Blog: First impressions - Hoofdinhoud

Moving in, starting work

I've just spent the last few days with my team moving into the Berlaymont building in the heart of Brussels' EU quarter. It wasn't just us, of course, but all the other cabinet teams of the new European Commission at the same time. A time of great change - and the start of the next five years of working together to build a genuine digital single market for Europe.

So it's been a hectic start as everyone changes offices, unpacks the boxes piled up in the corridors and gradually settles in. Still, coming from Estonia where we have created a real culture of online government, I am often surprised at the amount of paper that people generate over the years and then want to keep.

The Estonian government stopped using paper for its cabinet meetings back in 2000. It's so more efficient; it saves a lot of time, money and resources. And it reinforces my belief that Europe as a whole needs to move to a more paperless society, particularly in public services. I know from personal experience in my own country that it can, and does, work.

As I said during my European Parliament hearing a few weeks ago, there is no reason why - in the 21st century - a public service cannot be put online. Given the mountain of paper that I've seen this week alone, I am convinced more than ever that the Commission should lead by example, even though this won't happen overnight. My own team will be as paperless as we can be under the circumstances.

Now that we've got over the office move, I'm excited about getting to grips with the work ahead and the list of meetings, engagements and conferences is rapidly building up for the rest of the year.

My first outside meeting was with the influential American economic and social theorist Jeremy Rifkin, who has been an advisor in the European Union for many years. We agreed that 'digital' is much more than ICT. It's not only about getting seamless broadband and Wi-Fi connections, although these are vital first steps as we build a digital single market.

It's about making Europe digital to the widest and deepest extent so that we benefit from the advantages and efficiencies - and that means people as well as business. This is the same single market, but in the digital world. Jobs will change; new and good jobs will also come.

I also attended my first meeting of European commissioners, which normally takes place every Wednesday. One of the agenda items for the 28 of us to discuss was Jean-Claude Juncker's plan for a €300 billion investment package.

While these are early days in the discussions, I do know that there is huge interest in this flagship initiative from both inside and outside Brussels.

I will fight from the start for digital to have a prominent place in the package, especially since we were not so successful when the Connecting Europe Facility was being negotiated. Then, the original figure mentioned for investments in fast broadband networks and pan-European digital services was €9 billion - a figure which ended up being cut massively. So now we have to look for other ways to leverage this money and create incentives for private investment. It is how we can make sure that Europe gets the infrastructure that it needs to benefit from the digital economy.

I see this investment as vital for restoring Europe's economic growth, as well as creating jobs. This week I read the Commission's latest economic forecasts with some alarm, because they show that Europe's recovery is still weak and fragile. A properly functioning digital single market can - and should be able to - play its full part in helping growth in Europe. It is also my job to make sure that it does.

Next week I will convene a meeting of the key commissioners who have responsibilities in the digital single market - the first of several 'cluster' meetings that we will have - as we decide how to move forward and work together. I will report later on how this meeting went.

Just to conclude, I'd like to remind you that I continue to be available online on Twitter, at @Ansip_EU. And I haven't forgotten my promise to hold tweet chats from time to time, following the success of #askansip a couple of weeks ago - you can read my first blog about it on this website.