GOOD news in Brussels for two of our Eurocrat high-fliers but bad news for commissioners Padraig Flynn and Sir Leon Brittan, who now have to replace highly regarded and experienced deputy chefs de cabinet very well versed in the mysteries of Commission infighting.
David O'Sullivan (43) and Catherine Day (42), who served together in the Peter Sutherland cabinet before the latter became the statutory foreigner in the Brittan camp, have had their promotions to A2-grade jobs approved by the Commission, joining only six other Irish at this level or above. This means a salary in of between £7,400 and £9,500 a month.
Both have been given deeply sensitive jobs - Day takes over relations with former Yugoslavia and Turkey (Switzerland and Norway are also thrown in for good measure), while O'Sullivan is charged with Social Fund policy development.
O'Sullivan's reputation as a tough task-master is put down to genes - his father was chief of staff of the Army. But so can Day's. Once described in Europe magazine as one of the smartest and toughest bureaucrats in Brussels" she is a daughter of the former chair of the Pigs and Bacon Commission, Reddy Day.