PRESS RELEASE 20 October 2009 MEP Robert Sturdy has promised to challenge any attempts to bring back huge EU cash subsidies to the crisis hit dairy sector. As the European Commission announced £255 million in aid is to be given to European dairy farmers to help the sector cope with the recent slide in milk [...]
The European Union’s Commissioner for International Trade, Catherine Ashton, has announced her wish for Prime Minister Gordon Brown to re-appoint her as the United Kingdom’s Commissioner in Brussels for its next five year term, preferably in her current portfolio. Each member state is entitled to nominate an individual to become Commissioner and the Trade portfolio [...]
16 October 2009 A damning report from the National Audit Office has once again revealed the blundering of the British government in paying EU subsidies to farmers, said MEP Robert Sturdy. The report said the administration of the Single Farm Payments scheme did not provide value for money for taxpayers, and accused DEFRA of showing [...]
16 October 2009 Letter to The Editor, East Anglian Daily Times: Dear Sir I would like to commend Zoe and Shane Murphy for reopening their second pub in Suffolk in the last three months. (EADT 15 October). This is an incredible achievement, especially during this economic downturn and at a time when The British Beer [...]
SHOE HIKE LIKELY AFTER UK TRADE COMMISSIONER BOWS TO PRESSURE Brussels 14 October 2009. Conservative International Trade spokesman Robert Sturdy said Britain’s hard-pressed consumers would be hit further after Trade Commissioner Catherine Ashton chose to extend ‘anti-dumping’ for another 15 months. The so-called ‘anti-dumping’ measures currently in place will see additional duties on shoes of [...]
I have just written to Chris Mole MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Deparment of Transport, expressing my disappointment about further delays regarding much needed improvements to the A14. This is what I said: “Thank you for your letter of 30 September regarding the current situation with the proposed A14 improvement scheme between [...]
At a GMO Conference in Brussels this week, the head of the Directorate General for Environment, Karl Falkenberg, outlined how the Commission will give Member States the final say over whether to grow genetically modified (GM) crops on their territory. EU President Jose Barosso had previously kept any discussion on GMO at arms length, but [...]
NFU blogger Katy Lee has singled me, as well as other MEPs, for working proactively at a recent meeting of the Agricultural Committee. She says that UK MEPs “did us proud”, and such sentiments are always appreciated. In an article she wrote here, Katy stated that I had given the Commission “rather a hard time” [...]
