Please, don't let this be true

Oh the vicissitudes of writing about the European Union and actually understanding most of it (nobody understands all of it, not even Jacques Delors).

My colleague and I spend a good deal of every day clutching our respective heads and wondering why we bother. That is when we do not "celebrate" anniversaries: ten years since my first briefing on the Meat Hygiene Service (my colleague got on to that long before me); so many years since the first position paper for the Countryside Alliance on FMD; and ten years since I first wrote about the British art market and the likely effects of EU legislation on it.

In April I put up a posting because the Financial Times in its infinite wisdom published an article that "sounded the alarm" about the full version of the droit de suite legislation. The posting explains what the fuss is all about.

Then I added:

Well, I never. So the droit de suite, opposed by every British political party but passed through QMV by the Council of Ministers mostly representing countries that have no art markets, is going to harm the successful British one. Where have I heard this before?

Actually, more to the point, where have I written this before? Well, apart from articles in the European Journal and eurofacts in the past (first time in 1998), as well as several briefing papers for friendly peers, I wrote about it on EU Referendum on February 15, 2005, December 20, 2005, December 22, 2005, January 25, 2006. On the One London blog I wrote only twice, in connection with the fatuous report produced by Angie Bray, that stalwart member of the Conservative Party, on December 21, 2005 and on February 1, 2006, the latter showing some choice examples of fatuousness both on the part of Ms Bray and of Hizonner the Mayor.

Over and above that I wrote the One London Minority Report that was attached to Ms Bray’s rather idiotic (I have overused the word fatuous) official report.

Earlier today I received a press release from the European Foundation, whose European Journal clearly has no archives.

The press release tells me that in the next issue of the European Journal, shadow minister for science and innovation (the jobs these people have!), Adam Afriyie, will ask "if a new EU Directive will damage Britain's £8.5 billion art market". Please don't let this be true, I said. Please, just for once, could we have evidence of intelligence and knowledge on the part of a Conservative politician and a Conservative Eurosceptic outlet, to wit the European Journal?

It seems my pleas to whatever powers there might be is about as effective as the little boy's to the famous baseball player "Shoeless Joe" Jackson. Allegedly, when he came out of the courthouse after admitting to being part of a fix, the boy said to him: "Say it ain't so, Joe". The story may or may not be true but "say it ain't so" has become a well-known phrase. Of course, the point is that the reply would have been: "sure it is, kid".

That is presumably all I can expect from the Conservative Shadow Minister and the European Journal:

"Sure it is. We have just discovered Directive 2001/84/EC and we are going to be shocked and horrified by what it might do to a successful business in the country, now that we cannot do anything about it.

Of course, we never could do anything about it, as this is a Single Market legislation and is, therefore subject to qualified majority voting procedure but we are not too clear what that means in real terms, so let's just forget about that.

Naturally, we assume that everybody else is just as stupid and ignorant as we are and will not notice that we are wasting our time and stretching everybody else's credulity trying to acquire some eurosceptic kudos."

Oh dear. Say it ain’t so.

Another day, another failure …

"EU urges action on European transport network," says the Guardian. And so another bland headline plops into the ether, unnoticed, unregarded and totally devoid of significance.

But then, without the history, there is no way that the average reader could even begin to understand that this represents yet another EU policy failure – and this one has to be one of the biggest.

The Guardian story itself tells us that the cost of linking up Europe's transport network (TEN) has risen 16.8 percent from original projections to nearly €400 billion euros ($618 billion), and big sections are behind schedule.

This is lifted from a commission report which states: "It is very clear today that significant parts of the 30 priority projects will not be completed until 2015 or even 2020," and the paper then adds a comment from EU transport commissioner Jacques "Wheel" Barrot, who says the slippage is unacceptable, "… given that switching passengers and freight from roads to the more efficient railways could help the EU meet its targets of curbing carbon dioxide emissions, key to its strategy for fighting against climate change."

We are also told that, "Integrating trans-European roads and railways" is seen as vital to the growth of the internal market within the 27-member bloc, as well as to boosting employment and economic output.

But that does not even begin to describe it.

The TEN project, in fact, stems from an initiative presented by Jacques Delors – then EU commission president - to the European Council in Brussels on 11-12 December 1993. Delors was concerned to present a big idea to cure "Europe's structural unemployment" and, at the same time to demonstrate the supposed benefits of "Community action".

