1) David Cameron’s acceptance in Brussels yesterday that Britain would place no obstacles in the next stage of European development is the biggest U-turn by a British prime minister in the decades-long tortuous history of the UK’s relationship with Europe. Six weeks ago Cameron came back to cheers from Eurosceptic MPs and press as he promised to block what the rest of Europe sought to do. Now his 9 December veto is seen as pointless. He has accepted that the rest of Europe will move forward without Britain. On Sunday Iain Duncan Smith told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Britain would veto involvement by the European Court of Justice in oversight of new treaty. Now Cameron has U-turned on that as well.
2) British standing not just in Europe but worldwide suffered greatly in December as a result of Cameron’s short-term posturing. Around the world the linkage between the word ‘isolation’ and ‘British prime minister’ was in the news headlines. In the semiotics of world power ranking this was a disaster. The Financial Times reported that when George Osborne was in China earlier this month he was told that Beijing would lose interest in investing and trading via the UK if London were to become more and more isolated in Europe.
3) To cover up the weakness of his position Cameron has resorted to lecturing the rest of Europe. This chutzpah is met with incredulity. At the World Economic Forum in Davos the prime minister said the currency union between England and Scotland was a success unlike the Euro and Britain was showing the way forward. Europeans looked on in sheer disbelief. Wolfgang Schauble, the second most powerful politician in Germany after Angela Merkel, mocked Cameron openly telling Davos that people should ask for his mobile phone number in order to get advice on how to run their economies. Cameron and Osborne preside over the weakest of the big EU and OECD economies. Zero growth, £1 trillion debt, rising unemployment, a weak debased currency and social unrest exemplified by the August riots do not provide the best of platforms for a British PM to lecture others.
4) Europe has turned into a poison pill for the Tories. It is a major divide with Nick Clegg. David Cameron, William Hague and Iain Duncan Smith spent 15 years telling their followers there was a radiant Eurosceptic future for Britain under a Conservative administration. Now he has to come to terms with a Eurorealist politics as Britain’s economic, trade and global standing depends on influence and engagement with EU member states. It cannot be repeated often enough that the UK exports more to Ireland alone than all the BRIC nations combined. If Britain wants influence in Washington, in south America on the Falklands, at the UN, or when talking to China, Russia, or seeking to press Syria, London is in a much stronger position as part of a united EU than William Hague’s preference for go-it-alone bilateral relationships.
5) Thus Europe will continue to haunt and divide the Conservatives. Liam Fox is positioning himself to re-enter political life as leader of the anti-EU wing of the Tory party. He will have money, an audience and plenty of MPs behind him, The only way Cameron can be saved from his shambles of a contradictory, U-turning, isolationist EU policy and a divided Conservative party is if Labour helps him by drifting to a modified 1980s Euroscepticism-lite politics. Britain as a key IMF member, for example, cannot seek to veto IMF help to troubled Eurozone nations as such solidarity was precisely why the IMF was set up on Keynes’ urging after 1945. It is better to highlight the fact that Cameron is following the austerity, growth-killing policy of the European right. On economics there is no difference between Cameron and Osborne and the leaders of France, Greece, Italy, Spain and Ireland where Osbornomics and 1930s style Treasury orthodoxy applies. A growth focused politics that can win public support is now a priority for the European and global left. Labour should be working with the best economists, policy thinkers in Europe, North America and Australia on shaping such a policy. Hugging the Tories close on rightwing orthodox economics, Euroscepticism, and Europeans living and working in Britain is unlikely to help Labour as thoughts turn in the course of the year to the next election.
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Denis MacShane is MP for Rotherham and a former Europe minister.
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