Erasmus programme, consumer protection, online safety: What the EU gets right

Things may look bleak for the European Union in the depths of winter, with challenges across the board: the threat of a trade war with the US, weakened political figures in Germany and France, European farmers menacing protests about the Mercosur deal, an uncertain outcome for the conflict in Ukraine, plus budgets being tightened for households and governments across the bloc. But despite or perhaps because of those threats, Europeans’ sentiment is on the up: 51 percent of Europeans tend to trust the EU, the highest level since 2007; while 44 percent have a positive image of the bloc, a figure that’s stayed more or less constant since 2010. Those figures are according to a recent Eurobarometer poll.