Eu

The Prime Minister needed to reassure his own side at PMQs today on the EU budget and give his whips something to work with. He largely did that, saying almost immediately that his position was that at best, he’d like it cut and at worst, frozen. That Cameron has said he’d like it cut will give those of his backbenchers who stick with him tonight some cover. They’ll be able to say that they’re supporting the government which already wants a cut. Ed Miliband’s decision to lead on the issue and try and use it to paint Cameron as ‘weak’ has also made the issue more partisan. I suspect that

When in 1996 the US Congress threw out Bill Clinton’s Federal budget they precipitated a partial shutdown of the US Government. However, anyone looking at the growing prospect of a UK EU budget veto and cheerfully imagining Eurocrats being shut out of their offices on 31 December 2013 will be disappointed. Because when it comes to EU budgets, a veto is not quite a veto – the EU will continue one way or another to claim its dues. Nethertheless, a UK veto is not meaningless. Not least because, as we have set out here, the scenarios that could play out after a UK veto may not be that much worse for

Tony Blair gave a speech today in which he proposed a ‘Grand Bargain’ to revive the European Union. One of the proposals in this grand bargain is – and Blair is clearly speaking entirely without self-interest – that there be an elected president of the European Commission or European Council. The former Prime Minister told the Council for the Future of Europe in Berlin: ‘Let me make a few quick reflections. A Europe-wide election for the Presidency of the Commission or Council is the most direct way to involve the public. An election for a big post held by one person – this people can understand. The problem with the

In The Spectator this week, Charles Moore argued that David Cameron — despite his oft-stated desire to renegotiate the terms of Britain’s EU membership — doesn’t actually have a European policy. Charles’ criticisms have clearly stung. For in his Telegraph column, he outlines what post-2015, the Conservatives would seek in any renegotiation: “In essence, the scheme is to turn the EU into two concentric rings. The inner ring shares the euro and undergoes political union. The outer ring avoids both these things and has a looser, trading membership grounded in national parliamentary sovereignty. You could say that this split already exists, in fact if not in theory, but the difference

The EU budget negotiation, now a month away, promises to be David Cameron’s next big European test. The Prime Minister has repeatedly declared that he wants to see the EU budget frozen at 2011 levels and that he’s prepared to use the need for unanimity to achieve that. The Economist this week has a very useful scene-setter for the budget talks. It sketches the contours thus: ‘Countries are coalescing around loose (yet often divided) groups. There are the ‘friends of cohesion’: the net recipients of regional spending, such as Poland, Hungary and the Baltic states. And there are the ‘friends of better spending’: the net contributors, such as Germany, France,

David Cameron had lunch with Herman van Rompuy in Downing Street today to discuss the UK’s position on the EU budget. Despite the Prime Minister’s tough talking in public about his determination to veto any real-terms increases in the money available for the multi-annual budget, the Downing Street spokeswoman refused to confirm that there was in fact any mention of this threat at today’s meeting, which Nick Clegg apparently popped into briefly. She said: ‘Discussions focused on the multi-annual budget. Both the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister made clear the Government’s position that we do not support a real-terms increase in the EU budget. They reiterated that at

Throughout his statement on the European Council, David Cameron seemed slightly irritated. One sensed that the headlines of the last few days have rather got under his skin. Cameron began by declaring that the Council meeting had made ‘limited progress’, which is hardly much to report to the House. He also was unable to resist another pop at Chris Bryant; complaining that he still hadn’t apologised to him when the Labour MPs asked a question. It was striking what a pro-European tone Ed Miliband took in his response to Cameron. It was all about how Cameron was losing control of his party over Europe and needed more friends there. When

I don’t suppose too many Coffee House readers will have noticed, but the EU is currently without a dedicated health commissioner. This is because the holder of that important office, a nondescript former Maltese politician called John Dalli, resigned last week in connection with an alleged lobbying scandal. So, until they can find another nondescript Maltese politican to replace him (the country’s foreign minister looks as if he is to be the lucky guy), our health needs at euro level are in the acting hands of one Maros Serfcovic, a Slovak, who is also the Commission’s commissioner for administration. This makes him the EU-equivalent of Jim Hacker, the Minister for Administrative Affairs,

David Cameron is determined to renegotiate the terms of Britain’s EU membership. But to get a good deal and to show his own eurosceptics  – let alone UKIP voters  – that he’s serious about this, he is going to have to be prepared to say that he would be prepared to leave if the rest of the European Union doesn’t play ball. (This poker game is why the other northern European countries that Cameron is relying on to help him secure a better deal have been quick to suggest that they wouldn’t mind Britain leaving that much.) Cameron, though, is highly reluctant to do this. Not only does he think

Yvette Cooper was in a stern mood this afternoon when she responded to the Home Secretary’s announcement about plans to opt-out of 130 European law and order measures and then re-adopt those which it fancies. Her main gripe was that she hadn’t been sent Theresa May’s statement about the plans until 45 minutes before it was delivered in the Commons, but she was also peeved about the content. The Shadow Home Secretary argued that ministers ‘haven’t actually told us anything today at all’, arguing that the different limbs of the coalition were doing entirely different things on this matter. While David Cameron had spoken about an opt-out, Nick Clegg had