ANALYSIS:British prime minister may have lit a fuse that threatens the UK's very place in the EU
SOMETIMES THE French are the gift that keeps on giving. This week saw a 24-hour display of fury by French leaders demanding that the UK should be the one to lose its triple-A status and not France.
For David Cameron, having the French incandescent is not unwelcome at the end of a week when he has tapped into the latent Euroscepticism of the English, if not the Scots or the Welsh – though doubts about the EU can be found among them too with little effort.
Cameron would deserve congratulations if his current position was the result of a thought-out strategy.
Instead it has been marked by cack-handed negotiation, along with a less than clear idea of where the UK’s longer-term interests lie.
He enjoys the clarity that sometimes comes only with ignorance. He does not understand the continentals much and does not particularly want to, even if, unlike some of the feral types in his ranks, he does not bear them any ill-will.
Despite all the assertions to the contrary, he has not bought one extra ounce of protection for the City of London since most of the legislation from Brussels affecting it will be decided in the end by qualified majority voting.
One week ago he was on the edge of the EU, claiming that the EU-26 could not hold meetings in the Justus Lipsius building across the road from the Berlaymont to negotiate an inter-governmental agreement between them.
Now the British are to be involved in the technical discussions needed to get the ball rolling, and perhaps much more, accepting – and this is not insignificant – a talks invitation directly from the hands of the European Council’s secretariat.
Cameron’s original action was greeted hysterically: as a Henry V Agincourt moment by Eurosceptics, even though they became more doubtful as the week progressed; or as the destruction of 200 years of British foreign policy, in the words of Tony Blair’s former adviser Jonathan Powell.
In truth it is neither. The accusation that the UK had scuppered a plan that would save the euro is a nonsense since many of those who sat with Cameron are now unsure about what it was that they agreed. Months of negotiations lie ahead.
Many euro zone countries will have issues with the creation of permanent rules for external budgetary oversight. So, too, will those who are not in the euro zone but due to join it.
In the end, Sweden and Denmark, and perhaps more, may join the UK, assuming, of course, that the euro zone and the EU have the luxury of almost four months for negotiations and months more for ratification.
And Ireland will not be alone in opposing France’s demands for a common corporate tax base, if not a common rate. And the idea that labour market reforms have anything to do with saving the euro – also a French idea – is bordering on the laughable.
Whether Cameron has acted in the UK’s best interests is uncertain. However, what is undeniable is that he has lit a fuse that threatens the UK’s very place in the EU if his Eurosceptics push him into demanding concessions in the months ahead. So far that does not look likely.
Throughout the week Cameron was careful not to throw red meat to those who want withdrawal from, or a Swiss-style relationship with, the EU, telling the Commons that “we want to be in the EU” – a remark that was greeted in silence by his backbenchers.
Seven days on, his Eurosceptics still suspect him, but they know that he has, for now, won the “air war”. The narrative that has gone out to a disengaged British public is that Cameron has stuck two fingers up to the Europeans.
Equally, the majority do not want to quit the EU, even if they would like more distance from it. For now his Eurosceptics will carefully note a number of points. First, the Conservatives are back in the lead in the opinion polls, despite all the bad economic news, and Labour’s Ed Miliband has had a really bad week.
Meanwhile, the UK Independence Party’s gallop has been frustrated – something that might be important in the 2014 European Parliament elections, though, frankly, there may be no point in even thinking that far ahead.
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has been seen by voters as ineffectual, first appearing to welcome the outcome of the Brussels summit talks before sharply going into reverse once he tested the wind among his own people. In the end he did not do very much, apart from damaging his own reputation, by petulantly staying away on Monday from the Commons for Cameron’s summit report to MPs.
In politics there are days when one must sit and bear the abuse. Looking at Thursday’s Feltham byelection result that saw a Labour win and a fall in the Conservative share of the vote, but not a disastrous one given the climate, one Conservative MP was able to muse contentedly.
“It’s the perfect result for us. Good enough to keep Miliband in place and good enough to keep Clegg in place. Right where we want them,” he said.
The new year will tell if British politicians will continue to enjoy the luxury of looking at life through domestic eyes.
Mark Hennessy is London Editor