London Boroughs
Jean spoke on Green politics at a public meeting in Newham, organised by local Greens. She also spoke at a public event in Walthamstow, addressing the question 'can we improve on junk food and supermarkets?'
As part of an ongoing campaign to improve London's air quality, Jean visited an air quality monitoring site on the Holloway Road with local Green campaigners. Air quality monitored at the site has breached EU standards for nitrogen dioxide, a gas which can cause major respiratory problems. Jean has raised the issue of London's air quality breaches with the Commission, who have acknowledged that further action may be taken.
Jean promoted launched a project at Hackney City Farm, which gives language and green skills to asylum seekers, as part of the Back to Earth programme. The programme receives EU funding.
To promote local social enterprise and IT refurbishment and recycling, Jean visited the Maxitech social enterprise in Haringey. Maxitech recycles and refurbishes old computers, and recently won a Local Authority Waste and Recycling Magazine's recycler of the month award.
In the lead up to International Women's Day, and to mark that occasion, Jean spoke to two groups of girls at Walthamstow Girls School. She spoke about her work as a Green MEP.
Extraordinary Rendition
Jean is on the European Parliament committee investigation extraordinary rendition. To tie in with this, Jean was one of the speakers at a Liberty public meeting at the LSE, 'No Torture - No Compromise: Extraordinary Rendition' which was chaired by Liberty Director, Shami Chakrabarti.
Jean was a guest speaker at the Chartist 'Beyond the Consensus' conference at the LSE. Sharing the platform with Michael Meacher, she focused on Green and European issues.
Action on Education
As part of the NUS week of action against the UK Government's higher education funding plans, Jean was one of the main speakers at a rally in Birmingham. She signed up to the Coalition 2010 campaign, a coalition of unions and students opposing Government plans to remove the cap on top-up fees. Jean told the rally that the Greens are opposed to top-up and tuition fees.
Launch of 'I Must Work Harder?'
Jean's new report on work/life balance, stress and the UK's opt-out from the Working Directive was launched in late February. The UK has some of the longest working hours in Europe, which is undermining workers health and business productivity. Jean's report is calling for the UK to end its opt-out as the key way of addressing work-stress and poor productivity. As part of the launch event, Jean gave out Green Group stress balls to busy office workers in Paternoster Square, near St Paul's Cathedral, and was accompanied by a 'clock juggler' trying to juggle time. Jean gave public talks on the report in Camden and as part of the Cafe Diplo season of events at the Institut Francais in Kensington. The report is available in hard copy from Jean's London office or by clicking HERE.
International Women's Day
Jean spoke on the subject of 'women in politics' at the University of Westminster's 'Politics, International Relations and Diplomacy' Careers event.
Jean spoke at the War On Want conference, 'Land, Bread, Freedom: Popular struggles against corporate power' in Bloomsbury, alongside activists from Uganda and Brazil.
Turkey, EU and the Kurds
Jean was a panel speaker at this event held at the Halkevi Turkish and Kurdish Community Centre in Stoke Newington, Hackney. Jean shared the platform with Kurdish and Turkish speakers, and gave an EU perspective on how the accession process could benefit democracy and human rights for Kurds and Turks.
The ban on Moscow's Gay Pride Festival was met with protests outside the Russian Embassy in London. Jean supported the protests and issued a statement calling on Moscow to lift the ban immediately.
Iraq
Jean was one of the main speakers at a London seminar organised by the OWFI, the Organisation of Women's Freedom in Iraq.
Brussels
Free Movement High Level Round Table
As author of Parliament's Report on 1408/71 (Coordination of Social Security Systems) and having worked closely with the European Citizen Action Service on the myths associated with free movement, Jean was invited to speak on this issue along side a high level panel which included Commissioner Spidla, ETUC Secretary General John Monks and Philippe de Buck, Secretary General of UNICE. The Conference aimed to raise awareness of 2006 as the year of workers mobility.