The "big idea" he presented to the Council was a massive scheme of public works which he equated to the "New Deal", a scheme to build the "trans-European infrastructure", interconnecting energy transmission systems and a series of cross-border road and rail projects.

This "trans-European network" or "TEN" was to cost 400 billion ecus (£260 billion), partly paid from EU regional funds but mainly by member states, with private finance involvement. And, crucially, in order to have the intended effect of a massive boost to employment, the whole, vast scheme was to be completed within fifteen years and

The initial approval, with the enthusiastic support of the then 15 member states - was given in 1995 and, for the 2000-2006 financial period, €4.2 billion was allocated from EU funds, co-funding projects up to a maximum of 10 percent. Top-ups came from the European Regional Development Fund to the tune of € 34 billion, with loans from the European Investment Bank totalling €37.9 billion.

Then, under the "multi-annual financial framework 2007-2013", the commission added another €8.013 billion to the pot, with billions more flowing in from other EU sources and member states.

Now, 15 years after Delors proposed his grand scheme – to last 15 years – TEN is behind schedule and massively overspent, soaking up huge amounts of taxpayers’ money. And, with nothing very much to show for what was originally hailed as Europe's "New Deal", it still has another 12 years to run – and some.

But, as another grand initiative bites the dust, all it warrants is a brief story in the on-line edition of The Guardian, the only media source even to mention it. It is no wonder the "colleagues" find it so easy to extol the virtues of le project, when even the most egregious of their failures go unnoticed.

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Oh dear, they've noticed

[Health warning: this is not a Toy posting. There will be no mention of Toys in this piece. Some of our readers might, therefore, decide to skip this. But, let me repeat: there will be no Toys.]

Just recently we have noticed that there is excitement abroad (in every sense of the word) about the Euroblogosphere. It is being discussed and analyzed in a way it has not been before.

Euractiv has produced a list of blogs that might be considered to be relevant with, as you would expect it, heavy emphasis on the more official “clogs” (corporate blogs) – Commissars, members of the Toy Parliament and journalists – but there are some blogs, including this one, that are outside the Pale.

It may be that the opinion, frequently voiced by us, that it will be the issue of further European integration and the future of the European Union (short, we hope) that will make the blogosphere on this side of the Pond as important politically as it has been for some time in the United States is now shared by the Euro-establishment.

Scholars at the University of Hamburg are labouring on a more profound sociological and philosophical analysis of the blogosphere and its possible developments and outcomes. Their, possibly interim, conclusion is interesting in the way it tries to come to terms with a basically unknown and uncontrollable force:

In conclusion, it is not in the hands of the EU to organize the Euroblogosphere but it is in its hands to provide a basis for this partial public sphere to grow, fostering collective incentives, which are fundamental for the development of collective action and community. Doing this is one of the necessary steps that the EU has to take if it wants to act according to its motto of “closing the gap” between citizens and European institutions.

Earlier paragraphs make it clear that the opinion of this paper is that the importance or otherwise of blogs depends entirely on the attitude taken by the various governing strata who are encouraged to use the blogosphere for their own purposes. Can’t help feeling that these people are in for a shock.

My colleague and I have been wondering whether it is entirely a coincidence that so soon after we have found these and other discussions, there have been two (so far) perfectly courteous messages telling us about projects and websites that are supposedly “discussing” the European project though not quite as openly as we are.

One link, sent to our forum by a delightful new correspondent, is to a site called Tomorrow’s Europe, which is running a discussion forum at the European Parliament in September. The participants will be “a truly representative sample of ordinary citizens from all 27 countries in the EU”, 400 in number, the population of the EU being around 490 million. And, of course, the 400 will have no personal views or agendas of their own at all.

Let me add that the main organizer of Tomorrow’s Europe is Notre Europe, the think-tank set up by Jacques Delors, the last talented President of the European Commission and one of the sponsors, indeed the main organizational one, is George Soros’s Open Society Institute from which Lord Malloch-Brown has probably resigned. (It is good to have all one's enemies in one basket, so to speak.)

(Actually, I am not sure what happened there but the original idea had been to bring together 500 representative ordinary citizens. That 100 might have made all the difference. What went wrong? Were they purged for saying the wrong thing and supporting Snowball instead of Napoleon?)

