Tories will have no influence in Washington, Paris or Berlin
I am at the Liberal Democrat National Conference in Bournemouth this weekend and I will provide brief updates of key messages.
Our shadow foreign secretary, Ed Davey MP, highlighted the fact that the Tories will have no influence in Washington, Berlin or Paris on key issues affecting British political and economic interests. Having pulled the Conservatives out of the centre-right European People’s Party in the European Parliament, David Cameron has alligned his party with 36 ultra-right isolationist MEPs including homophobes and climate change deniers.
If the Tories come into power next year, Foreign Secretary William Hague, will have no influence with President Sarkozy in France or Chancellor Merkel in Germany, who are both members of the EPP. And who is US President Obama likely to call regarding European matters? Not London if the Tories get in. More likely to be Paris or Berlin.
Britain’s role in tackling urgent problems such as the economy, climate change or security will be diminished without any effective influence in Europe under the Tories. This will also diminish our special relationship with the US as well.
Good to hear your views on the conference. I understand what Ed Davey is saying but I think he’s over-egging it.
International politicians have to deal with people all the time that they don’t like or agree with to get things done. As things stand, the UK is a major player in the EU. We are a reluctant player but we have political and economic clout in Europe and have had that for the past 900 years. Who sits where and with who in the EP isn’t going to change that.
The Prime Minister of the UK has influence with the Presidents of France and America and the Chancellor of Germany - it is the roles, not the groupings in the EP or even the personalities that determine who speaks to who about what.
President Obama may look at the number of troops France and Germany have helping his forces out in Iraq and Afghanistan and decide that London is the place to call after all.
Incidentally, the Swiss and Norwegians seem able to tackle economic, environmental and security problems pretty well in partnership with their neighbours without the “filip” of EU membership at all.
Not quite so. Aside from military decisions, the Conservatives will have no or little influence in the European Parliament over matters such as security, economic policy and climate change. Had they stayed in the largest bloc - the EPP - they could have real influence in decision-making.
The European Parliament passed the European Arrest Warrant which was applied to arrest one of the 21 July “bombers” in Rome and enabled him to be brought back to the UK. Without this, it would have been more difficult to arrest him and charge him in the UK. Curiously the Tories voted against the European Arrest Warrant. So much for their concerns about security.
On economic matters, action was swiftly applied across Europe to safeguard British and European economic interests with government stimulus money. At least Gordon Brown had influence in Europe to achieve the financial rescue.
Finally, of greatest concern is the Tory group aligning themselves with a group of climate change denialists in the European Parliament. I thought that the Tories were green now? Climate change does not stop at Calais or Dover. It crosses borders and the European Parliament is where most of the climate change initiatives and policies are made. You got to admit, this does make the Tories seem pretty hollow on this issue and does not serve British interests in this area well.
I guess it depends what you think the EP is for. For me, the EU was formed to prevent pan-European war through greater cultural understanding and economic co-operation. Things such as “security” and environmental concerns have in my view been bolted on to give the EU a political dimension and legitimacy that it was never intended to have.
My greatest concern about Europe is one of sovereignty and I want our EP politicians to prevent any further transfer of power to Brussels, ensure our rebate remains intact and promote free trade.
The Conservative group has rightly left the EPP, which has totally different objectives ie political and economic union. I would be lying if I said that I was comfortable with all the views of our new partners but those views are not the reason we are working with them.
Politicians have to find a balance between idealism and practicality. I think the Europe question is too big to rely entirely on the former.
And my argument is that in order to secure British interests and greater sovereignty is to ensure that the UK is involved in greater political and economic union to tackle the big issues such as security, climate change and a rising China as an economic superpower.
I have been to Taiwan and Africa several times and seen the effects of Chinese economic colonialism. Together we are stronger on these important global issues.