International organisations need to keep operating in emergencies

To be sure ‘critical’ staff were temporarily re-housed elsewhere but Commission officials this week were unable to say who these were and how many there were of them. Nor could officials say what specific Commission departments had been out of action. International News Services is normally in contact with Commission offices several times a day. Not last week we weren’t.  Scores of telephone calls were simply not answered. No doubt some of this lost ground will no doubt be made up in the coming days and weeks but some business may never be regained.

None of this would matter very much if we were talking about something like the backwater ministry of a minor country or the regional headquarters of a development aid agency. Not all business is of the same urgency. But the Commission is different. It is important. What it says and does affects potentially millions.

The Commission can hardly be blamed for taking perhaps excessive measures to ensure the safe evacuation of its staff. What it can be blamed for is tolerating a system where a small, contained, localised fire can bring the entire institution to a halt. The exact cause of the fire has yet to be determined and there will certainly be prolonged and scrupulous analysis of the incident. We won’t pre-judge any of that but we can surely make the point that a collapse of the system like this is simply intolerable. European commissioners are constantly exhorting the EU member countries to speed up their research and engage more fully with new technology in order to make the EU the leading technological force in the world within a couple of years. What an advertisement for European efficiency this is!