Chris Bryant: Cameron will come unstuck on EU fudge
With the Lisbon treaty set to be ratified, Conservative promises of a referendum and renegotiation will soon prove unachievable
Digg
del.icio.us
Facebook
Reddit
Google
Stumble Upon
Fark
Newsvine
YahooBuzz
Bebo
Twitter
Independent Minds
There is a deep and deliberate double deception at the heart of the Conservative position on Europe. David Cameron has been refusing for months to come clean on Europe – but he's about to be found out.
Such is the visceral anti-Europeanism in his party, ever since he became leader of the Tories he's had to keep on suggesting that he would hold a special referendum on the Lisbon treaty, even if it has been ratified and brought into force. But now the moment is virtually upon us, with the Czech Republic set to ratify it, Mr Cameron will have to come clean. I would bet my bottom dollar he won't guarantee a referendum on Lisbon.
Instead he will almost certainly unveil a heavily disguised fudge of a promise, with a guarantee that any future treaty that would cede powers away from the UK would be subject to a referendum. It'll be a remarkably hollow promise.
After all, there are no plans anywhere in Europe to start drafting new European treaties. But Mr Cameron hopes he'll appease the Tory and UKIP right. He hopes people will blink and not spot the sleight of hand. I very much doubt he'll succeed, and his fudge will melt under heated sceptic scrutiny.
But the other deception Mr Cameron wants to get away with is his constant use of deliberately vague hints that sound tough but guarantee nothing. So he suggests they would renegotiate the treaty, but he must know this is impossible. Any treaty negotiation requires the unanimous agreement of all 27 governments – and every other government in Europe is absolutely clear they do not want another round of treaty talks. Indeed the one thing that unites every government and every political party in Europe (apart from the Tories) is that they do not want any more treaty negotiations and will do all in their power to block them.
Quite rightly they want to get on with the real issues that matter to European citizens – jobs, industry, competition with China and India, and tackling international crime. A Tory government determined to secure yet another new treaty would have to spend vast amounts of political capital needlessly trying to force the 26 other countries into doing a special new deal. What would they offer France, Spain, Germany, Poland and Italy?
There is an additional irony. Under the Lisbon treaty it is even more difficult to renegotiate the European treaties. The European Parliament now has a blocking power and can insist on a full-blown treaty convention, which would take years to complete. Since Mr Cameron has walked away from the mainstream in the European Parliament by abandoning the EPP grouping, he has next to no friends who would vote his way. So a renegotiation is a virtual impossibility and threatening it would simply set up a fruitless war with Europe that would be doomed to failure.
Mr Cameron also coyly intimates he would "repatriate powers to the UK", with a nod towards the social chapter. Again he flatters to deceive. Quite simply, the social chapter doesn't exist any more; elements like the right to paid leave and maternity pay are embedded parts of the single market now, scattered across several treaty clauses.
Any attempt to opt out of these provisions would rightly be seen by Paris and Berlin as an attempt to dismantle the common market and undermine the union. Leave aside the fact that I believe these measures are an important part of being a fair and competitive economy, the uncomfortable truth for Mr Cameron is that if he tried unilaterally to opt out, the European Court of Justice would immediately decide that the UK was in contravention of its treaty obligations. Mr Cameron would have set us on the path towards Britain leaving the EU, or being thrown out.
Already Tory isolation is damaging British influence. The Tories have abandoned the European People's Party group – the largest group in the European Parliament – and set up their own hand-picked group. The trouble is threefold. First, British businesses now have no direct access to the largest group in the Parliament. Second, the Conservatives are in a group of right-wing extremists with very dubious pasts, a matter which has already brought British conservatism into disrepute. And third, because a grouping has to have MEPs from seven countries and four of the countries represented in Mr Cameron's new group are solo figures from their country, the group would collapse if any one of them chose to leave. So Mr Cameron is completely in hock to the whimsy of four MEPs.
It is easy to point to the failings of the EU, but pursuing the British interest does not mean macho posturing. Our membership of the union is vital to our economic future. The single market has given British people the freedom to trade and work in the largest market in the world. That has meant three million extra jobs and annual exports of £370bn. Half the UK's inward investment comes from the EU, rising from £16bn to £106.5bn. British businesses don't want their futures put in peril by a reckless Tory policy of European wrangling. The head of the British Chambers of Commerce has said that Mr Cameron's policy "could do significant damage to British business interests". This is a warning that should not go unheeded.
We also have to ensure that the EU plays a far more effective role on the world stage. There are many global issues where a united EU voice added to ours will deliver real benefits to the UK. Last week the debate was about climate change, but I would add the Middle East peace process, Afghanistan and Pakistan, Russia and relations with the growing giants of India, China and Brazil.
