law. In 2021, Juhana Vartiainen, then mayor of Helsinki, proposed to elevate English as an official language in Finland. He cited the difficulty typically encountered by foreigners in learning Finnish and the aim of making Helsinki more attractive to international talent. 8,000 Helsinkians speak English as their native language, which is 1.2% of Helsinki's population and makes it the 7th most spoken language in the city. Throughout Europe, tourism, publishing, finance, computers and related industries rely heavily on English due to Anglophone trade ties. Air traffic control and shipping movements are almost all conducted in English. In areas of Europe where English is not the first language, there are many examples of the mandated primacy of English: for example, in many European companies, such as Airbus, Philips, Renault, Volvo, etc. have designated English to be the language of communication for their senior management, and many universities are offering education in English. The language is also a required subject in most European countries. Thus, the percentage of English speakers is expected to rise. Euro English or European English, less commonly known as EU English and EU Speak, is a pidgin dialect of English based on the technical jargon of the European Union and the native languages of its non-native English speaking population. English as lingua franca English is the most commonly spoken foreign language in 19 out of 25 European Union countries (excluding the UK and Ireland) In the EU25, working knowledge of English as a foreign language is clearly leading at 38%, followed by German and French (at 14% each), Russian and Spanish (at 6% each), and Italian (3%). "Very good" knowledge of English is particularly high in Malta (52%), Denmark (44%), Cyprus (42%) and Sweden (40%). Working knowledge varies a lot between European countries. It is very high in Malta, Cyprus and Denmark but low in Russia, Spain (12%), Hungary (14%), Italy (5%) and Slovakia (14%). On average in 2012, 38% of citizens of the European Union (excluding the United Kingdom and Ireland) stated that they have sufficient knowledge of English to have a conversation in this language. English has become the pre-eminent second language of Europe in the absence of any colonial history or diaspora, but rather as a concerted effort to increase fluency in English by Europeans since the Second World War. English has become the most useful language to connect different language groups in Europe. The