---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Cristi Cretzan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Oct 31, 2006 6:36 PM Subject: [romania-economics] Reuters: Commissioner for what? EU defends multilingualism To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Commissioner for what? EU defends multilingualism BRUSSELS, Oct 31 (Reuters) - The European Commission defended on Tuesday creating a top-paying job of commissioner for multilingualism after Romania's first member of the European Union executive was nominated to the post. Commission spokeswoman Pia Ahrenkilde-Hansen said Leonard Orban would be in charge of the translation, interpretation and publications departments, with 3,400 staff -- about 15 percent of the Brussels executive's workforce. "I would stress that this is a major and important portfolio and it's at the heart of the EU's values, which are aimed at ensuring that increasingly we can provide cultural and linguistic diversity," she told a news briefing. But she struggled to describe what exactly Orban would do at the office all day for his salary of 18,233.38 euros ($23,140) a month plus generous housing allowance. Critics say the job, previously a small part of the brief of the commissioner for education, training and culture, is a gimmick or a make-work position in an overcrowded EU executive. "The trouble is there are 27 commissioners -- one per member state -- but there are not really 27 portfolios. There may be 15 or so," said an EU diplomat. The bloc's stalled constitution includes a provision to reduce the size of the Commission to 18 members, with countries taking turns to nominate a commissioner two out of three times. The EU's linguistic problems have exploded with expansion, and Orban will face some politically sensitive issues. The number of official languages surged from 11 to 20 when 10 new member states joined in 2004, piling huge strain and expense on the translation and interpretation services. Meeting rooms had to be redesigned to accommodate more interpreters' booths, and some Commission legislative proposals have been delayed because of the need to translate them into all official languages. Three more will be added when Romania and Bulgaria join and Irish becomes an official language on Jan. 1. There are shortages of translators into Irish, a minority second language in Ireland, and Maltese, spoken by less than 400,000 people. The EU this year opened the door for the first time to the use of regional languages such Catalan and Basque, on condition that the member state concerned, in this case Spain, pays for translation and interpretation. Brussels faces conflicting pressures between efficiency and multilingualism. Founder members France and Germany are unhappy at the growing dominance of English as the Commission's working language and insistent on maintaining linguistic parity. *** sustineti [romania_eu_list] prin 2% din impozitul pe 2005 - detalii la http://www.doilasuta.ro *** Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/romania_eu_list/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/romania_eu_list/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
