As I understand it, McGrath is right and the French and Germans were trying to rat on a formula negotiated at the time of the proposed entry of Poland and upon which it had a referendum.

I happen to think the Poles are correct on this. As usual with the EU, everything that ought to have been sorted out through the lengthy accdession phas becomes a last minute crisis due to bully states trying to change the rule to suit themselves.

On the jokes front I abhor racist jokes and behaviour of any type (I was rather flamed a while back on another (musical) thread, by someone who should have known better, for saying this). Perhaps I am quite sensitive to this issue as I have Irish parentage and Irish nationality and passport, but grew up in London and sound like any other Londoner to all intents and purposes. This put me in the firing line over the years of many rather nasty anti-Irish jokes and comments by people who didn't know I was Irish, which naturally I felt compelled to stand up to, even leaving one organization (quite some time ago now admittedly and perhaps things have changed since then) because of its "institutional racism". I've now been in Belgium about 12 and a half years. Here there is no anti-Irishness or Englishness but there is still an unfortunate underlying racism about certain groups. Seems the same the world over as some have remarked above.

My best friend is Polish, I work with several Poles, and I personally have never met the stereotypical Pole of the "Polish joke".

Peace,

moo