UKIP claim that we pay £55 million per day to be a member of the EU. My UKIP neighbours ask what we get back for that money. What should I tell them?
First off, it seems we get about £22 million a day back in cash, in the form of grants and subsidies. But even UKIP neighbours can do simple arithmetic. That leaves a net cost of about £33 million per day, or about 50p per day on average for every man, woman, and child in the UK. What do we get in return?
Some say: “Simple – we get free trade”. But, say my UKIP neighbours: “We’d get that anyway if we weren’t a member. The UK is a nice big fat market for continental companies, and they don’t want to lose their profit centres! They want access to the UK and will grant access to the continent in return.”
So, would we really get free trade outside of the EU? Do we really have to pay that £33 million to access free trade with Europe?
So I say: “We get to participate in making the rules, and that’s valuable”. “Ha ha!” say my neighbours, “Think Sovereignty! Think unelected civil servants in Brussels making the rules!”. “But wait!” I retort, “Isn’t the role of MEPs to check the civil servants’ proposals, even to reject them sometimes?” “Are you joking?” say my neighbours. “MEPs have no power; anyway it’s a gravy train for them! That’s where the money goes!” “Nige too?” I meekly ask. “No, not Nige” they reply, “He’s the good guy!”.
The European Movement says we get about £25 billion extra GDP from the Single Market, and more in “wider benefits”. But how does that work? And how can it be explained to my UKIP neighbours when they say: “Wouldn’t the European Movement say that anyway? It’s all a big trick of the Money Power!” ?
So I’m stumped. I come over to LDV for a bit of enlightenment and I see the Chair of the Association of Liberal Democrat Engineers and Scientists claiming that “80% of Lib Dem voters more-or-less reject…the idea of ‘Ever-closer Union’”. One respondent to that post had a great argument about how our future is a choice between pooling sovereignty or accepting European Free Trade Association status. But that’s a prediction about what might happen, and we all know how uncertain predictions can be!
And I remember my neighbours’ parting words “We’d do better OUT as a sovereign nation – free to do what we like!”. Another “what might happen” argument – but one they accept.
Well, I tried to say that 50p a day isn’t much, even for someone on a low wage – it’s less than the annual cost of inflation. But no-one believed that, not even my friends!
So now my head hurts. Please help! Is UKIP winning the argument?
I’d just like to know what we get for £33 million a day.
* Richard Dean is a civil engineering consultant who lives and works in Wales, Spain, and the Caribbean. After 30 years as a staunch Labour supporter he joined the LibDems a few years ago. He recently left but would rejoin if things change.
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117 Comments
None of the things your “UKIP friends” say are actually true. The return to a 1950s dreamworld of freedom to be a racist bully in poverty that they wish for is a nightmare for all of us. Britain is a prosperous world leading country and it owes it to EEC and then EU (because your “UKIP friends” will surely point out the name has changed – it’s their rather pathetic excuse for ignoring the fact that we’ve had a referendum).
You look, like me, old enough to remember Britain pre-EU. It was embarassing to be part of the decline of a once great country – the nightly news was a story of which industry had closed down that day. The EU has saved us and the UKIPs want to throw it away.
We get to bribe the ex-Warsaw-pact countries to be on our side instead of Putin’s.
I’m not a Lib Dem, but the events of recent weeks and months have shown they will be unable to provide any substantive argument for our membership. When their leader Nick Clegg demanded a debate on the EU with NIgel Farage, despite having all the time in the world to prepare, the best he could come up with was the usual vague scaremongering tactics such parroting the lost 3 million jobs statement repeatedly, even though it has been completely discredited by its original author.
In my experience the LibDems don’t care a jot what we get from the EU, the project is entrenched in their DNA, it is visceral to them, it woud appear they would still value it, if it cost us £200-£400-£600 million a day. The EU is ingrained in their ideological one worldism, of a party completely disconnected from its constituency, who consider the UK as a self governing entity, simply as a cause to be undermined at every opportunity whatever the cost to individual Britons.
What do we get for our £55 million a day? I would suggest a persistent, throbbing headache!!
“One respondent to that post had a great argument about how our future is a choice between pooling sovereignty or accepting European Free Trade Association status.”
Nearly there, but let us elaborate on what is meant by “pooling sovereignty”.
Currently, this means ever-closer-union where all nations are forced to march in lockstep towards a glorious federal future.
What we get for our £33m is EFTA status in ten years time unless the EU accepts that nations can have options other than ever closer union.
@Bill
If by bribe you mean that we’re part of a political structure that brings peace and economic opportunity to the countries that were until recently either part of Russia’s empire or perpetually on the brink of armed conflict, then yes. Also in the ‘bribe’ category might be the huge improvement in our relationship with Ireland, although of course the role of Europe in creating space for dialogue is usually dismissed by the nationalists.
Also, the idea that the EU will simply let Britain into the single market no questions asked is idiotic. At the very best, Britain will be able to negotiate a new accession to the EEA EFTA halfway house. A new accession, with none of the budget rebate stuff we get now.
So there it is. The kippers’ big plan. Cost Britain more money to get the same rules with no say over what those rules might be.
Richard Dean
And I remember my neighbours’ parting words “We’d do better OUT as a sovereign nation – free to do what we like!”. Another “what might happen” argument – but one they accept.
Well. ok, so what do they think is this great controlling thing it is doing at a cost of 50p per person per day?
jedibeeftrix writes about being “forced to march in lockstep towards a glorious federal future”, but how is that happening? All the things that people are moaning about – the NHS, “bedroom tax”, university tuition fees and so on – seem to be decided by the UK government. There seem to be big differences in how similar things are dealt with in other EU countries. So just where is this “lockstep” we are being forced into, just what it is forcing our country to do politically that people here don’t like? Just what is it that the people of this country would like Cameron and Clegg to be doing MORE of right now that they think they are stopped from doing by the EU? Just what is it that they think is so wonderful about Cameron and Clegg and Miliband that is not found in political leaders in the EU? Just what is it that they think is so wonderful about the Westminster Parliament and its politicians that they are afraid the EU is stopping?
It is simply not possible to be a “sovereign nation” these days as it was in the past. The globalisation of the economy means the state government is not the overwhelming dominating power it once was. See how we are forced to kow-tow to big global companies because if we don’t “they’ll move elsewhere and take their money and jobs with them”. Without some sort of international co-operation, the big companies will play one country off against another, as we are seeing anyway in the way they avoid paying taxes and so have an unfair advantage over purely British companies because they can play silly games whereby the branch of the global company in one country supposedly has to make big payments for vague reasons to the branch in another company which just happens to have lower corporation taxes. Is that what all these anti-EU people are moaning about? Are they all in tears about poor, poor Starbucks, poor poor Amazon etc, and the possibility of the nasty EU imposing some sort of uniformity which means we in the UK won’t be able to kow-tow to them deeply enough? Or do the people of this country feel enslaved by not being in the position of being forced by their employers to work 50 hours or more a week?
Thanks for the many surprising and interesting comments. I’d like to be able to say to UKIP “We get such-and-such”, and for “such-and-such” to be obviously worth our daily contribution. Chris’s point that the EU saved the UK seems a bit like throwing dynamite on a nationalist fire! Is it true?
How can T’J’s claim be proved that being out would cost more than being in? To a sceptical electorate? To an electorate that is receiving lots of partially credible UKIP literature through mailboxes right now? Literature that builds credibility by starting with verifiable facts.
I wonder what alternatives there could be to EFTA or a “glorious federal future”, and what might be the problem with that future? If we’re IN we’d be negotiating on how it was, it we’e OUT wouldn’t we just have to accept whatever the others decided?
Bringing peace is a huge benefit, but would it have happened anyway, or happened without us, and how can that be related to the original question of what we get for our daily contribution?
If by bribe you mean that we’re part of a political structure that brings peace and economic opportunity to the countries that were until recently either part of Russia’s empire or perpetually on the brink of armed conflict, then yes
By ‘bribe’ I mean ‘shower with money’. Quite a lot of that £33 million is spent on development programmes in ex-Pact countries. If the EU wasn’t spending that money there, those countries would be a lot poorer. They would therefore be more likely to be receptive to advances from Russia, especially if Russia were to offer money.
So: the £33 million is, in large part, being spent to openly bribe the ex-communist countries so that they are more receptive to us than Russia.
Given the current geopolitical situation, this actually might be seen as not bad value.
@Matthew Huntbach
Do we need a new definition of what “sovereignty” is? And a calculation of how much not having it can cost?
Thank you for this useful question Richard.
As the ‘Party of IN’ we should all already have been empowered with the answers and used them!
I think this is one topic amongst many that we can valuably explore and add to our wider understanding here on LDV.
We do only hear of the bad elements of EU legislation. Two great positives in areas such as chemical safety, food and food packaging safety – and the list must be huge – are that we get to work collaboratively with likeminded citizens and trading partners so that we protect consumers and users of such products and services without being forced to carry out such work and carry all the costs alone in the UK. In my own sphere even the EC struggles. Without our membership, British consumers would almost certainly be left unprotected due to the complexity and cost of many of the issues.
A general observation would be that every step in the evolution in human society from the extended family unit through to the nation state must have had their detractors … “what have ‘XYZ’ ever done for us!” At least this next stage is proving less bloody than the earlier developments!
jedibeeftrix writes about being “forced to march in lockstep towards a glorious federal future”, but how is that happening?
Well, a big part would be that it seems that the opt-out from the Charter of Fundamental Rights which Britain negotiated in the Lisbon Constitution might not be respected by the EU courts. If this were the case then you would have British labour laws being ruled ‘unconstitutional’ according to a constitution that Britain explicitly did not sign up to, which seems like quite a good definition of being suckered into, if not ‘marched lockstep towards’ a federal state (ie, one where the federal government and constitution can override the decision of individual states).
There are also the proposals that countries might have to submit their budgets to the EU for approval, before they are voted on by national parliaments; that would strike at the very heart of a sovereign parliament. At the moment that has only been suggested for Eurozone countries in trouble, but it could well be attempted to be extended. Imagine if a British government had to submit a budget to the EU council, and was told that they could not make a proposed tax cut!
There’s also the issue of ECHR rulings, for instance on the voting rights of prisoners, where people think that (for instance) whether prisoners can vote is rightly a matter for the British Parliament alone to decide. And while the ECHR is not technically part of the EU, firstly a lot of people confuse the two, and secondly it’s not entirely independent of it, either, given that remaining in the EU is dependant on remaining bound by the ECHR.
Richard Dean, we lose the rebate if we walk out. Anyone who thinks otherwise should join the SNP and help them out in their Wildly Unrealistic Independence Scenarios department, although I suppose they might be overqualified for the role.
The inability of the British political establishment to constructively engage with devolution and to meaningfully decentralise our system of government is on the verge of killing the UK anyway. Combine that with a refusal to accept subsidiarity within a Europe that speaks with credibility on global concerns but stays out of domestic policy and you’ve got a political monster that will see England commit economic and geopolitical suicide in the name of pride and outdated notions that sovereignty means doing whatever you want.
a Europe that speaks with credibility on global concerns but stays out of domestic policy
But the whole point is that Europe keeps poking its nose into domestic policy: what is the Charter of Fundamental Rights but an attempt by the EU to say that its institutions, rather than individual countries’ parliaments, is the ultimate authority on what is acceptable domestic policy on such matters as labour laws or the limits of the franchise, or what counts as ‘discrimination’?
If Europe really did stay out of domestic policy then the arguments of the Eurosceptics would be a lot weaker, but Europe seems incapable of doing that.
Richard – it’s just not correct that the UK is as important to the EU as an export market as the EU is to us. A briefing from the House of Commons Library from February last year (SN/EP/6091 if you want to track it down), based on 2011 figures, found that whilst exports from the UK to the rest of the EU were worth over 15 per cent of our GDP, exports to the UK from the rest of the EU were worth less than 3 per cent of their GDP. The EU is a much more important marketplace for us than the UK is an important marketplace for them.
To export to that market if we were outside we’d still have to comply with all their rules about stuff like the energy efficiency of washing machines or whatever else it is we wanted to sell them, but we’d have no say in how those rules have been drawn up.
Bill, you mention employment rights and budgets.
In a single market, the rules governing contracts and transactions need to be harmonised. Not identical, because members aren’t, but certainly drawn up to avoid unfair anticompetitive practices being allowed.