We have also received an e-mail about another website in the making that is set to advocate the advantages of no borders in Europe. Having spent some of my life traveling round the place, I can appreciate that notion, though I should like to point out that travel across Europe was very easy before the First World War (unless one ran into a revolution or some local massacre) so there is nothing terribly new in the idea of borders being unimportant.

Its not totally literate mission statement reads:

In a rapidly changing environment where high mobility is a key element of success and where the post war cooperation initiatives in Europe have generated dynamics of peace and mutual understanding, we anticipate a trully united European continent without borders and without barriers of any kind.

We pledge to work hard on raising awareness on the benefits of a borderless Europe and broadcasting the will of the people of Europe towards the higher levels of administration.

There is a forum but it is not fully functional yet. We are looking forward to the developments in Europe/no-borders.

In the meantime, we can but smile at the thought of all these groups, organizations, academic seminars, old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all getting so excited and worried about the euroblogosphere. Long may that continue.

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And the power ebbs away...

One of the most powerful members of the supreme government of Europe is the president of the EU commission and, if the new "reform" treaty goes through, he will become even more powerful. But he (there has not yet been a female president) was not always so powerful.

In the beginning, under the Treaty of Rome (Articles 158 and 161), he was appointed "by common accord" by the Council – i.e., the Member States - from amongst the members of the commission. Commissioners, likewise, were appointed by the Council by common accord – their appointment coming first. The member states, therefore, had total control of who became a commissioner, and who then became president – each member able to exercise a veto.

The term of office, incidentally, was two years, but could be renewed indefinitely, once again by common accord, making the president beholden to the Council for his position. This was soon to be increased to four years.

Then, following its first elections by direct universal suffrage in 1979, the EU parliament began to flex its muscles, demanding a role in the appointment of the president. The pressure was to have its effect and, in 1984, 1988 and 1992, the European Council (which by then had taken on the role of appointing the president) submitted the nomination of Jacques Delors to the "enlarged bureau" (the governing body) of the EU parliament for consultation.

However, the Parliament itself had already decided to deliver a "vote of confidence" on the appointment, which it first delivered in 1981. As is so often the case, with the treaty following the practice, this procedure was enshrined in the text of the Maastricht Treaty. This stipulated that the European Council must consult the parliament and not just its enlarged bureau on the choice of the president and that whole parliament should hold a vote on the appointment.

The Maastricht Treaty also increased the commission's term of office from four to five years and brought it into line with parliament's own term of office, so that the endorsement of the president by the parliament would become its first major political acts after every election.

On 21 July 1994, the appointment of Jacques Santer was endorsed in the parliament by 260 votes to 238 with 23 abstentions. Also, the parliamentary committees then, for the first time, held individual hearings on the candidate commissioners. These hearings were held in public, which increased still further the role of the parliament, lessening the grip of the member states over the appointment process.

As to the appointment of the president, the Amsterdam Treaty further strengthened parliament's power by granting it a right of approval, rather than merely a consultative role. The Nice Treaty (Article 214) then even further reduced the power of individual members states by requiring the European Council to nominate the president by qualified majority vote instead of by consensus (common accord).

That is how it remains to this day but, under the EU constitution, the candidate for president was to have been selected after "taking into account" the results of the European elections. In other words, the politics of the person nominated had to reflect the dominant make-up of the parliament, making him a more political animal and, at the same time, restricting the choices available to the member states. Additionally, the candidate had to be approved by parliament not by a simple majority of votes cast but by a majority of members.

These provisions have been transferred into the "reform" treaty, without change. Under the amended Articles 9a and d, the European Council is obliged to take into account the elections to the parliament and the nomination is decided by qualified majority voting. This candidate then has to be elected by the parliament by "a majority of its component members".

By this means, from being a creature of the member states – which had sole authority to decide on who held the office, the president has become a creature of the parliament – the institution of the European Union which, traditionally, has been the most aggressive supporter of political integration.

Through the years, the progression has been in one direction only and this treaty is but another step, draining away the powers of the member states, pulling them into the centre to strengthen the powers of that supreme government of Europe.

And what a perfect illustration this is of the sustained, incremental power grab embodied in the treaty process, a process that has so aptly been called a slow motion coup d'etat.

