Gary Titley, MEP - "The EU After the French and Dutch Constitutional Referenda"

This is the text of a talk given by Heaton & Lostock Branch member Gary Titley, MEP and Leader of the British Labour Group in the European Parliament at the Party's Branch meeting on 2nd September 2005.

Gary began by saying a few words about Robin Cook who he'd worked very closely with for many years. Gary had at one time been his European Parliamentary Private Secretary. He said that Robin's death was a great loss for the Party; he had been a phenomenal Parliamentarian, an intellectual giant able to take in huge amounts of information very quickly, digest and understand it and explain it to people in simple terms. This was no better shown than when he had only a few hours to read the Scott enquiry into the Matrix Churchill affair and floored the Tories to whom it had been available for days.

Gary added that in 1997, due to Robin, Labour had a very positive European policy, as Foreign Secretary he introduced a code of conduct for arms exports, he became President of the European Socialists organisation and completely reformed and revitalised it. But despite doing all of these things he really was a "man of the people" who cared passionately for the poor and those in need. Despite resigning from the Government in his own inimitable style over Iraq he was very loyally Labour and campaigned tirelessly in this year's general election. Gary said that he had been privileged to attend Robin's funeral and he paid tribute to the eulogy delivered by Gordon Brown.

Returning to things European, Gary said that Britain currently holds the Presidency of the EU Council of Ministers, which moves around the member states every six months. Therefore the UK is in charge of driving through the business during that period, including a great deal left over from the previous Presidency.

One advantage of holding the Presidency is that it gives the host country a chance to "showcase" itself and its policies, for example there will be a meeting of the EU Finance Ministers in Manchester next week. At the same we have to take a more neutral role in the discussions. The UK has, at the same time, the Presidency of the G8 countries and a theme in both organisations is "make poverty history". So far we have managed to persuade EU states to increase aid to the developing world by 50%.

Gary said that the job of the rotating Presidency is a difficult thing because it's only for six months and this isn't long enough. The proposed EU Constitution calls for a full time president who would be in office for 2½ years at a time and this would be better.

The main issues being dealt with are "make poverty history", talks on world trade with a meeting to reform trade rules in Hong Kong during November, economic reform and better regulation in the EU. There is a big agenda on justice and home affairs, cross border activity, people trafficking, illegal immigration and asylum. There are still problems to be resolved in the Balkans, especially in Croatia/Serbia there are big summits coming up with India, China and Latin America and a huge amount of work to be done on development in the Mediterranean area.

The recent London terrorist attacks have highlighted the need for intra-European cooperation, policing, data retention and ensuring that data collected remains available for up to two years.

The EU has also had to deal with the question of the Constitutional Treaty (the "Constitution"). So far 12 countries have ratified it but two have not (France and The Netherlands, of course) and it must be unanimously approved before it can be adopted. The French and the Dutch didn't vote "no" because they didn't like the Treaty itself but because they didn't like their governments and because of such a huge amount of misleading information about what it was supposed to do. For example, the French left claimed that it would make abortion illegal, which is rubbish.

So there were serious political issues, and are in other countries too, and popular mistrust of politics and politicians. Globalisation is a good thing but it can make people feel insecure and this makes them protectionist and isolationist. However, globalisation can only be dealt with by international action. Countries that do "go it alone" tend to stagnate and don't develop, e.g. the Republic of Ireland until the 1960s.

One of the current problems concerns textile imports from China but it was agreed 10 years ago that protection for the textile industry would end. But those European countries with substantial textile industries have not been able to meet the challenge of their markets being opened up and demanded quotas and these were eventually agreed with the Chinese. However, they were agreed too late to stop the retailers and wholesalers ordering Chinese made garments for the winter season and so the warehouses are full of them until something can be sorted out.

Gary referred to a TV debate between French President Chirac and a group of young people during the Constitutional Treaty referendum. He failed completely not only to convince them that the treaty is a good thing but showed what a huge gap there is between a lot of people of his generation and the next generation of voters. There has been a whole generation of European leaders who have worked all their lives to prevent another European war, because they have experienced one, but those of the younger generation take peace for granted and want something much different from their politicians.

The benefits of the EU are also taken for granted by most of its citizens, e.g. deregulation of the airlines which has enable all of us to travel so much more cheaply in Europe, the setting up of a single mobile phone system (the US has three or four), open borders for travel and many other things. A truck travelling from Bolton to Turkey now takes two days less for the journey because of the opening up of the EU borders.

A favourite theme of governments seems to be that if it's good and it works it was our idea, if it's bad and it doesn't then it's the EU's fault, e.g. the "one eyed lorry driver" issue (see http://www.cec.org.uk/press/myths/myth32.htm). The key thing the EU has to do regarding the Constitutional Treaty is to present it better. It's not a constitution in the way that many countries have constitutions, rather it's simply a rule book for the EU and who, in any organisation, is very interested in the rule book?

France thinks that the EU is great for France but the French have to realise that France is not the EU and it must reform economically. We must stop thinking that everything the EU does is a federalist conspiracy against our nation state. The CAP must be tackled in an honest way, for example.

Gary went on to say that of all the world's international bodies - the UN, NATO, WTO, WHO, etc. the EU has been the most successful. In the EU, if countries agree to do something then they are usually legally bound to do it and will suffer consequences if they don't. In the UN resolutions are easily passed but just as easily ignored.

In the EU, economic prosperity is imperative and this has to go hand in hand with social justice. It's not the case that we can only have economic efficiency if wages are driven down, workers' conditions made worse, their protections eroded, etc. The UK is doing it correctly, with support for families, the unemployed, etc. There are 20 million unemployed in Europe and Germany and France, being two of the biggest countries, are suffering worst.

Gary said that we must also have an open society. People must be free to join and leave our society. We must reject the philosophy of the right who want to put up barriers and make Europe a fortified island; but this must be done with fairness and justice. When Tony Blair came to the Council of Ministers to launch Britain's Presidency he completely "wowed" them by talking about how Europe must go forward. This is a key moment for the EU, there a huge challenges that must be confronted and dealt with.

The budget for the EU has also to be sorted out. It's actually not as big as people think - £80 billion when social security spending in the UK is £110 billion. Individual countries' contributions are capped at 1.24% of gross national income but less than that (actually ~1.1%) is actually spent. However, the bigger countries, UK, Germany and France, want to reduce it to 1% but that will have a big impact and damage the Union.

The CAP is 40% of the budget and the UK government says that it should be radically reformed but we're already going through a big reform of agriculture. Therefore it's very difficult for the British government to talk about not approving the EU's budget unless the CAP is further changed.

Gary's talk was followed by a discussion and questions:

The Chair thanked Gary for attending the meeting and the members for their interest and contributions. He declared the meeting closed at 9:30 pm and John thanked him and Anne for hosting it and for their hospitality. The meeting was followed by an informal buffet.

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