Down - but certainly not out

How can one communicate what poverty is like? That may sound like a trite question for those who experience it first hand. Perhaps we could emulate George Orwell and take to the kitchens, streets and mines in Paris and London and Wigan and experience grinding poverty first hand. I imagine it would be quite a shock to anyone born after the creation of the welfare state, health service and safety at work regulations.

I raise this point as we are now almost half way through the “European year for combating poverty and social exclusion” and I chanced upon some video diaries made during a conference on “Poverty between reality and perceptions” in October last year in Brussels.

In it a series of policy makers and journalists talk about ways of raising the awareness of poverty in Europe and also how it manifests itself in other “stories”. I was quite struck by the comments of BBC Northern Ireland correspondent William Crawley who pointed out that often what can lies behind racism, violence, school drop outs, unemployment and family break-up is poverty. He urged people to look a bit closer at the origins of many of our problems and suggested that perhaps we may find poverty as a cause.

There are believed to be around 85 million people living in poverty in the European Union – a staggering amount given the resources Europe has on offer. This figure has grown due to the economic crisis. Add to this the millions “at risk of poverty” (those who earn less than 60% of the average of other people in society) and the fear of unemployment and it makes for a bleak state of affairs. In an article in February we tackled a few of the ways of defining what poverty really is.

I think this should also prompt us to delve a bit closer into the background of issues and stories that we publish on the site. Perhaps sometimes we are not doing something – or more importantly the people affected by it – justice.

Last week a group of people experiencing poverty met at the European Parliament for the 9th time. Many Euro MPs from across the House have taken up the fight against poverty and exclusion and are looking for ways to create jobs and increase incomes. A recent report in the Employment and Social Affairs Committee on the prospect of a minimum wage generated a lot of debate on how best to help people – more social protection (in a time of huge public debt) or more work schemes and incentives. Or a mixture of both in fact. Unsurprisingly, the preference in Parliament reflects  left-right political orientation.

In addition to these MEPs earlier this year backed a report that seeks to help the disabled by making disability a legal one and a question of human rights. This step, though it may sound legalistic, is intended to make it easier for Europe’s 50 million disabled to access health care, the job market and other essential services.

Let’s hope that the crisis steadily becomes alleviated and the initiatives taken lead to a steady improvement in the position of so many of our fellow citizens over the coming months and years.

I’m honoured to work at this project, and I want to invest myself to make it bigger, nicer, and more powerful. It is a lab of experimentation and creativity, as it tests the potential (and pushes the limits) of institutional communication. Nowhere else, as far as I know, there is a community from so many different countries discussing political issues among them.  I was literally touched by the post on Thailand, when we talked about the riots in Bangkok. Some Thai people commented on it and many, many Europeans expressed them their solidarity and their sorrow, but also discussed the political situation there.

With over 76.000 fans, each post seen at least 100.000 times, and over 1.000 interactions per week, I think we shouldn’t be shy and say that this is one of the most successful experiences of communication on EU affairs ever.

Football time: the genius of Fred "en jouant avec son 'toshop"

Positive feed-back

In fact, we don’t need to auto celebrate ourselves, because we have a lot of positive feed-back, from inside and outside the House.

The other EU Institutions consider us frontrunners, and want to exchange experiences. The last example: a communication officer from EuropeAid at the Commission said he is “a big fan of the Facebook editorial team of the Parliament” and he would like to share with us some best practices.

After the chat with Heidi Hautala on human rights on Facebook, her assistant wrote to me that the results were “very impressive” and that the MEP “was very happy to participate and would do it again for sure :)”, encouraging us to “continue the excellent work!”.

FB fans appreciate our work, and they expressed it many times. Just over the last week, Marcello Toni thanked us for organising the chats, Tremopoulos Michalis encouraged us to “keep up the good work!!”and Mark Valdam said he likes “funny organisations like the EP :-))”.
…and some secrets to reveal
So far so good. Of course we can do much better, and I’ll write another post on what we can and should do in the future. For the time being, just two little confessions.
1) It is a serious thing – When “the pillar” left, I didn’t sleep for one week. I was given more or less informally the responsibility of coordinating the magic Facebook team, and this gave me a good dose of stress. The page took off and grew thanks – among others – to the creativity, restless effort and “geekiness” of Christian. I don’t know if I can keep up, but I will do all my best because I believe that this communication platform has a great potential to get Europe a little bit closer to citizens, but also to get citizens closer to European decision makers, and maybe most important, to get Europeans closer to each other.
2) But you don’t have to take yourself (and the others) too seriously. Do you know how the best posts that we publish see the light? Normally we exchange tonnes of emails, and at some point somebody comes up with a funny, sometimes hilarious email, that the others – crazily enough – take seriously. And then it goes on Facebook and gets a lot of comments and “likes”: the magic of Facebook!

