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Returning President Jose Manuel Barroso has now announced the line-up of his new Commission, which includes 14 new faces and a number of new or reorganised portfolios. The role of the current Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian aid has been split to create the two portfolios. One covering Development, which will be filled by Latvia's Commissioner Andris Piebalgs; the other for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, given to Bulgaria's Rumiana Jeleva. Piebalgs held the Energy portfolio in the last Commission, while Jeleva is Bulgaria's current minister of foreign affairs and has previously served as a member of the European Parliament. Both are affiliated with Barroso's centre-right European People's Party.
The previous portfolio of External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy has been divided between the new High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Britain's Baroness Ashton, and Stefan Fule, the Czech Republic's Minister for European Affairs who is to become the Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood. Reacting to the announcement, Eurostep Director Simon Stocker said: "I welcome the nomination of Andris Piebalgs, who has a good reputation in his current position. However, the exact role for Mr. Piebalgs remains unclear since it is subject to decisions still to be taken on the implementation of the Lisbon Treaty." Much depends on what competencies are given to the European External Action Service, a new diplomatic service for the EU, which will be headed by Baroness Ashton and is scheduled to be in operation from the middle of 2010. The new portfolio of Climate Action will be headed by Denmark's Connie Hedegaard. There will continue to be separate Commissioners for Energy (Germany's Günther Oettinger) and Environment (Slovenia's Janez Poto?nik). The Commissioner for Climate Action will have responsibility for "mainstreaming" climate change policies across all the Commission's departments. All new Commissioners must stand before hearings in the European Parliament between 11 and 19 January. While the Parliament cannot reject individual commissioners, it can vote to reject the entire Commission. "I think it's important that parliament asserts itself in this critically important time. That's what the public expects of us," said UK MEP Andrew Duff. Following complaints from MEPs of gender imbalance in the new Commission, the number of female Commissioners has now risen to nine. Sources: |