I would illustrate the point with a reduction to absurdity where one member of a single market introduces chattel slavery and reduces its labour costs to zero and thus unfairly beats out its competitors, but given recent contract and workfare changes, I’m not sure its so absurd anymore.
Regardless, the point is that initiatives like the working time directive are primarily about ensuring a fair marketplace while avoiding a race to the bottom as the single market balances to accommodate its members needs. You could focus on the headline that the Westminster Parliament has lost its sovereign right to tell you your boss can work you till you drop, but I think that focuses on the wrong end of the issue.
The EU is the vehicle through which our country influences those rules, and the institution through which we are now starting to exercise democratic control over. Leave and take EFTA, and we’re just rolling back to a time when it really was unelected bureaucrats making decisions for us.
You could focus on the headline that the Westminster Parliament has lost its sovereign right to tell you your boss can work you till you drop, but I think that focuses on the wrong end of the issue
The question was, ‘what is this push towards a federal future’ (ie, questioning that any sovereignty had actually been lost).
The answer is, ‘the EU increasingly poking its nose into domestic law’.
You are defending the loss of sovereignty as a good thing, or at least as a price worth paying for access to the EU market.
However, for some people sovereignty is an important principle in itself: some people would rather be sovereign even if it came at an economic cost. For some people there are more important things than money, and the ability to say that we are free to determine our own domestic laws without having them overturned by a foreign court is one of those things.
(Also: if British workers are prepared to work longer hours than French ones, and so gain a competitive advantage, how is that ‘unfair’? It seems to me the very definition of fair competition. It’s as if you entered a tennis competition and the number of hours’ practice each competitor was allowed to do was capped so that the more dedicated players wouldn’t have an ‘unfair competitive advantage’ over the ones who only played socially three hours a week.)
@Bill
That’s a very interesting point.
How much poorer would UKIP be willing to make us, just to support their concept of “sovereignty”?
How much poorer would UKIP be willing to make us, just to support their concept of “sovereignty”?
That’s a question for them, not me, but I do remember a poll a while ago where UKIP supporters were asked if they were willing to cut immigration even if it meant the country was poorer, and they said yes. I don’t know if there was a follow-up question, ‘how much poorer?’. Presumably just a little bit less well-off is one thing, but total economic disaster would not be.
I assume it’s the same thing as people who say they would like to raise the higher-rate tax band to 50% or higher, even if doing so actively reduced the total amount of tax raised: they think that the principle of making the rich pay is more important then money.
There’s an interesting pi-chart on http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/government_expenditure.html. According to that website, in 2015 we aim to spend about …
£410 million per day on pensions
£360 million per day on health care
£240 million per day on education
£120 million per day on defence
£300 million per day on welfare
which totals about £1430 million per day, and there’s also about £550 million per day spent on other things. I’m not sure where the £33 million fits in, but it seems pretty small in comparison.
But it still doesn’t answer the question about what we get for £33 million a day!
The benefits of EU membership are hard to quantify in monetary terms (or in pounds, shillings and pence, as Richard Dean’s UKIP neighbour would probably say) but two especially valuable things immediately come to mind: (1) because we are part of the European Single Market, many foreign companies have chosen to have their European HQs here; several have said openly they would leave if the UK withdrew, with serious implications for British jobs, and (2) as part of the world’s biggest economic and trading bloc, we have clout on the world stage (though we’d have even more if member states got their act together more on a common foreign and security policy); Britain alone no longer has that influence to the same degree as in the past — a past after which UKIP and Empire Loyalists hanker. In a globalised world in which there is a diversity of big and ever more competitive players, the EU has the potential to hold its own, despite its increasingly elderly demographic. As EU members, we Brits share that power. If we left the EU, we would surrender it.
There are areas where the EU have stepped in to save us as consumers money – OK, not everyone travels within EU countries, but for the millions of UK holidaymakers who do, they have seen the cost of mobile roaming charges fall, and from December 2015, completely scrapped. From an ‘individual’ perspective, it has a direct impact.
“In April this year the European Parliament voted to completely scrap mobile roaming fees in the EU, so that the cost of making a call, sending a text and using the internet in another EU country would be the same as at home.
However, the changes aren’t due to come into effect until December 2015 and won’t apply to countries outside the EU, which could leave operators free to hike roaming costs in other destinations to offset the new restrictions.” Source quote: lovemoney.com
Take note of the last sentence! If we leave the EU, then mobile users may see the costs of travelling within EU and phoning/texting/data download increase. These added increases for UK business, could be substantial which are going to be passed onto consumers – It may not be a huge point, but it would cost all of us.
Bill, you’ll notice that I specified the rules are intended to ensure a fair marketplace (they should be similar everywhere, a criterion that your idea of not having any does technically meet) while also avoiding a race to the bottom.
Your analogy to elite sports figures is interesting, but only applies to similarly elite professions. Such figures work as hard as they need to – the neurochemist might put in a 62 hour week because he’s on the brink of a breakthrough, not because his contract says so. The Chief Executive might take her job home to get the edge and there’s no law that could justifiably stop her.
Let’s step outside the world of high flying elites for a moment, though. Do longer hours really increase productivity? They certainly reduce efficiency. Is it reasonable to compare the executive taking a job home with a steel mill worker’s situation? Competition outside of the most elite layer is between firms, not really between individuals. Their interest is in maximising work while minimising costs. Government can choose what its objectives are, and a hard right one would agree, maximum work, minimum cost. But most people will see a role for government in ensuring exploitative practices (that unchecked will reduce to slavery) are challenged and prevented. This means regulations, and in a single market those need to be fair.
In an ungoverned market, the lack of wellbeing that an exploited contract signer suffers is just one more unregarded externality. Freedom in a liberal market economy has to mean more than a free choice between a range of exploitative contracts or starvation.
On the sovereignty point, i think your case is missing a key issue. The sovereignty that people defend when they argue that line isn’t the UK’s. It isn’t even that of the British people. It’s the sovereignty of the Westminster Parliament. We all need to ask ourselves what that means in practical as well as nationalistic-romanticism terms.
Government can choose what its objectives are, and a hard right one would agree, maximum work, minimum cost. But most people will see a role for government in ensuring exploitative practices (that unchecked will reduce to slavery) are challenged and prevented.
Indeed. The whole point of a democratic system is to balance these sorts of things by finding out what the population’s preferred option is.
But, why should each population have the same preference? Might it not be the case that the British electorate, say, would put their preferred point of work/life balance between the two extremes at a different point from the French? And the Germans, at a different point again? And the Spanish? And the Italians?
It might just be the case that the British electorate as a whole values economic success more than holidays, and the French electorate values long summer holidays more than economic success.
The whole point of democracy is to allow populations to express these preferences.
Claiming that otherwise there will be ‘a race to the bottom’ and ‘slavery’ is clearly just nonsense, because even without the Charter of fundamental Rights the British electorate doesn’t vote for slavery, or for total labour market deregulation. Yes, they vote for less regulation than the French. But why isn’t that okay? Why can’t it just be that we value different things to the French? Whose business is it to tell us that we can’t work as much as we want to?
And if it turns out that as a result we are more competitive than the French, why is that a problem? The tennis player who prioritises practice over spending time with her family is going to win more tournaments than the one who always makes time for birthdays and family meals. That’s not unfair, that is just the result of different choices.
If the British electorate as a whole (ie, not just elite individuals but the general population) is comfortable with a less regulated labour market than the French (not an unregulated market, not slavery, just one that puts the balance between work and life at a slightly different place) and as a result the nation as a whole is more competitive and therefore becomes richer, that’s not ‘unfair competition it is simply the result of us having different values.
And I don’t see why we should be prevented form expressing our different values simply because it would lead to a perfectly fair competitive advantage over our neighbours.
Richard – a welcome attempt to take the EU financial question head on without trying to massage the figures…
It would be interesting to see what the annual variation has been, ie. do we regularly get back ~40% of our annual contribution.
As another intangible benefit of membership: would the Tour de France have come to England if we weren’t in?
This is not backed like some of you by facts however I voted years ago for joining and indeed I thought closer union would arrive, all ok
What has happened was the expansion and the effect throwing EU money at the countries less prosperous and allowing free borders so we spend every day on sending money out into the EU but we also get immigration unchecked and not all are highly skilled many just want a job. Great so they want any job but the impact has been a fast decline in pay and conditions due to so many people waiting to fill your shoes.
When we say we get peace I hope you mean wars as some of the riots in Spain Greece and here in the UK are probably triggered because many feel lack of prospects
What do we get, eventually closer ties more harmonising free border crossing shared energy policy green policies and another tier of politicians with a hand in our pockets.
I would almost certainly vote to stay but I am fed up of feeling I need permission to sneeze, laws change and we don’t even seem to get to know when, most of all it’s the rule that tells us we can not remove terrorist or criminals because they have human rights so do the people who live here that is brushed under the carpet
@Roland
There’s an interesting graph on the following website. It seems that we got quite high rebates in some years, but recently about half or less. http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2052433/Chart-How-does-Britain-pay-EU-does-back.html
There’s also an interesting pi-chart on page 11 of the following document. It sees that we paid in 2013 about 12.4% of the EU’s budget, which was less than Germany, less than France, and less even than Italy. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/259692/EU_Finances_2013.pdf
Richard Dean
Do we need a new definition of what “sovereignty” is? And a calculation of how much not having it can cost?
It’s something like the “freedom to dine at the Ritz” issue. That is, you may have freedoms in theory, but they mean little because you are so constrained by circumstances that it is not possible to exercise them.
Power is shifting from the nation state. There is so much that it could do in the past that with today’s more globalised and large scale economy it just can’t do today, or at least can’t do effectively.
A lot of this “sovereignty” issue is yearning for an imaginary time past when things were simpler, so supposing that it can be magicked back in existence in a sort of cargo cult way. I see a lot of the calls for Scottish independence as the same sort of thing – probably why the anti-EU case doesn’t get as much support there as they have the independence thing as the easy-easy solves all our problems escape route instead. The reality is that if Scotland gained independence, it would still be battered around by the big international corporations, who could decide whether to invest there, or whether to close down their operations there. Its culture would still be donated by the wider English-language culture, with the USA being the dominant influence.
Martin Wolf. the Financial Times economic commentator, has published his thoughts on the subject recently http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0813c1ae-f099-11e3-8f3d-00144feabdc0.html#axzz34u0aOJ4A
He writes: “the saving on net budgetary contributions (now 0.5 per cent of gross domestic product) following an exit could be notional. If the UK still wanted access to EU markets on privileged terms it would have to make a fiscal contribution, as do Norway and Switzerland. Today, Norway’s contribution per head is much the same as the UK’s.
The only way to give the UK more independence would be abandonment of all forms of privileged access to EU markets and so total reliance on membership of the World Trade Organisation. But that would also give the UK little say in new plurilateral agreements among big powers, provide negligible protection to its exports of financial services, damage its appeal as a base for multinationals’ exports to the EU and allow the eurozone to force relocation of trading in euro-denominated assets from London.
Yes, full exit would allow the UK greater freedom over its own regulations. But, as the OECD has shown, product and labour market regulations in the UK are already among the least restrictive in the developed world, despite EU membership. Though some fantasists hope that these rules would be repealed if the UK left the EU, the idea that the British people would allow elimination of almost all labour, product or environmental regulations is mad. Remember: the most economically damaging UK restrictions – those on land use – are, alas, entirely home-grown.
It is perfectly possible that a lethal blend of xenophobia, public folly and political incompetence will lead to a UK exit from the EU in the next parliamentary term. But let us be clear about the implications. All attempts to preserve some form of privileged access to EU markets while being outside the EU would merely add humiliation to all the other disadvantages. Full exit would at least be an honest choice. But it would also be extraordinarily stupid. It would bring no important economic benefits, while certainly delivering significant costs.
The British people might not like their current position. But it is much the best of all available choices. In any referendum, I would expect them to reach that obviously sensible conclusion..”
The British people might not like their current position. But it is much the best of all available choices
It is also not viable in the medium to long term. Within ten years, the EU will either have collapsed entirely, or the Eurozone will have begun the process of full fiscal and political integration. Britain will not join that, so if the EU still exists at all, we will end up effectively in the EFTA area by default.