For me, the important thing is to keep this spirit alive and…enjoy your work!

Why?

I got super-stressed when I arrived at the European Parliament’s building in Strasbourg.
“No info desks,” I was told by the buildings service, “however, the security service at the entrances can provide information. Plans of the buildings can be consulted at main points and in front of the lifts.”

But …… If you think that you will arrive there and the security men will tell you the correct updated office number of your boss, then you are as naive as I was. They sent me to the 14th floor, where he had been more than three years previously. No DG Communication anywhere near… A Polish administration lady went with me to investigate the right office. We even grabbed a passing fire-fighter to help us to find it.

After asking, labyrinthine-ing among 2.600 offices and 57 meeting rooms, including the Hemicycle, while hoping I would not have to take all 34 staircases and sweating because I was already late, we finally arrived. After three quarters of an hour. Polish lady, fire-fighter and ME {laugh}.

Letters, numbers and colours … Coffee, please!

There are 4 buildings and 6 places to get some snacks in European Parliament area:

1, Louise Weiss (LOW) named after a lady Weiss born to a Bourgeoisie, Alsatian family. The centre of her interest was Europe, and so she came to find herself in Strasbourg towards the end of her life. She was then the oldest Member of Parliament to be elected by direct universal suffrage. She remained MEP and oldest member until her death in 1983 at the age of 90.

LOW is famous for its Flower Bar with a very funky carpet and a lot of yummy things to choose from. It is always very full, though. :{

Second one is Visitor’s bar at LOW 00 – under the Hemicycle
Thirdly, Members’ bar at LOW 01 -next to the Hemicycle zone Nord
And the fourth one – Press bar at LOW 00 zone Nord – approximately opposite of the Members’ bar, one floor beneath.

1946: “There is a remedy which … would in a few years make all Europe … free and … happy. It is to re-create the European family, or as much of it as we can, and to provide it with a structure under which it can dwell in peace, in safety and in freedom. We must build a kind of United States of Europe.”

2, Winston Churchill (WIC), a former army officer, war reporter and British Prime Minister (1940-45 and 1951-55), was one of the first to call for the creation of a ‘United States of Europe’. Sir Winston Churchill also made a name for himself as a painter and writer; in 1953 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

I think Mr. Churchill would be very happy If he would have known that we have on -1 floor Cygnes/Swan Bar. It is very nice one with view to the river and a lot of trees. Bonus!  It is very close to the one of 28 restrooms in the complex.

3, Salvador de Madariaga (SDM) is the founder of the College of Europe. Passionate defender of liberty and tolerance, he wanted to construct a free and democratic Europe of continental scale. He was also a writer, poet, historian, philosopher and politician. After working for the League of Nations, he pursued a university career at Oxford, where published a number of works, including the famous “Englishmen, Frenchmen and Spaniards”, an essay on the observation and comparative psychology of people.

Unfortunately, no bar in SDM.

4, Pierre Pflimlin (PFL) Pierre Eugène Jean Pflimlin was a French Christian democratic politician who served as the penultimate Prime Minister of the Fourth Republic for a few weeks in 1958, before being replaced by Charles de Gaulle during the crisis of that year. Pflimlin served as mayor of Strasbourg from 1959 to 1 983. He also was the President of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe from 1963 to 1966 and President of the European Parliament from 1984 to 1987.

And finally our building: It has an Accueil Bar on the -1 floor. Wonderful place to meet all communication people.

My PFL F000445A.  My castle.

First 3 letters is the abbreviation of the building’s name PFL= Pierre Pflimlin. The first 2 numbers are the floor number and then the rest is the office number.

LOW building, the biggest of the 4 Strasbourg buildings, is divided into 6 zones: N=Nord, S=Sud, T=Tower, H=Hemicycle, C=Canal, R=Rivière. The other 3 buildings have not been divided into zones. However you can still follow different colours connected to different zones in the WIC.