But all of that requires a European Union that has actively decided not to spend its every waking hour arguing about the internal architecture of the treaties, but deliberately focusing on enhancing the prosperity and security of its citizens. In the end, that's the greatest Tory deception – to suggest that another bout of treaty negotiations would serve Britain or Europe well. The choice for Britain, and for Europe, is simple. Help the EU, with Britain at its heart, be a real leader on the world stage; or become spectators in a G2 world shaped by the US and China.
Chris Bryant is Europe minister
View all comments that have been posted about this article.
Offensive or abusive comments will be removed and your IP logged and may be used to prevent further submission. In submitting a comment to the site, you agree to be bound by the Independent Minds Terms of Service.
- Print Article
- Email Article
-
Click here for copyright permissions
Copyright 2009 Independent News and Media Limited
Comments
The hypocrisy of the Labour Party regarding this matter is breathtaking.If as was promised at the last election by the Labour Party, a referendum had been carried out, the Treaty would never have come into being because the UK electorate would have thrown it out, which is why Brown did not dare hold a referendum.
Bryant talks as though Cameron would be in a weak position to get powers repatriated, but the UK is one of the largest net contributors to the EU and the UK imports more from the EU than it exports. Incidentally Brown gave away our rebate and got precisely nothing in return. I think it is certainly not difficult to see that there are a number of areas that Cameron could list and ask for the backing of the UK electorate, even if it meant withholding contributions and incurring the wrath of the other members.
I believe he would receive massive support and this would strengthen his hand for any negotiations.
Even if the referendum was just in England, I doubt that the NO camp would win. Just because the anti-Europeans make a lot of noise, it does not mean there are more of them. Most pro-EU people in England are quiet about it, they see the benefits of the EU and don't see the benefit of getting drawn into an argument about it. Plus, the EU has learned from Ireland that the YES camp has to be well funded and their message has to be out there, dispelling all the fear mongering that the NO camp always resorts to. The YES camp also resort to fear mongering.
I also think a lot of people over-estimate the importance of Britain within the EU (since there is no real common defense policy, where Britain could certainly lead). A EU of 26 without Britain would not be very different but it would certainly integrate much faster. The Treaty gives member states (for the first time) the option of leaving the Union. This was not done by chance. This was done so that when Cameron starts trying to opt out of things and repatriate this and that the other member states can show him the door. People should be asking David to commit to THAT referendum, the IN or OUT... which the IN wouls win, ending this endless nasty debate. If the NO won instead, the UK would break up, Scotland and Wales would join the EU as independent nations and England would have to hope there is still enough fish in the Atlantic to feed its people.
There is a very serious lack of democratic accountability in the EU and it is imperative and urgent to address that. The EU is a very heavy train and you cannot stop it... but you can (whilst it is still forming) try to influence its direction and its constitution. Please join the European Participation Party and help repatriate some power back from Brussels... not to London but to the PEOPLE.
.
Find out more about it:
http://europeanpp.wordpress.com/
.
Thank you for your time
Heseltine is right. Cameron is going to have to eat crow and reverse his European policy and rejoin the mainstream European People's Party. If he doesn't, Europe, the USA, India and China will simply not take the UK seriously on any issue. Unless changed, current policy will cost the Conservatives a majority.
Remember John Major's problems 1993-95? The anti-european fanatics destroyed Conservatism as a serious political force. They will do the same to Cameron. They are already costing Cameron a majority.
Heseltine is also right that there will be a hung parliament. But whether a Cameron minority or a Brown minority remains to be seen. Clegg is sitting pretty.
There exists no current polling evidence to support either of these assertions; either that a hung parliament is likely or that current Conservative policy on the EU is costing the party votes. Take a look here: http://www2.politicalbetting.com/in
The current positions relative positions of the parties in comparable polls are close to being a mirror image of the the situation in 1997.
You outline the benefits (argueable) of membership of the EU all of which are to do with finance. Did you and your fellow internationalists really need to give away quite so much political power to foreign politicians in order than we trade with them?
At any rate New Labour's immediate problem isn't the electorates lack of enthusiasm for the EU it's how to overcome its loathing of your party that promised a referendum and then reneged and even though the liar Tony Blair has fled the party hatred of him is still directed at New Labour. Blair, I remind you, didn't have the courage to be pro-Europe in his own country so afraid was he of us. And Brown didn't have the courage to even be seen signing the Lisbon Treaty/European Convention.
For all his shortcomings Milliband has the courage, at least, to give his ultra-pro-European beliefs an airing.
So wide is the democratic deficit between the British citizen and the EU that I doubt that most of us care what kind of EU faces the winner of the next GE; it will be the same for either New Labour or the Conservatives and given the opportunity to chuck New Labour out I expect the electorate will do so regardless of the'Europe' arguements.
