In Europe, a hotel is a health hazard

PERIGUEUX, France, Aug. 13 (UPI) -- The bureaucrats of Brussels are playing fun and games again. It's driving Madam la Proprietaire of the Restaurant Estalou in Le Bugue - among thousands of others in the catering and hotel business across Europe - wild with frustration. Already upset that American tourism to France is down 40 percent this summer, she blames the United States.

The Brussels gnomes, building a stronger European Union, think they must move to guard against the American penchant for taking legal action at the break of a fingernail from catching on among the service industry personnel of Europe.

Madam la Proprietaire, along with hotel, café and restaurant owners, grand and humble, from Paris to Penzance and Portofino, is now required to keep a book stored at the ready to present to inspectors arriving unannounced over the polished marble doorstep of her establishment.

This polished marble doorstep and its potential for tripping a foot features in the accursed book, along with the polished copper pots and pans that hang in artful array across the walls of the restaurant and any other "objets" that Madam has been taught by Brussels to view instead as obstacles.

In a ritual that must take place with every new employee and which occurred last week with all the current hands at the Restaurant Estalou, Madam paces the building pointing out its hazards to her young waitresses and kitchen staff.

"I must ask them," she expostulated indignantly, setting the absurdity of the scene, "'Do you observe our dining terrace overlooking the waters of the River Vezère? Do you appreciate that if you were to propel yourselves over the railings, you would plunge to your deaths?' 'Oui, madam,' they reply. So I write in my book 'Jumping off the terrace is dangerous.' Then they each must sign against the entry."

She shepherds them round the premises, noting the polished pans display and the effect it might have should it dislodge itself from the walls and conk them on the head, pointing out the step that leads from the dining room onto the river view terrace that could twist an ankle, at each impediment collecting signatures that they each appreciate how hazardous a restaurant can be.

"I say, 'This is a glass. Do you accept that a glass once broken could sever an artery?' Oui, madam, and I write 'Broken glass can kill' and we all sign the book."

In the kitchen, the chef keeps 45 different knives. Each must have its own separate signed acknowledgement in the book.

Madam has other Brussels-enforced difficulties with her staff. Young people in France may drink wine and beer from the age of 16, anything else from the age of 18. A 17-year old can wait tables but is not allowed to take any orders for alcohol. An 18-year old is allowed to place an order for alcohol at the bar, but not allowed to deliver it. Only a person over 21 may do that. But in this summer of trying to balance the books with a slump in profits, these are best avoided as wait staff. They demand higher wages.