(The good news is that we will probably get to keep the rebate, as it won’t be a case of leaving and then re-apply to join EFTA, just of the core Eurozone countries signing up to a Constitution that Britain isn’t a part of — all the old treaties, including the ones with the rebate, will stay in effect.)
Economically we don’t get very much, we don’t lose very much, if we just look at government payments. Ignoring the short term disruption, pulling out of the EU would do very little to the government’s finances.
But that changes. For instance in my own sector you have the construction products directive, which means all construction products must be CE marked (an EU requirement), manufacturers and suppliers are having to spend time and money complying with these directives. Many for products that are made and sold only in the UK (we used to have an opt out for such products), many for products already sold in the UK from Europe, I don’t see how such regulations are helping anyone, specifiyers find the regulations even more complicated and trade from multiple sources already exists despite anything to do with this harmonisation.
It just doesn’t achieve anything other than to generate paper, and office worker jobs, but would the money spent on these jobs simply be better spent elsewhere (opportunity costs).
This is one cost that won’t be included in the “£33 million a day figure”, it is hard to calculate the cost of such measures.
Leaving the EU would allow us to choose to follow such regulation, rather than every manufacturer being forced into it, and if you understand how the regulation is made, it makes no difference whether we are a member of the EU or not.
And the democracy question is just that, “do you want democracy”, the EU just isn’t fully democratic, it can’t be. We just about manage to make the UK serve England/Scotland/Wales/Ireland in a democratic fashion, and some would argue about “rule from London”, I don’t know how anyone can be aware of our own potential democratic deficit, and somehow think that magnifying that 10x in size will in any way make it more and not less democratic. Either the EU parliament has little power to override nation states (in which case why bother with it), or it can, and it is not democratic.
By and large it affects peoples day to day life only a little, but then so did the bedroom tax, small issues can kick up a stink.
You also have to ask the question, yes we get £xx million of the money back, but then we are told what to spend it on, what if we don’t want to actually do what the EU pays us to do with our own money?
I think the only argument for staying in the EU is = It’s not a huge benefit to us, it may be a cost, and it’s just enough of a pain in the ass to pull out to not yet bother.
Not an inspiring argument.
@ Richard Dean
I suppose my answer based on your figures would be our £33 million a day helps us not spend an extra £120 million a day on defence and £300 million a day on welfare – since without the EU we would have fewer jobs in the UK and more wars in Europe. Does that help?
Since Clegg messed up the Farage debate – getting rid of him would also help that argument.
http://www.libdemfightback.yolasite.com
@Joe Bourke
Unfortunately my UKIP neighbours don’t read the FT, nor do they even speak its language, and if they did they’d dismiss Martin Wolf as oligarch-speak.. Maybe as he says, therefore “It is perfectly possible that a lethal blend of xenophobia, public folly and political incompetence will lead to a UK exit”. Can nothing be done to communicate things to the electorate?
Will we really be forced to accept EFTA or Full Integration in 10 years?
@Jonathan Pile
That might fly ok! Many thanks, I’ll have a go at my UKIP neighbours and see what they say.
Will we really be forced to accept EFTA or Full Integration in 10 years
That or the EU will have collapsed after yet another Euro crisis leads to a chain reaction of countries restarting their own currency.
A couple of years ago I’d have put even money on both those, but given how amazingly patient the PIIGS have been and the indignities they have been willing to suffer just to not lose their place in the Eurozone, now I think full integration is a probable 12-7.
@Bill
(on working time directive and common EU policy in general)’the whole point of democracy is to allow populations to express these preferences’
Indeed. There should be a referendum on the whole stupid question, as clearly the antis have got themselves into such a froth that the political system will be able to address little else in future. Barring a large majority win in 2015 any government is going to be held to ransom over this. Although I believe that said antis should and will lose.
In a broader sense, though, you’re going back to the unelected bureaucrats line. Trouble is, with the newer treaties and, pending the final decision on Commission Presidency etc, the European Union is becoming democratic. Accountability is still too low, but the principle being established now is that the Commission must work with and for the Parliament, not around it.
Your points on how the economy should (or more’s the point, should not) be regulated simply return to the tennis player oversimplification, a school of thought related to the one that wants us to imagine the economy as a household budget. Its all over reduced neoclassical stuff that would model a dairy farm as a single spherical cow existing independently in a vacuum, radiating milk in all directions. But setting that aside as ideological and thus not going to be resolved during a lunch break on the internet, there’s still the point about the British people voting for a work-life balance and getting what they vote for.
In a word, optimistic. You’re assuming a lot from what is pretty much the most moribund democratic system anywhere in Europe, which delivers strong majorities on 35% of the vote and where ‘didn’t turn up’ would win the most seats under FPTP, were it a party. And that’s overlooking the state of the parties, their candidates and the whipping system. I find it odd how so many people opposed to an allegedly undemocratic Europe suddenly lose all their campaigning zeal when it comes to the undemocratic British system.
And also, I see that ‘if the EU still exists’ line there. To be honest, your prediction covers pretty much what I’d expect if the Tories run the show leading up to the next stage in the development of the EU. But there are a few things that can divert that course. The EU isn’t presently going through a referendum to terminate its existence, but the UK is and that’s one of the main ones. How does your calculation change in the event of Scottish independence, if at all.
In a broader sense, though, you’re going back to the unelected bureaucrats line. Trouble is, with the newer treaties and, pending the final decision on Commission Presidency etc, the European Union is becoming democratic
No, it’s not. The EU can never be democratic because you can’t have a democracy without a demos and there is no pan-European electorate, and attempts to pretend that there is — as if last month there was a ‘European election’ rather than a load of completely independent national elections, all decided on national issues, which just happened to be held in the same week — are just misguided and foolish.
The solution isn’t to give the European parliament more power: there shouldn’t even be a european Parliament. there’s no NATO parliament, and NATO is a similar treaty organisation of member states. What is the point of the European Parliament except to pretend that Euro is something — a single state with a single people — which it is not, never has been, and never should be?
But, to the nub of the matter: if you don’t trust the British people to vote for the balance between regulation and freedom in the job market that they prefer, how are you going to set that balance? Are you just going to declare that ‘experts know best’ and that therefore these experts should set the correct level of regulation, because the people clearly are either incapable of or uninterested in doing it for themselves?
In which case, fine — this technocratic, supercilious strain in your party has been noted — but if so might I suggest dropping the ‘Democrats’ from your name, as clearly if you don’t trust the people to make their own rules you cannot be ‘democrats’.
(Oh, and the calculation doesn’t change in the event of Scottish independence because Scottish independence won’t happen.)
” since without the EU we would have fewer jobs in the UK and more wars in Europe.”
Fewer jobs is Debateable, arguing the EU prevents war is the sort of argument best left to the monster raving lunatic party.
I agree with Bill that the fate of the Euro will determine the future of EU integration and force a UK decision of all-in or out.
This paper by Thomas Palley gives some key insights into the Eurozone Crisis and the extent of the challenges the EU faces: http://www.boeckler.de/pdf/p_imk_wp_111_2013
It concludes “Europe was long headed for economic stagnation because of its embrace of the neoliberal economic model that undermined the income and demand generation process. That stagnation was serially postponed by a number of developments including the stimulus from German re-unification and the low interest rate convergence produced by creation of the euro. The latter prompted a ten year credit and asset price bubble that created fictitious prosperity, particularly in the GIPSI countries.
However, postponing stagnation in this fashion has had costs since it worsened the ultimate stagnation by creating a large build-up of debt that now over-hangs the economy. Additionally, the creation of the euro, which also helped postpone stagnation, has left behind a flawed monetary system that fosters public debt crisis and the political economy of fiscal austerity. Lastly, during this period of postponement, Germany sought to avoid stagnation via export-led growth based on wage repression. That has created an internal balance of payments problem within the euro zone that is a further impediment to resolving the crisis.
There is a way out of the crisis. It requires replacing the neoliberal economic model with a structural Keynesian model; remaking the European Central Bank so that it can act as government banker; having Germany replace its export-led growth wage suppression model with a domestic demand-led growth model; and creating a pan-European model of policy and wage coordination that blocks off race to the bottom tendencies within Europe.
Countries, particularly Germany, can implement some of this agenda on their own. But much of this agenda must be implemented collectively, either because countries are now locked into institutional arrangements (such as the euro) or because markets threaten to punish individual countries that try to go it alone. This makes change enormously difficult because political consensus that borders on near unanimity is needed. Moreover, the war of ideas in favor of such reforms has yet to be won. Consequently, both politics and the ruling intellectual climate make success unlikely.
Europe confronts three possible future scenarios. By far the most likely is prolonged stagnation with on-going bursts of mini-crisis that compel policymakers to make small reforms which are just enough to preserve the euro. By far the least likely is that policymakers enact the type of reform program described above that can restore full employment with shared prosperity. The third scenario, with an in between likelihood, is that Europe is hit by a political or economic “black swan” event that leads to country exit from the euro, causing it to shrink or disintegrate completely. This last scenario would likely be very economically disruptive and costly.
@Bill
Tell me, is there a British ‘demos’? Why?
Are British elections not simply a large number of contituency elections all run in parallel?
In 1707, would you have been saying that the UK represents an attempt to create on this island a ‘single state with a single people — which it is not, never has been, and never should be.’?
‘Oh, and the calculation doesn’t change in the event of Scottish independence because Scottish independence won’t happen.’
Right. Of course. Something you don’t want to see and that rubs against your favourite political vehicle that spans multiple nations. Obviously can’t happen.
The odds today are 1 in 4. Up from 1 in 6 last month. The Yes bunch are converting three don’t knows for every one the No lot win over.
Any sensible person would consider contingencies for the eventuality. Particularly when the very existence of the question raises the ‘no democracy without a demos’ line you trot out for Europe. But, I guess head in sand works too. Depending on your goals.
Tell me, is there a British ‘demos’? Why?
Because we vote for national parties. Someone in Aberdeen and someone in Cardiff and someone in Torquay and someone in Belfast can all cast a vote for David Cameron (you can’t vote for David Miliband or Nick Clegg in Belfast, but that is a flaw and I have long said that Labour and the Lib Dems owe it to their supporters in Northern Ireland not to disenfranchise them by not standing candidates). They know what and who they are voting for.
National parties organising into ‘groups’ with no leader, appointing candidates that no one in Europe could name or recognise even if they cared about them, which they don’t, is not the same thing at all.
Something you don’t want to see and that rubs against your favourite political vehicle that spans multiple nations. Obviously can’t happen
A hundred days out, and the ‘Yes’ campaign is trailing in the polls? They would need a comfortable poll lead to counter the ‘status quo effect’ that sees the ‘no change’ side in a referendum always gain in the final vote.
Bet you thought it was possible that the ‘Yes’ side might win the AV vote too.
It’s probably a mistake for MEP candidates to campaign as members of national parties, rather than as representatives of their parliamentary groupings. I think that would clarify European elections as being about Europe (rather than as consequenceless polls on party popularity) and would get people more interested in the elections in other parts of Europe, as they look to see how European parties are doing — not just their local candidates.
It does seem that the lasting impacts of devolution have totally passed you by. Group identity, political subsidiarity and the existence of a ‘demos’ aren’t simply a matter of answering yes to the question of whether the same parties stand in a given arbitrary construct. Unless you think that Ireland was always part of the same British demos as Ipswich and that it shouldn’t be independent?
The move in Scotland and Wales towards voting for their own parties mirrors the rise of organisations like the IPP or later Sinn Fein in British ruled Ireland in the late 19th century. Perhaps in time we’ll see the same situation as Ireland in the 1890s through 1910s, where separatist candidates would stand against a full spectrum of so-called nationwide parties and be elected with results of 70% of the popular vote. Where then your UK demos?
Britain is as artificial as Europe, the sole single difference is that its older and dominated by the politics of stagnation and nostalgia.
@ MH – “jedibeeftrix writes about being “forced to march in lockstep towards a glorious federal future”, but how is that happening? All the things that people are moaning about – the NHS, “bedroom tax”, university tuition fees and so on – seem to be decided by the UK government.”
The difference is that the things you mention I accept the democratic legitimacy of those who have imposed these things.
@ MH – “Just what is it that the people of this country would like Cameron and Clegg to be doing MORE of right now that they think they are stopped from doing by the EU?”