You can get to our office in PFL by two ways – the official way and my way

The official way: “The common floor to all 4 buildings in Strasbourg is floor 01. You access the PFL building through the WIC building, than you take the lift or staircase down to floor 00. The working post F00044a (and not F000445a) is situated inside the open plan space F00040. There are 2 such spaces in the PFL, the F00030 and the F00040, each one contains approximately 30 working posts, ” explains  Buildings service.

My version would be: Get off the bus. Behind the corner, there is a big entrance to PFL building. Pass the security. First stairs on your left to first floor. And do you see second door on your left? You scored….

Strasbourg a peaceful city

The capital city of the Alsace region situated in north-eastern France where some of us spend every 4th week or the others have the only possibility to see while on traineeship.

What interests me is the density of the city. It is around half of Brussels one {according to an online encyclopaedia statistics Brussels has 6,6 inhb/m² while Strasbourg only 3,5 inhb/m²}.

Getting around

You can easily get around by bus, tram or on foot. The best way to get to EP is tram or bus number…  It has actually no number. It is a special service for the European Institutions and it is called the Navette. The actual bus stop is on your right side behind the flags when you are standing the way that the train station is behind you.

Joe Biden addresses the European Parliament

Parliament is undoubtedly just a bit star-struck on these occasions. When the American show rolls into town, you can’t exactly fail to notice… You can bet that there’ll be hot competition for seats in whatever room the prime attraction will occupy (not fair, MEPs have reserved seats…), an insatiable demand to get up close and personal which is inevitably difficult to reconcile with the heavy security needs of all those smartly dressed gentlemen with wires in their ears who precede and accompany the VIP guest…

So there was the usual excitement this week when US Vice-President Joe Biden came to the European Parliament. Two things on his agenda: first he would address the House in a formal sitting, whereafter he would go into a private meeting with the leaders of Parliament’s seven political groups, the so-called Conference of Presidents. There are some great photos of it all by Pietro on Flickr, here.

Joe Biden is a experienced, respected and big-hitting politician. You could pretty much say he’s seen in all. Including recently, that classic pitfall of the contemporary politician, the off-the-cuff remark picked up by an open microphone, an event now amplified by the speed of the internet and social media (ask Gordon Brown). Thus, his heartfelt remark, as he introduced his boss to an audience eager to hear about the passage of Obama’s historic health care legislation, that this was a “big f*#king deal”, duly did the rounds on Youtube (you have to listen hard!). I have to say, this episode did much to endear him to me, anyway. First, the remark is accurate – the passage of health care was no small matter – and second, it showed him for the real human being he undoubtedly is. Thus the odd social media accident can actually play into your hands.

“The  administration strongly supports, a vibrant European Union.”

I refer to this incident for a particular reason, as a pretext to say, Mr Vice-President, your visit to us was a big f*#king deal.

I don’t mean, this time, that it was the usual American star turn. It was, but that’s not the point. This was politically highly significant. Watch the speech. Read the speech. Read about the speech. For one thing, it was a damn good speech. As a statement of the Obama administration’s attitude to the EU, it is unequivocal: “The Obama/Biden administration has no doubt about the need for, and strongly supports, a vibrant European Union. We believe it is absolutely essential to American prosperity and long-term security.” (I couldn’t help feeling it was a shame most UK members were absent, May 6 being election day back home. They should have heard this.)

But, more than that, from the perspective of the European Parliament, this speech marks a real coming of age. The Vice-President’s speech is a recognition of the European Parliament as a crucial partner, a recognition of the need for the US Congress and the European Parliament to deal with other as equals: ”The new powers granted this Parliament in the Lisbon Treaty gave you a greater role in that struggle [against terror and extremism] and a greater imperative to govern responsibly.”

“I think we got your attention”. Right, Mr Vice-President?

This was not the grand, but ultimately abstract idealistic stuff ladled out by Reagan in 1985, but hard-nosed politics about mutual interests, a senior politician bringing a practical political message to his transatlantic partners.

