Jon Worth Euroblog

OK, so you would assume that it should not be too complex. I am a member of the Labour Party, and the party is supposed to be pro-European. Within the party there is a group called the Labour Movement for Europe. This evening – 22nd November – they are holding […]

I have complained here about the poor quality of Britain’s houses and a lack of taste in carpets. But there are decent British designers – take Jonathan Ive, the inventor of the iPod for example. Now the government is starting to get interested and hope that better investment in design […]

Apparently it’s because Italy is so corrupt that any ethnic minorities can manage to make money on the black economy – have a read of this from Samizdata. The discussion about dictatorships and China is also very much worth a read. You could also add the fact that in Italy […]

There have been rumblings for a while about the inbalance in the UK political system where MPs from Wales and Scotland can decide legislation only applying to England. There was also the absurd example of Scottish MP John Reid, representing a Scottish constituency, but yet being Secretary of State for […]

OK, anything must be better than Silvio Berlusconi, but you have to get a bit scared when one of the first references to Romano Prodi in recent times on BBC News Online talks of his plans to reconstruct a Catholic pilgrim route – see this. It is clear that Prodi’s […]

It was almost exactly a year ago when I was shouted at on a bus in Brussels for not having left my seat in favour of a pensioner. I was in the wrong then and had not really been concentrating. Since then I have aimed to pay the utmost attention […]

What a ludicrous idea. The government has announced that it is going to start a pilot to install bag-scanners in some railway stations, starting with Heathrow Express departures from Paddington – see this from the BBC. Now, UK railway stations are already crowded enough with the cumbersome ticket barriers that […]

OK, so my time in JEF is over. It gives me free evenings, and the release from the responsibility is so, so welcome. But the Congress in Strasbourg leaves a bit of a bitter taste in my mouth. The main political resolutions I wrote – on the situation facing the […]