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Tweets of the Week: Corbyn in town, MEP expenses, and Brexit lemons

By Evan Lamos, Jennifer Baker and Michael Ball | EURACTIV.com

28-09-2018 (updated: 29-10-2018 )

This week, Jeremy Corbyn comes to town, MEP expenses ruling raises a frown, and MP lemon tweet is totally shot down.

Today we are supported by Cefic, more about them at the end.

On Thursday British opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn came to town amid fears of a no-deal Brexit.

Daniel Boffey says he heard that meetings between Corbyn and Michel Barnier were initiated by the EU side.

But that’s not the story from fellow Guardian hack Jennifer Rankin. “The European Commission did not ask to meet Jeremy Corbyn. Requests for a meeting said to have come from Labour,” she reported.

Corbyn was in town to pay tribute to murdered MP Jo Cox at an official unveiling of a square named in her honour.

But the biggest mystery was whether or not Corbyn would meet Commission svengali Martin Selmayr. Chief spokesman Margaritis Schinas said there was no meeting he was aware of.

How very odd,  said Bruno Waterfield. Others – in Corbyn’s office – seem to think the meeting is on.

James Crisp took the direct approach tweeting directly at Corbyn and Selmayr to ask are are going to meet? Why or why not?

Spoof account Martini Seltzermayr said, “calm down everyone, I was just looking for some jam-making tips.”

On Tuesday, the European Court of Justice ruled to keep details of MEP expenses secret. Transparency International, and dozens of others, found the decision hugely disappointing.

Martin Daubney went further calling it “grotesque”. Each MEP can claim €4000 a month without showing receipts. According to Daubney, a third claim for offices that don’t have addresses.

The CJEU decided that data protection outweighs revealing detailed MEP expenses explained Michael Veale. Redacting personal data would render documents useless and would take disproportionate effort said the court.

But MEP Molly Scott Cato said the shameful secrecy around public money undermines faith in EU. “We’re campaigning for greater openness, but the right wing opposes it.”

But in case you thought that was the biggest court case of the week, eagle-eyed  Jack Schickler spotted this important legal news: on Thursday the court ruled on whether an Australian company can copyright the shape of a kangaroo.

Exciting times! Finally, “If life gives you lemons, make an ass of yourself”.

At least that’s what American EU Dude thought after British Conservative MP Daniel Kawczynski claimed lemons would be cheaper after Brexit. Tweeting a picture of himself in Tescos, the hapless MP wrongly claimed an “EU protectionist racket means inefficient EU growers preferred to other non-EU growers.”

This led Jim Cornelius to school him on the EU tariffs system in the greatest take down in Twitter history that received a whopping 10 thousand likes.

Steve Analyst account suggested Kawczynski might want to delete the tweet. “Or you can leave it there for the amusement future generations will get from it.”

Indeed, Deborah from Shrewsbury thinks his constituents only voted him in because of his comedy value.

This week we are sponsored by Cefic, the European Chemical Industry Council. Find out how research and innovation can develop solutions that help combat climate change by following the hashtag #ChemistryCan.

And that’s it for this week! Join me again next Friday for more japes and scrapes in the Brussels Bubble Twittersphere.

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