By: Tim Ambler
Date: 18 August 2014
There’s no reforming the EU without understanding it
Once again the Daily Telegraph (“Brussels plots fresh City of London power grab”, 8th
August) and like-minded media have become irrationally frenzied by EU
moves that are wrong but nevertheless entirely rational. London has
been reminded that the three UK financial regulators will have to give
up their regulatory powers to Brussels and become merely supervisors. As
this Institute pointed out in our letter to The Times in June 2009, the
UK governmentagreed that the previous March. It was President
Sarkozy’s price for attending the London G10 Summit in April. The
necessary legal framework was agreed by Parliament before that summer’s
recess.
The government and the City were silent at the time and in the five years since. It is no use yelping now. Brussels is only implementing what we agreed.
The worry now is that the City and the government ignorance of Brussels and its processes make EU reform all the less likely. One needs to understand and then work the system to succeed. The UK negotiators’ failure is demonstrated by the 55 occasions on which we have sought to block some new Brussels initiative or other and been over-ruled each time. The French and the Germans know how to garner support for what they want done; the British government clearly hasn’t a clue.
If the past five years, during which the EU financial regulation issue has been ignored by City and government, show anything, it is that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and HM Treasury have been asleep at the wheel. The FCO lacks backbone and is notoriously pro-EU. We need a new team.
Obviously some of the existing team do have some understanding of the EU. Perhaps we need an exam, supervised by Michael Gove, to sift out the good ones and then complete the new team with our finest negotiators first to understand what has to be done and then to prepare the way. It will make little difference to the UK’s position in the EU if our involvement, for the few years preparation will take, is little more than keeping bums on seats.
The Coalition has at least done some of the preparation in asking and thinking about what reforms Britain would like but that is no more than a Santa Claus wish list without a plan to achieve any reform.
A final thought along these lines is to put the new team under John Major’s charge. He is the last British Prime Minister successfully to have negotiated any substantial matter with the EU.
The government and the City were silent at the time and in the five years since. It is no use yelping now. Brussels is only implementing what we agreed.
The worry now is that the City and the government ignorance of Brussels and its processes make EU reform all the less likely. One needs to understand and then work the system to succeed. The UK negotiators’ failure is demonstrated by the 55 occasions on which we have sought to block some new Brussels initiative or other and been over-ruled each time. The French and the Germans know how to garner support for what they want done; the British government clearly hasn’t a clue.
If the past five years, during which the EU financial regulation issue has been ignored by City and government, show anything, it is that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and HM Treasury have been asleep at the wheel. The FCO lacks backbone and is notoriously pro-EU. We need a new team.
Obviously some of the existing team do have some understanding of the EU. Perhaps we need an exam, supervised by Michael Gove, to sift out the good ones and then complete the new team with our finest negotiators first to understand what has to be done and then to prepare the way. It will make little difference to the UK’s position in the EU if our involvement, for the few years preparation will take, is little more than keeping bums on seats.
The Coalition has at least done some of the preparation in asking and thinking about what reforms Britain would like but that is no more than a Santa Claus wish list without a plan to achieve any reform.
A final thought along these lines is to put the new team under John Major’s charge. He is the last British Prime Minister successfully to have negotiated any substantial matter with the EU.
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