Britain has everything it wants from the European Union.
Yet if David Cameron, the British prime minister, is reelected in the general election to be held on May 7, he intends to renegotiate the terms of Britain’s EU membership. More importantly, he will then hold a referendum before the end of 2017 on whether the UK should remain in the EU.
Either way, Cameron has set Britain on a collision course with its European allies and with the United States. This is shortsighted and dangerous for all concerned.
With unprecedented threats facing Europe and global challenges that the continent cannot afford to shirk, this is the time for even closer security, defense, and economic cooperation among all 28 member states—not for thoughts about leaving the EU. A British exit would do untold damage to the integrity and credibility of the EU.
Despite such a looming catastrophe, Cameron has been playing a pernicious game with Europe since taking his Conservative Party to power in 2010. He has used every opportunity to lambast Brussels and its bureaucracy in the hope of boosting his popularity back home.
At the same time, he has insulted hundreds of thousands of hardworking citizens from Eastern and Central Europe who moved to Britain after their countries joined the EU in 2004. Numerous studies have shown how these immigrants have contributed to Britain’s economy and have not milked the country’s social services, as Cameron has so often implied.
Cameron’s anti-immigrant rhetoric was intended to keep the populist and nationalist UK Independence Party, or UKIP, at bay. Instead, the prime minister’s words have had the contrary effect, with damaging consequences. UKIP has eaten into Cameron’s support. And Britain’s reputation as an open and welcoming country for motivated immigrants has been tarnished—except, of course, when it comes to Russian oligarchs.
Cameron has set #Britain on a collision course with its European allies and with the US.Tweet This
Indeed, looking back, it is surprising that Britain ever joined the EU. When it did so in 1973 under a Conservative prime minister, London already had an ambiguous relationship with Brussels. That ambiguity was a trait continued by Labour governments. Over the years, successive British governments have quarreled with Brussels, mostly over the competences of the European Commission, the EU’s executive.
Yet in retrospect, the sovereignty of the member states has not been undermined, contrary to what British and other Euroskeptics across Europe would argue. Defense, health, education, and tax policy are still national competences, while the internal market and competition are EU responsibilities. Without these two fundamental powers, the EU would be an oxymoron.
Moreover, Britain has negotiated many opt-outs. It is not a member of the eurozone. It is not a member of the passport-free Schengen zone. It has a special rebate on its contribution to the EU budget. And it is no longer part of the EU’s justice and home affairs policies.
Tellingly, as Europe faces increasing terrorist threats, Britain has chosen to remain in the European Arrest Warrant system, which allows member states to speed up the extradition of any EU citizen without a political decision. London has chosen to support the European Arrest Warrant precisely because it is in Britain’s interests.
More than ever, #Britain and the other 27 member states have an interest in strengthening the EU.Tweet This
And that is exactly why the UK should remain in the EU: it is in the country’s interests, and Europe’s, to do so. More than ever, Britain and the other 27 member states have an interest in strengthening the EU. The security and economic threats facing the EU, as well as the transatlantic relationship, are too great for any one EU country to go it alone.
It is naive to believe that Britain’s intelligence services or judicial authorities can deal with cybersecurity, cross-border terrorism, and all kinds of trafficking without closer cooperation with the country’s European allies.
It is naive, too, to believe that Britain or other member states can withstand Chinese or Russian attempts at corporate takeovers without the support of the European Commission’s powerful competition arm. As Britain and other EU countries indulge in lucrative bilateral deals with Beijing and Moscow, both China and Russia are adept at playing off the member states against each other.
Yet without the EU’s competition authorities, Russia would have been able to build the South Stream gas pipeline across the Black Sea. That project, which was later abandoned, would have enabled Russia to control large swaths of the gas market in Southeastern Europe.
Cameron has ducked these issues, even though there is a greater need than ever for more competition, more open markets, and closer cooperation to deal with the immense security threats facing Europe. Instead, Cameron has turned Britain to look inward at a time when it should be doing the opposite.
