EU treaty negotiations

What’s in the new version of the constitutional treaty?

Any new constitutional treaty is certain to include the “core” institutional elements from the original version of the Constitution: a powerful new EU President; a new EU Foreign Minister who would ‘automatically’ speak for Britain at the UN; and a new voting system which would reduce the UK’s voting strength by about 30%.
 
France has indicated on numerous occasions that these three demands are absolute preconditions for any agreement, and the UK seems prepared to accept these changes.
 
This is despite the fact that the UK was defeated during the set-up of both the EU President and the EU Foreign Minister. At that time, the Government clearly saw elements of the changes that were being proposed as being against the national interest, but, as with the original Constitution, the Government now seems ready to accept both, and defend their inclusion.

If an EU Foreign Minister appears in the same form as the original Constitutional Treaty national vetoes in several areas of foreign policy would be abolished. The original version of the Constitution proposed that votes on policies or actions proposed by the EU Foreign Minister would not be subject to national vetoes. This would represent a substantial shift in power from member states to the EU. The UK Government strongly opposed the inclusion of majority voting on foreign policy in the old EU Constitution. Jack Straw said that this clause was "simply unacceptable", but ended up rolling over and accepting it anyway.

The EU Foreign Minister would also have an automatic right to speak on the UK’s behalf in key international meetings like the UN security council. The original version of the Constitution said that “When the Union has defined a position on a subject which is on the United Nations Security Council’s agenda, those Member States which sit on the Security Council shall request that the Union Minister for Foreign Affairs be asked to present the Union's position.” The UK asked for this to be removed, but later gave in, and allowed it to be included.

An EU President would fundamentally change the lawmaking process in Brussels. Instead of new laws being negotiated between the supranational Commission and a national head of Government (with a vested interest in protecting the rights of member states), negotiations would in future take place between one independent Brussels institution and another. Furthermore, EU federalists see the President as a stepping stone to a US-style President of Europe. The author of the original Constitutional Treaty, Valery Giscard d’Estaing, suggested that the new President of the Council will later be merged with the President of the Commission, and be directly elected. Nicolas Sarkozy has also recently backed making the President directly elected. During the negotiations on the Constitution Jack Straw said the UK “would have preferred to have explicit separation of those two posts”. The UK Government tried to block an amendment which allows the two posts to be merged, but later gave way.

The proposed new voting system (separate from the issue of vetoes) would slash Britain’s ability to block legislation by a third; this is a clear a transfer of power. Even pro-euro groups like the Centre for European Reform have admitted that under the new system “those opposing a law would find it slightly harder to block it.”

In fact it would mean a radical 30% cut in the UK’s power to block damaging EU laws. Even just looking at the proposals that are currently in the pipeline, we can see that less power would mean trouble for the UK - never mind anything unpleasant that might be further down the line. The UK and a few other liberal states are currently blocking the Temporary Agency Workers Directive, which would give temporary workers the same rights as permanent workers. The UK and other countries are blocking moves to restrict the UK’s individual opt-out from the 48 hour working week – which would cost £9bn per year according to the DTI.
 
Because the negotiations are taking place completely behind closed doors it is difficult to know what else might appear. For example, there have been some suggestions that the European Court of Justice might gain jurisdiction over issues like justice and home affairs for the first time – a move resisted by successive UK governments since 1992. This could be even worse than giving up the veto over crime and justice. If criminal law was moved to qualified majority voting, the UK could at least try to persuade other member states to help it block things it was opposed to. But when the ECJ makes a ruling, there is simply no come-back at all.
 

To read Open Europe’s analysis of the new version of the constitutional treaty, click here:  http://www.openeurope.org.uk/research/newtreaty.pdf

Blow for Government as CBI refuses to back new constitutional treaty

At a meeting this week CBI Director General Richard Lambert said that the CBI would not take sides in the debate about the new constitutional treaty.  He said that he had discussed the issue with CBI members around the country, and, “If they think of treaty change at all, they think of it more in terms of risks than opportunities. They see few potential benefits for business and some potential hazards.”

He said, “The decisions to be taken over the weekend – if a deal is struck among the member states – then those decisions will be intensely political in character and there is no political consensus in British business about what kind of trade-offs and compromises might be acceptable next weekend, or about how far Mr Blair and Mr Brown could go without promising a referendum.”

He said that: “some business people ask the question: do we need these treaties anyway? The failure of the draft Constitution has not had catastrophic consequences... The institutional framework continues to operate, the European Court has not collapsed into chaos, laws get passed, decisions get made. So the question people ask is: isn’t this all just a total waste of time, a distraction from the real big issues which the Union has to face: the current failing trade round, budget reform, energy security and climate change.” He noted that “The conclusion is that there is a window of opportunity here – but it’s not as a result of treaty change, but through the shifting courses of European politics.”

The announcement is a blow to the Government, who had hoped that the CBI would campaign for the new text. But given that the new version of the text would still cut Britain’s power to block legislation by 30%, and inevitably mean even more costly EU regulation – it is not surprising that the CBI members have little zeal for the new version of the constitutional treaty.

Getting ready to campaign for a vote: how you can help

We believe that in the modern world decisions should be made at the local level - close to the people they affect. The last thing we want is to give even more power to remote EU officials who are not accountable to anyone. But the EU just keeps trying to grab more and more powers, no matter how many times people say "no". We need a vote to make Europe's politicians finally listen to the people - and sort out the failings of the EU.

The new constitutional treaty seems certain to be another step in the wrong direction. It will be more of the same, consolidating the current failings of the EU, rather than introducing the reforms that Europe desperately needs.

Open Europe will be pressing to make sure that people are given the vote they were promised. We will be working to make the case against the new treaty in every region.

If you would like to help please contact our Campaigns Manager: claudia@openeurope.org.uk