Britannia Radio

	Home   About Us   Multimedia   In The News   Events   Research & Analysis Media Centre Open Europe Berlin
New on the Open Europe Blog Cameron: Before the 2015 election, we will do everything we can to make an EU referendum the law  Open Europe Blog "Do you think that the United Kingdom should remain a member of the European Union?” - the Tories publish their EU referendum Bill Open Europe Blog Lord Leach: EU reform is the best option, even for us sceptics Open Europe Blog
Daily Press Summary Conservatives’ draft EU referendum Bill commits UK to holding in/out vote by end of 2017The Conservative party yesterday published its draft EU referendum bill which would commit the government to ask voters if they think that the UK ought to remain a member of the EU by the end of 2017. The draft Bill will be offered to Tory MPs to take up as a Private Member’s Bill, meaning it is unlikely to be passed. The Times reports that, following the publication, Prime Minister David Cameron ruled out any further concessions to his backbenchers, with a senior party source quoted as saying that “This is our red line — we’re not going to give them any more ground”. Meanwhile, Conservative party co-chairman Grant Shapps challenged Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg to show courage and back the referendum bill, accusing the Liberal Democrats of "complete disdain" for the views of the British people. Open Europe’s Nina Schick appeared on Bloomberg TV’s Countdown show discussing the draft referendum and the UK’s position in the EU. Nina also appeared on BBC Radio Wales. Sun Mirror Express Guardian Guardian: Leader Guardian: Milne Telegraph Telegraph: Martin Mail BBCIndependent IHT Times Times: Leader FT CityAM CityAM: Heath CityAM: Lilico Bloomberg EU finance ministers split over structure and timing of plans for bank bail-insDivisions arose at yesterday’s meeting of EU finance ministers over the plans for an EU Recovery and Resolution Directive, specifically over if and when uninsured depositors should face losses under bank bail-ins during a crisis. The UK, the Netherlands and Denmark suggested support for equal treatment of uninsured depositors and senior bondholders. This position was backed by Germany to some extent. On the other side France, Spain and Portugal called for even uninsured depositors to only face write-downs as a very last resort. The UK and Sweden also called for flexibility in the rules for non-eurozone members, while the ECB called for the rules to come into force in 2015 – something France expressly rejected. Chancellor George Osborne said the plans forcing countries to set up ex-ante resolution funds were “totally useless”. Open Europe’s twitter coverage of the meeting was cited by the Guardian live blog. FT WSJ CityAM Telegraph Dow Jones Euronews Bloomberg Bundesbank: Banking Union Guardian: Live blog UK outvoted over €7.3bn top-up to the 2013 EU budgetEU finance ministers yesterday agreed to provide an extra €7.3bn in additional funding for the 2013 annual EU budget, despite the UK, Finland and the Netherlands voting against. The UK’s share of the additional funding will be around €1bn, although this could increase further as the Commission has requested a total of €11.2bn. Chancellor George Osborne described the move as “unacceptable”, while Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem argued that it would necessitate greater cutbacks in Dutch domestic spending. FT Euractiv NRC EU Observer Volkskrant Economic data released today showed that the French economy contracted by 0.2% in the first quarter of this year, pushing the country into its third recession in the space of four years. German results were also poor with the economy growing by 0.1% compared to expectations of 0.3%. Meanwhile, Italy’s GDP contracted for the seventh quarter in a row – the longest recession in more than two decades, notes La Repubblica.FT WSJ CityAM Telegraph BBC FAZ Reuters Reuters Germany Le Monde La Tribune Le Figaro PresseStandard Kurier Repubblica Fitch yesterday upgraded Greece’s credit rating from CCC to B- and put the country on a stable outlook, although the rating remains in ‘junk’ territory. The Greek government has also said that the fiscal gap for 2015/16 in Greece is around €4bn not the €8bn previously reported.CityAM Kathimerini Kathimerini 2 Times La Tribune Guardian WSJ The European Commission has opened an inquiry into oil companies BP, Shell and Statoil saying they had “concerns that the companies may have colluded… to manipulate the published prices for a number of oil and biofuel products.”Telegraph Sun Express The FT reports that, in a debate in parliament yesterday, Dutch deputy Finance Minister Frans Weekers faced criticism from opposition MPs after a TV show revealed that dozens of Bulgarian citizens had defrauded the Netherlands’ welfare system.Open Europe research: Free Movement FT The new Pew Research poll shows that public opinion in seven out of eight EU member states supports reducing government spending in order to deal with the crisis including 80% of French, 67% of Spaniards, 67% of Germans, and 59% of Italians. Only in Greece is there a majority of 56% in favour of increased government spending.Welt Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s plan to set a looser 2013 deficit target for Catalonia is facing opposition from other regional presidents within his own party, reports El País.El País El Mundo Expansión Expansión 2 EU ministers have reached an agreement on reform of the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), paving the way for negotiations with MEPs to enter the final stage. Under the deal, a ban on discards would be gradually enforced starting from 1 January 2015 – one year later than initially proposed by the European Commission.BBC Finland’s Supreme Court yesterday ordered the publication of the deal which saw Finland receive collateral in return for participating in the Greek bailout.EUobserver FT blogs: Alphaville German Chancellor Angela Merkel has called for greater efforts in Germany to attract skilled workers from crisis-struck eurozone countries, noting that "We are a European internal market, and we will certainly need to develop much more mobility in the labour market".FAZ La Tribune reports that France has convinced thirteen EU countries – including Germany, Italy and Spain – to sign a letter to the European Commission calling for the audio-visual industry to be excluded from upcoming negotiations over an EU-US free trade deal.La Tribune German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble has hailed a “historic” agreement which sees Luxembourg and Austria drop their opposition to EU-wide exchange of banking information.Reuters ORF

---