EU BYTES EU Bytes
Former Executive Director of the European Casino Association and current Managing Director of Time & Place Consulting, Glenn Cezanne provides the latest info on what’s trending and what’s coming down the pipeline in Brussels and around the EU.
T Glenn Cezanne
he policy temperature in Brussels is high. There is a fever for crunching in the remaining legislative dossiers ahead of the European elections next year. In the European Parliament, MEPs are hoping to
get their files finalised and agreed upon before the last Plenary session in April. Actually, preferably before that, as negotiations on legislative files would still need to finalised with the other EU institutions if these ambitions are to be fulfilled. Taking into account the natural decline for introducing new legislative files by the European Commission, I often get asked, so, what will the lobbyists do the next year? I wonder whether my Editor would allow me a 10-page spread on the ins and outs of having an impact on European elections, nudging the right MEPs into the right Committees, influencing the work programme of the European Commission – note that following European Parliament elections, the Commission candidates will be scrutinised with a view of setting up a new College of Commissioners – and so on. The other question I hear mostly now concerns
where Europe is headed in light of Angela Merkel having decided not to run again as either leader of the Christian-Democrats, neither as Chancellor? A void that will need to be filled. What does that mean for our continental future? I repeat, a void would have to be filled. But, until the next German elections, it is pertinent to remember that Germany is not only Merkel, Germany is also Germany. The country with the biggest EU economy, the highest population in the bloc, and an impressive decline in unemployment. Well, I know that my friends working in the trade unions would raise an eyebrow and declare their disappointment at the simplicity of the statistics vis-à-vis considerations of inter alia part-time or contractual work. In any case, everyone is speculating left, right and centre on the question
28 NOVEMBER 2018
of Germany. Guess what? Me too. I believe Merkel will remain the go-to-person until her term ends with increasing presence from the friends in France. Furthermore, what is often underestimated or indeed forgotten is that Germany has a strong federal system with some of the German Länder having a mammoth presence in economic and social policy discourse. Look, for example, at the Bavarians with their beautiful representation which lies just across the road from the European Parliament. This time round I would like to follow up on the
question of Gibraltar which I discussed in the last EU Bytes edition with Peter Wilding, a brief update on geo-blocking as well as the gambling advertisement ban in Italy.
Gibraltar
Spain and the UK have agreed on most questions relevant to Gibraltar as this rock will leave the EU along with the UK in March 2019. Gibraltar was considered a point of concern in the Brexit negotiations; not as prevalent as the question of
dizfoto1973/Adobe Stock
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