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The hunting of the constitution

Jens Peter Bonde (or his team) has been hunting out politicians crowing about the rescue of the EU constitution.

Thus, to add to the trawl, we have a whole galaxy of EU parliament notables.

First, we have Alexander Stubb who says, "We have salvaged 99 percent". Stubb is the Finnish conservative, co-coordinator of the biggest political group in the EP (EPP-ED), and former civil servant participating in three different intergovernmental conferences.

Jo Leinen, Chairman of the Constitutional Committee (PSE), crowed: "We kept the substance of the Constitution", Enrique Barón Crespo (also PSE), declared, "We have the same thing, but we regressed for transparency and clearness," and the Green, Gérard Onesta, happily chortled, "It's incredible to see all what they slipped under the carpet!"

Carlos Carnero (PSE) was slightly more guarded: "Formally, it's not a constitution,” he said, "but it's a big step towards the constitution." The great guru Richard Corbett (PSE), ventured: "Technical reforms and democratic reforms have been rescued." And another Green, Johannes Voggenhuber, vice-chairman of the Constitutional Committee, pronounced: "Our political union finally has a Constitution!"

He was joined by (French) Liberal, Jean-Louis Bourlanges, who told the the radio programme "Esprit public", "All the Constitution is there! Nothing is missing!"

Meanwhile, picked up by England Expects is a startling intervention by Jacques Delors, possibly – says EE - the most infamous (and effective) centralising European Commission President.

He has come out in favour of an EU referendum in France. Speaking to France 1 radio (Reported by AFP) he said, "If I was an MP today I would "vote in favour of the compromise", but he is a "supporter of a second referendum to clarify the positions and to ensure that the opposition does not stiffen".

Another mad Frog has also intervened, none other than Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. As author of the original EU constitution, he has, according to The Telegraph confirmed that the negotiating mandate agreed in Brussels was a revival of the old constitution. Also confirming other comment, he added that it had simply become more "complicated".

This is actually on his blog, where we writes: "This text is, in fact, a rerun of a great part of the substance of the constitutional treaty."

And finally … the fragrant Margot Wallström has told a Swedish paper, "It's essentially the same proposal as the old constitution." She was slightly more coy in her official statement but her unofficial pronouncement was backed by the commission's legal service, which helped in the drafting the text. "For the commission the key goal was to save as much as possible from the 2004 text. On reading and rereading the new text, one can safely conclude that most has been preserved," an official said. "The essentials have been retained."

But hey! It's just an amending treaty.

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The last hurrah?

The Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat is telling us in a leader that Germany is facing the same problem in reviving the European Union constitution as a magpie stuck on a tarred roof: when the beak is pulled out, the tail gets stuck.

Finland having just escaped from the maw of the EU presidency, that is an especially poignant comment and the paper's leader-writer is by no means the only one noting that Germany seems to have adopted an extremely difficult task. One wonders why Merkel, with so many other things to entertain and detain her, is so keen to make a rod for her own back.

One also wonders why the "colleagues" are bothering at all for, in the aftermath of the French and Dutch rejection of the constitution, it became very clear that they were pushing on without it and, in many respects, the lack of the document seemed hardly to make any difference to the pace of integration.

With nearly two years elapsed, however, we have actually seen the process of integration stall, with the commission failing to offer any major new initiatives, or "big ideas" in the Delorsian mold.

Furthermore, as a player on the international scene, the EU had been almost totally ineffective. From the slow response to east Asia Tsunami, the failed attempts to constrain Iran's nuclear ambitions and the inability to restrain the genocide in Darfur, the project's famous "soft power" has proved as effective as stale marshmallow.

Then many of the projects which offered the EU a great leap forward seem to have slithered to a halt or are failing to make significant progress. For instance, the European Defence Agency – which was intended to be the proto-European defence ministry – has been forced to operate on a minuscule annual budget, and seem to be going nowhere.

Eurocorps, the wannabe European Army is confined to marginal operations of little political significance that no-one can recall, while the timetable for the European Rapid Reaction Force is slipping, as the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan dominate the headlines – which do not include the EU.

Prestige projects like the Airbus A-380 are going down the pan – possibly followed by the A-400M, about which we reported yesterday. And that includes the EU's Galileo satellite navigation system, as more troubles pile up.

