The last thing the EU want is for the British to be reminded of the EU’s intrusive, pointless plans to control them from afar:
Dave Keating, Euractiv.com
EU’s ban on inefficient toasters delayed to avoid pro-Brexit press attack
The EU has put plans to regulate inefficient kettles and toasters into cold storage amid fears in Brussels that they could galvanise support for the leave campaign in the UK’s 23 June referendum
Freudian slip?
Are the laws made for the people, or for the M.P’s?
But in fact, these efficiency improvements have had a complicated relationship with public opinion in the past decade. Public backlash has been one of the biggest impediments to passing these EU laws.
Dang voters are an impediment to bureaucrats.
Efficiency improvements for things like toilets and lightbulbs, passed by the Commission of Jose Manuel Barroso which ended in 2014, prompted negative press, particularly in the United Kingdom.
So the British press has more spine than the French and German propaganda sheets?
Newspapers accused the European Union of meddling in the most minute details of daily life and demanded the freedom for consumers to use too much electricity and too much water if they so choose.
Joy. At least they stopped regulating toilet flushing (only just):
Juncker: This Commission no longer regulates the flushing of toilets
Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said on Thursday (23 February) that he “fought like a lion” against “ill-inspired Commissioners” who thought the EU should regulate the flushing of toilets. He also indicated that he will push for a multi-speed Europe in proposals to be unveiled next month.
Junker the lion. Sure.
The article is about the EU passing efficiency laws that the public are “unconvinced” about. The toaster line is buried. In the opening paragraph, there is a strange admission that the EU has plans to make your whitegoods “independent”:
European legislation has made appliances like washing machines and dishwashers even more water and energy efficient than washing clothes and dishes by hand. The next step is to connect these appliances to the web and allow them to act independently.
Because we all long for our fridges to grow up and tell us what we are permitted to eat, right?
Photo by Stocksnap.