The case of SWIFT (Parliament’s rejection of an agreement whereby banking data is supplied to the American authorities) was not mentioned explicitly in this speech, but it was there as a subtext throughout the parts dealing with the responsibility of US and European lawmakers to protect their citizens. You know what Americans say: “I think we got your attention”. Right, Mr Vice-President? But this is not a game of transatlantic oneupmanship, it’s about a practical demonstration of the fact that two partner institutions are finding that their activities overlap, their interests both coincide and diverge and that their decisions affect each other directly. So Mr Biden’s words in Brussels to the European Parliament confirm the new reality spotted by many in the famous call made by Hillary Clinton to Jerzy Buzek to try to persuade him to try to swing the Parliament away from its impending rejection of the SWIFT agreement. This video rightly puts the emphasis on this aspect of the speech. (You can also see SWIFT rapporteur, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert’s, reaction here.)

Said Mr Biden: “President Obama and I reject the false choice between safety and our ideals.” He pointed to the US constitutional attachment to privacy, aka the “right to be let alone”, and then made his basic point: “The United States needs Europe, and I respectfully submit that Europe needs the United States. We need each other more now than we ever have.”

“God bless you all and may God protect all of our troops. Thank you very, very much.”

In a speech so focused on emphasising the common interests of Europe and the US, without shying away from the areas of disagreement, it is perhaps a little ironic that Mr Biden’s concluding sentence acted as a reminder of a way in which US and European politicians have come to differ. In the States, it would have sounded natural and uncontroversial, a rhetorical evocation which can be guaranteed to generate consensus in any audience: “We wish you God-speed, and may God bless you all and may God protect all of our troops. Thank you very, very much.”

Yes, we are a little different, but if we’re listening to each other that’s the main thing.

The network is spreading

We don’t claim the scientific method or the statistical sophistication of Fleishman Hillard, but we have some rough and ready figures on how many MEPs are using social media – and it seems the numbers are well up since the elections. Doubtless increasing every day as well…

So, here we go:

Twitter

We found 230 MEPs with Twitter feeds.  That’s just over 31% of the membership of the EP. Collectively, they have over 114,000 followers.  If you want information on who is most followed, most active, etc., the euro-twitter aggregation site europatweets.eu offers some statistics (for which I take no responsibility).

Twitter is of course currently having another of its moments in the limelight, thanks to its role in helping people deal with myriad difficulties caused by the air traffic ban (see Tibo’s post mentioning this and his praise for Eurocontrol’s exemplary efforts on Twitter), and many MEPs have been using their Twitter feeds to tell stories of travel disruption, seek/give information or occasionally vent some frustration.

Facebook

A majority of MEPs have Facebook profiles! We found 401, that’s 55% of them. That’s a comfortable co-decision qualified majority… Unlike Fleishman Hillard, we haven’t got the research firepower to try to assess “extensive” users of social networks, but I think we can assume that the total we found represents a significant increase over the 33% who “used social networks extensively” before the elections.

A majority of MEPs have Facebook profiles! That’s a  qualified majority.

Altogether, and very interestingly for anyone thinking in terms of a burgeoning EP online community, these members have well over 450,000 fans, but, of course, fairly spread out between them.  (We couldn’t help noticing though that almost 90,000 of the total were fans of just two members, but otherwise the numbers are quite even.)

Facebook is the social media platform which seems to offer us the greatest possibilities at present. The number of fans (or, as it now says, “people who like this”) of the EP Facebook page is growing steadily, and stands at 66,640 at the beginning of the day I write this, which also happens to be the page’s first birthday! We are also seeing an increasing level of interaction on the page from fans, and, it is good to observe, from MEPs who wish to join in the debates they see occurring there.

Personally, I can’t find anyone else in the EU institutional framework, or in the wider “official” European parliamentary world, who has built up a number of fans approaching this. (That said, I am not going to compare the page with, say Britney Spears or Barack Obama – 2.6 and 8.0 million fans respectively – but that’s different, right?) So, perhaps, embryonically, the EP Facebook page stands as good a chance as anyone at offering one place where the mythical European public sphere to start taking shape online. Now, moreover, that we know about all those members – and all their fans – it seems all the more clear that the time has come to start getting serious about developing the links and interaction between them all, and maybe creating a kind of institutional hub for their conversation.

But that is another, very interesting, story and doubtless material for many more posts in the future. Back to business.

Blogs

Last in our research, we found 282 MEP bloggers, which is about 38%. I admit to wondering whether we found everything, but do note that the FH study had MEP “extensive” bloggers at 24%.