Actually, I’d like them to be doing less, ever since the Blair we seem to have enormously accelerated the rate at which we create new laws. Ever since Carrinton vs Entwick we have accepted that we are free to do whatever that which is not specifically prescribed by the law. Activist governments seem to have taken this as a challenge, and decided to pass laws about everything.
@ RD – “I wonder what alternatives there could be to EFTA or a “glorious federal future”, and what might be the problem with that future? If we’re IN we’d be negotiating on how it was, it we’e OUT wouldn’t we just have to accept whatever the others decided?”
Actually, this is the genius of Cameron’s veto. For in forcing them to enact the fiscal compact outside the architecture of the EU, backed up by the trasnfer of sovereignty referendum, he has forced the brussel’s to frame all succeeding legislation exclusively on the eurozone. It is not us carving out a federal free alternative to ever-closer-union, it is the Commission itself! The leap yet to be made to is accept the principle that ever-closer-union should be something smaller nations can choose to opt into, should they not wish to adopt the looser association we have made for ourselves. At the moment they do not appear to feel they have that freedom. But, this is only one battle, and there are many more to come.
@ Bill – “Well, a big part would be that it seems that the opt-out from the Charter of Fundamental Rights which Britain negotiated in the Lisbon Constitution might not be respected by the EU courts.”
Indeed, another example would be interpreting rather broadly the remit of the social chapter (which blair stupidly signed up to), in order to pronounce of labour regulation similarly to that which you mention above.
@ Bill – “However, for some people sovereignty is an important principle in itself: some people would rather be sovereign even if it came at an economic cost. For some people there are more important things than money, and the ability to say that we are free to determine our own domestic laws without having them overturned by a foreign court is one of those things.”
Indeed. There ‘might’ be an economic cost, equally there are legitimate models that show over the medium term britain might end up more wealthy. Either way, the difference is not by very much. What matters is legitimate governance, through being deemed [both] representative [and] accountable.
jedibeeftrix – I think you confuse (at times) majoritarianism with democracy. A fine line maybe, but still real. However your overall point is very well made I think.
There is a far, far wider question here which does right back to the headline. What do we get? Well more and more I sense that it very much depends who exactly, ‘we,’ is. To my mind the EU is becoming more and more divisive because some of, ‘we,’ get a very good deal whilst an awful lot of, ‘we,’ really get a bad deal, with not much in the middle. Who actually benefits from the EU – and by that I mean benefit in the sense of day-to-day touch-and-feel benefit, not hopey-changey peace and love benefit.
Big agribusiness wanting to buy cheap land out East get a good deal. People that employ dirt-cheap Lithuanians get a good deal. The BTL slum landlord gets a good deal. Granny selling her bubble-priced house to a French banker gets a good deal. Those who are mobile with jobs in multinationals get a good deal. And, of course, the benefit to these people personally is indeed very, very real. Good for them.
It’s those, basically, not able to take up the advantages of the open EU that are the not getting anything and may well be seeing disbenefits. The fact that there are benefits to others that in aggregate may or may not benefit the UK plc’s corporate interests is very much an abstraction to many. It’s not perhaps that these people are inherently sceptical about Europe or even union. But if you are seeing economic dislocation and the downside of uncontrolled people movement, and you are not mobile then what is the EU at the moment other than rights for other people in other countries that are reciprocal on paper only? If large numbers of British people who have fallen on hard times can’t head East for a living/housing/wages etc then this is not a meaningful union. We can argue of course about why the flows of people are not more symmetrical (perhaps it is a debate not had often enough), but facts on the ground matter.
Jedibeeftrix very correctly talks about the nature of democracy. Perhaps it is democratic that those with the wherewithal and the means should be accommodated in an open EU. But then to those not able to take advantage this is in effect (stress, effect) their own government preferencing open-ended opportunity for people of other countries over the domestic population’s immediate interests and concerns. It’s not difficult to see where UKIP score big by presenting themselves as outsiders to all this. What the Party of IN message did was basically say that the European Ideal is above the interests of those domestically left behind and the voters made of that what they did. Majoritarianism spoke about how far openness works for all, open democracy or nay.
What and who is democracy there to service in 2014 – the European Ideal and those able to take advantage, or those not able for whatever reason to be meaningful ‘European Citizens,’ and who look to the UK state first and foremost. More and more I suspect that the argument doesn’t split both ways. UKIP is winning the argument amongst those for whom the EU and indeed supranationalism beyond the EU is not obviously working in their interests. And the divide is widening in a pretty unhealthy way for democracy.
I really have no idea what the answer is. Personally I’m agnostic about the EU by and large. It may well be that in future technology will have made closer union real. Technology, not treaty, will bring ever closer union.
But for the here and now what do, ‘we,’ get? It rather depends who, ‘we,’ is.
T-J – ‘Group identity, political subsidiarity and the existence of a ‘demos’ aren’t simply a matter of answering yes to the question of whether the same parties stand in a given arbitrary construct.’
That’s probably true, however I would suggest that for real democracy what is needed is a real civil society and I would struggle to say that there is a real, true pan-European civil society. Group identity and civil society are closely linked, sure. However more is needed and I think essentially technocratic devices like the EMU aren’t really a substitute for true civil society.
@Little Jackie Paper
Yes, free movement of labour isn’t valuable if you don’t want to move! Maybe you have family, children who need educating and parenting, other family, friends, roots, etc.
In theory, free movement of capital might allow firms to profit from investing in poorer countries, enriching them (creating equality). This might require free movement of labour so that skilled managers and others can move to the poorer countries to assist the enterprise. In practice the opposite may apply. Capital might find higher profits from investing in the richer countries, particularly if unskilled labour moves there from poorer countries, further impoverishing the poor ones (creating inequality).
So I am still wondering what we get, but now I am also wondering who “we” are! The EU has an answer. In its typical incompetent style, its answer is that we are white, female, single, probably well-off, living easy. It’s all there on the video on the following webpage, particularly the video: http://europa.eu/pol/financ/index_en.htm
Richard,
“So I am still wondering what we get” The Independent has a round-up of some of the benefits at an individual level:
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/european-debate/so-what-has-europe-ever-done-for-you-9099786.html?origin=internalSearch:
– A cap on mobile roaming charges
– Compensation and food when flights are delayed or cancelled
– The right to study in Europe — possibly for free
– The right to state healthcare
– The right to retire in Europe
– Shoppers’ rights to compensation and refunds
– The right to trade across borders
– The right to work and vote across the EU
Following on from Joe, this is from an article I wrote in 1999 – but I think the principle still holds:
“Since the world-wide ban on British beef was lifted on 1st August this year, 18 governments have agreed to lift the ban on British beef. This includes 13 of our 15 European partners. Two EU countries have not lifted the ban – France and Germany. And we can take them to the European Court of Justice to enforce our rights.
“Just in case you’re wondering, the other five countries which have accepted British beef are Cyprus, Mauritius, Hong Kong, Gibraltar and the Falkland Islands. Perhaps you’d like to hazard a guess as to how much difference this will make to our farmers. The reality is that EU countries make up over 90% of our traditional beef market.
“Where would we be if we followed Mr Hague and his friends? They would like us out of the EU altogether; they want us to return to the good old days, when our major trading partners were our Commonwealth allies and other English-speaking nations. So let’s look at the facts: Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, America, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Singapore all still ban our beef. And what legal remedy do we have against them? None.”
http://www.rayleighlibdems.org.uk/?p=73
Sid Cumberland – I like your well written piece from 1999. It stands up well fifteen years later.
Perhaps we should have had you in the TV studios against Farage.
@Joe Bourke
Thanks for that. But it does rather illustrate Little Jackie Paper’s question about who those rights are worth something to. A husband, wife, and two children are paying £2 per day as a family so that the UK can be part of Europe. If the family doesn’t want to actually go to Europe, what benefit is it getting for all that cash?
Thanks are due to Richard for initiating this discussion.
jedibeeftrix
@ MH – “jedibeeftrix writes about being “forced to march in lockstep towards a glorious federal future”, but how is that happening? All the things that people are moaning about – the NHS, “bedroom tax”, university tuition fees and so on – seem to be decided by the UK government.”
The difference is that the things you mention I accept the democratic legitimacy of those who have imposed these things.
Sure, but you haven’t actually answered my question by saying what are the equivalent things that the EU is doing that the British people are upset about and feel as something forced upon them. If the British government really was being forced to “march in lockstep”, then surely when we moan about things the government is doing that we don’t like, they would all be things the government is being forced to do due to this lockstep process, rather than things it has decided to do but didn’t have to. If it is as you say, there must be numerous examples. So give us a few. Or if you can’t, then it proves my point – the anti-EU rhetoric is just about winding people up as a distraction.
@Fake – Fewer jobs is Debateable, arguing the EU prevents war is the sort of argument best left to the monster raving lunatic party
I don’t think we should dismiss this argument in such a facile way and debate as if the only reason to be in the EU is economic. You have to be older than me (64) to remember WW2 and perhaps 1914 is too much like ancient history for some but haven’t those disastrous 35 years taught us anything about how to achieve peace and security in Europe?
.
Richard,
the principal Universal benefits are food security and the economic development of markets for British goods and services. The UK has been a net contributor to the EU budget that is made up primarily of farm subsidies and regional infrastructure and development funding.
Ireland joined the EU at the same time as the UK in 1973 and has for most of that period been a net beneficiary of EU funding. The country has developed from what was then principally an agricultural producer (with the UK as its only significant export market) to a major trading partner for the UK. By 2009, Ireland had become a net contributor to the EU.
Today we export more to Ireland than we do to China. Ireland is a small country compared to the main beneficiaries of EU funding today – Spain, Portugal, Poland, Hungary and other East European States. As these countries grow and develop they too become major markets for British goods and services and cross-border trade.
Germany and France contribute considerably more then we do. We are on par with Italy. I don’t think they are paying in out of altruism or solidarity with EU neighbours. They benefit from development of export markets and stronger economies in neighbouring states, just as we do.
Most people in the UK will understand the benefits of a common market while still recognising that the EU as a political institution needs reform. What political institution doesn’t need reform?
Your neighbours view “We’d do better OUT as a sovereign nation – free to do what we like!” didn’t hold in 1973 and doesn’t now. No country is free to do what It likes in a globalised world. We are members of various international institutions and bodies such as the UN, WTO, IMF, Nato, Commonwealth etc. We co-operate with other countries around the world and enter into alliances and arrangements for our mutual benefit. The EU is no different. Even were we to adopt EFTA status and resile from the provisions on free movement of labour, we would still be bound by EU mandated standards and regulations for the sale of goods and services in EU markets. Equally, our own domestic labour, product or environmental regulations are hardly likely to be significantly inferior to those of our near neighbours.
A couple of years ago I’d have put even money on both those, but given how amazingly patient the PIIGS have been and the indignities they have been willing to suffer just to not lose their place in the Eurozone, now I think full integration is a probable 12-7.
And if Junker gets the job, it’s odds-on favourite and we’ll be associate members in no time. .
We are members of various international institutions and bodies such as the UN, WTO, IMF, Nato, Commonwealth etc
The difference is that none of those pretend to be single countries, or indeed pretend to be anything other than sovereign nations getting together for a mutually beneficial purpose.
You don’t find, for example, the Commonwealth overruling domestic laws in the way the ECJ could if the opt-out is not recognised (no matter how much we might think it should eg in Zimbabwe).
We co-operate with other countries around the world and enter into alliances and arrangements for our mutual benefit. The EU is no different
An attempt to create a single federal state by stealth without the consent of the population is actually very very different indeed from an alliance or an arrangement for mutual benefit.
Bill,
this is a reproduction of the pamphlet for the 1975 referendum http://www.harvard-digital.co.uk/euro/pamphlet.htm
It addresses the question of WILL PARLIAMENT LOSE ITS POWER?
<iAnother anxiety expressed about Britain's membership of the Common Market is that Parliament could lose its supremacy, and we would have to obey laws passed by unelected 'faceless bureaucrats' sitting in their headquarters in Brussels.
What are the facts?
Fact No. 1 is that in the modern world even the Super Powers like America and Russia do not have complete freedom of action. Medium-sized nations like Britain are more and more subject to economic and political forces we cannot control on our own. A striking recent example of the impact of such forces is the way the Arab oil-producing nations brought about an energy and financial crisis not only in Britain but throughout a great part of the world.
