GORDON BROWN delivered his most pro-European speech to date as he sought to gain transatlantic consensus ahead of next week’s G20 summit.

Addressing the European parliament yesterday on the first day of a diplomatic offensive in the run-up to next week’s summit, the British prime minister lavished praise on the European Union – but was rebuked for his rhetorical protectionism.

His address came as Barack Obama appealed to leaders of the G20 countries to follow the US lead by taking action to stimulate their economies. “We are living through a time of global economic challenges that cannot be met by half-measures or the isolated efforts of any nation,” the US president wrote in a column in leading newspapers.

Mr Brown’s call for a further international stimulus effort was in contrast to calls at home to avoid a second fiscal boost.

He said the 27-member bloc was “uniquely placed to lead the world”, with old continental divisions healed to create “only one Europe – our home Europe”.

Mr Brown said Britain’s place was “not in Europe’s slipstream but firmly in its mainstream”.

The rhetoric, what officials dubbed a “deliberate echo” of Mr Brown’s overtures to the US Congress earlier this month, was in contrast to his earlier, sceptical approach to Brussels.

His speech came on the eve of a trip to New York where he will address business leaders before heading to South America.

Mr Brown emphasised his belief that the new Obama administration marked a rare opportunity for global agreement.

“Never in recent years have we had an American leadership so keen at all levels to co-operate with Europe,” he said.

Joseph Daul, chairman of the European parliament’s centre-right EPP group, attacked Mr Brown over his 2007 pledge of “British jobs for British workers”. The French MEP warned such phrases risked “picking a scab on the wound of dangerous nationalism”.

The sharp criticism clashed with Mr Brown’s calls for Europe to avoid the “defeatism, retreat and fear” of protectionism.

Officials suggested his passionate defence of open markets was targeted at “covert” barriers, such as France’s support for its car industry, as well as open breaches of world trade accords.

Mr Brown’s call for a united continent to lead a “new era of heightened co-operation between Europe and America” stemmed from more than a desire to create dividing lines with his political opponents at home.

The British prime minister has invested significant political capital in the G20 summit and will need at least a token show of pan-European support to be able to claim a success.

British officials yesterday tried to play down expectations that next Thursday’s meeting would deliver concrete, quantitative commitments. “The test of it will be what happens in the following months,” an official said. “We’re not expecting countries to use the summit to make domestic announcements.”

British frustration with such “domestic announcements” – notably Germany’s resistance to a further fiscal stimulus – spilled over in briefings to journalists. “The G20 is about much, much more than the German fiscal policy,” an official said. “For domestic political purposes, it suits Angela Merkel to downplay the size of her fiscal stimulus.”

Mr Brown insisted the “biggest fiscal stimulus the world has ever agreed” was already being implemented.