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Armament industry : Making life (?!) easier. Good news/Bad news. Wakey wakey, Europe and bakey. More Europe anyone?. Pointless
Armament industry : Making life (?!) easier
Among the many sectors in urgent need of a boost, such as employment, education or the fight against discrimination –these are just examples- who would have thought the defence equipment market needed help too?Until now, it was apparently a bit of an ordeal for EU states to buy and sell this type of products between each other. Too much red tape, too little competition. Thankfully, german MEP Alexander Graf Lambsdorff, came up with a set of new rules that will make business a lot easier between the members states. The new legislation should allow more transparency and increase competition, which in turn will be good for taxpayers since they’ll be getting value for money. It should also be beneficial for small and medium businesses due to the new rules on subcontracting. In case you’d forgotten, we’re talking about the sector of armament here : a sector that will not go bankrupt anytime soon…
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news
Good news/Bad news
Until last Tuesday, workers in Europe didn’t benefit from their holiday rights while they were on sick leave. Now the European Court of Justice has decided otherwise. According to the court ruling : “A worker does not lose his right to paid annual leave that he has been unable to exercise because of sickness. He must be compensated for his annual leave not taken”. If this is great news for workers, well, it doesn’t have such a nice ring to the ears of businness managers and bosses. In fact, David Frost, DG of the British Chamber of Commerce said it was the worst possible timing to approve such a reform, considering the current economic climate. Indeed, this sort of ruling costs money to companies, which means they won’t be as keen to hire new staff, and it may even push them to lay some off.Happy or worried?
Wakey wakey, Europe and bakey
The previous piece of news was a perfect example : decisions taken at the European level do change the daily life of all Europeans citizens. Do you know how many people that is? Five hundred million… Half a billion men in women, in 27 different countries, speaking 23 different languages… I could carry on endlessly with a list of facts like these, but my point is, how many of us do actually know or want to know we’re part of a much bigger community than we think?From a Eurobarometer survey done in autumn last year we learn that 67% of european citizens do not have the slightest idea of when the next vote for european parliament is supposed to take place. More than half of them say they wouldn’t be interested in voting anyway. This would be due to the lack of information combined with a fairly negative image of the parliament. 2 out of 5 people regard it as technocratic rather than democratic and inefficient. Harsh comments that should have the MEPs work on their communication.In any case, if we don’t speak our voice, one way or another, somebody else will make the decisions for us. Think about it, MEPs are elected for 5 years. SO, the next vote is in June and I recommend you check the europarl.europa.eu website and form your VERY OWN PERSONAL opinion.
http://euobserver.com/883/27432http://www.europarl.europa.eu//elections2009/default.htm?language=FR
More Europe anyone?
Another european day, another european competition from the european commission promoted here on Europocket TV…This one is aimed at european journalists covering European policies or european institutions and contributed to get the european message across. Hey if I say european one more time,will that get me any closer to the 5000 euros cash prize? Nope, apparently not… There’s 4 categories you can enter: print media, radio, TV and the Internet for any work published between the 1st of May 2008 and the 31st of March this year.Check the parliament website for further details.Good european luck…
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/public/story_page/037-46384-019-01-04-906-20090115STO46380-2009-19-01-2009/default_en.htm
Pointless
Like I said in the intro, we close the news with a silly survey relating crisis and sexdrive. Although one would have thought the financial crisis would bring us closer and give us good reasons to stick to our partner, the exact opposite is happening. You’ll also be happy to find out that women tend to have more orgasms with wealthy men… mmm… accurate? Most probably not… my guess is golddiggers are faking to get a new dress… Why not a survey telling us why the media is so hungry for pointless surveys? And why do we feel the need to broadcast it here?! I feel a bit mad at myself right now…
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