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Whatever next? Barnier’s hair comes under fire

Thursday 17 November 2011 – by Regulation Mutters

It appears that European internal market commissioner Michel Barnier has unwittingly made an enemy or two in the UK.

In a House of Lords debate on credit rating agencies on Tuesday evening, Lord Myners – former city minister – got rather personal in an attack on the Frenchman.

Moving on from lambasting the European Commission’s proposals on rating agencies as flawed, the former Labour peer revealed his simmering tensions with the commissioner saying he worried “very much” about Barnier’s power-hungry attitude.

Myners said: “I met Mr Barnier when he was a Minister. He came to see us at the Treasury. He came down the corridor and I was watching him. I am a great fan of art and I was rather impressed that he stopped to look at every painting.

“I thought this is a man with whom I share a common interest – until I realised he was actually looking at his reflection in the glass on every painting, and adjusting his hair or his toupee.

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“This to me is a man whom we should treat with a very long spoon. I hope the Minister will take due care in working with Mr Barnier because we have been forewarned that this man intends to seek even more powers than those he announced today.”

Britain’s policymakers are getting increasingly irate with the Eurocrats in Brussels. Myners’ remarks follow prime minister David Cameron’s comments that the city of London is “under attack” from Europe on the issue of a financial transaction tax.

Handbags at dawn.

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READERS’ COMMENTS

2011-11-17 14:59:43 | Anonymous

how do spoons and hand bags relate?

Surely knives at dawn!

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