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This from Open Europe

Blair: “the argument in favour of an open Europe is winning”

Tony Blair will give a speech in Oxford this evening which will attempt to defend his EU policies as Prime Minister. It is reported that he will insist that he has achieved his ambition of enhancing Britain’s clout in the EU through his policy of “positive engagement”. He will argue that Britain is now in “a much better place” on Europe than when Labour took office, saying it is a “pivotal country” at the heart of a new consensus over the need to adopt economic reforms.

The Independent reports that he will say: “Europe has emerged from its darkened room. It has a new generation of leaders. A new consensus is forming. Yes, there is still a debate to be had, but the argument in favour of an open Europe is winning… there’s never been a better time to be optimistic in Europe or enthusiastic about Britain’s part in it.”

He will also signal that there is a “new generation” of European leaders, such as Angela Merkel, who are united around the need to pursue economic reform. The FT reports that Downing Street is confident that the two principal competitors for the French presidency in 2007 - Nicolas Sarkozy and Dominique De Villepin - are increasingly focused on the economic reform agenda. The Times reports that Blair will claim today that Europe is now a “more comfortable place for Britain”, and that there is agreement on the new priorities of jobs, security, energy supply and migration.

Blair will, however, acknowledge that he has not secured the “big bang” change in Britain’s relationship with Europe that he aimed for but will blame this on Britain’s “Eurosceptic-dominated” newspapers.

Comment: It is pretty difficult to see how the current state of play in Europe can be spun into a success for Tony Blair or the Foreign Office: world trade talks in crisis because of EU protectionism; a budget deal under which Britain will pay £10.5 billion a year into a totally unreformed EU budget; an increase in the EU regulatory burden (on the Govt’s own figures) of at least £30 billion since mid-1998 alone; a disastrous drift to a single EU defence which has wasted more than £20 billion duplicating NATO assets and lost Britain access to US technology; and above all - no halt whatsoever in the EU drive towards deeper integration. The only argument in France and Germany about the EU Constitution is now when and how to bring it back – not if.

Blair’s suggestion that Sarkozy and Villepin are going to be “reform allies” in Europe calls to mind all the other people the FCO claimed were going to be our new partners: Angela Merkel, Romano Prodi, “The Blair-Berlusconi-Aznar axis” – even Jacques Chirac at first. Hopefully the team of Brown, Straw and Ed Balls are not under the comforting illusion that we are currently “winning the argument” in Europe…

The next big crunch in Europe is in 18 months’ time: the confluence of the French elections, the German Presidency of the EU, and a number of difficult decisions about enlargement. Hopefully Britain will have a new approach by then.

Times FT Telegraph Scotsman
Sarkozy on Europe Villepin on Europe