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MEPs are increasingly engaging via social media. This must have momentous implications for our own institutional online strategy in the future.

So there you go, just some quick figures. Many thanks to the doughty trainees for their valuable efforts on this. As I said, I don’t pretend it is “scientific” research and I am going to be cautious about getting into more detail, which might be rather spurious. The key thing is we know that, yes, MEPs are increasingly engaging via social media, that a critical mass is surely being reached and that this will have momentous implications for our own institutional online strategy in the future. More anon, no doubt.

The European Parliament is a sociable place - can it also be media social?

“Less stories more creatively told” was one of the phrases ringing in my ears as I departed the recent “Social Media World Forum” in London. These words were uttered by Adam Parker of RealWire who was speaking about the relative merits of press releases and whether they work or not in the social media age.

He lamented the fact that according to his research only 2% of all press releases in the UK had any kind of social media aspect (twitter, Facebook etc) to them.

Our articles for the Parliament’s website are not press releases but they could definitely be improved using hyperlinks more inter linking with videos and audio-visual material. Interestingly, Adam felt that humble audio was the most under-rated and under used of all the communication mediums which was strange considering it has been the method of communication since our ancestors were sitting in caves.

Much of the social media forum was about the uses that Facebook can be put to. I won’t divulge much on that subject as one of our FB-boffins was there as well and is eager to share some findings with you later in this blog.

A generational shift in online politics?

In terms of politics and the public sphere Alex Aitken of Westminster City Council voiced fears that many people were treating social media as merely an end in itself. For him the only point in any public communication must be about encouraging people to be engaged in public debates and policy making.

Craig Elder, the Conservative party’s social media guru said he thought there was an aspect of generational change in the way the parties and politicians generally used social media and the internet. He contrasted Tony Blair and Gordon Brown with the younger pretenders David Cameron and George Osborne in that regard.

The entire panel, including moderator Matthew Fraser, agreed that things were moving incredibly fast (social media was scarcely heard of at the last UK election in 2005), and that future elections would make our current efforts look amateurish.

Newspapers – remember them?

For me personally perhaps the most depressing presentation was on the future of newspapers – if indeed they have one. Caught in a perfect storm of depression, scant advertising and demographic changes circulation is in freefall.

Dirk Singer (“Head Rabbit, Rabbit”) estimated that circulation in the UK had fallen by 3.1 million by 2008. To put that into perspective that equates to almost the population of Wales who have stopped reading newspapers.

This trend started in the US, has spread to the UK and will no doubt soon be found in Europe more generally. Putting this into perspective he said that in the US newspaper have lost 7 million readers in the last 25 years whereas online readership was up 34 million in the last 5 years.  He sees the print future as being made up of specialist newspapers and magazines catering for people who want long well researched articles.

Finally, we turned up for what came to be an ironically named workshop on “Reputation online – are we ready for the future of social media?” Unfortunately, the panel were not ready neither for the future or the present for that matter as they failed to show up! In their place the moderator and a man from Linked in did a great job in filling in and somehow salvaging something.

Nevertheless, a productive and dare I say it enjoyable experience!

Rooting for Europe: the West Wing team

I’m not talking impressionable youngsters here – the bright-eyed parliamentary assistants, trainees and, yes, WebCom editors who hang out in “Place Lux” on Thursday nights – no, I’m talking top officials, the senior movers and shakers, men and women whose opinion really counts and whose administrative grades add up to serious totals. I speak with authority, the first DVD boxed set I watched (ah, the untold bliss of Series 1!) was pressed on me by the (then) most senior official in the European Parliament, a man whose many talents probably include the ability to provide a plot summary of any one of the episodes of the West Wing at the drop of a hat.

I was not alone. Soon I was part of a circle of West Wing addicts, passing the latest boxed set on from one to the next. Judging by the rapidity with which the 23-episode series were recycled, some serious 2, 3 or even 4-episode sessions were being put in on a nightly basis. A fan phenomenon of course swiftly emerged, with online quizzes identifying the respondent with one or the other West Wing character being particularly popular. Try this, by the way, it’s a lot of fun. I was delighted to come up (repeatedly) as an alter-ego of CJ Cregg, President Bartlett’s feisty, sharp, empathetic and witty press secretary. (I am myself not particularly feisty, sharp, empathetic or witty, but I would dearly love to be like CJ Cregg…).

