Nieuws van de afdeling

19 March 2010

The trade union movement in Europe

Since the mid-1980s, Brussels has been associated first and foremost with Europe's neoliberal policies. The trade union movement in Europe appears to have been taken in by Brussels' institutions and thus rendered harmless. There is, nevertheless, a great deal which the movement could achieve there.

19 March 2010

Weeklog Kartika Liotard: I saw two polar bears...

2010 is the UN Year of Biodiversity, declared to be such because the wealth of species of to be found in nature is under pressure. Take the polar bear population. There are still some 25,000 left, but by 2050 their numbers will have fallen by two-thirds. Why? Not because it is too warm or too cold for them, but because there are people who hunt them for their pelts, their teeth and their claws. The EU has issued a stiff call for opposition to this: as a MEP I participated in this call with complete conviction, because this sort of hunting is senseless, cruel and unworthy of the dignity either of the animal or of humanity.

19 March 2010

Gays in the army: Defence Minister must make views clear to US senate

SP Members of Parliament Harry van Bommel, party spokesman on foreign affairs, and Krista van Velzen, spokeswoman on defence issues, are anxious to know whether Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen and Defence Minister Eimert van Middelkoop are prepared to distance themselves explicitly from remarks by American General Jack Sheehan. Sheehan asserted in the US Senate that the fall of Srebrenica was brought about in part by the presence of homosexuals in the Dutch army, which was charged with defending the Bosnian town, at the time supposedly a 'safe enclave'.

16 March 2010

When will we finally see an intelligent policy on soft drugs?

On 23rd February the European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policies (ENCOD) will hold a public hearing in the European Parliament. This seems a desperate attempt from the organisations affiliated to ENCOD to draw attention to the need for a more liberal drugs policy in the EU member states. I heartily support this initiative and will make that clear in my contribution to the hearing. It's high time that the European Commission stopped mindlessly following the hard-liners and instead began for once to listen to what people who have daily contact with drug users have to say.

16 March 2010

SP: labels on food should be straightforward

A success and a setback for the SP today in the European Parliament Committee on Food Safety and Health. It seems likely that, first of all, the packaging of foodstuffs will probably not carry a straightforward red, orange or green colour code, a system which would help the European consumer to establish whether, for example, a particular pack of breakfast cereal contains a large amount of sugar, salt or fat. On the other hand, a proposal from SP Euro-MP Kartika Liotard, that the Netherlands (as well as Sweden and the United Kingdom) be allowed to introduce its own colour-coding system won the Committee's support.

10 March 2010

SP: Banks are breaking the rules on cashpoint withdrawals abroad

European banks should not be forcing customers resident in the European Union who use their bank cards to withdraw money from cashpoints in other EU countries to pay additional charges. So say the rules. Yet the SP has received complaints from a number of Dutch people who have been confronted with transaction costs as high as €5 per withdrawal when doing just that. SP Euro-MP and European Parliamentary group chair Dennis de Jong today raised this with the European Commission. "It's irritating when you've been on holiday in another European country or crossed the border to do some shopping and then when you get home you're hit with this extra charge," says De Jong. "Ordinary people appear in this case once again to be the victims of banks which are evading the rules. the Commission must launch an immediate enquiry into which banks are guilty and then ensure that the practice is stopped without delay."

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