'Mushrooming' EU institutions cause unease amid era of national austerity

There is a growing nervousness at the top of the European Commission at a threat to the very legitimacy of the European Union if the bloc's institutions continue their "mushrooming" while beyond Brussels, public spending is being slashed to the bone.

Speaking to a group of reporters, one very senior commission official let rip about his frustration at the forward march of institutional expansion and how so many European actors appear to be blithely oblivious to the incongruence of their...