...and I agree with much of what you say in your last paragraph. We could argue all day about the desirability of the political union and how accountable it might be for the 55 years of peace we have enjoyed, the question of whether there is a discernable European identity, etc. But we have to agree about the reality of a huge democratic deficit.
You can sulk, you can try to pull out of Europe and face the consequences and explain the free fall of your standards of living to future generations or you can fight to make the EU more democratic and to decentralize power back to the people (not to the countries, which are just as corrupt as the EU). That's what we're trying to do.
.
http://europeanpp.wordpress.com/
.
That's why many people could now vote BNP, because it's the biggest issue in this country along with the economy. This country will take a much needed lurch to the right under the Tories, and we can have our England (Britain if you must) back. Labour have been a national embarassment and have admitted they tried to force multiculturalism. That's a disgrace.
We're the laughing stock of Europe because of our lack control of immigration.
Come on the Tories- sort it out.
Another example being the "car scrapheap scheme" which whilst popular with Car Dealerships because it brings them business, has only benefited French, German, Spanish and Italian car manufactures rather than the British based plants, BMW Mini apart.
Also, even Bryant knows that British Policy towards the EU has always been the same, whatever the public declarations of each Government including his own, it is being totally semi-detached and contentious. This "policy" has been in force in one way or another with regard to Europe since Henry VIII and will continue into the future and was formulated to ensure "Continental Powers" could not gang up on Britain.
As to what grouping the Conservatives belong to is totally irrelevant, with 27 member countries, even if all the British MPs banded together to oppose any measure, they would be out voted by France and Germany on principle. As to why France and Germany will always oppose the UK, it is simply that the enlargement process has diluted their power so their next goal will be a two speed Europe so that they can rule the roost again and, the UK will oppose this in the best interests of all of Europe.
As the individual countries are and will remain just that into the foreseeable future, there will never be a political bloc called the EU that can strut its stuff on the world stage, even when Germany and France agree, many others will not follow.
The reason that neither Blair nor Miliband will get a sniff at the "EU Top Jobs" is quite simply that the EU, Sarkozy and Merkel already know that Brown and Labour are a lost cause and therefore being "nice" to them is a waste of effort because they will disappear within 6 months to be replaced by a Conservative Government. As Cameron will be bogged down in administering tough fiscal medicine at home, "Fighting for British Interests" within the EU is a guaranteed theme in the years ahead and all the EU know it, payback time for not holding a British Referendum which most certainly would have rejected the Lisbon Treaty.
Funnily enough, the smartest first move Cameron could make is not related directly to the EU as such but very effective, remove the UK from the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights, make UK Courts supreme. As to Bryant's "...the uncomfortable truth for Mr Cameron is that if he tried unilaterally to opt out, the European Court of Justice would immediately decide that the UK was in contravention of its treaty obligations." It is hardly surprising that he is so ignorant of the British Constitution which means that a Parliament led by Cameron, is not bound by any Treaty signed by Brown and Labour - a previous Parliament.
Having made his intentions clear whilst in Opposition and whilst it is normal to honour Treaties from one Parliament to another, Brussels can have no complaint if they are forced into a number of opt outs and concessions to the UK, it is the game and they know it.
Bottom line of course is that this article is part of a desperate attempt to find any topic to slow down a Tory victory and minimise the extent of the Labour defeat. Null points Mr Bryant, you'll have to find yourself a "proper job" after the Election ! However and as Bryant knows full well, if the public were mad enough to re-elect Bodger Brown and his Band of Renown, British Policy towards the EU, despite any flowery words used, would be identical to a Conservative Government, "In it but not of it."
Instead, Mr Bryant contents himself with slinging mud at the opposition. Perhaps after 12 years in government and a catalogue of incompetence and failure, not least their disastrous economic record (remember those boasts of no more boom and bust, first major economy out of the recession?) mud-slinging is all that is left to Labour ministers.
With a 17-point lead in the opinion polls, David Cameron, voted Britain's most influential man in Britain by GQ magazine, need pay little heed to Mr Bryant's warning that he will come unstuck. Gordon Brown (9th in that GQ poll) is in free-fall. He has less chance of winning the next general election than all the king's horses and all the king's men had of re-assembling Humpty-Dumpty.
I really don't see this take it or leave it, like it or lump it argument convincing the UK electorate to be more favourably disposed to the EU than they currently are.
Now he is preparing to slide out of any form of referendum as Lisbon is about to be completed. You "Eurosceptic" Tories know perfectly well that a referendum on a completed Lisbon would be no more than a fudge, an opinion poll to be ignored. The only honest thing you can put in your manifesto is an immediate In or Out referendum. So just get on with it and cruise to a big majority.
Your current position closely resembles 1997 when Old Labour stalwarts and camp followers just kept quiet to allow whizzy PR man Blair get them into power. What dangerous dishonesty that was - Power before Principle and Party before Country.