Germany has elections on the way, Spain is just about holding a lid on its economic crisis while keeping a wary eye on the uphill struggle that its neighbour Portugal faces to avoid a second bailout, and François Hollande has his own political crisis to deal with (and is apparently also mourning the death of a camel). So is now really the best time for David Cameron to pitch up in Madrid, Paris and Berlin to argue for reform of the European Union?
The PM visits the first two cities today, with a meeting with Angela Merkel planned for later this week on the same topic. He wants to make the case that it’s not just Britain that would benefit from a concerted push for change in the EU: all its member states are in his beloved ‘global race’ with countries like India, China, Indonesia and Malaysia. Ahead of the meetings, he said:
‘We need a Europe that is more open, that is more competitive, that is more flexible, that thinks more about the cost that it’s putting onto its businesses, particularly small businesses; we want a Europe that wakes up to this modern world of competition and flexibility. That is the aim.’
He accuses Europe of having ‘something overreached itself with directives and interventions and interferences’, and reiterates his case for a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU, saying again that ‘consent for Britain’s membership of the European Union… has become wafer-thin in Britain’.
This is all well and good, but why now? Germany’s tough stance over Cyprus shows that Merkel is keen to show her country’s electorate that she isn’t a pushover. And just last week Germany and France declined to join the UK’s ‘balance of competences’ review. It doesn’t look as though these meetings are going to be particularly productive.
But the point is that Cameron needs to start with his push for reform now, not after the 2015 election. He was advised by Sir John Major, who knows a thing or two about the problems Europe can create for a Conservative Prime Minister, to get on with the negotiating immediately. There’s never really a good time to bring up these issues in Europe: there will always be an election looming for one member state or another, and unfortunately for the next few years there is also likely to be one economic crisis looming here and there in the eurozone. And if Cameron fails to engage his European partners now, he risks creating the impression of an isolated Britain. He worked hard at the EU Budget summit to show that he didn’t need to be the only voice calling for reform.
He also has to show voters and his own party that he really is serious about this renegotiation. Many Tory MPs think that this needs underlining with legislation in this Parliament, but if Downing Street doesn’t want to do that, it needs to be making a fair bit of noise about its push for reform of the EU so that Cameron’s Bloomberg speech doesn’t get forgotten. The circumstances of these meetings aren’t perfect, but David Cameron is right to get on with making the case for reform. Otherwise he’ll never get round to it.
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