Since we cannot go it alone in the modern world, Britain has for years been a member of international groupings like the United Nations, NATO and the International Monetary Fund. Membership of such groupings imposes both rights and duties, but has not deprived us of our national identity, or changed our way of life.
Membership of the Common Market also imposes new rights and duties on Britain, but does not deprive us of our national identity. To say that membership could force Britain to eat Euro-bread or drink Euro-beer is nonsense.
Fact No. 2. No important new policy can be decided in Brussels or anywhere else without the consent of a British Minister answerable to a British Government and British Parliament. The top decision-making body in the Market is the Council of Ministers, which is composed of senior Ministers representing each of the nine member governments.
It is the Council of Ministers, and not the market's officials, who take the important decisions. These decisions can be taken only if all the members of the Council agree. The Minister representing Britain can veto any proposal for a new law or a new tax if he considers it to be against British interests. Ministers from the other Governments have the same right to veto. All the nine member countries also agree that any changes or additions to the Market Treaties must be acceptable to their own Governments and Parliaments.
Remember: All the other countries in the Market today enjoy, like us, democratically elected Governments answerable to their own Parliaments and their own voters. They do not want to weaken their Parliaments any more than we would."
Fact No. 3. The British Parliament in Westminster retains the final right to repeal the Act which took us into the Market on January 1, 1973. Thus our continued membership will depend on the continuing assent of Parliament. The White Paper on the new Market terms recently presented to Parliament by the Prime Minister declares that through membership of the Market we are better able to advance and protect our national interests. This is the essence of sovereignty.
Fact No. 4. On April 9, 1975, the House of Commons voted by 396 to 170 in favour of staying in on the new terms.
I think European countries have been clear that the EU is a political and economic union from the outset -with the stated aim of establishing a currency union. There is no stealth there. It is successive UK governments that have obfuscated the inherent political nature of the European Union.
I agree with your assessment that the fate of the Euro will determine the future of EU integration. In this country we will need to make up our mind – are we staying-in what will always be a political union (tempered only by subsidiarity) or are we going to opt for splendid isolation. Presenting the choice as a pick and choose arrangement tailored to the specific requirements of the British economy has never been an honest depiction of our relationship with the European Union and even less so since the advent of qualified majority voting.
The problem is that we have to convince a skeptical electorate. From their perspective, I think that “food security and the economic development of markets for British goods and services” has meaning, but wouldn’t we get that in EFTA? Indeed, wouldn’t we get better food security as an independent island?
Would your four 1973 facts will stand up to modern-day scrutiny?:
Fact 1. The oil crisis hit Europe too, so being a member of Europe doesn’t provide any apparent protection
Fact 2. That’s very far from what today’s papers and some politicians say, and noone is credibly challenging them
Fact 3. In practice we won’t be able to get out that easily, will we?
Fact 4. Would the HOC do that today? Would the electorate?
I’m still searching for that 33 million! Do you know how much the EU civil service costs? One eighth of that might be a starting point, since we get the benefits of their services in proposing laws and regulations consistently with the directions from the Council of Ministers and votes from MEPs, do we not? Can a value be put on the future markets our 33 million is helping to develop?.
Richard,
I would make a distinction between your typical mildly sceptical voter and committed Euro-sceptic UKIP supporter. The latter have already made-up their minds on the basis of immigration policy and won’t be convinced by economic or other arguments.
The EEA Agreement does not cover the following EU policies:
Common Agriculture and Fisheries Policies (although the Agreement contains provisions on various aspects of trade in agricultural and fish products);
Customs Union;
Common Trade Policy;
Common Foreign and Security Policy;
Justice and Home Affairs (even though the EFTA countries are part of the Schengen area); or
Monetary Union (EMU).
We have not been self-sustaining in food production since the 19th Century – not even during WW1 and WW2.
I suspect that a pamphlet for an EU referendum now would use very similar arguments to those used in 1975.
Administration costs are around 6% of the EU budget.
The trade deficit figures give an indication of the sums involved in trade with the EU http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27734877
“Weak demand in the eurozone – the UK’s largest trading partner – has hampered the government’s efforts to rebalance the economy to support greater manufacturing and more exports. Exports to the European Union (EU) as a whole rose 1.3% to £12.4bn, but the deficit with the bloc widened to £5.1bn, from £4.8bn a month earlier. …the upside for UK exports may well be limited by only gradual improvement in eurozone domestic demand, while the strength of the pound could become an increasing problem for UK exporters.”
“If the British government really was being forced to “march in lockstep”, then surely when we moan about things the government is doing that we don’t like, they would all be things the government is being forced to do due to this lockstep process”
Prisoner voting – the principles of subsidiary and margin of appreciation:
https://www.libdemvoice.org/votes-for-prisoners-cameron-says-no-what-would-borgen-do-31730.html#comment-229027
The fiscal compact –
Tobin taxes –
Submitting budgets to the Commission before parliament –
Now, a lot of these we have managed to work around……………… but, only after a deeply unpleasant amount of argument and ill-feeling, where many in europe see britain as holding them back, and people in britain see themselves as being dragged into a political cosntrcut they do not accept the legitimacy of.
If there purpose of the EU was to foster harmony and well-being between the nations of europe have we, post Mastricht, moved beyond the point we are achieving this aim?
Thanks for your thanks, Ian Sanderson (RM3). Even if the EU is primarily a political project, it surely needs to make sense economically? As jedibeeftrix and others seem to show clearly, the politics is far from straightforward, and far from easy to defend.
I wonder what voters make of Joe Bourke’s “Weak demand in the eurozone … hampered the government’s efforts to rebalance the economy”. To me this means we need and benefit from Europe. To others it can mean the opposite.
So I’m still looking for that £33 million. I hope the LibDem policy-making and information-gathering bodies can help. After all, if the party of IN can’t answer the economic question, how can it say that its policies have been well thought through? And if his advisers couldn’t help, is it any wonder Nick didn’t do so well in the debate with Farage?
I’m trying to understand the official data, but it’s in Eurospeak and so virtually inaccessible to the electorates it’s supposed to inform! http://europa.eu/about-eu/basic-information/money/expenditure/index_en.htm
” You have to be older than me (64) to remember WW2 and perhaps 1914 is too much like ancient history for some but haven’t those disastrous 35 years taught us anything about how to achieve peace and security in Europe?”
Uh uh, so what has that got to do with the EU, founded in 1993?
fake
But that changes. For instance in my own sector you have the construction products directive, which means all construction products must be CE marked (an EU requirement), manufacturers and suppliers are having to spend time and money complying with these directives.
Thanks, this is a much more useful contribution than the “being forced to march in lockstep” stuff we generally get. You are at least getting somewhere near providing concrete evidence for actual control from the EU which we might dislike.
Could you perhaps say more and give specific examples of aspects of these directives which you think are an unwarranted interference in what people can do?
I am supposing that if we were not in the EU we would still need to have some sort of legislation imposing some sort of standards on these products. So is there any particular reason why the EU would impose more onerous standards than our national government would? Is there any particular reason why what the majority of people in the EU think are acceptable standards would be thought of as being too rigorous in the UK? Do people in other EU countries experience these attempts to establish EU-wide standards as “being forced to march in lockstep”, are there things we in the UK would want to see in such standards that they would not in some other EU countries? Is Germany becoming less German, France becoming less French, Italy becoming less Italian and so in because of these standards in the way people suggest Britain is becoming less British due to the EU?
I’m asking these as genuine questions. If an argument can be made that there are genuine differences between what people want in the different EU countries, so that what seems sensible in one seems an unacceptable interference in liberty in another, I can accept that. But I would like to see some actual factual cases of these things from people who know about them rather than vague claims about “rule from Brussels” and the like with noting in the way of concrete facts to explain what might actually be meant by that.
A short history of the EU and its predecessors can be found at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3583801.stm
It really didn’t start in 1993, but the fact that you didn’t know that perhaps makes my point.
@Matthew Huntbach
Very good point. And the construction products regulations are an excellent illustration of how we would want regulations and quality markings of some sort anyway. Getting the Brussels civil service to develop appropriate regulations seems like a cost-effective way of doing it, with the added bonus of freeing up trade.
http://shop.bsigroup.com/Browse-by-Sector/Building–Construction/Construction-Products-Directive/
jedibeeftrix
Now, a lot of these we have managed to work around……………… but, only after a deeply unpleasant amount of argument and ill-feeling, where many in europe see britain as holding them back, and people in britain see themselves as being dragged into a political construct they do not accept the legitimacy of.
Hmm, having taken a bit of a look at what the budget is paying for from the link Richard Dean gave, I can see there’s quite a lot of general co-ordination and establishment of standards stuff that people with an extreme free market view of life might oppose. The biggest budget item is environmental protection, and of course one can see why there are people who would want to make money from environmental destruction who would object to that. How very easy it would be to drag the uninformed into support of them by painting this as “rule from Brussels” etc. Also, you mention Tobin tax – well, there you go, you don’t like the idea of international co-ordination to stem the way in which the global super-wealthy elite can dominate us by playing one country off against another. Fine, but isn’t it a bit misleading to play this up as the “rule from Brussels” line? Do the people voting UKIP really do so thinking “poor, poor bankers, how cruelly they are treated by the EU”? People I know who say they voted UKIP often justify it by saying “it’s in protest about how the politicians here only care about the rich, they don’t care about people like us”. So isn’t it a little dishonest that if you look into the details one of the biggest moans of anti-EU people who know what they are talking about is that they think the EU is stopping Britain from acting as favourably to the rich as they think it should? Sure, I know the argument “People who are rich are rich because they are very skilled at what they do, so let them carry on doing what they like and they’ll become richer but we all will as well due to the economic benefit”. But if the people who say they are voting UKIP were doing so in agreement with that argument, why would they be angry at the supposed bias if UK politicians towards the rich when the case for what appears as bias is just the same thing? It would make more sense if people voting UKIP were saying “I dislike the EU because it is stopping our politicians from being as favourable to the rich as I think they should be, and I feel that is damaging our economy”. Now, I know in elite right-wing anti-EU circles that IS the line used, but I doubt you’d hear it much on the streets in those wards which returned UKIP councillors last month.
So, I hear what you say, but I think it is very much one sort of message to one audience, and a very different message to another audience, and that being used to make out that the audience hearing one message is in support of the completely different message given to the other audience. That is why I object to the emotive and misleading language you use and the absence of concrete facts. I do not think it is leading to honest and informed debate, and I do not think people like you WANT honest and informed debate.
I appreciate that Clegg utterly failed to get honest and informed debate going because he to played the same game of using emotive lines with little in the way of concrete facts, to quite a large extent because he too is far too starry-eyed about free market economy ideas to come out directly with the sort of thing I’m saying here. But that’s all more sign that he shouldn’t be leading the Liberal Democrats – he’s failing on all levels to do the job that should be done there, unless he is a Tory plant, in which case – well done to him, he’s performing excellently.
@ MH – “Thanks, this is a much more useful contribution than the “being forced to march in lockstep” stuff we generally get.”
Do you not understand what ever-close-union means?
All EU nations sign away competencies via the acquis, and they do not get them back.
Let me know if that requires further parsing…
@jedibeeftrix
It requires further parsing! The acquis is nothing to be frightened of, as long as we participate in developing it. It is just the agreed community law, which is developed and enacted through processes to which we have access; the Council, Parliament, and Commission. Any form of international cooperation needs rules, and rules that need to be able to develop in accordance with the participants’ aims and needs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_acquis
jedibeeftrix,
The Single European Act, which was strongly promoted by Margaret Thatcher, marked the single biggest transfer, or at least sharing, of sovereignty ever seen in Europe. It was followed by the Maastricht treaty and then a decade ago by the Lisbon treaty.
As to ever-closer union today – many markets across Europe are still far from being integrated, as a casual look at the service sector will testify. Taxes are unharmonised and there remains intense tax competition between countries. As to legislative control – Britain adopts no more than 8% of primary legislation that originates from the EU. Despite the moves to greater integration since the euro crisis first struck, the fact is that if one looks at the legislation making headlines across Europe – gay marriage, education policy, health care provision, whether to have contributory or free systems of pension and student fees, welfare reform, voting systems, pay control, or even speed limits on motorways – it is Europe’s national governments that determine these policies.