So why this West Wing thing? Of course, there’s a fair dose of wish fulfilment about it. The real West Wing cannot be like that, of course, but we doubtless all wish it could be, just as anyone who works as a staffer in the world of politics dreams of being at the heart of things and making a difference in world affairs. And where better than the world’s most potent symbol of democratic political power, the US presidency?

White House press secretary C.J.Cregg - WANNABEEEEE!

Of course, wish-fulfilment easily elides into envy, and, sure, there’s a healthy dose of envy there too: where political Europe is perceived as complicated, often ineffectual, misunderstood or disregarded by the citizens it serves, the White House is decisive, central to national life  and, at least in its fictionalised version, steered by a small group of (ususally) wise, energetic, idealistic people. EU officials can only look on in wonderment as world crises are decisively addressed with a couple of presidential words uttered gravely in the Situation Room (delivered, naturally, following sage advice from the grizzled but ultra-reliable chief of staff Leo McGarry), or when hi-octane presidential staffer Josh Lyman knocks a few heads together on Capitol Hill and key legislation makes it through the House as a result. Even day-to-day business, the scurrying open-plan offices, the fast-talking fast-walking wit, the state business conducted in terse exhanges in corridors over a Starbucks coffee and muffin “to go”, the gruelling-but-glamourous 24-hour working rhythm, the ruthless-but-inspired hiring and firing (no pernickerty EU Staff Regulations here!)… it all seems exciting, adrenaline-driven, so unlike the EU official’s daily lot of turgid task forces, fiendish financial regulations, protracted procurement procedures and all the dull, necessary impedimenta of public service.

Of course, it ain’t like that really, neither there nor here, but that shouldn’t get in the way of a bit of wholesome envy, should it?

Maybe however, the envy goes a little deeper, beyond the fictional world of Jed Bartlett and co., to touch on something which really does bother those EU West Wing fans. If you know the West Wing, you also know that, for all the plot lines of human imperfection, political infighting and frustration, the bad taste left by the occasional realpolitik needed in foreign affairs, it rests ultimately on an underlying belief in the system, a bottom-line respect for the office of the Presidency, a conviction that when push comes to shove, the system is – or can be – inhabited by high calibre individuals genuinely doing what they believe is best for their country. A strain of unfeigned idealism, shared assumptions and national unity underpin the West Wing’s appeal. Naive? Maybe. Cheesy? Sure. But don’t tell me, that, deep down, Brussels is not full of people who profoundly wish some of that sense of idealism and common interest could be replicated here. For they are themselves, very often, idealists, true believers in a European ideal, which increasingly they see as neglected and eroded by the daily reality of Brussels. And it’s not just EU politics, at national level too, that West Wing spirit is hard to find.

Can we afford to lose even that basic belief that the system, at heart, can work for us rather than against us?

Indeed we’re probably going the other way.  If I look at UK political drama – the local equivalent of the West Wing perhaps – I can draw a straight downward line from Yes Minister, though the House of Cards trilogy to In the Thick of It – all uproariously funny and clever television, but marking a steady increase in the cynicism and disrespect with which the political system and its inhabitants are viewed. Healthy? Possibly. Deserved? To an extent. But can we afford to lose even that basic belief that the system, at heart, can work for us rather than against us?

If you think I’m being misty-eyed about American idealism, you’re probably right, but then I’m not alone. The presidential campaign of Barack Obama said something about how Americans view their political system, surely, and one need only look at European reactions to his election to see that there is an appetite in Europe too for the brand of idealism it represented for many in the old continent.

But all is far from lost. For a start, life imitates art, as we know from the extraordinary predictiveness of the West Wing’s seventh and last series. (Though we subsequently discover the real story was even more extraordinary.) Second, history moves on. Europe is not what it was even five years ago, the heyday of the West Wing fan club. As already noted on this blog, the moment has finally come when Kissinger’s famous question about who he should call to “speak to Europe” has finally been answered (by the New York Times, no less) – with the answer being neither Van Rompuy nor Ashton, but Jerzy Buzek!

