As always, France stands in the way of reforming the EU
Dear Peter Mandelson,
On your return to ministerial office, I remember Gordon Brown eulogising about your time as EU Trade Commissioner. He said that he needed “serious people for serious times” and commented on your ”unrivalled” experience in global trade. Brown even said it was in the “national interest” to bring in people like yourself because you have ”built up a reputation over the last few years as someone who can get things done.” It is this last point that amuses me the most, seeing as Gordon Brown was obviously not paying attention to how little success you really had.
So what exactly was Gordon Brown referring to when he referred to you getting things done? Perhaps it was designed to bring attention to your dealing with Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska and your decision to give him highly preferential trading rates with the EU after meeting him on his yacht? Ok, maybe not. Perhaps it was a reference to the Doha Trade talks that started several years ago with the promise of reforming subsidies for global trade, even though the talks failed because no-one could agree on new farm import rules, which allow countries to protect poor farmers by imposing tariffs on certain goods? Ok, maybe not. One wonders what you did achieve as EU Trade Commissioner, seeing as your desire to lower trade barriers is clearly at odds with major countries such as the USA and China. More importantly, your love of free trade put you directly in conflict with France.
Today we learn that France, which currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency, has suggested to a meeting of EU farm ministers that the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) should be continued unchanged beyond 2013 - the date when a new five year Brussels budget period begins. As I’m sure you know, this move flatly contradicts the promises made three years ago when Tony Blair handed over our £7 billion rebate from Brussels in the knowledge that there would be a future cut in farm subsidies. Now, before we go any further, I should point out that giving up this rebate in the first place was totally unjustifiable. The UK loses out very badly from the CAP and the EU as a whole because we have a relatively small agricultural sector compared to many other EU countries (which is why Margaret Thatcher demanded the rebate almost two decades ago). For Tony Blair to hand it over without guaranteeing anything in return was the most pathetic excuse for EU diplomacy I have heard in quite a while. I knew, I just knew, that France would never give up their beloved CAP and now we have the evidence to prove it. It appears that France is using its EU presidency to try and find ways of protecting the CAP from being reformed, and a senior French official even went as far as saying that “the red line was to preserve tools for the regulation of markets, not to give up the economic governance that the CAP founded over 40 years ago. We do not want agriculture to become a variable in an adjusted European budget.” How blatant can you get?
The CAP costs £42 billion every year, accounting for an astonishing 40% of the EU budget. Every EU taxpayer funds this ridiculously ineffective and distorting scheme yet the UK gets little in return. Michel Barnier, the French Agriculture Minister, said that the British veto was “not objectively a total surprise” as if this country is somehow standing in the way on his righteous mission to preserve the CAP in the same form that it was in during the 1960s. This is what really angers me about federalists like you, Mr Mandelson. You appease the voters by saying that ‘we want change’ and ‘we know there is work to be done’ and other hollow platitudes yet the EU never changes. Why? Because France and Germany don’t want it to change. Labour will never reform the CAP, you will never curb the excesses of MEP expenses, you will never halt the appalling and expensive bureaucracy and you will never make the EU more democratic because unless France and Germany want it to happen, it never can happen. France and Germany will never agree to relinquish their power or control over the EU, seeing as it brings them so many benefits for doing so little, and your federalist instincts are quite simply a disgrace to this country.
Yours sincerely,
A.Tory
Witanagemot Blogs
Good stuff.
I don’t do many posts laying into the EU because it’s so difficult to know where to start, tips, icebergs, and so on. And if you do, people just say “Ah yes, but you’re in UKIP, you would say that!”.
Duh. That’s why I’m in UKIP in the first place.
I don’t do many posts on the EU either. I’m obviously not in UKIP and always face the problem of being branded as ’same old Tories, hate Europe’ blah blah blah.
I find that the best response in that situation is to give specific examples of how much of a joke the EU is e.g. CAP costing £40 billion and consigning most of Africa to extreme poverty, MEP expenses scandals etc. You are then normally met with the standard ‘obviously some things need to change’ pro-EU response, which is usually best countered by pointing out that things never change.
I am starting to think there is no hope for the EU. We’ve heard the arguments. “Those who are in favour of it in general will be able to abolish the abuses because they are generally positive & constructive, so if we give a bit we’ll get some back”. But if the CAP obscenity remains to mock us & working-class consumers in this country & producers & their dependents in the 3rd world, how can this be done?
Even the Liberal Democrats will claim to be against the CAP/CFP, but what’s their big idea for getting rid of it? The same goes for Cameron. He surely isn’t going to lose support by taking a firmer stance, so why doesn’t he? It could console right-wingers for his stress on environmentalism etc.
Taking a firmer stance on anything to do with Europe is clearly not on Cameron’s agenda. Pulling out of the EPP is against as radical as you’re going to get, unless something forces this hand.
The Lib Dems have made a bad move by being so pro-EU when so much of this country wants a better deal from Brussels.
LFAT, “same old Tories, hate Europe”, that’s the Big Fat Misinformation, when people say this, you have to nail the semantics straight away, neither you nor I have anything against “Europe”, it’s the “EU” we don’t like. Which is why some Ukippers have car stickers saying “Love Europe, hate the EU”.
That is precisely my attitude as well – love Europe, hate the EU.
In my experience, Conservatives can’t disagree with anything in the EU without being labelled as a Europe-hating narrow-minded racist – so I just don’t bother to speaking to Lefties about it. The problem is that the government and Lefties never dare go in front of the camera to explain their views because they know that they will get shot down.
In fairness to DC he did say referendum on the Lisbon treaty for definite.
There are a lot of left-liberals who are anti-EU
See, it’s not the EU as such that is the problem. The EU is juts a symptom of the larger malaise of bureaucratism (for want of a better word).
I haven’t a clue how to stop it – short of a revolution – as most of the political class live off it and want it sustained. Possibly the first step is for the UK to leave it. But…
I have been predicting for a while now that theFrench will call for a common nuclear policy
(to bail out their extremely disproportionate nuclear decommissioning problem)
watch and see
France ‘looks after it’s own’ with the CAP, not so with British farmers.
Jean, you’re absolutely right. France’s entire economy would fall apart without massive EU subsidies. We obviously have a large farming community in this country as well, but the Labour government does not feel very attached to rural communities because their votes are mostly in urban areas.
Nick, they’ve already tried to create an EU army to cover up their own pathetic military so you might be onto something.
Lola, bureaucracy is an excellent method of preventing power from being shared and hiding institutional shortcomings. Labour use it in the public sector to stifle reform and hide incompetence – the EU is no different.
Sarkozy can hardly do otherwise – he came to power on that platform.
Have to agree with Mark here…
I’m delighted to announce to those who will listen that I’m a happy European, a conservative but distinctly cool towards the EU. I refuse to let the other lot force me to modify my beliefs.