British eurosceptics point to the eurozone crisis as proving the failure of the attempt to move to a closer ‘union’ through the adoption of a common currency across much of the continent. But it is precisely because political union didn’t exist that the eurozone has experienced the difficulties of recent years.
The euro is still in trouble and the basic flaws in its construction have still not been corrected. There can be no doubt that to make the single currency work there will have to be more political union that can make the EU capable of overruling Berlin and telling Italy and Portugal how better to govern themselves. Collective responsibility is required to ensure that the eurozone gets out of its current problems sustainably. That in turn means an understanding by surplus countries like Germany, whose growth has been export driven and which has greatly benefited from membership of the wider euro area of the concessions they too must make. They need to rebalance their own economies in favour of more consumer spending, open their own markets to competition, which in many areas is still lacking, and support growth on the periphery through the direct and indirect transfer of funds to weaker countries. They also need to accept that the debt burden of many of the ‘stressed’ countries will remain unsustainable, and that further restructuring is inevitable. But this should be on condition that the periphery countries fully buy into the proposition that they must themselves focus on investment and growth through the substantial reorganisation of their economies.
The European Central Bank must also be allowed to do what it is supposed to do if it is to act as a proper central bank of an integrated Europe and should be able to engage in Outright Monetary Transactions (OMT) to buy the bonds of stressed countries whenever necessary to prevent periodic sovereign debt and credit crunches. Crucially, EU governments must accept that individual countries’ budgets will no longer be decided by national governments alone, and that national banking systems will be supervised and monitored centrally.
Ever-closer union means different things for those in the Euro and those outside. Joining the Euro will ultimately require exactly what the British have long feared – the surrender of monetary, fiscal and regulatory authority to the EU and adopting a common European approach to economic and financial management. Staying-in as a non-euro member preserves fiscal and monetary independence, but with diminished influence on the collective development of the single market. Withdrawal means marginalisation on the periphery of Europe and striking the best deals we can as a financial services, advanced engineering and creative industries centre of 65m people in the world economy.
@ JB – thank you.
“As to legislative control – Britain adopts no more than 8% of primary legislation that originates from the EU. Despite the moves to greater integration since the euro crisis first struck”
Yes, and as noted previously; i recognise that britain has escaped (with no small amount of ill feeling), a deal of this post-crisis economic integration, not least by forcing it to be focused on the eurozone.
“The euro is still in trouble and the basic flaws in its construction have still not been corrected. There can be no doubt that to make the single currency work there will have to be more political union that can make the EU capable of overruling Berlin and telling Italy and Portugal how better to govern themselves.”
This has always been my point; given the scale of the political and economic integration required to make sure that monetary unions functions on both a technical and democratic level, can we expect to keep on dodging knives (scalpels) to the ever growing anger of those that wield them (who see themselves as performing vital surgery)?
I have some confidence that we can, which is why I support our continued membership in principle, and it is why i have not become a kipper. I say the latter, because the quality of british reprsentative democracy, in both its institutions and the ability of the british people to receive governance that is representative of their will, is my number one concern.
This confidence is tempered by the knowledge that Cameron’s renegotiation is not just desirable, it is absolutely vital. At the moment everyone pretends that everyone else can live with ever closer union when this is clearly untrue. We cannot, and in remaining part of the doctrine we inevitably hold back the legitimate political and economic ambitions of several eurozone nations who are determined to make it work.
“Collective responsibility is required to ensure that the eurozone gets out of its current problems sustainably. That in turn means an understanding by surplus countries like Germany, whose growth has been export driven and which has greatly benefited from membership of the wider euro area of the concessions they too must make.”
Absolutely agreed, as I have said previously:
Federal US taxation is ~25% of GDP and the variation in spending levels between rich and poor states is ~5% of GDP, so a variation of roughly 20% of federal spending.
How big a budget would the EU need to be able to slosh around 5% of combined GDP into the poor regions (bearing in mind the current budget is only 1% (and heavily constrained by CAP payments)?
The other point is that americans accept this, they are all american, whereas we are rapidly finding out just how german the germans are, and finnish the finns are, when it comes to firehosing cash at nations they consider to be essentially delinquent! In the UK this ‘sloshing’ occurs in the form of:
a) National pay-bargaining which benefits poorer regions (teachers, nurses, etc)
b) National social benefits more generous than poorer regions could afford alone (eg.housing benefit in glasgow)
c) Targeted regional development grants/discounts to encourage business growth (objective 1 EU/WEFO funds)
d) Additional infrastructure spending to support the local economy (the mainland-skye bridge)
e) Operating national services hubs from depressed regions to boost wages (DVLA in swansea, etc)
Unless Germany recognises the ‘familial’ relationship, and the obligation that goes along with that, then it needs to leave for the good of its neighbours.
This principal applies equally to the netherlands and finland, but since it is Germany that is the driving economic power for the euro’s sake the answer must be ‘right’.
“Crucially, EU governments must accept that individual countries’ budgets will no longer be decided by national governments alone, and that national banking systems will be supervised and monitored centrally.”
No. No, No No. A thousand times; No!
EU governments can do as they damn well please. It is eurozone governments that have to make this choice.
And this is what is so poisonous about ever-closer-union:
The. Little. Countries. Never. Get. To. Say: “no thanks, we really don’t fancy this.”
We are big enough and bad enough to carve out an exception (with a great deal of ill will), but what of the little guys?
Even Sweden is technically required to join the Eurozone once it ceases to be able to justify how its economy is economically ‘misaligned’.
And what of accession countries, do they have any choice over the ultimate conclusion of monetary union? No, of course not; you want in to the EU then you’re adopting the euro. Tough luck.
How is being “marched in lock-step towards a glorious federal future”, not an accurate description of ever-closer-union?
So when I say I want an end to ever-closer-union it is not just for Britain, I want all EUropean nations to have that choice.
“Staying-in as a non-euro member preserves fiscal and monetary independence, but with diminished influence on the collective development of the single market.”
Fine, I can accept that as long as you can accept that risk that ECB managed consensus over eurozone nations on QMV matters using the tools of the EBU represents a caucus which completely overrides british democracy on matters of fundamental economic sovereignty (read your Gladstone).
If we can cross that chasm, fine, I am content that we should remain within the EU. Fail to achieve this and I will vote to leave in 2017.
In. A. Heartbeat.
jedibeeftrix
Do you not understand what ever-close-union means?
No I don’t. It’s not a precise statement. It’s a bit of fancy rhetoric that sounded good at some point.
I’m a practical man, so I want practical examples of actual THINGS the EU is doing that not just you but all those British people who have been whipped up into an anti-EU fervour would agree are bad and should not be forced on us. So far you’ve not come up with much.
I’m afraid it’s obvious to me that in today’s world with its globalised economy small nation states are going to be battered around, and so can’t really just do whatever they want, and that therefore a degree of international co-ordination is necessary if there is going to be some democratic involvement in how things are rather than rule by the global super-elite. I can also see the necessity for international co-ordination on the environment, given that we all live in this one small world, we can’t just declare independence from what everyone else is doing to it.
Of course there are people – global elite types, and those who are suckers up to them and those who are fooled by their propaganda – who don’t like this sort of thing and so write it up in the terms you do. I think we ought at least to hear more than we do the argument from the other direction.
@ MH – indeed it is!
“and that therefore a degree of international co-ordination is necessary if there is going to be some democratic involvement in how things are rather than rule by the global super-elite”
A degree of cooperation, eh? Surely that anodyne declaration of love covers a multitude of sins!
“I’m afraid it’s obvious to me that in today’s world with its globalised economy small nation states are going to be battered around, and so can’t really just do whatever they want,”
Agreed, but I am confident enough in britains capabilities and prospects to worry less about that than a government that is not considered legitimate by the majority of its people.
Quite aside from the moderately pro europe labour (with 20 MEP’s) versus the moderately eurosceptic tories & unionists (with 19 MEP’s), let us rather consider the wildly pro europe lib-dems (with 1 MEP) versus the wildly eurosceptic UKIP (with 24 MEP’s)…. I see a problem, do you?
Ah, no, it’s all Murdoch’s fault for creating a mass false consciousness. Right!
Representative democracy isn’t only about giving people what they say they want. People generally don’t have time to go into political matters deeply, they tend to want their representatives to do that for them. So representative democracy is also about leadership.
So, it seems to me that the fact that people have made one choice isn’t a valid argument against presenting them with rational arguments for why they might want to change to a different one.
Sure, but a political party ultimately needs to appeal to a sufficient number of people that those ideas it advocates can be enacted.
If doubling down on the message causes support to crater then maybe the idea is wrong.
@jedibeeftrix
I think we’re now getting down to some real basics. My impression is that the LibDems have firmly decided to be a party of IN. The question seems decided, arguments about sovereignty etc are behind us, and we are now on a different question, one that involves principles and leadership.
The voting results mean that LibDems need to present the arguments for staying in, and show that arguments for pulling out are invalid. One of the arguments that UKIP use for pulling out is that EU membership costs so many millions per day and it’s not worth it. The question is: what is an effective, valid counter-argument? I am personally a simple person, and a simple response might be to list all the things we get back and show that they are worth those millions!
So now I am back to the original question: what do we get for £33 million per day? The many interesting responses on this thread have included many possible ideas. Do we get, for example
> more security, through more “clout” at world level, and through cooperation on food security,
> improved ability to manage environmental impacts and change,
> more efficient industries, cheaper products, more leisure,
> more equality, less stress,
> a modern, firmer concept of national identities
> greater freedoms and opportunities for us and our children
> a society that is better suited to human beings than would otherwise be the case
What do you think? And if membership achieves these things, how can we assign monetary values to them, and thereby counter UKIP’s argument?
@ RD – thank you.
“My impression is that the LibDems have firmly decided to be a party of IN. The question seems decided, arguments about sovereignty etc are behind us”
I’m not so sure that is true. The leadership might have tried that number in the eu elections, but it was suggested even here that it was a desperation move given the ~8% approval ratings on the hope that they might attract more of the ~24% of people who are broadly pro-eu. I have been on this site since March 2010, and i have never seen so many sceptical comments from users who tagline i recognise as committed lib-dems.
“One of the arguments that UKIP use for pulling out is that EU membership costs so many millions per day and it’s not worth it. The question is: what is an effective, valid counter-argument?”
Hmmm, that was your argument, and while it might be intellectually satisfying to build a cost benefit analysis around it i don’t believe it will have any great traction among the electorate. In fact, i’m not even sure it’s worth asking, as i believe the economic question either way to be of marginal importance. Britain will retain and gain jobs and wealth whichever way we go. I have always felt that things like daft regulations, wasted money, and a strasbourg parliament were nothing but symptoms, and while they might not be able to articulate in such terms i believe the real public angst is against the cause: people don’t recognise a european government as ‘theirs’.
“> more equality, less stress, > a modern, firmer concept of national identities”
These might be things you want, and it might be something the 24% want, but does the fact that you hope europe will bring these things only really reveal that you are not confident that they can be achieved with britain’s political ecosystem?
“> greater freedoms and opportunities for us and our children, > a society that is better suited to human beings than would otherwise be the case,”
Again, this is interpreted through the prism of your aims and expectations, do other people (by which i mean a useful) majority), share your interpretation of a free and fair societies as best achieved by anglo-saxon capitalism or continental social market economies?
“And if membership achieves these things, how can we assign monetary values to them, and thereby counter UKIP’s argument?”
I think this is the wrong question; the EU dilemma is ultimately about identity and ownership of the governance that acquiesce to…
Not directed at you, Richard, but i do wonder if this is a classic example of Jonathan Haidt’s Righteous Mind, where a right winger can empathise with the moral framework of those on the left even if they do not agree with it, but the reverse is not true because people on the lift simply do not understand the value base that guides the moral framework of the right?
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tomchiversscience/100147703/why-liberals-need-conservatives-and-vice-versa/
Just a thought. 🙂
For example;
I think i do recognise MH’s legitimate concern that social democracy is being undermined by corporations abusing globalisation by playing off nation states against each other with tax/regulation arbitrage, and that larger regional agglomerations are best way to protect european social democracy. It simply isn’t a massive concern of mine.
On the other hand, I don’t believe MH even recognises the possibility that any logical foundation might exist to underpin my reservations about subsuming british identity and governance into a EU that will inevitably alter society away from a norm i am quite comfortable with. I might as well be an alien squawking some unintelligible gibberish.