Dan Brown fans among you may also wish to draw conclusions from a new instance of life imitating art, with the news that the Commission’s former spokesman, Johannes Laitenberger, has become chief of staff to President Barroso. Sound familiar, West Wing fans? (For the uninitiated, press secretary CJ Cregg ultimately makes the same move to the office abutting the Oval Office.) Maybe Mr Barroso is a West Wing fan too?

But so what? What can we conclude from all this? I crave your patience to advance two ideas: one academic, one practical.

My theory holds that the extent of devotion to an American TV series about American government is a reasonable indicator of the level of euro-idealism among officials of the EU institutions.

The first is my new working theory, Steve’s West Wing Paradox or the West Wing euro-idealism coefficient. This theory holds that the extent of devotion to an American TV series about American government is a reasonable indicator of the level of euro-idealism among officials of the EU institutions.

The second is linked to this observation, not least because it in inevitably a theory of limited shelf life, and to the second observation that the EU system is maturing and starting to resemble the US system to an ever greater degree. It is simply that the time is surely ripe for an equivalent of the West Wing to be made about the EU…

European West Wing fans have long indulged in a parlour game, imagining the title, setting and plotlines of a local equivalent. Suggestions inevitably range from the hopeful to the facetious and back. But maybe now we can – just – start to imagine what such a series might be like, a series to be followed avidly by White House staffers. So dear readers, your suggestions please; now is the time to reveal your creativity and your shameless euro-idealism. Just one rule: no MEDIA subsidies, no DG-Comm grants, no public funded co-productions, this one has to make it alone…

SWIFT rapporteur Jeanine Hennis is congratulated after the vote (EP Flickr)

A “yes” to the Commission did not come as a surprise, but no-one who was there could mistake the political buzz surrounding the decision, itself the result of a process which will have undoubtedly left scars and unfinished business. The debate in the chamber was passionate, the political clashes genuine, the language straight, at times to the point of being what we stuffy Brits might call “unparliamentary”. This was not the turgid technocratic consensus stuff of euromyth. Nor was it play-acting. Under the surface were good old-fashioned ideological clashes, contrasting personalities, plus, variously, hefty doses of radical euro-federalism and militant euroscepticism (with not one, but two, allusions to violence on the streets!) in the smaller groups. Not a routine occasion in anyone’s book. In the end, Barroso got his Commission, indeed with a higher proportion of MEPs supporting him than last time (he was spotted in the chamber examining a table comparing the two occasions), but he would be very optimistic to expect a long honeymoon period with this parliament.

There has rarely been a greater compliment to Parliament, nor a greater acknowledgement of its new-found power

Parliament’s “no” to the SWIFT agreement to provide banking data to the US authorities was a less foregone conclusion, but was in the end passed by a convincing majority. This was the EP taking a position against European governments, the Commission, the Council and (gasp!) the US administration of Barack Obama. Much indeed was made of the lobbying efforts of the Americans, with European imaginations caught by Hillary Clinton’s widely reported calls to Jerzy Buzek, and the inhabitants of the Brussels bubble equally engaged by the efforts of US Ambassador Kennard in the corridors of Strasbourg. For all the outrage of some at the US lobbying of MEPs, there has rarely been a greater compliment to Parliament, nor a greater acknowledgement of its new-found power.

The ultimately solid majority decision to block the SWIFT agreement belied a cliffhanger and a close political call. Immediately before the final decision, a motion to postpone it was defeated by a slim margin of just over 30 votes. The joy of rapporteur Jeanine Hennis-Plaschaert as Parliament followed her recommendation on the substantive vote was unalloyed and the delight of her supporters genuine, though, one might fancy, tempered by a sense of – well, yes, – history.

There was other business in Strasbourg this week of course, but the week’s “maybe” was played out in Brussels as EU leaders met to work out how to respond to the first great crisis of the euro. No, this one was not primarily the Parliament in action, but it nonetheless says much about the new political Europe in which the Parliament has staked its new, greater role. Leaders scurrying to rally the currency, bankers, business, pundits following their every move, workers taking to the streets… Remind you of anything? Surely this is old fashioned “real” politics, the sort that moves markets and hits citizens where it matters – in the pocket.

Yes, it was a huge week. Huge in Parliament, and huge because it gave us a foretaste of the Europe Lisbon built.

