-Länder fordern Klage”, which translates as lignite states call for legal action: it was reported that the Minister President of Saxony, Stanislaw Tillich had written a letter to the Minister of Economic Affairs, Brigiite Zypries, of the German federal government complaining about stricter EU regulations limiting the emissions of mercury and nitrogen oxide from lignite burning power stations. Tillich – who was writing on behalf of his own state of Saxony and three other states of Brandenburg, North Rhine-Westphalia, and Saxony-Anhalt involved in the open-cast mining of lignite and electricity generation from burning lignite – said that to keep to the EU’s regulations would be technically impossible.

However the answer for Germany’s future economic prosperity will not be to fight against the EU’s climate protection and anti-pollution regulations, but rather to phase out the open-cast mining of lignite altogether. In the process new technology will be developed to bring many more local clean energy power sources onto the electricity grid. This will involve retraining and re-employment of management and workers – who previously worked in the fossil fuel energy sector – to implement the energy transition successfully. Instead of resisting the EU’s environmental regulations: politicians, energy companies and unions should now be lobbying the EU institutions for grants to help with these structural changes of energy supply towards renewable energy and storage technology, that will phase out fossil fuels, in order to create a clean and sustainable energy future.

Sources

http://www.tagesschau.de/inland/braunkohle-laender-grenzwerte-101.html

http://jolyongumbrell.ideasoneurope.eu/2016/04/05/renewable-energy-deal-europe/

http://jolyongumbrell.ideasoneurope.eu/2015/11/24/obsolescence-coal-oil/

http://jolyongumbrell.ideasoneurope.eu/2015/03/30/will-britain-left-behind-energy-storage/

The post Prosperity versus pollution in Germany appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

AMENDMENTS 1 - 281 - Draft report Recommendation to the Council, the Commission, and the EEAS on cutting the sources of income for Jihadists - targeting the financing of terrorism
Committee on Foreign Affairs

Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

Just two days before last year’s EU referendum Theresa May insisted there would have to be border controls with Ireland if the UK voted to leave the European Union.

She said then that it was “inconceivable” that there would not be any changes on border arrangements with the Republic of Ireland if Brexit happened.

As home secretary, Mrs May visited County Down on 21 June 2016 and told the BBC:

“If we are out of the European Union with tariffs on exporting goods into the EU, there would have to be something to recognise that between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

“And if you pulled out of the EU and came out of free movement, then how could you have a situation where there was an open border with a country that was in the EU and had access to free movement?”

Now, of course, she is insisting that Brexit will not result in a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland – but she hasn’t been able to find a way to do it, just as she predicted would happen before the referendum.

How can anyone believe this woman ever again? She is not fit to be our Prime Minister.

In a speech in April 2016, Mrs. May spoke firmly against Brexit and in favour of Britain’s continued membership of the EU.

She said then:

“My judgement, as Home Secretary, is that remaining a member of the European Union means we will be more secure from crime and terrorism.”

And as for replacing the trade we do with the EU with other markets, she asserted that this would be a an unrealistic route. She said:

“We export more to Ireland than we do to China, almost twice as much to Belgium as we do to India, and nearly three times as much to Sweden as we do to Brazil. It is not realistic to think we could just replace European trade with these new markets.”

And there were other serious risks too.

“If we do vote to leave the European Union, we risk bringing the development of the single market to a halt, we risk a loss of investors and businesses to remaining EU member states driven by discriminatory EU policies, and we risk going backwards when it comes to international trade.”

And other risks too.

“Outside the EU, for example, we would have no access to the European Arrest Warrant, which has allowed us to extradite more than 5,000 people from Britain to Europe in the last five years, and bring 675 suspected or convicted wanted individuals to Britain to face justice.”

And leaving the EU, she said, could lead to the disintegration of the EU, resulting in “massive instability” with “with real consequences for Britain.”

In addition, Brexit might prove fatal to “the Union between England and Scotland”, which she did not want to happen.

