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06 March 2010 |
Emboldened by the Lisbon Treaty, Brussels is making an ambitious grab for more surveillance powers, writes Stephen Gardner. Plans for amassing data on individuals and making it available across the continent are contained in an "internal security strategy for the European Union," which has been approved by justice ministers. |
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05 March 2010 |
Germany’s highest court, the Bundesverfassungsgericht or Federal Constitutional Court, has suspended a law that requires Internet and telephone operators to store for up to six months data on their customers’ telephone, email and Internet communications, writes Stephen Gardner. |
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05 March 2010 |
The European Parliament's secretive secretariat is having a new and uncomfortable experience. The Parliament's budgets committee is asking probing questions about its management of the Parliament's budget, writes Stephen Gardner. |
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09 February 2010 |
Nearly two centuries after Napoleon attempted to destroy Belgium’s vineyards as a way to protect French producers, the reputation of Belgium’s viticulture is re-emerging from the shadow of its illustrious neighbour, writes Jon Eldridge. |
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05 February 2010 |
Documents published by the European Parliament's budget committee have revealed a final sum for the amount spent by the Parliament on advertising the 2009 European elections: €21.4 million, writes Stephen Gardner. |
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02 February 2010 |
Germany is sometimes viewed as a slow-mover on CSR. But German companies argue that by complying with a strict regulatory framework, they have been doing CSR for years, writes Stephen Gardner. |
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19 December 2009 |
The Copenhagen debacle shows one thing very clearly: the European Union has minimal political clout to influence international climate negotiations, which are really negotiations about global economic, and therefore political, power, writes Stephen Gardner. |
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15 December 2009 |
Every Brussels policy edict comes with green edging nowadays, writes Stephen Gardner. So, when in September Monaco suggested that the best way to conserve the highly endangered and emblematic Atlantic bluefin tuna was to ban international trade in it, the European Commission was quick to lend its support – only to huff and puff when Spain and other Mediterranean countries declined to back it up. |
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10 December 2009 |
Feckless wasters of energy beware. From April 2010, large corporations and public bodies in Britain not paying enough attention to their power consumption could find themselves named and shamed under a government scheme called the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), writes Stephen Gardner. |
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