Maybe he’ll prove me wrong, but i’m not hopeful…
Let me just say this is about the most productive thread on a europe topic I have seen on LDV.
But let me conclude by returning to the last sentence in my first post:
“What we get for our £33m is EFTA status in ten years time unless the EU accepts that nations can have options other than ever closer union.”
I don’t understand why pro-europe people aren’t quietly cheering on cameron’s renegotiation.
We are going to to have a referendum in the next five years.
In the next five years the eu is going to converge economically and politically in a way that will make it extremely difficult for a sovereign nation to remain within.
Ever closer union remains a guiding principle for the mainstream of continental politics, and they are not much interested in accomodating awkward special cases.
There is a car crash approaching!
If you are pro-eu, and keen to maintain a continental link to succour social democracy in britain, then cameron is absolutely your best chance of winning a referendum to stay in.
Unless people really do believe that with just a little more explaining the british electorate will turn around and say; “what a bunch of dummies we were for all these years, who needs national identity, and by golly i want me some of the high-taxing big-spending consensual european democracy”. Which would be delusional, but we can’t exclude the possibility…
“I might as well be an alien squawking some unintelligible gibberish.”
I think if you’re looking for an epitaph, Jedi… 😀
@jedibeeftrix
The UKIP literature is strong and it’s going through letter boxes now. It contains this question as a kind of “that clinches it” question, and this is also one of the questions that UKIP supporters and thinking-about-it people ask in doorways, on buses, and at social events.
So I think that LibDem supporters in those situations might argue more effectively if someone, perhaps even LDHQ, could research a good, direct answer. I can’t imagine how a policy making body could consider itself competent if it wasn’t able to provide an answer – one that was supported by facts rather than thin air.
I personally think the EU “dilemma” has got virtually nothing to do with identity. The French are no less French from being in the EU, etc. I don’t even see “dilemma”. But the EU does seem to have about the worst kind of PR advisers you could possibly imagine, and the LibDems are pretty close to that too.
@ RD – “The UKIP literature is strong and it’s going through letter boxes now. It contains this question as a kind of “that clinches it” question, and this is also one of the questions that UKIP supporters and thinking-about-it people ask in doorways,”
I see it as a kind of dog-whistle politics, i.e. it is a signal to which they will respond even if they (the multitude), even if that is not the root of the problem that troubles them.
“I personally think the EU “dilemma” has got virtually nothing to do with identity. The French are no less French from being in the EU, etc. I don’t even see “dilemma”.”
The french just voted in the National Front in a political earthquake built on two messages:
1. Get me out the EU
2. To protect french society and its economic model from all the badness of global capitalism
I’m not sure howw you got there….
@ Malc – thanks 🙂
@ Fake
“Fewer jobs is Debateable,”
As the head of the Chinese Construction bank inconveniently pointed out , with no axe to grind he states that leaving the EU would make no difference to UK/China trade. What a refreshing change to hear the opinion of somebody who actually knows what he is talking about, rather than the ill-informed biased opinion of Clegg and Co.
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/06/19/Farage-vindicated-one-of-China-s-financial-giants-says-it-makes-no-difference-if-UK-is-in-EU
Even Airbus have changed their tune in the last few months, and are now stating there would be no dash to leave the UK if we left the EU.
https://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/airbus-sees-no-reason-leave-221121128.html
It seems the argument for staying in the EU is struggling to survive the disinfecting process of being exposed to sunlight, now the scaremongerers have lost control of the debate,
@Raddiy
Interesting that Airbus didn’t mention wages. Imagine a scenario in which Britain leaves Europe, unemployment rises as a result, and Airbus can then get skilled workers much more cheaply than their commercial rivals (mainly Boeing in the US). That may be fine for Airbus, but is it good for the ordinary Briton?
The lesson is that business leaders’ opinions are not usually independent of business interests.
Raddy, there is no suggestion that all investment would leave the UK if we left the EU. But we are in a stronger position to trade and attract investment if we are in, and UKIP has its head in the sand on this one.
On a broader point, when facing the rising economic might of China, it is important not just for prosperity, but for geopolitics too, for the free world to be more united not less, which includes keeping the UK and EU together and pressing ahead with TTIP. China will take a different view of course.
@Bill
You want the EU without its parliament?
@ Joe Otten
” Raddy, there is no suggestion that all investment would leave the UK if we left the EU.”
Really Joe!
Well why are senior Lib Dems still touting the discredited 3 million lost jobs. How many times did Nick Clegg use it during the two debates with Nigel Farage.
Might I suggest you reprise any thread on here about the EU, and the BTL comments are full of the portends of doomsday with every manufacturer packing up the day after we leave and scuttling off.
Even your response to me is full of the usual if’s’ but’s and maybe’s of abstract thought, based on nothing more solid than opinion. It was Nigel Farage who said leaving the EU would have no impact on our trade relations with China, and NIck Clegg who said it would. I think it is patently apparent who have their heads in the sand.
I was simply posting the opinion of one of the movers and shakers on the world economic stage to support the view of my party, that our best interests are served by acting independently in dealing with the global economy. We are doing moderately well because we are not in the Euro, if we had entered the Euro as your party wanted, our economy would be a total basket case like France or Spain.
@ Richard Dean
Richard.
Interesting that you should mention wages, I have many friends in the building industry who have seen their incomes drop dramatically, by upto 50 % since 2004 with the immigration of large numbers of skilled manual workers from eastern Europe, prepared to work for the minimum wage or less. This has caused massive wage depression across whole sections of the blue collar economy.
.Wood and Trees spring to mind.
@Raddiy
Wages in the building industry have not fallen by 50%, and if your employer is paying less than the minimum wage then you have the ability to report that to the local jobcentre. Plus you have the European Working Time Directive and other protections.
http://www.payscale.com/research/UK/Industry=Construction/Hourly_Rate
joe bourke; come back to me…
@jedibeeftrix
I got there because I lived and worked in France for several years, though admittedly a while ago. Marine le Pen and the French Nationalists got about 25% of the French vote, which is far from a majority. Just like UKIP, they are using the EU to express frustrations that the EU did not cause.
jedibeeftrix,
– Staying-in as a non-euro member preserves fiscal and monetary independence, but with diminished influence on the collective development of the single market.
” I can accept that as long as you can accept that risk that ECB managed consensus over eurozone nations on QMV matters using the tools of the EBU represents a caucus which completely overrides british democracy on matters of fundamental economic sovereignty (read your Gladstone). If we can cross that chasm, fine, I am content that we should remain within the EU. Fail to achieve this and I will vote to leave in 2017.”
The single market seeks to guarantee the free movement of goods, capital, services, and people – the EU’s “four freedoms” – within the EU’s 28 member states. The internal market is intended to be conducive to increased competition, increased specialisation, larger economies of scale, allowing goods and factors of production to move to the area where they are most valued, thus improving the efficiency of the allocation of resources. It is also intended to drive economic integration whereby the once separate economies of the member states become integrated within a single EU wide economy, represented as one in international trade negotiations.
The euro crisis has led to a massive transfer of power to the EU level, and put political union back at the forefront of EU debate. Last year, French President Hollande called for the creation of an “economic government” for the Eurozone which would meet every month to discuss ways of promoting growth. He would push for a “political union” – a step towards a federal state – harmonisation of EU taxes and a European energy policy. Cameron might take a relaxed view of a Eurozone government, but all the other proposals run directly contrary to his desire for a looser, less centrally controlled EU to put before a British in-out referendum after the next election.
European leaders will need to make three choices in the coming years about the type of political union they want:
• A limited economic federation aimed at stabilising the euro, or a full economic federation that takes on member state competences such as taxation, social welfare, and distribution.
• A rules-based federation with a very small margin for policy flexibility, or one with wide-ranging discretionary powers and policy instruments.
• A political system reliant upon indirect legitimacy, governed through intergovernmental mechanisms, or one drawing on direct legitimacy conferring executive authority to supranational institutions such as the European Commission.
The flexibility or rigidity of political union will determine the extent to which a caucus could override British democracy on matters of fundamental economic sovereignty.
The European Central Bank will begin supervision of big banks across the euro zone later this year, the first step in banking union. The next step will be a common approach to preventing banks in trouble from dragging down the governments of euro zone countries, as happened with Ireland. That step remains a work in progress. So far, only a small emergency fund exists. The IMF has argued that it should be easier for the euro zone’s rescue fund, the European Stability Mechanism, to help struggling banks directly, rather than lending money to the banks’ home countries i.e. a lender of last resort to Eurozone banks.
If the banking union is extended further to a financial market union that seeks to supervise the shadow banking system and capital markets then it will go beyond the Eurozone countries and encompass the activities of the city.
@Joe Bourke
From what you write, it seems that part of the £33 million will pay for some form of protection of populations from bank collapses. That does seem a valuable service, but how much will it cost, and how would the results compare with a situation with Britain outside of the EU?
The four freedoms are presumably needed to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of firms? Which is not people-centred at all! It’s the last one that gives trouble, and it can be the opposite of a freedom, since the four together enable firms to invest where they want and force people to come to them, rather than the other way around.
Should the EU be re-thought, focussing around the needs of people rather than the needs of businesses?
@ Joe Bourke – I have no problem with your analysis, I am pretty much agree with it.
The only thing I would add is to drawn a line connecting your paragraph on the purpose of the single market and your three choices faced by the EU, to draw attention to the deeply worrying fuzziness over whether the former can remain an explicit competence of the EU28, and not steadily bleed into territory that the Euro18 deem to be an essential duty of economic union…
If the single market remains a function of the EU then we have a future in the EU.
If the choices you mention result in the single-market being hijacked by eurozone governance then we face a choice; join the euro or leave the EU.
This is what Cameron has to fight to reform in the next four years; forging an EU that still has room for sovereign nation-states.
Richard,
I think freedom of movement of people has served us well enough. There are nearly as many Brits living, working and retired in the EU as there are Europeans here. Plenty of British workers went to Germany to work on the construction sites there in the early nineties when work was tight here and there is no shortage of British staff working in Spanish and other European holiday resorts popular with British tourists.
The issue of EU worker only arose because ten Eastern European countries were admitted at one time in 2004 and the UK waived its right to transition arrangements designed to stem a large migration of workers from poorer countries to the booming UK economy. Had the Labour government simply utilised the existing protections available within the EU agreement, much of the friction arising from a sudden large influx could have been avoided. In recent years, more of the migration is coming from Spain, Greece and France then Eastern Europe and is likely a temporary feature of high unemployment in those countries.
At the end of the day, if you have a prosperous country (say the USA) sitting next to a poor country (like Mexico) you are going to get immigration one way or another. The EU free movement of labour is to my mind, a better solution than Maquiladoras or any other labour solution NAFTA has provided for.
jedibeeftrix,
I think Cameron keeps shooting himself in the foot. If, as seems likely, Jean-Claude Juncker is elected as the next president of the European Commission – the centrists blocs (the EPP and S&D) and their respective heads of state, will make all the running on further integration on the basis of – more Europe, not less.
Of the ten EU members not currently in the Eurozone – only the UK and Denmark have an ‘opt out’. Sweden has not yet qualified and those states that acceded in 2004 & 2007 – Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Lithuania, Hungary, Poland, Romania have a derogation until they meet the conditions for entry to monetary union.
The more members that join the Eurozone, the more focus there will be on the shared economic interests of the Eurozone grouping. There may be accommodations, reforms and ‘opt outs’ made to maintain the UK and other non-euro members within the Customs Union, Common Agricultural Policy and Common Foreign Policy; and Britain may maintain a place “at the top table.” However, it seems inevitable that the single market will become dominated by the collective interests of the Eurozone members, while the UK relationship aligns more closely with that of non-euro and EEA members. This process is likely to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary and certainly not completed by 2017.
It’s off topic, but anyway, Cameron’s objection to the process by which Juncker was nominated seems odd to me, perhaps someone could explain?
Wikipedia describes the normal process as follows:
“The European Council [the heads of member governments] votes by qualified majority for a nominee for the post of President …. This proposal is then put before Parliament which must approve or veto the appointment. If an absolute majority of MEPs support the nominee, he/she is elected.”
It seems in this case that parties in the European parliament made their views pretty clear, and that heads of several governments backed Juncker, so it would be somewhat odd if the Council didn’t then nominate him. If they didn’t, the parliament would simply reject their alternative nominee!
