RUTHFULLY YOURS

Federica Mogherini has a broad and rather engaging smile, and people are going to be seeing a fair bit of it in the coming days. She has just been chosen as the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, otherwise Foreign Minister of the EU.

Mogherini is 41, which is considered young for the job, although she is older than her current boss, Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. She is Roman, and after leaving Rome’s La Sapienza University went straight into politics. She specialised in Foreign Affairs, in particular the politics of the Middle East, and became one of the Democratic Party’s spokesmen.

Renzi appointed her Italian Foreign Minister and she has been less than six months in the job.

Mogherini’s predecessor Catherine Ashton had been a Commissioner (albeit only for a year) and had steered the Lisbon Treaty through the House of Lords, and there were complaints that no one had heard of her. Mogherini is less well known. Incidentally, since Ashton was the first High Representative this job will only ever have been done by a woman. Expect demands for male only shortlists next time: you heard it here first.

So how did Mogherini get the job? It is by the European Procedure which still, after more than forty years of membership sounds strange to British ears. For one of these big jobs, the candidate has to emerge through some sort of murky, secret consensus.

Jean Claude Juncker had already got the top job as Head of the Commission, despite objections from David Cameron. Donald Tusk, two term Polish Prime Minister, was the front runner for the President of the Council, with belated support from David Cameron. These are both men and both from the centre-right of politics.

So, a woman from the centre left. A couple of problems though. Firstly these jobs go to senior politicians. Juncker has been taking his pousse-café in the bars of Brussels since before anyone can remember, and Donald Tusk was re-elected Prime Minister of a large country. Mogherini was not in that league.

Next, there is a technical problem. Europe, at the same meeting that appointed Tusk and Mogherini, has announced the threat of enhanced sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine. These are supported by Mrs Merkel in Germany and Donald Tusk, whose country borders Ukraine.

They are not so much supported by Italy which imports most of its gas from Russia and for whom Putin’s turning off the taps would be a disaster. Several former Soviet bloc members, particularly the Baltic states, thought an Italian High Representative would not be tough enough.

Third, Italy with its past has been a little bit the bad boy of Europe, so despite being a founder member, its candidate might not have been taken very seriously.

Lastly, as well as being unknown, Mogherini is very, very inexperienced. Ashton is seventeen years older.

But Matteo Renzi, in what will be seen as a brilliant coup de théatre, decided early on that he wanted Mogherini (and this is crucial, look at the mess Britain has made with its candidate, whose name still eludes me). He lobbied everyone, particularly the Baltics, Czechs and Slovaks.

But really only one person matters. Renzi was all over Mrs Merkel, making encouraging signs about keeping within the 3% deficit limit. This would enable Mrs Merkel to deal with France as the only child on the naughty step. And Mrs Merkel in particular wanted a favour.

She desperately wanted to block Pierre Moscovici, the former Revolutionary Communist who had been a fairly disastrous Minister of Finance in France. Hollande had his eyes on the Economic Commissioner job for Moscovici. Italy blocked the appointment.

So that’s how it is done: early decision on the candidate, smoothing the way, giving concessions where necessary. The British are bad at it, in part because no British – particularly Conservative – Prime Minister would want the kudos of having fought for his candidate. They have a habit of going native.

And of course, we can’t do the horse trading. We shall always be a fish out of water in Brussels.

On a not completely unrelated issue, following Daniel J. Mitchell’s mention here on The Commentator of the 28,000 foresters in Sicily, it is both better and worse. Firstly they are not lumberjacks but members of the Corpo Forestale, who are responsible for regulating hunting, maintenance of the fauna and flora on Mount Etna and preventing and putting out forest fires. Still, most large regions manage with three or four hundred.

My favourite is Godrano in the Province of Palermo, whose 1,000 men women and children comprise 190 Forestali, including the mayor.

It is of course an electoral fiddle, with jobs handed out to secure votes. What is clever is that they are only needed for six months of the year so the central government picks up half the tab.

Tim Hedges, The Commentator‘s Italy Correspondent, had a career in corporate finance before moving to Rome where he works as a freelance writer, novelist, and farmer. You can read more of his articles about Italy here