I really did earn my salt today. I spent all morning in the Budget Group. The main point on the agenda, from my point of view, was a proposal about how the annual budget drafting process should ideally look for the 2011 budget. I know; it sounds a long way off but, for the EU institutions, the planning is already under way. In the afternoon I co-chaired a meeting together with my Committee of the Regions counterpart, Gerhard Stahl, designed to provide some strategic administrative overview and input to our so-called ‘joint services’ (including translation, IT and logistics). From there, I dashed to the Council’s Budget Committee, where I explained and defended a request for a budgetary transfer (successfully, I should add!). As usual, the gaps in between these formal meetings were soon filled in by informal meetings of various kinds. Still, if I’d had my senior staff in place I would only have attended one of the three formal meetings – the one with Gerhard Stahl. The recruitment process for the new directors is taking a long time, but I am already imagining how relieved I will feel to be able to concentrate on one job instead of three.
Saw this movie too, and it was on my mind for several days thereafter. Kept me thinking what a system can do to people. A message of hope too: the “watchdog” is no robot after all. But, more than anything else, it makes one realise how fortunate we are to live in 21st century Europe, regarless of all its imperfections.