FG Interviews EU Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel
EU - EU Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel’s patience with the UK is wearing thin. In a frank interview, she told ALISTAIR DRIVER about her aspirations for European farming – and how our Government is getting in the way of delivering them.
27 October 2006
2 minute read
Being a European Commissioner is not unlike being in charge of an unruly class of children.
You are dealing with 25 member states, each with their own assets, their own problems and their own agendas. They form their cliques, they squabble and they try your patience to the limit as you try to steer them in the right direction.
Currently, in Mrs Fischer Boel’s class there is one pupil above all the others giving the teacher a hard time. It has just spectacularly flunked the task it was given last year, while all the others managed to cope.
It is also the one leading demands to totally reform a system only put in place at the school last year.
This disruptive pupil is of course the United Kingdom. But if it thinks Mrs Fischer Boel, with her distinctive white hair and glasses and softly spoken manner, will be a pushover, it has another think coming.
The EU Agriculture Commissioner is not afraid to be tough on those who step out line. What is more, she appears to be relishing the battle that lies ahead over the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).
Source: Farmers Guardian