And if Britain left the EU, she argued, we might not be successful in negotiating a successful divorce settlement.

Explained Mrs May:

“In a stand-off between Britain and the EU, 44 per cent of our exports is more important to us than eight per cent of the EU’s exports is to them.”

She added, “The reality is that we do not know on what terms we would win access to the single market.

“We do know that in a negotiation we would need to make concessions in order to access it, and those concessions could well be about accepting EU regulations, over which we would have no say, making financial contributions, just as we do now, accepting free movement rules, just as we do now, or quite possibly all three combined.”

She added:

“It is not clear why other EU member states would give Britain a better deal than they themselves enjoy.”

And in summary, Mrs May said:

“Remaining inside the European Union does make us more secure, it does make us more prosperous and it does make us more influential beyond our shores.

“I believe the case to remain a member of the European Union is strong.

“I believe it is clearly in our national interest to remain a member of the European Union.”

Now her tune has changed.

“Brexit means Brexit and we’re going to make a success of it.

“There will be no attempts to remain inside the EU.

“There will be no attempts to re-join it by the back door; no second referendum.

“As Prime Minister I will make sure that we leave the European Union.”

How is it possible for Theresa May to lead Britain in a direction which only last year she advocated was not in the country’s best interests?

Theresa May is a hypocrite. Enough is enough. She has to go.

My vote is for the UK to Remain in the European Union, and for Theresa May – with her hapless band of Brexiters – to leave office.

Now, all we need is a ballot.

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The post Theresa May is a hypocrite appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Coty Germany
Competition
A supplier of luxury goods can prohibit its authorised distributors from selling those goods on a third-party internet platform such as Amazon

Promoting women’s participation in CSDP missions and operations is important to sustain EU’s credibility, to improve effectiveness, to promote equality at home and abroad, to increase the talent pool for personnel, and to make the best use of our financial resources. More needs to be done by both member states and the EU to fulfil promises to implement the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security. This report looks at three issues that contribute to more inclusion and better effectiveness: First, the structures that promote equality in the security sector institutions within the EU; second, the effects of women’s participation in missions and operations; third, how CSDP structures and EU member states policies could be further adapted to create a working environment that is conducive to both men and women contributing their full potential to better solutions to security challenges. Political commitment and hands-on leadership by the EU and its Member States is key to more diversity and inclusivity in CSDP structures. A pro-active approach to recruitment and retention of female staff, adapted job-descriptions, comprehensive family policies, and employing an approach that values diversity and creates a positive work environment are all necessary in this regard.
Source : © European Union, 2017 - EP

The European Union consists of 28 member states. All treaty changes or enlargement of the EU require the unanimous consent of every single member, however large or small.

The Union of the United Kingdom consists of four member states: England, Scotland, Wales and the province of Northern Ireland.

In the referendum, two of them voted to remain in the EU: Scotland and Northern Ireland. Yet the UK government is going ahead with Brexit, without the unanimous consent of all the UK’s member states.

That couldn’t happen in the European Union, where all member states of the EU, however large or small, each have an equal vote and a veto on new treaties.

If the UK was run on the same democratic principles as the EU, then the UK could never leave the European Union without the unanimous agreement of all its four members: England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

But in last year’s EU referendum, the democratic wishes of Scotland and Northern Ireland were ignored by the UK government, splitting the United Kingdom in two.

Similarly, Gibraltar – a British Overseas Territory which also had a vote in the EU referendum and strongly chose Remain – also saw their objections to Brexit ignored.

Even though Northern Ireland voted for Remain, one party – the pro-Brexit DUP – is being allowed to dictate what future relationship the province will have with the EU (and therefore the entire UK’s relationship with the EU), because it’s only that party that’s keeping the Tories in power.

The EU’s remaining 27 member states will have a greater say and vote on the final Brexit deal than the devolved areas of the UK and the overseas territory of Gibraltar.