CRE Meeting and Reception
As Vice-President of the Anti-discrimination Intergroup, Jean hosted a meeting and Reception with the Commission for Racial Equality. The meeting - which was oversubscribed - focused on race relations in 21st Century Europe. CRE Chair Trevor Philips opened the panel debate.
Submission of Opinion
Jean has been nominated to author the Employment Committee's Opinion on fighting trafficking in human beings. Her Opinion will be debated on in the Committee on the 21st March. The final vote on the Report will take place during the June Session.
The Services Directive vote took place on February 16th. The controversial Report was in the end amended and approved by the European Parliament. However, while labour law and many important services such as health care were excluded from its scope, some social services were kept in. Jean therefore voted against the Directive warning that it does not provide adequate protection for public services. Prior to the vote Jean - along with thousands of others - took part in a public demonstration through the streets of Strasbourg.
Strasbourg
Services Directive Vote and Demo
Climate Change Campaign
On the eve of the first anniversary of the Kyoto Protocol’s entry into force, the Greens launched a Joint European Climate Change Campaign in Strasbourg. At the press launch, Jean and other Green MEPs wore raincoats and put up their umbrellas in order to bring attention to the issue (see top photo).
When Jean received confirmation from the EU Commission that London’s Air Quality was failing and that they would consider taking legal action against the UK Government, Jean gained coverage on Time FM and in The Evening Standard with a half page article.
The debate and vote on the Services Directive created a lot of media interest. Jean appeared on CNBC, BBC News 24 and World at One to discuss the issues surrounding the controversial directive.
Jean gained local coverage on LBC Radio, Time FM and The Walthamstow Guardian when she launched her new report ‘I must work harder? Britain and the working time directive’.
Further coverage was gained in the Hackney Gazette when she visited Hackney City Farm.
Jean's opposition to the Moscow ban on the Gay Pride Festival, and her support for the London Embassy demonstration was covered in UK Gay News and Gay.com
Jean took part in the Woman to Woman show on the Voice of Africa and Woman’s hour on the Sky Channel BEN TV. Materials Recycling Week also ran a feature with Jean regarding the proposed single waste authority for London.
Comment on Current Affairs - Services Directive
14 February 2006 - Extract from speech to Plenary ahead of Services Directive vote
Listening to the debate this afternoon, I have a feeling that the vote has already taken place, because people are talking with such certainty about what is in and what is out. Nothing is out until we vote on Thursday morning.
It is certainly clear that this directive needed a rewrite. It is a pity that Parliament is doing it; we asked the Commission to take it off the table and rewrite it, but it would not do so. As others have said, many of us here have found that the Commission’s behaviour during the whole debate about the directive has been highly problematic. We have been unable to get clarity; unable to get answers to specific questions; and there has been a lack of public response to amendments tabled, not least in our committee meetings, as well as a lack of an effective social impact assessment, which might have gone some way to allaying public fears about what is in this.
Many of us have had big problems with the whole country of origin theory – I do not think it is a principle – and how this, for example, might fit with the ability of Member States to seek higher standards, which is also allowed. Again, many of our questions about how the overriding public interest will come into play in this have not been fully answered.
I would agree that health should be taken out of this directive; it should never have been there in the first place, and many of us look forward to a speedy proposal from the Commission on the issues of patient mobility and not service mobility, which is why it should not have been in the directive in the first place.
8 March - International Women's Day
7 March - Green Group Enlarged Bureau, Vienna
9 March - Free Movement of Labour Conference, Brussels
6 -19 March - Fairtrade Fortnight
16-19 March - Green Party Conference, Scarborough
18 March – Troops Home From Iraq/Don't Attack Iran Demo, Parliament Square
21 March, 26 March, and throughout March – Newroz, Kurdish New Year
22 March - Dublin Foundation Working Lunch and Report Launch, Brussels
23-26 March – Women and Global Justice event, Greenwich
25 March – Power Commission conference, Queen Elizabeth II Centre
26 March – Bangladesh Independence and National Day
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