Like everyone assumed at the beginning of 2010, the ambition of Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier to correct the very tolerant approach of his predecessor and to introduce more stringent regulations on financial services is not going to be facilitated by the homeland of the City.
To start with, the Brits opposed the nomination of a European Commission's official to a position in charge of this financial regulation because they feared he was "'too European' to stomach" and could "not offer the right counterbalance to his boss, French financial regulation hardliner and EU Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier" reports Euractiv.
How strange.
Is the European Commission supposed to be independent from the Member States -even from the Brits- to promote/protect the EU and, consequently, to manage its own 'human resources'?
Yes it is. That it is even its 'raison d'être'. But "Though governments do not officially get to decide who takes up posts at the EU executive, sources say that under pressure from the British government, the Commission allowed London to choose the internal market director as compensation for the appointment of a Frenchman as commissioner.".
Euractiv kindly refers to the 'Commission' to suggest that it is its President Mr Barroso who actually did it.
For memory, the Commission is to protect the Union's interests when Member States logically secure theirs.
Unsuprisingly, Mr Barroso adds one again a little confusion to the defined roles for the sake, here, of the City. Click here for a complete report (a shame the slapometer does not apply to eurocrats...).
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