Even the European Parliament will have a greater say on Brexit than our Tory government wants to give our Parliament in Westminster.

Brexiters claim that the EU is ‘undemocratic’.

But in reality, the EU is more democratic than our system in the UK, where we still have an unelected second chamber; where the wishes of devolved UK states can be ignored, and where we still have an antiquated voting system of first-past-the-post (MEPs are voted to the European Parliament using a system of proportional representation).

Brexiters tell us that the EU is run by faceless bureaucrats.

But the truth is that all EU laws can only be passed by the democratically elected European Parliament, in concert with the Council of Ministers, that comprise the ministers of democratically elected governments of EU member states.

The European Commission is the servant of the EU, and not its master. The European Parliament elects the Commission President, has to approve each Commissioner, and has the power to dismiss the entire Commission.

If that isn’t democratic, I don’t know what is.

This time last year, Brexiters mocked that a region of Belgium, called Wallonia, had the power to block the new free trade agreement between Canada and the EU.

But that shows how Belgium, a country only a tenth the size of the UK, has a better democracy than ours.

Under Belgium’s constitution, regional parliaments such as the one governing Wallonia, must give their unanimous agreement before Belgium, as an EU member state, can give its consent to any EU Treaty.

The regions of Belgium have much more democratic power than our devolved parliaments of the UK. That’s how Wallonia came to block the EU-Canada agreement, called Ceta.

Eventually, Wallonia sought and received assurances about the Ceta deal, and lifted their objections, so the EU-Canada free trade agreement could go ahead, which it did.

The EU-Canada trade agreement, incidentally, is calculated to be worth an estimated £1.3bn a year to Britain – but of course only whilst we are an EU member.

Last year, whilst the parliaments of Belgium and other EU countries were democratically considering Ceta, the UK’s international trade secretary, Liam Fox, had to apologise to MPs for not allowing our Parliament to have a debate on the Ceta deal.

There’s something else that makes Belgium arguably more democratically accountable than the UK.

Since 1894 voting in Belgium’s elections has been compulsory. Everyone must vote.

Contrast Belgium’s system of compulsory voting with what happened in Britain’s referendum last year, where around 20 million people who could vote, didn’t vote.

That included around 13 million who registered to vote but didn’t, and around a further 7 million who could have registered to vote, but didn’t.

What a difference 20 million voters could have made to the EU referendum result if it had been compulsory for them to vote.

Polls indicate that those 13 million who registered to vote but didn’t would have supported Remain 2-to-1.

So, in summary:

• The Tory government is going ahead with Brexit, without the unanimous consent of all the UK’s countries, and without the consent of our overseas territory, the state of Gibraltar.

• Although Northern Ireland voted for Remain, just one small Northern Ireland party, the pro-Brexit DUP, is being allowed to have the final say on the province’s (and therefore the UK’s) future relationship with the EU, because that party is keeping Mrs May and her Tories in office.

• The Tory government hasn’t allowed Parliament to have a vote on whether Britain should leave the EU, saying the decision was already made by the referendum (even though the Supreme Court ruled that only Parliament could make the decision, as the EU referendum was advisory only).

• The Tory government does not want our Parliament to have a proper vote on the final Brexit deal.

• The Tory government doesn’t want our Parliament to have a say on which EU laws brought into UK law should be kept, amended or scrapped. 

So, which has the better system of democracy: the EU or the UK?

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The post Which is better: UK or EU democracy? appeared first on Ideas on Europe.

Xiaomi v EUIPO - Apple (MI PAD)
Intellectual and industrial property
Apple succeeds in preventing the registration of ‘MI PAD’ as an EU trade mark in respect of electronic devices and (tele)communication services

MB
SOPO
Advocate General Bobek considers that a requirement in national law for a person who has changed gender to be unmarried in order to qualify for a state retirement pension is unlawful

M.A.S. and M.B.
FIN
The obligation to protect the financial interests of the EU must be reconciled with observance of the principle that offences and penalties must be defined by law