European Commission survey on mobile citizens needs

The European Commission has launched a study to identify the needs for cross-border public services. This questionnaire aims at gathering information from 'mobile' citizens -Europeans living and working in another European country than their native country- and organisations involved in cross-border activities.

As a 'mobile' citizen, you, better than anyone, know what it’s like to deal with cross-border administrative obligations: think about the time when you arrived in a new country, how to find out where to get a residence/working permit, how to deal with recognition of diploma’s/qualifications, how to get child allowance, etc … and still you might be dealing with filling out income tax statements twice, difficulties to obtain certain documents from your birth country when for example getting married, enrolling for an education..

Or you, working in an organisation which performs cross-border activities, can provide input on cross-border administrative obligations for organisations: think about the time when you tried to establish abroad, when you were trying to reclaim your VAT, how to find out where to get information on the social security system for your employees abroad, how to deal with the registration of trademarks, patents, etc …

To help making live easier for you, you are kindly invited to fill in this web-based survey which is open until Thursday October 6th 2004.

Thank you in advance for your collaboration!

More information on the study can be found at this address:
http://europa.eu.int/ida/en/document/3199

Feedback about Zapatero's visit to New York

Our blog comments facility does not appear to have been working properly so we are copying below a message received in relation to this post about President Rodriguez Zapatero's visit to the United Nations.

The message is from Mark Alexander and we received it yesterday:

"President Zapatero is so obviously an appeaser! He is weak and ineffectual.He has withdrawn his country's troops from Iraq, and now proposes a'cultural alliance' with Islam. For 'cultural alliance' read 'appeasing theMuslim world'! Does Mr. Zapatero, a man whose country was once overrun byMuslims, not understand that the phenomenon we see today with Islamicterrorism is a manifestation of Islam on the move? The warning signs are onthe wall. We shall ignore them at our peril! There is no compromise with theIslamic world to be: we either value our democracy and freedom in the West,and we 'fight' (whatever that will entail) for them; or we don't. In thelatter case, they win and we loose our freedoms. The Muslim world concedesnothing. It doesn't give an inch. With Zapatero's 'cultural alliance' allthe West will do is give away and concede and appease. It is a recipe fordisaster!"


Thanks Mark! Obviously we do not share your views and we believe that it is at least desirable to try to gain friends in the Arab world. And to help eradicate the reasons which drive so many young Arabs to commit terrible acts of terrorism against the West in the name of Islam which, essentially, is a pacific religion used by a minority of Islamic extremists to justify terrible crimes against humanity.

Spain was conquered (rather than overrun) by the Moors in the same way as it had been by Italians during the Roman Empire, centuries before the Arabs arrived, and in the same way as America and other colonies in Africa and Asia were invaded and conquered in the 1500s onwards by Spain itself, England, Portugal, France etc etc.

We believe that rather than being a sign of "Islams on the move", the current violence is a result of a much more complicated socio-political and economic situation. We also believe that violence cannot be resolved by further violence. As Nelson Mandela said when he was released from captivity after 40 years, we will only win a real victory over our enemies when we talk to them, start to understand why they act as they do and convince them that they are wrong.

Divorce in Spain

The Spanish government is going ahead with its pledge to reform divorce legislation in Spain. Although originally last week government spokesmen said that divorce would be granted in just 10 days, the Spanish Justice Minister intervened towards the end of last week and said that only a minority of cases would be granted divorce in 10 days, and that the government expected the average waiting period to be two months.

This is a vast improvement on the current system, and although the Catholic Church in Spain has heavily criticised this latest move, the majority of the electorate support it. Divorce was legalised in 1981 when a very timid law was passed by Spain's new democratic government in the face of heavy criticism again from the Church and the Military. It has not been reformed since, and many believe that if it was already outdated when it was created, it is certainly unsuitable for modern Spain and for changed social values.

The changes to be introduced by the Socialist government are aimed at

• clearing a backlog of cases - cases can take up to 2 years to settle here, but under the new law will take a maximum of 6 months and a minimum of 10 days -
• and also at encouraging shared custody of children - something which has become an issue here very recently, as the old law almost always gave custody of the children automatically to the mother.
  

The notion of a "guilty party" in divorce, due to infidelity or abuse, will also disappear and couples will no longer have to prove responsibility for the marital breakdown. Nor will they have to prove they have been separated for a year before applying for divorce.

Spanish President in New York to explain Spain's new foreign policy

Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero arrived yesterday in New York to co-chair today's Summit against Hunger, an iniciative organised by President Lula (Brazil), with the support of presidents Chirac (France), Lagos (Chile), Rodriguez Zapatero and UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan.

Today's summit is called Innovative Sources of Finance to Alleviate Hunger and Poverty and is expected to attract over 50 world leaders. Afterwards Zapatero, Chirac and Lagos are expected to join President Lula in a press conference.

Tomorrow in the UN General Assembly, President Zapatero is going to address the Assembly for the first time since he became Spain's leader. He is expected to explain the changes introduced by his government in the Spain's foreign policy during his address, and will stress his support for "effective mulilateralism" and his respect for international law. He will talk about his ideas for an international order based on collective security and social justice. The Spanish president will underline his commitment to fight international terrorism and may refer to his decision to withdraw Spanish troops from Irak. He will give a press conference tomorrow too.