According to About Electronics, delays in commissioning the system are being blamed for delaying the integration of satellite navigation into mobile telephone handsets in Europe, as operators and manufacturers remain uncertain over the deployment schedule for Galileo and the likely quality of its signal.

Then GPS World tells us that the Russian may well be redesigning the electronic architecture of its GLONASS, to permit interoperability with the US Navstar system, allowing the development of cheap handsets utilising both signals – and thereby reducing the utility of Galileo.

And just to rub salt in the wounds, as ballooning costs, bickering over the command centre, doubts even among backers on how it will earn its keep, and problems with the second test satellite weren't enough, Galileo now faces a continued challenge to call itself by its own name.

This is something we reported on way back in January 2005, but now legal proceedings have begun at a district court in Munich, Germany. UK-based Galileo International Technology LLC has filed a lawsuit against the German company Galileo Industries GmbH, headquartered in Ottobrunn.

The district court has already ruled in favour of the British company in a similar dispute and seven other courts are currently involved in settling legal disputes centring on the name Galileo, which appears as part of several other company names. A lawsuit filed against the EU commission (EC) is also ongoing.

Uncertainty over the identity of the name may contribute to the lack of a name for what has been called the Galileo Operating Consortium, or Company, composed of eight European aerospace and defense companies, communications device makers, and satellite manufacturing companies. Formed in 2005 and based in Toulouse, France, it has yet to formally name itself or nominate a chief executive officer. A 20-year funding contract with the European Space Agency and the EU remains in limbo.

From a situation where the constitution didn't actually seem to matter, the European Union as it stands today – at once battered and becalmed – seems to be going nowhere. And, when lost for ideas, the "colleagues" clutch at the nearest passing treaty with the same degree of determination that a heroine addict reaches for the needle.

Thus, despite the difficulties – and the enormous risk of reopening old wounds, with the concomitant risk of rejection – it seems the "colleagues" have little choice but to go for broke - a reflection of weakness rather than strength. With no more guarantee of success than the original attempt, however, this may be the project's last hurrah.

COMMENT THREAD

It ain't Brussels, stoopid!

We (or I) – according to one of our revered forum members - should be killing the fatted calf over the leader in today’s Telegraph, headed, "Brussels will never take no for an answer". We – or so we are told - all have said this for years, "but when the by-far-the-biggest non-redtop endorses it," it is a cause for celebration.

Frankly, I'd sooner slaughter the leader-writer. It is precisely this type of muddle-headed, superficial diatribe that confuses the issue and makes it so hard to progress the debate.

Consider, if you will, the opening offer: "You may be outraged by the EU's declared intention to revive the European constitution. But, if you have been reading these columns over the past 12 months, you will not be surprised."

Leave aside the little bit of self-promotion – you will not be surprised (but much better informed) if you read this blog, not least that the intention is to delay any attempt at reviving the constitution, rather than any confirmed intention to bring it back to life.

The substantive issue here is the use of the "EU". As a generic term, this can mean all sorts of things and we all use it as a convenient short-hand. But, in this context - as the next part of the leader makes clear - the reference is to the "leaders of the 25 member nations". It is they, according to the Telegraph, who "have pledged to ratify the main parts of the document by 2009".

In other words – no, in the exact words – it is not "Brussels", as such that is doing this, but the democratically elected leaders of our own governments who are hatching this tryst. One of those is Tony Blair who, in any case, is unlikely still to be leader in 2009 but, if his successor takes the same line, then our problem lies not in Brussels, but at home.

Further, it is not the "leaders" who ratify treaties – they sign them. Ratification is down to the parliaments, with or without referendums. Leader can propose – parliament disposes.

On the slender basis thus established by our leader-writer, however, he launches off into the stratosphere, telling us that "there is never a Plan B in Brussels; Plan A is simply re-submitted over and over again until it is accepted." That maybe the case, but it may not. At the moment, plan A is actually stalled and there is no sure way of working out what happens next. The "colleagues" are at as much of a loss as everyone else.

