8 July 1999 Edition
Bangemann's £650,000 bonanza
BY ROBBIE MacGABHANN
A just solution would be to pension off EU commissioners on the average industrial wage of the member states they originally came from.
``He is our Ronaldo.'' Is it Henrik Larsson, Dwight Yorke or Alessandro Del Piero? No it is the rather more portly figure of Martin Bangemann, who this week gives up his £120,000-a-year tax free job as EU industry Commissioner. The 64-year-old German is to become a board member of Telefonica, the Spanish telecommunications company.
Telefonica is to pay Bangemann £650,000 a year for his services. The path from EU commissioner to the boardrooms of industry is a well-trodden one. Our own Peter Sutherland has been chairperson of AIB, BP and Goldman Sachs since his stint in the EU Commission.
However, most EU commissioners wait until their term of office is over before hitching up to another gravy train. Bangemann's star transfer has caused consternation in Brussels, as his commission portfolio includes responsibility for telecommunications.
Telefonica chairperson Juan Villalonga described Bangemann as ``our Ronaldo''. Bangemann's departure form Brussels has caused incoming Commission President Romano Prodi, who is no stranger to boardrooms himself, to announce that when in office he would formulate clear and transparent rules governing what happens to EU commissioners after they leave office.
It is obvious that the only reason EU Commissioners are taken onto the boards of international companies is because of their access to decision- and policy-makers. This is the very reason that they should not be let serve on these boards after holding EU office.
A just solution would be to pension off EU commissioners on the average industrial wage of the member states they originally came from. This might be difficult for Mr Bangemann. Like our own Padraig Flynn, he has multiple houses to keep. Bangemann's houses are in Germany and the south of France, not to mention his private yacht.
Much hype has made in recent months over reform of the EU Commission after the 20 commissioners were found guilty of ignoring fraud, and of cronyism. A real step towards reforming the commission would be to stop the merry-go-round of perks and privilege after they leave office.
The representatives of 50 million workers met in Helsinki this week to discuss the future of trade unions in Europe. 1,000 delegates to the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) are discussing the possibility of creating an EU-wide super union structure to take on the institutions of the EU and multinational employers at a transnational level.
`Workers of the world unite' was once the catchcall of the left. Now the question is whether the workers of Europe will or can unite in a common interest. Unions from Britain, Italy and Spain support the idea of a super union while some of the Nordic states, where union membership is over 80% of the workforce, prefer to continue with their own strategy of intervention solely at a national level.
In a parallel development, many individual unions have made international links with unions involved in the same industries. One example of this is engineering unions in Belgium, Netherlands and the North Rhine-Westphalia region of Germany. Together they are co-ordinating their wage bargaining structures.
The danger for trade unions of organising on an EU basis is the possibility of being sucked into the right wing agenda of the project for Economic and Monetary union. EMU is eroding wages and working conditions across Europe.
European workers must agree a common position on the EU, its structures, institutions and policies before they create a transnational structure. Simply mirroring the structures of the EU in the trade union movement is a recipe for disaster.
A just solution would be to pension off EU commissioners on the average industrial wage of the member states they originally came from.
``He is our Ronaldo.'' Is it Henrik Larsson, Dwight Yorke or Alessandro Del Piero? No it is the rather more portly figure of Martin Bangemann, who this week gives up his £120,000-a-year tax free job as EU industry Commissioner. The 64-year-old German is to become a board member of Telefonica, the Spanish telecommunications company.
Telefonica is to pay Bangemann £650,000 a year for his services. The path from EU commissioner to the boardrooms of industry is a well-trodden one. Our own Peter Sutherland has been chairperson of AIB, BP and Goldman Sachs since his stint in the EU Commission.
However, most EU commissioners wait until their term of office is over before hitching up to another gravy train. Bangemann's star transfer has caused consternation in Brussels, as his commission portfolio includes responsibility for telecommunications.
Telefonica chairperson Juan Villalonga described Bangemann as ``our Ronaldo''. Bangemann's departure form Brussels has caused incoming Commission President Romano Prodi, who is no stranger to boardrooms himself, to announce that when in office he would formulate clear and transparent rules governing what happens to EU commissioners after they leave office.
It is obvious that the only reason EU Commissioners are taken onto the boards of international companies is because of their access to decision- and policy-makers. This is the very reason that they should not be let serve on these boards after holding EU office.
A just solution would be to pension off EU commissioners on the average industrial wage of the member states they originally came from. This might be difficult for Mr Bangemann. Like our own Padraig Flynn, he has multiple houses to keep. Bangemann's houses are in Germany and the south of France, not to mention his private yacht.
Much hype has made in recent months over reform of the EU Commission after the 20 commissioners were found guilty of ignoring fraud, and of cronyism. A real step towards reforming the commission would be to stop the merry-go-round of perks and privilege after they leave office.
A united Europe of workers?
The representatives of 50 million workers met in Helsinki this week to discuss the future of trade unions in Europe. 1,000 delegates to the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) are discussing the possibility of creating an EU-wide super union structure to take on the institutions of the EU and multinational employers at a transnational level.
`Workers of the world unite' was once the catchcall of the left. Now the question is whether the workers of Europe will or can unite in a common interest. Unions from Britain, Italy and Spain support the idea of a super union while some of the Nordic states, where union membership is over 80% of the workforce, prefer to continue with their own strategy of intervention solely at a national level.
In a parallel development, many individual unions have made international links with unions involved in the same industries. One example of this is engineering unions in Belgium, Netherlands and the North Rhine-Westphalia region of Germany. Together they are co-ordinating their wage bargaining structures.
The danger for trade unions of organising on an EU basis is the possibility of being sucked into the right wing agenda of the project for Economic and Monetary union. EMU is eroding wages and working conditions across Europe.
European workers must agree a common position on the EU, its structures, institutions and policies before they create a transnational structure. Simply mirroring the structures of the EU in the trade union movement is a recipe for disaster.