Britain’s introspection is not about the country trying to come to terms with the collapse of empire. That is long past. It is about a British government willfully allowing its influence in Europe to slip away for populist, short-term gains. And even though many EU countries, particularly Germany, do not want Britain to leave Europe, it is hard to see German Chancellor Angela Merkel rushing to rescue whichever party wins on May 7.
Comments(5)
As a Briton I find it incredibly dispiriting that Cameron - a moderate conservative and capable man on the domestic scene - has frittered away the UK's political capital amongst our allies. A referendum on the EU may be necessary to resolve what has become a persistent, if minority concern within the country, but what is the benefit of alienating the President of the Commission or allies in central and eastern Europe? A more profound challenge to the national interest is the risk that the UK will hold a referendum with England voting one way and Scotland, Wales or NI voting the other stoking major separatist tensions. Ultimately Mr Cameron finds himself in a position whereby he regards picking occasional fights with the EU to placate the right of his party, as an acceptable trade for their support in maintaining the coalition and thus himself in power. It is an understandable political calculus but the long term geopolitical consequences for the UK could be profound.
It seems that that your idea to maintain membership to a flawed EU at any price has thrown the fundamentals of democracy and common sense, if you had any, out of the window. From what you are saying if a Scottish majority, which could be less than 3 million Scots, decides in a UK wide referendum that the UK stays in the EU despite the vast majority of the rest of the UK population of 59+ million voting the other way then we stay in the EU just to please the Scots. I cannot see that going down very well. Fortunately for the UK we have the world's best constitution, that is an unwritten one, this basically means that it only takes the Westminster Parliament to pass one bill and we are free from the EU's outdated tentacles.
Spot on, Judy! OMG!, what has happened to Great Britain's great intellectual, reasoning heritage? Number 1: the (truly) awful editorial policies in the UK media (morphia by "infotainment") Number 2: the wilful misrepresentation by many UK politicians of Great Britain's position in the modern world It doesn't have to be this way. I hope that my adopted country (I am one of those dreadful EU migrants) will not walk off the stage in misdirected rage. Should I vote for the SNP (I live in Scotland)? - might a SNP supported minority Conservative government pull back from the brink? Alas, despite his past business experience in PR, I am doubtful of David Cameron's leadership qualities now. The choice: ruin the economic rebound by voting in Labour or commit global "harakiri" by voting in the Conservatives again? The choice stinks.
The only way to gain influence in the EU is to hand over ever more of your income to them. Once the money dries up your are irrelevant, the EU worships money especially other peoples money. The single market doesn't work, utilities & services aren't fully integrated into it. It is like telling the Germans that Cars aren't included in it, that is the effect on the UK. The EU will not open up to free trade agreements with our traditional trading zones & hits us with duties for having the temerity to buy something as simple as a clove of Garlic from China. If food is better from Canada, Australia, New Zealand etc why should be have to contribute to the subsidies of medieval farming practices in Europe? On matters of defense, the EU has shown it has no wish to build interoperable systems & hardware that would work with our NATO allies preferring instead to protect its own manufacturing base with projects that weaken the ability of the Union to project power. The French were supposed to be building an Aircraft Carrier to UK Spec using our specification & design (Queen Elizabeth Class Carriers) so that our forces would be interoperable, where is it? They were too busy designing & building hardware for our biggest adversary. The EU now wants to indulge itself building Drones that can be bought off the shelf, again designing & building systems that aren't interoperable with NATO's biggest security provider. The EU is a hindrance to international trade & has outlived its usefulness, the EURO is an enslavement mechanism to tie countries unwillingly together, it is creating chaos, the only countries that are growing creating jobs are those that have large amounts of trade outside or the Eurozone.
"Britain has everything it wants from the European Union" Sorry, but it doesn't... It wants to be able to limit immigration to a manageable number. A net of over half a million in the last 12 months is not sustainable. It does not want, and cant afford, a net outlay of 40 million pounds a day to prop up the poor governance of the peripheral countries. You miss the point that the EU exit is possible only because the people of the UK are dissatisfied with the corruption and self serving nature of the EU. We should not have to tolerate that. So, the EU has to reform...fast...or we should leave. You should be critical of the EU for failing to get its house in order, not critical of those who refuse to put up with it any longer.
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