The EU bureaucracy has found a new way to get rid of undesired staff.

The European Commission has been accused of trying to have troublesome staff declared mentally ill in order to provide an excuse for giving them the sack.

Critics claim that the commission has resorted to tactics "worthy of the KGB" by pronouncing staff unfit for work after grillings from psychiatrists.

The reason why they engage in these tactics:

The practice is alleged to have developed unofficially because the commission's generous employment terms make it all but impossible to dismiss staff. In the past, employees who have had run-ins with the commission, or simply underperformed, have generally had to be persuaded to leave by offers of expensive early retirement packages.

One person who was in such way investigated was identified with:

an internal report on his mental health revealed signs of "megalomania and paranoia". Another document said that he "suffers from an astonishing lack of daily awareness in the world of work". It concluded: "All this signals a pathological state."

Megalomania and paranoia? I thought those were prerequisites for working at the EU.