This seems like a democratic process. What grounds has Cameron really got to object?
@ JB – “However, it seems inevitable that the single market will become dominated by the collective interests of the Eurozone members, while the UK relationship aligns more closely with that of non-euro and EEA members.”
That would seem to be the case, and if it comes to pass thus, what would be your recommendation for britain’s policy response?
@ RD – “This seems like a democratic process. What grounds has Cameron really got to object?”
It signals a pretty fundamental shift in power from a union of sovereign states to a supranational political entity whose legitimacy takes precedence over the constituent nations.
It wasn’t only Cameron that rejected this, a lot of the northern nations has precisely the same reservation.
… ok, but it was agreed by the UK in the 2007 Lisbon treaty, so the shift happened when that treaty came into effect, 2009, not now. The UK agreed in 2007, so he has no real grounds for complaint now in 2014
several eu leaders seem have an identical interpretation of the texts, not helped by it being a shambolicly imprecise function they talk about.
Article 17 is pretty clear, see the clause numbered 7 of the following website:
http://www.lisbon-treaty.org/wcm/the-lisbon-treaty/treaty-on-european-union-and-comments/title-3-provisions-on-the-institutions/86-article-17.html
jedibeeftrix,
the British policy response to an inner core of Eurozone members will have to be determined by our own national interest.
In addition to a banking union, the European Council is discussing an “integrated budgetary framework”, which, if adopted, would mean that the EU would become a fiscal union that would be able to coordinate national taxation and, most likely, levy European taxes or establish redistribution or compensation mechanisms among different member states. There is also discussion of an “integrated economic policy framework”, which would effectively mean an economic union in which key macroeconomic policies (labour market, pensions, unemployment) would be jointly adopted, harmonised, and supervised.
The institutions required to deliver this kind of economic union are not simply a choice between federalism or inter-governmentalism. In fact, the choice facing Europe is much more complicated. European leaders must decide how far to go in terms of creating a genuine economic federation involving debt mutualisation, how much “policy space” to create at the European level, and whether to legitimise political union through national governments and parliaments or through developing existing EU institutions such as the European Parliament or creating new EU institutions. In other words, there are three distinct dimensions of political union: limited versus full economic federalism; rules versus discretion; and direct versus indirect legitimation. While the first two dimensions concern the substance of an economic and political union – that is, which powers are attributed to which level of government and to which degree they can be exercised – the third dimension concerns the procedures and roadmap that would eventually lead the EU to political union.
In each of the three dimensions of political union, European leaders face difficult choices. In each case, there are two extreme positions:, limited and full economic federalism; an approach to policymaking based on the enforcement of rules and an approach based on the creation of space for discretionary policymaking at the EU level; and indirect legitimacy through member-state governments and parliaments and direct legitimacy through a reform of the EU institutions.
If the UK and its European allies are able to exercise sufficient influence with respect to reform of the EU such as to – limit the extent of EU wide economic federalism to the minimum required to sustain the Euro and maintain the supremacy of national governments as the ultimate decision makers, then continued EU membership will remain in the national interest.
The more ambitious approach, creating a full-fledged economic federation and direct legitimisation through reformed EU institutions would be an economic federation that would also be a full-fledged political union, with something very much like a European government and a parliamentary democracy with two chambers, the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. If there were ample powers for discretionary policymaking in this approach (as against the German penchant for a strict rules based approach), the UK might be able to live with it, but the question of national self-interest, while remaining outside the Euro, becomes more finally balanced.
Until we see how the Eurozone crisis is ultimately resolved and how the EU institutions develop to underpin the stability of the currency – we will be unable to make an informed decision based on national self-interest.
@Joe Bourke
Regarding your last paragraph, it is not a matter of waiting and seeing, it’s a matter of participating in the process, surely? We can shape the outcome if we’re IN – in those discussions, developments, and votes
And we can be reasonably confident that we can shape the outcome to our needs. The reason is that other EU members will be doing the same thing – meaning there’s room for compromise. Also, if they are sensible, the EU and its members will want as many national governments and peoples to be satisfied as possible.
So the future looks bright, and yourself and jedibeeftrix might even be able to stop worrying, except that Cameron’s antics, based on misreading the Lisbon treaty, seem rather irrelevant and damaging.
@ JB – “If there were ample powers for discretionary policymaking in this approach (as against the German penchant for a strict rules based approach), the UK might be able to live with it, but the question of national self-interest, while remaining outside the Euro, becomes more finally balanced.”
Thank you for the very thorough explanation. I agree.
@ RD – “Taking into account the elections to the European Parliament and after having held the appropriate consultations, the European Council, acting by a qualified majority, shall propose to the European Parliament a candidate for President of the Commission. This candidate shall be elected by the European Parliament by a majority of its component members.”
I’m sorry, but what is clear about that? From a parliamentary report on the treaty:
” Ambiguity about relations between the senior leaders?
4.28. The impact of the Treaty on the relations between the Union’s senior leaders is, for some, hard to predict. Timothy Kirkhope MEP told us that “no-one has a complete answer as to how [the relationship between the European Council President and the High Representative] is going to work” (Q S346). According to John Palmer, “there are no clear answers at present to how [the European Council President’s relations with the other senior leaders] will function in practice.” He told us that this was “something one would expect to be the subject of a subsequent decision by the Council of Ministers” (p S14). Professor Wallace agreed that there remained “a very large number of coordination issues” which needed to be addressed (Q S175). Sir Stephen Wall told us that because the role of the European Council President was “controversial, it has not been possible to define it quite as closely as, I think, the British Government would have liked” (Q S202). Charles Grant thought it “very important that the governments do work out rough job descriptions of the Council President and the High Representative” (Q C57). The Minister agreed that a number of issues still needed to be addressed (Q S252), but he stressed that any decisions would need to be taken by unanimity. He recognised an urgency, saying that “it is absolutely essential [that] before this starts … the exact roles, responsibilities and relationships have to be ironed out in precise detail … we cannot allow the enactment of the Treaty across the European Union and then work out the detail; it has to be nailed down in advance of the commencement of the operation of the Treaty” (Q S252). He told us that “[w]e have agreed, as 27 Member States in the European Union, that this has to be worked through before commencement” (Q S253).
4.29. However, other witnesses suggested that the Treaty included deliberate ambiguity. John Palmer’s understanding was that “the heads of government deliberately did not seek to address some of the mechanics of how the institutions will relate to each other … because it is always open to an act of the Council to define a clearer functional answer to the question” (Q S17). Brendan Donnelly considered that many of the institutional provisions were “perhaps deliberately” permissive or tentative, so that their impact would depend on how they are implemented, which would be influenced by personalities and politics (p S131).
4.30. Other witnesses thought that more precision in the Lisbon Treaty about the relations of the senior leaders could not have been achieved. Sir Stephen Wall did not think that it would have been “feasible to define the roles so clearly that [the European Council President and the Commission President] were bound to get on” (Q S204). Lord Brittan of Spennithorne said: “I think all this has to be worked out and that it is complex I do not deny. That it is potentially problematic I do not deny. Is there a better way of doing it than that which is in the Treaty? I cannot think of one” (Q S356). While he was troubled by the role of the High Representative, he considered that “everything depends on the personalities. It can be made to work” (Q S355). He told us: “If I had carte blanche to write the Treaty, I do not think I would have wanted to write into it more provisions which would make it more likely to work than there are at the moment. The extent to which it works is dependent on personalities and working practices rather than any further or different treaty language” (Q S353). ”
As noted several times, this is not Cameron being awkward, it is a fundamental principle objected to by several members of the Council.
Power of the President
4.87. According to Professor Chalmers, the President will have a considerable role in the reallocation of Commission portfolios. “He or she becomes a lot more central in my view and has become a lot more central in the last five or six years” (Q S38). In his view, “the Commission is moving away—and this will affect its priorities—from being something close to a British style cabinet with first amongst equals and collegiate responsibility to a much more presidential system”. The President will have “a lot of power”, which “will influence the whole nature of the Commission once you have moved towards the end of the term and that person has an eye either to reappointment or non-reappointment” (Q S28).
4.88. John Palmer agreed that “[i]f the presidential commission emerges more strongly … the Commission will play a more important part in the balance of powers in the future than some people right now imagine” (Q S28). David Heathcoat-Amory MP pointed out that the President “will gain the ability to sack individual Commissioners” (Q S88): the Lisbon Treaty provides that “A member of the Commission shall resign if the President so requests”, not “after obtaining the approval of the College” as the current TEC provides (Article 17 of the amended TEU; Article 214 of the TEC). However, Lord Brittan of Spennithorne was “not sure” that this change “is going to make a great deal of practical difference” (Q S350).
4.89. Professor Wallace told us that “in practice the President is becoming much more important or has the scope for operating in a more presidential way”, because already “fewer things go to the full College for full debate in oral sessions … much more is done in smaller chambers or groupings.” She felt that “a president who is skilful is in a position to exploit that” (Q S183). According to the Minister for Europe, “the formal powers [of the Commission President] have not changed”, but his sense was that “the increased influence of the President of the Commission will come about by the Commission itself being more effective” (Q S266).
4.98. The Commission told us that the requirement to take into account the elections was “quite significant” and that “it is correct that there is a debate about who should lead the Commission following direct elections to the European Parliament” (Q S315). Neil O’Brien felt that the European Parliament was gaining a significant power in electing the Commission President, and “in the future Commission Presidents are more likely to have a strongly integrationist bent in line with the general opinion of the European Parliament” (Q S81).
4.99. Lord Brittan of Spennithorne told us that “‘taking into account’ does not mean the same as ‘following'”. According to him, “what it will mean is that it would be difficult for Member States to come up with a proposed president who was known to be violently contradictory to and opposed to the weight of opinion in the European Parliament … I do not think it is going to make as much difference as all that” (Q S351). He thought that “‘take account of’ gives the flexibility but at the same time a nod in the direction, in effect saying it has to be acceptable to the Parliament, which is about right” (Q S363).
4.100. Questions remain regarding party nominations for Commission President. Will the elected President feel beholden to the political party or group which put his or her name forward? Will the President always be a candidate of the majority party or group? Could the Council refuse to nominate someone sponsored by the party commanding the majority in the Parliament? Experience will tell.
@ RD – “We can shape the outcome if we’re IN – in those discussions, developments, and votes And we can be reasonably confident that we can shape the outcome to our needs. ”
What do you mean by “IN”? In the Eurozone… If not, when this is all about economic and political integration resulting from the eurozone crisis, why should we feel that we will be given an outcome that suits us when we are not even a member!
@jedibeeftrix
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? We’re better off IN.
In the words of Sir Humphrey; is that a “brave” decision that would lose you votes, or a “courageous” one was one that would lose you the election?
What do you thin; will the leadership put joining the Euro in the 2015 manifesto…
In the words of Jim Hacker, MP, that’s leadership. It’s a service that the electorate expect politicians to provide, and one that the Humphreys of this world definitely disapprove of!
Fine, but that does rather beg the question of whether you even see the Lib-Dem’s as a political party seeking government in an adversarial political system, or, merely another pressure-group willing to carry out the jobs society occasionally wants doing. Social workers with a portfolio of green intentions, if you will.
I sound flippant, but the question is serious; would you really advocate a manifesto policy for 2015 that would see the party’s support wrecked (rather than just reduced), purely on the principle that you think the euro is a jolly good idea?
@jedibeeftrix. Yes, you are being flippant. If the 2015 manifesto is to include an argument to join the Euro, it would need to be a coherent argument, not just saying it’s a “jolly good idea”.
Would you advocate to Paddy – if you were in the position to do so – as the mastermind of the 2015 lib-dem election strategy, that he should stick “join the Euro” in the manifesto?
A fairly straight forward question.
@jedibeeftrix
Maybe I’ll write a separate article on this off-topic topic, and see if LDV publish it, provisionally called “Pros and Cons of Joining the Euro”. Since I am far from an expert, I imagine you and others will cut me to pieces. Well, it’s the taking part that counts!
And while it would be very interesting to read – and I would gladly do so – that is not really what a manifesto is about.
what do we get for our £33m:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/10918176/UK-could-make-its-way-in-the-world-outside-EU.html
@ Joe – this seems apposite;
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/uk-will-be-forced-join-euro-leave-eu-if-brussels-power-not-reformed-says-report-1453735