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Andrew Marshall on the London ex-policewoman shaping European socialism : Pauline Green : Profile
THE socialist vision of the future of Europe will be determined over the coming months by two women: Pauline Green and Elisabeth Guigou. They could hardly be more different. Mrs Guigou, from the French socialist group in the European Parliament, is smooth and elegant and was part of the chic set that surrounded Francois Mitterrand. She is a former European minister of finance; before that, she held a string of glamorous jobs in the French bureaucracy. Mrs Green is a former policewoman from Tottenham, who once worked for the co-operative movement. Yet it is Mrs Green, 46, who is leader of the European Parliament's socialist group, the largest in the assembly. The fact that it is the MEP from North London rather than the one from the eighth arrondissement of Paris who wields such power speaks volumes about the Labour Party in Europe. While the Conservatives have been whipping themselves into a frenzy over the EU, Labour has been quietly building bridgeheads in a version of what the German socialists once called the Long March of the Institutions.
The British left is increasingly a presence in Brussels, with the Kinnocks now installed at the commission and the parliament. Mr Kinnock held his first meeting with the British press last week, evidently relishing the task ahead as Transport Commissioner. In the parliament, the Labour Party is dug in deep, the largest national political grouping by far.
BARBARA Castle was the last female leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party and there is something of the brisk Castle manner about Mrs Green. Friendly and accessible, she is less the Labour intellectual, more the party manager. She is regarded as tough and practical. Her hallmark is the ability to build consensus from diverse views. Like her fellow Labour MEPs, she is rarely given to cerebral musings about the nature of Europe. As a group, the British are likely to spend more time worrying about traffic accidents and power stations than about stage three of monetary union or variable geometry. Mrs Green has little patience with the kind of discussions about Europe that often characterise the European Union. "All that...