To "prove" the point, though, The Telegraph tells us that "with or without formal ratification, most of the policies and institutions proposed by the constitution have been, or are being, enacted anyway: the European Defence Agency, the External Borders Agency, the Human Rights Agency, the EU foreign ministry and diplomatic corps, the European Public Prosecutor, the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the European Space Programme." Therefore, "the EU … is behaving as if the French and Dutch electorates had voted "Yes" and the constitution were already in force."

Errr… no. What is happening is a lot more subtle, and more complex. For sure, we have the European Defence Agency, but this has been set up not as a community institution but as an intergovernmental agency. It reports via Solana to the Council and relies for its existence of voluntary annual subventions from the member states. In terms of the Monnet method, it is an aberration and, to the integrationalist orthodoxy, a dangerous one at that.

Similarly, while the commission is providing administrative support to the External Borders Agency, its "teeth" are supplied by member states and its continued existence depends on co-operation between member states, with the Council at the helm. We do not have a KGB-type force wearing the ring of stars, answerable to Brussels.

The same intergovernmental framework applies to the space programme, again funded by voluntary contributions from member states – which is why the Galileo programme is in so much trouble. The commission would like control but it remains outside its grasp.

We saw the same with the "diplomatic corps", certainly slated as a backdoor attempt to introduce the constitution, and worrying in its own right. But, in the final analysis, the plan relies on the voluntary co-operation of the member states. And, what can be given, can be taken away.

What is happening, therefore, is a subtle but important shift in the very nature of the European Union. While the constitution was supposed to consolidate and extend the powers of the commission, entrenching the Monnet method – even bringing the European Council fully into the institutional structure – its failure has given a boost to the rival and instable process of intergovernmentalism.

In that important respect, therefore, the constitution, as devised, is not being enacted. It is, in strict community terms, being subverted. If the commission president was more versed in the orthodoxies of the Monnet method, alarm bells would be ringing, but Barroso is going with the flow. It has thus been left to former commission president Jacques Delors to accuse member state leaders of driving the Union into its "worst ever crisis". In his own terms, he is right to do so.

From all this though, it is possible to gauge the complexities and subtleties of a game, the nature of which The Telegraph seems to be entirely unaware. In its ignorance, it rehearses the one-dimensional stereotype. "Brussels" it says, behaves this way "because, in short, that is what it has been designed to do."

Thus follows a "Janet and John" dissertation of the basics of the engrenage process – without, of course, that term being used - with a concluding peroration which asks, "How much longer can decent democrats subject themselves to such a system?"

And therein lies the unacknowledged paradox. The system is being hijacked by those self-same "democrats" – our very own leaders, who subject themselves to the system - and increasingly run it - because it suits them. They are our problem, more so as the ways of the Council, which they employ, are even more secretive than those of the commission. Strangely, they are Brussels' problem as well.

COMMENT THREAD

Boring us all to death

A slightly left-of-field question: what have the EU and the anti-EU party, the UK Independence Party – and, to an extent, other political parties - got in common? The answer, it seems to me, is that for each, their favourite occupation is talking about themselves – to the exclusion of practically everything else.

Certainly, this has to be true of the European Union which, we are told, is planning yet another interminable round of navel-gazing for this weekend.

Foreign ministers of the member states are to gather in Klosterneuburg outside Vienna on Saturday, "to brainstorm ways to end the political stalemate over plans for an EU- wide constitution", even though almost all member state leaders say they have already come to the conclusion that it is on ice for the foreseeable future, and with it any prospect of closer European integration.

That hasn't stopped Luxembourg premier Jean-Claude Juncker wailing on German radio that "Europe has lost its bearings”, reiterating that "there is no consensus" on what to do about the constitution.

Needless to say, the meeting is not due to produce any decisions, but one "idea" – which is very far from new - is a proposal to open to the public Council of Minister discussions on new legislation. Another is to bolster cross-border cooperation in fighting crime "by removing national vetoes over EU initiatives", something that should be a real "wow" in Eurosceptic Britain.

Given the drearily repetitive refrains, one is almost nostalgic for the days of "up yours" Delors, wishing for a little spark and controversy. Now, the wonder is whether the "colleagues" are trying to bore us all to death, or whether they are in danger of suffering that fate themselves. Perhaps, though, this is all part of a secret plot, hoping we will all switch off, whence they can get on with building their new superstate.

As for the relevance of the photo – there isn't any. Just a nice pic, nicked from David Rennie's blog.

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