Norman Tebbit’s comments urging Tory supporters to abandon their party at the European elections for the likes of Libertas and UKIP were, on the one hand, unsurprising – Tebbit has always been unremittingly hostile to the EU. His comments, and the fact that no sanctions will be taken against him despite his disloyalty to his party, demonstrate that the Tory civil war over Europe continues unabated.
Cameron has gone further than any previous Tory leader in pursuing a eurosceptic agenda. This included appointing William Hague as Shadow Foreign Secretary, refusing to rule out a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty even if the treaty has already been ratified by every EU country and come into force, and finally making good on his pledge to withdraw Tory MEPs from the mainstream centre-right group (the European People’s Party (EPP)) in the European parliament. But for the likes of Dan Hannan (the new darling of American neo-cons after his diatribe against the NHS) and dinosaurs like Norman Tebbit this still is not enough – they will only be satisfied when the Tory party pledges to withdraw Britain from the EU.
On the other side remain a number of Tory moderates, including over half their MEPs, and the likes of Ken Clarke, David Curry and Ian Taylor in Westminster. In Brussels, Caroline Jackson and Christopher Beazley have been particularly vocal in their criticism of Cameron’s stance. Jackson last week described the decision to withdraw from the EPP as “pathetic” while Beazley used his last speech to tell parliament that Cameron was wrong in attempting to “rip up 30 years of work by British Tory pro-Europeans.” They are not the only ones. Senior Tories such as Malcolm Harbour, Struan Stevenson and Edward McMillan Scott, are bitterly opposed to their leader’s machinations, with McMillan Scott describing the alternatives to EPP membership as “frankly barking”. We can expect these divisions to continue.
The Conservatives’ divisions on Europe will leave them isolated from the political mainstream. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy have already signalled that they will not co-operate with them, while Sweden’s Conservative Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt (a man who has also attempted to de-contaminate his party’s brand without changing the substance) has urged Cameron to reverse his stance on the EPP, warning that “Cameron will definitely need his friends in Europe. You can’t be on your own.”
All of this is actually damaging to Britain’s interests. The European elections do matter – the European parliament is a co-legislator on about 80 per cent of European legislation, and will be 100 per cent if the Lisbon Treaty is ratified – on vital matters such as tackling climate change and consumer protection. Indeed, European legislation is, almost exclusively, shaped by the three main political groups in the parliament: the EPP, the Socialist group of which Labour MEPs are members, and the Liberals. In forming a rag-bag group including the likes of the (equally divided) Czech Civic Democrats, the homophobic Polish Law and Justice party and an assortment of right-wing mavericks, the Tories will effectively marginalise themselves. As Tony Blair once said to other British Eurosceptic MEPs “you sit with our country’s flag; but you do not represent our country’s interest”.
For the last twenty years, the two main British parties, and the Lib Dems since 1999, have punched above their weight in the European parliament. But by putting political symbolism ahead of the power to influence legislation, the Tory delegation will be MEPs in name only.