Viviane Reding is famously outspoken, but even by her standards the condemnation of the French government that she delivered on Tuesday lunchtime was extraordinary stuff. She drew comparisons between France’s treatment of the Roma and the treatment of ethnic minorities in the Second World War. She came pretty close to accusing French government ministers of lying to her. This is simply not the way that European commissioners are supposed to behave.

The imponderable question (because such condemnations are so rare) is whether Reding would have treated a smaller member state with the same disdain – Slovakia, say, or Malta? And how would the bystanders have reacted. Part of the thrill – for the speaker and for her audience – was that she was taking on one of the EU’s biggest and most important states.

That Reding chose to make such a statement in English rather than French might, however, have raised a doubt in some listeners’ minds. Was her aim to get a message across to France and the French government, or to a different audience? Perhaps that question is churlish – the explanation will partly be that the commissioner and the team around her communicate in English and the statement was drafted in haste – but even that reinforces the impression that the potential effects had not been thoroughly thought through.

Some Commission insiders will applaud the sight of the Commission fighting back against a national government. But it does not follow that by raising the emotional temperature Reding will win greater popularity for the EU. Reding has the treaties of the European Union on her side, but immigration is a double-edged issue, as Tony Blair points out in his recent memoir. Reding has stood up for ethnic minorities, but the manner in which she has done so could yet win her majority disapproval in France.

The condemnation of France was absolute, but it will not resolve the problem of racism and discrimination against Roma, nor their social exclusion. As long as the Roma issue smoulders, Reding and the EU are vulnerable.

The commissioner has taken a high-risk course. She is an out-and-out populist, but she may yet learn that not all populists are popular, as France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy could attest.

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