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		The European Nanny State gone mad May 2002 Over the past few months spent in Brussels and Strasbourg I have seen clear evidence of a European Nanny State gone mad. My Conservative colleagues and I have been faced with a torrent of proposals that just seem to get more and more ridiculous. In February we had the so called "Noise Directive" thanks to a report by socialist Danish MEP and daughter-in-law of the Kinnocks, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, concerning noise levels in the work place. For a time there were real fears that if the proposals went through music in pubs and clubs, and live music in orchestras, would be banned for being too loud. Thanks to a key compromise amendment, originally proposed by the Conservative Group, music is now to receive a special exemption from the Directive altogether. Ms Thorning-Schmidt was also responsible for the Directive on Vibration, formally nodded through the European Parliament last week. Proposed on health and safety grounds this Directive will officially limit tractor drivers to only seven hours work at a time. There is no scientific evidence linking body vibration to back pain but this has not stopped the EU imposing completely unrealistic limits on farmers. Asking tractor drivers to work only seven hours at harvest time is completely ludicrous. Amendments supported by Labour MEPs could have made it madder still, proposing a limit of only two hours on a tractor. Working with the NFU we Tories tried to get agriculture exempt from the Directive altogether, but we couldn't get enough support in the Parliament. The good news is we got the Socialists' lower limit overturned, and managed to delay the implementation deadline for existing machinery used in agriculture and forestry until 2014. Another recent example of officious and onerous EU regulation is the proposals relating to vitamin availability. A new directive will mean that over 300 products will be subject to lengthy safety assessment behind closed doors in Brussels, at a cost of many thousands of pounds each. If they fail - and some countries, notably Germany, are very restrictive about what they will allow through - then they will be off our shelves for good. Tory MEPs voted to throw out these damaging proposals however the European Parliament passed the directive despite overwhelming and unprecedented levels of public protest. Campaigners even managed to shut down the computer system in the European Parliament by bombarding MEPs with thousands of emails asking them to vote to save vitamins. We Conservatives did successfully manage to pass through an amendment which will give manufacturers 3 years instead of the proposed 18 months to get their products approved. This month MEPs will be voting on EU proposals on the "Hygiene of Foodstuffs" that will seriously affect the Countryside and in particular game shooting. I have been campaigning against these proposals which apply not only to the commercial trade sector but could also affect all those wishing to hunt wild game for sport or pleasure. Following the Report hunters, game managers and game keepers would be forced to attend educational schemes and further onerous regulations for traceability would be introduced which are impractical for smaller game such as Pheasants. Every so often a liberal or a socialist will ask how I can sit in the European Parliament when I am a eurosceptic. The answer is obvious, I was not elected to promote the European project, but to represent the best interests of my East Midlands voters. Conservative MEPs have managed to successfully dilute some of the damaging EU proposals coming out of Brussels and we will continue to fight against elaborate, expensive EU solutions to problems that don't exist.