Zapatero will not have an official meeting with President Bush during his visit to the US, although he will coincide with him in the lunch hosted by Kofi Annan after the UN Assembly.

He is accompanied during this trip by his wife (it is the first time she has accompanied him on an official trip abroad) and by the Spanish Foreign Minister, Miguel Angel Moratinos.

Meanwhile, Cadena Ser has published the results of its latest opinion poll today. According to the results of the poll, nearly 65% Spaniards support Spain's new alliance with France and Germany and more than 67% think that Aznar's alliance with the US was negative for Spain compared to 20% who think that it was positive.

CE authorises Santander Bank purchase of Abbey National

The European Commission has given the Santander Bank the green light to go ahead with its plans to buy Abbey National. In its decision released yesterday, the Commissión said the operation was legal from the point of view of fair competition and that since each bank would continue to serve its national market "operations will never, or almost never, be carried out by both banks in the same geographical area".

Meanwhile the HBOS has withdrawn its counter offer, and the Santander Bank announced yesterday that it hoped to sign the final deal on 12th November.

The purchase of Abbey National by the Santander Bank could turn out to be the best thing that has happened to Abbey in years (as well as being good news for British people who bank with Abbey and own property in Spain). Emilio Botin, Chairman of the Spanish bank, is one of the most successful bankers Spain has ever known, and his career has been marked by a series of brilliant acquisitions and operations. When he took over from his father leadership of the bank which was originally founded by his grandfather, Santander was Spain's sixth most important bank. Today it is the not only Spain's biggest bank, but also the most important bank in Latin America.

In the past Botin has surprised financial analysts by purchasing big banks with financial and operative problems, for example Banesto in Spain or Banespa in Brazil. But he has succeeded, where many bankers would have failed, to turn downsliding banks into efficient, profitable financial institutions, and this is where one of his great strengths lies. The Santander Bank have achieved in Latin America, with purchases and alliances, what many US banks have failed, and it is only natural that its directors look towards Europe to open new markets.

Drugs in Spain

Yesterday Spain's Health Minister warned congress that according to latest figures Spain is one of Europe's highest consumers of cocaine, cannabis and extasis, and she said that the existing National Drugs Plan needed to be revised in order to reverse the trend.

As far as cocaine is concerned, Spain has Europe's largest number of consumers. According to the statistics revealed by the Minster yesterday, cocaine consumption among the Spanish population has doubled in the past 10 years.

The number of cannabis users is also rising and Spain, Denmark and the UK have the dubious honour of leading the Europe's league of cannabis consumption. 36% of Spanish adolescents between 14 and 18 (in other words 762,000) young people have consumed cannabis at some time in the past twelve months - this is double the consumption figure in Spain 10 years ago.

Cannabis and cocaine are not the only problem. 27% youngsters between 14 and 18 años admit to having got drunk in the past month (31,8% more than 10 years ago) and consumption of new addictive substances such as liquid extasis is also on the rise.

The only area in which the National Drugs Plan seems to have been successful is in heroine consumption where figures show that the number of heroine addicts has gone down. Salgado said the the Governments priority now must be to reduce drug consumption among Spanish adoslescents and to analyse how to get over to them the terrible risks of taking drugs in the short and long term.

Spanish foreign policy

Yesterday the Spanish president, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, hosted a meeting with his German and French colleagues, Gerhard Schröder and Jacques Chirac. After what is hailed today as a historic meeting by the Spanish press, the three leaders posed smiling for camaras and Zapatero said to reporters "The Old Europe has taken on a new lease of life".

This meeting is the latest confirmation of new Spanish foreign policy under the Socialist government which is to strengthen Spain's role and presence in the European Union. Zapatero believes that is is vital for the EU to become stronger and more united and to have more influence in world politics, and he wants Spain to have a central role in that process. He also (on a more practical front) wants to make sure Spain continues to receive European funds inspite of the fact that since the EU welcomed its new members Spain has ceased to be one of the poorest states elegible for European funding.

Spain has benefitted tremendously from the EU over the past 15 years and many of the Spanish motorways, restored heritage, Spain's modern railway network and hydraulic works have been built thanks to European money. Yesterday Chirac confirmed that the issue of how European money should be shared among member states was "one of the few issues" acound which the three leaders had not been able to reach an agreement yesterday but, in a clear reference to the Spanish government's change of policy and style, that now none of the three countries was defending its position in an arrogant manner, and that this was a positive move because arrogance leads to failure in negotiations.

During their meeting in la Moncloa, Zapatero, Chirac and Schroeder analyzed the current state of the European Union aswell as international events further afield. They underlined their common vision that a strong Europe represents the best way of "solving the problems of our citizens" and they stressed the "importance of successfully ratifying the European Constitutional Treaty, which is to be signed in Rome on 29th October. They expressed their support for the appointment of Javier Solana as Foreign Affairs Prime Minister for Europe, and they discussed the need for Europe to have a stronger united military presence in international conflicts by way of the so-called Battlegroups concept.

Related links:
Spanish referendum on European Constitution
Spain satisfied with European Constitution
European elections result in Spain