Pierre Nouvel's clever set

This evening we went to the Kaai Theatre to see a new production, Austerlitz, derived from the W.G. Sebald novel of the same name. Conceived of by Jérome Combier, acted by Johan Leysen, with video and scenography by Pierre Nouvel, lighting by Bertrand Couderc and music by Ictus, ten years to the day after Sebald died, in a traffic accident, this production seeks to reproduce the internal atmospherics of the dark world that Austerlitz describes, and so we make the transition with Leysen’s deep, sombre voice from archives to stations to transit camps to death camps, as the narrator seeks out the parents who sent him away so that he would not suffer their fate. Powerful stuff – and timely. A reminder of where we never, ever want to go again.

This morning, after a short and entirely constructive meeting, the EESC’s management board approved a new, four-year development plan. Thanks to a magician in my private office, Bernard T, the plan is genuinely the product of a grass roots exercise, generated through consultation with line managers, and has also been carefully articulated with the political authorities of the house. Why a plan? Put simply, we must think systematically about the future and plan accordingly. We know that collectively we have to face up to a number of challenges and we have to anticipate them, particularly from the resource-planning point of view. Thanks to the sterling work of Bernard T, we now have a set of objectives and actions, with lead services and targets clearly identified. In other words, we have equipped ourselves with an excellent management tool.

EESC President Staffan Nilsson opens the meeting

This morning I attended the opening session of a meeting held on the EESC’s premises of Lewiatan, the Polish Confederation of Private Employers, on the theme of ‘A Day of Social Dialogue’. In her opening address, Henryka Bochniarz, President of Lewiatan, underlined the importance of social dialogue to all stakeholders, including employers, and insisted that the primary challenge is to ensure the future of social dialogue since it is the best guarantor of a structured return to growth and prosperity.

The public waits expectantly...

This evening I went along to the Warehouse Theatre for the last of three performances of Families aren’t just for Christmas, which included three monologues I had written around the experience of my father’s illness and death. The show had some excellent comic writing and acting in it. Sara Hammerton and Conrad Toft reproduced an all too familiar dialogue (written by Conrad, who also directed) about the annual tugs of war between competing in-laws as to where the family will spend Christmas and Cherise Silvestri gave an excellent performance as a bubbly wife experiencing the upsides and downsides of marrying a divorcee in Carrie Caunce’s A Holly Jolly Christmas. Watching my own pieces was a fascinating experience. The first time, in rehearsal, I was deeply moved. Once I had got over the emotional response, however, I was interested to see how the experienced actor playing me, John Howard, adapted to the very different dynamics of the public. The first night the audience was largely made up of language students and so he played more to the room. The second night the audience was very responsive and empathetic and so he played for long, evocative silences. The last night, tonight, the audience was a little less responsive, so he shortened the silences. Gratifyingly – though thanks largely to John’s acting – the pieces seemed to work well. And – also thanks to John – my father’s dying message to his sons about the importance of brothers was transformed into a universal theme. It was quite an experience.

This afternoon, thanks to a tip from Matthieu in Paris, I watched The Children of Men, a 2006 science fiction film (deftly directed by Alfonso Cuaron) loosely adapted from P.D. James’s 1992 novel of the same name. The film portrays a dystopian near-world (of 2027) suffering from universal infertility (of unknown cause). With a few surviving outposts (the UK among them), much of civilisation has collapsed. A deluge of refugees leads the government to round up and detain all immigrants. A rebel immigrant rights movement ends up in a full-scale war with government forces. Through this dystopia meanders Clive Owen, playing a former activist, Theo Faron, and Claire-Hope Ashitey, an African-origin illegal immigrant who is miraculously pregnant. Michael Caine in a wispy wig turns in an interesting performance as a dope-smoking hippy political cartoonist (apparently modelled on his friend, John Lennon). The film’s messages of hope, redemption and faith converge in a bit of a corny ending and the book’s exploration of dispair (why struggle for a just society if mankind will soon die out?) is given a wide birth in favour of a fast-moving action plot. The gritty realism (a dirty London is itself, only more so, and a series of long tracking shots) gives the film a sadly believeable edge. I would have prepared a Brazil-type ending but, then, that has been done.

For reasons that will be well understood, I preferred not to study the newspapers straightaway this morning. Instead, I went with the dog out to Berthem for an early walk on a beautiful day. I have always been fascinated by the way agricultural landscapes are constantly changing. A sweet corn crop is harvested and suddenly a fresh vista opens up. Or (in the picture) a set of different plantations are suddenly ploughed together into a massive field, creating a single horizon. On the way we were treated to a spectacular flying display by a hobby, being mobbed by a crow. Why do carrion mob birds of prey? It must be deeply ingrained in their genes but I always wonder why. In this case the lumbering crow wasted huge amounts of energy trying to keep up with its swift and agile target. What is the evolutionary gain in such behaviour?

No sooner had I regained my office than I received another pleasant Christmas surprise. The Committee’s Director of Human Resources, Gianluca Brunetti, appeared together with two colleagues, Florence Baeten and Annette Orth, to give me the present you can see in the picture. It is a framed poster about ‘the competency framework’ that arose out of a seminar the directorate held and is, in a sense, the directorate’s mission statement. It has been signed by all of the officials in the directorate and will now take pride of place on our office wall.

After the excitments of the week it was back to the office to catch up on various files and then, at lunchtime, Christmas lunch with my secretariat was planned. Only, I had reckoned without super-Anna and super- Laura (with their Father Christmas hats in the picture). Not only was there a scrumptious lunch with goodies, variously, from Spain, Denmark, Italy, Slovakia, Hungary, France and Belgium, but there was a quiz and a competition and prizes! It’s been quite a tiring week and the lunch and entertainments (including a game of charades where, for the record, I had to act the role of a fire alarm installer) were a lovely surprise.

This morning, together with my counterpart at the Committee of Regions, Gerhard Stahl, I co-chaired a joint meeting bringing us together with all of our directors and deputy directors working in our ‘joint services’ (a mutual pooling of human and other resources which enables both Committees to make considerable economies). The meeting is one part of a whole series of governance mechanisms set out in a cooperation agreement between the two Committees that meet quite frequently and provide for differences and problems to be resolved in consensual fashion and for mutual challenges to be anticipated and resolved. The meeting, like every other I have attended in this context, went very well. The simple truth is that the cooperation between the two administrations works very well. The illustration is a photo I sneaked. This time we were hosted by the Committee of the Regions. The pictures on the wall are all of the Committee’s Presidents since its creation in 1993.

The third indicator that Christmas is truly getting near (after the Christmas tree and the Christmas choristers) is the EESC Staff Committee’s annual Christmas party. Run completely on voluntary grounds, it is always a wonderful sight to behold, with national and regional stalls spread out over two floors and stacked with home made goodies. Once again, the Czech stall (in my picture) excelled itself with a gingerbread creation; this time the Christmas crib, with all the animals and the magi. Nothing better sums up the rich diversity and the immense amounts of goodwill among our staff than the annual Christmas party!