The Commissionary Position

The nights are drawing in, and although we had a mercifully mild October, a winter chill is settling over the Nerve Centre of Europe. I have witnessed some spectacular sunrises over the Berlaymont (the EU Commission headquarters) which sits there in my line of vision like a great ocean liner, all lights blazing through the night, and I am often put in mind of the Titanic. I wonder what will be the iceberg that will sink the EU? Turkey? The Constitution? The CAP? Why is there never a cartoonist when you need one?

It won’t be a sex scandal, anyway. One of the Commissioners very recently upset his senior officials by publicly slagging off their efficiency, or lack of it. The swift publication by the tabloids in his home country of a photograph of him hand in hand with his recently promoted (female) Chef de Cabinet a few days after this incident was, I am sure, purely coincidental. Everyone, from the President of the Commission to the Commissioner’s wife, is Standing By Their Man, and the story has not, as far as I am aware, made the front pages of the Belgian press. The Brussels press pack are a different breed to the paparazzi and scumbags on the British tabloids, and any “dirt” they dig up is likely to be more of a financial nature than sexual, after all, every important man is expected to bonk his secretary, n’est-ce pas? It is considered rude not to.

The Mistress will not come out of this well, mark my words. Being the paramour of a powerful man used to be a sure way to the top, as Madame de Pompadour would confirm, if she were still here. How times have changed. It didn’t do much for Monica Lewinsky’s career, Antonia de Sancha sank without trace, and poor old Christine Keeler, after her 15 minutes of notoriety, spent the rest of her life in ignominy and a council flat. Nobody can even remember the name of John Prescott’s brief encounter, and that was only a few months ago. The only mistress who has got away with it in living memory is Camilla Parker-Bowles, who waited patiently to get her man, and did not kiss and tell. Although some might say that being married to Charles is a punishment in itself.

Commissioner Mandelson is not likely to get caught with his Armani trousers round his well-turned ankles. The erstwhile Prince of Darkness has acquired an aura of respectability in Brussels that he never had in London. He is fêted here for his slim figure, expensive hair and Italian suits, and his financial peccadilloes would not even have made the papers in Belgium, so tame were they by local standards. His sexuality (whatever it may be) is neither here nor there, and if he were to do the dirty on Reinaldo, I am sure he would have more sense than to go cruising for rough trade in public toilets. He is judged on his ability as Trade Commissioner, and has emerged as pretty competent and firm (stop sniggering, Banana). I can’t see him wanting to go back to London – or Hartlepool - any time soon. The proof that Mandy is a consummate politician is that he plays the Brussels game supremely well, and is respected for it in return.

It is a myth that Peter lives in Rue des Jeunes Garçons, as reported by the scurrilous British press, who can find nothing better to do than make up saucy French street names. There is no such street in my A-Z of Brussels. There is an Impasse des Matelots, a Square de Pede and a Rue de Nancy, an Avenue Debatty and a Rue Pierre de Cock, but if anywhere, I would have thought Avenue de la Joyeuse Entrée would be more up his street.