Looks impressive... In many ways it is impressive too

So this is what it’s like? After more than a decade and a half as a journalist, I am now a source… Not a real source, you understand, I will gladly leave that to those thus inclined or employed, but one of the many invisible hands behind the EP’s web page. One of the… yes, one of the “faceless bureaucrats”. What the true “sources”, the MEPs, say and do, we publish.

Wait. Isn’t that journalism? No it isn’t, for the simple reason that we are actually employed by our “source”, but it’s certainly as close as it gets. What we publish, citizens read, either directly on the site or because journalists use it as a source for what they publish or broadcast.

And as the absolute newbie of the team (well, Marko our Slovenian editor with whom I share my office is technically even newer, but only by a fortnight, so it doesn’t really count) I can vouch for one thing: everything here is as conscientiously and objectively researched before it gets published as anything you will read in your newspaper. We don’t express our own opinion through what we write, but then journalists really shouldn’t either, should they? After all that’s why all newspapers have a dedicated “opinion” column and dedicated “columnists”.

A few people did actually ask after my first few days with the unit, not what I thought about the job (everyone asked that) but if something surprised me. Well, if I had to point out just one thing, it would be how similar it is to my former job, from the actual reporting to the very warm welcome by everyone when I first arrived…

Ok, its is my first jab at this and it isn’t supposed to be profound, - I formally dislike expressing profound thoughts unless they are really, truly profound- But it certainly is de profundis…

So, want to know exactly what happened in the EP today, yesterday or last week? It’s here. Want to know what is coming up? It’s here as well. Want to know both sides of an argument in the hemicycle? Yes, we usually offer that too and if we didn’t write about it ourselves, check our links, we have you all set up and ready for the jump.

Anyway… hello everyone, good morning and good luck.

The journalists followed the nowadays trend on getting the news. Not searching, but getting. Searching is too old-fashioned. Nowadays the mountain comes to Mahomet, via Facebook and Twitter. The same way the EP news came to you this week.

Haiku goes global ©nobuojp

Monday: you find out on Facebook that the Bulgarian commissioner-designate will be evaluated by the Parliament. If approved, she will be in charge with development and she will be expected to take action on Haiti. If you have time to check the fan’s comments you read that she is an economist and was vice-president of the World Bank and that people trust her. Later in the afternoon you read that last year’s Sakharov prize laureate, Oleg Orlov, leader of Memorial, was arrested in Russia, and that the EP’s president called on the Russian authorities to “cease the heavy-handed treatment of peaceful demonstrators”. The fans comments inform you that Mr Orlov is the second Sakharov laureate to be jailed, after Lyudmila Alexeyeva was arrested on New Year’s Eve . On Twitter you read that the Balkans are “still suffering” from Yugoslav wars, and if you follow the link you will be able to read an interview on this subject with the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

Tuesday: you probably already knew that the European Parliament regularly examines the candidate states’ readiness for EU membership. But you can find out the citizens’ views on enlargement in the 200+ fan comments. The day’s bad news: we may have to raise taxes in the next years. If you don’t click on the link you don’t find out that the MEPs asked for the pensions’ reform. On Twitter you read that bankers have lost their friends in Davos and that MEPs ask support for small firms while tackling the crisis. If you are a fan of the EP president on Facebook, you find out that he paid his first official visit to a founding EU Member State – France.

In late afternoon you cannot believe you eyes: the Parliament’s communication team published on the EP official website the comments on enlargement from their Facebook fans.

Wednesday: you are informed on Facebook that the hearing of the Bulgarian commissioner-designate is broadcast live. Unfortunately not on Facebook, but on the EP website. So, follow the link!

Thursday: first news on Facebook: Parliament members look at how cooperation in organ donation could help to overcome shortages. In late afternoon you cannot believe you eyes: the Parliament’s communication team published on the EP official website the comments on enlargement from their Facebook fans. On Twitter you read that the commissioners’ hearings are over, and you can see the atmosphere caught by our photographer in a photo gallery on Flickr.

Friday: On Twitter you find a link to the verbatim reports of the commissioners’ hearings and another one to the parliamentary committees’ evaluations of the candidates. On Facebook you read that during the following week MEPs meet in plenary in Strasbourg. The video proposed in the link shows you the main points on the MEPs agenda, among which the controversial transfer of European banking data to the American authorities.

Did you miss any information by not reading the official news? Find out yourself on the EP “Headlines”!