The Sketch: Bad faith rules all debate on Europe

And why wasn't the Foreign Secretary there sitting beside the PM? In her absence, Tony Blair stuck it to her in the most fundamental way. That he didn't realise what he was doing made it the more enjoyable.

Richard Younger-Ross asked him why Britain hadn't been involved in the pre-Council negotiations on this "amending treaty", when all the other countries in Europe had been. "What IS he talking about?"the PM asked to much laughter. "We've been talking about this for years!"

Younger-Ross's point was lost in the laughter, but the Foreign Secretary is on the record, denying to the European Scrutiny Committee that there had been any discussion, any negotiation, any dialogue on the subject of this "amending treaty" at all.

Bad faith is the only reliable rule in these debates. We saw the Prime Minister proudly talking about Britain's highest aim having been achieved: a "pick-and-mix" approach to Europe. Malcolm Rifkind invited him to applaud this "à la carte" approach. He declined. Why? It is a Tory phrase. And one that Blair himself denounced in flowing rhetoric a few years ago. It was the only moment where the PM was discomforted. New Tories - completely useless!

Blair produced a devastating argument against a referendum: everyone's bored with talking about institutional arrangements. That's strong ground. Cameron's appeals were useless because no one understood them.

Can you begin to start thinking about whether the substitution of "union" for "community" throughout the treaties "collapses the pillars"? To understand that you must be, in the PM's words, "obsessed with esoteric institutional details" instead of wanting to get on and deal with climate change and global poverty. Cynicism and idealism, the most potent mix in modern politics.

He laid out the amending treaties back to the Single European Act, none of which had merited a referendum because none of them had been "constitutional". And therein lies the genius of the EU operators. No single treaty is constitutionally significant, but taken together they overwhelm any national constitution.

But as Gisela Stuart put it gently, calling for a referendum, the treaty talks about "the people of Europe" not "the governments of Europe". It is very hard to argue against that. In good faith.

simoncarr@sketch.sc

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