Sell Yer Euros

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Anger over EU summit failure

BRUSSELS, Belgium -- European Union nations are struggling to find a way forward after the failure of a two-day summit that produced neither a budget for the years ahead, nor a clear sign that the EU constitution will ever be ratified.

Leaders began attributing blame the moment they emerged from their fruitless talks in the early hours of Saturday.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, whose country takes over the EU's six-month rotating presidency on July 1 from Luxembourg, was the main target.

Summit host Jean Claude Juncker, Luxembourg's prime minister, pointedly told reporters he would make sure to miss Blair outlining his plans for the EU when he addresses the European Parliament on Thursday.

"As that is the national day of Luxembourg, I will not be listening," he said.

In two days of acrimonious negotiations, the 25 EU leaders haggled over their common spending plans for the 2007-2013 period. They failed to reach a deal.

Nor did they present a clear blueprint to save a proposed EU constitution recently rejected by voters in France and the Netherlands.

Juncker said the damage caused was profound. In weeks ahead, EU diplomats and others "will tell you that Europe is not in crisis," he said after the summit collapsed. "It is in a deep crisis."

Britain was criticized for postponing its referendum on the EU constitution after French and Dutch voters rejected it. Luxembourg, Denmark and others are now also expected to postpone their votes, throwing the charter's fate into more uncertainty.

The budget debacle centered on Britain's refusal to surrender an annual rebate to reimburse it for its outsized payments to the EU coffers.

Blair's demand to link any discussion of the rebate to overall reform of the EU's agricultural subsidies -- of which France is the main beneficiary -- scuttled a spending deal.

The budget requires the approval of all 25 EU member states, so it cannot go into force without Britain's approval.

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw accused other EU leaders of wanting a European Union "trapped in the past" and said Britain had the support of at least four other EU states. He told the BBC that European leaders face a "fundamental change (that) no one in Europe can dodge."

Former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher won Britain's EU rebate in the 1980s, arguing that part of the money her country paid into the EU's coffers should be refunded.

She argued that Britain received fewer benefits than other large countries, particularly France, which reaps more agricultural subsidies.

Blair has said he is only willing to discuss changing the rebate as part of a more in-depth overhaul of EU finances, including its common agricultural policy.

British officials have said it eats up too much of the EU's budget.

this + failure of constituion, will slam the euros value (I predict)
good for me, cuz ill be going abroad soon.

[Dinner]

Juncker is such a muppet.

[DanS]

Tempest in a teacup as far as the Euro economy goes. Keep yer Euros, if you're selling on the "crisis." Sell them if you're looking at the overall strength of the Euro economy and interest rates.

[Spiffor]

Juncker isn't a muppet. He's the only guy in Europe who says things as they are

[Dinner]

Britain was criticized for postponing its referendum on the EU constitution after French and Dutch voters rejected it. Luxembourg, Denmark and others are now also expected to postpone their votes, throwing the charter's fate into more uncertainty.

The last suggestion for a constitution is dead so why waste more money when the result is already known? Europe can still have a good constitution which solves the EU's structural problems but the last Constitution won't be the anwser. Instead they should get a simple document which stripes nations of their veto, institutes majority rule voting (in most cases but reserving a 2/3 majority in certain cases), enshrines direct elections instead of political appointments for all EU offices, and promotes Europe wide institutions over the national government. This can be done but it can't be done in a document which is thousands of pages long and which ibcludes a laundry list of totally unrelated items.

It needs to be simple, short, and understandable to everyone. Do that and people will like it.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Instead they should get a simple document which stripes nations of their veto, institutes majority rule voting (in most cases but reserving a 2/3 majority in certain cases), enshrines direct elections instead of political appointments for all EU offices, and promotes Europe wide institutions over the national government.

Indeed we should

This can be done but it can't be done in a...

...EU that encompasses Britain, Poland, Denmark, Sweden, etc... Many people are not at all ready to sacrifice their sovereignty.

It needs to be simple, short, and understandable to everyone. Do that and people will like it.

I'm not too sure that people will vote yes even to a short, concise and efficient constitution, for two things.

1. For the EU to be efficient, it must be more supranational, and it must rely less on bargainings between countries. As such, for the EU to be more efficient, national sovereignty will suffer. This will be loathed in many countries.

2. The referenda would have many external factors, and the people won't only judge the constitution. However, the campaigns (in Euro-enthusiastic countries) will have a lower risk of failure indeed, because the devil is in the details, and a short constitution wouldn't have details.

[BeBMan]

I don't understand why all referenda cannot be made at one single day Europe-wide. As it now stand the results of one referendum have too much influence. There were media reports here that in early may Germans agreed to the con to ca. 60%, but only some weeks later its only 42% (after the French and Dutch decisions). Of course we had not a referendum anyway, but this shows how volatile voters can be on such important decisions.....

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Juncker isn't a muppet. He's the only guy in Europe who says things as they are

He runs around parroting Chirac and trying to light the fire of anti-UK hysteria. His recent diatribe which included large doses of blaming the budget impasse on the UK then claiming the UK was doing it because it didn't want a united Europe was just rubbish. Juncker's whining about the rest of Europe canceling referendums on the now dead constitution were equally junk.

The UK, Sweden, and the Netherlands were willing to roll up their sleeves and solve the budget problem in a comprehensive way but Chirac, along with his muppet Junckers, didn’t want to play ball. Instead they resorted to name calling and pretending the sky was falling. This is simply a budget argument and lots of organizations have budget arguments without the whole thing disintegrating. Eventually the politicians from the countries which are refusing to talk about the budget will stop being a road block and will agree to meet those who do want to solve the budget problem. It will happen but how long it will take depends upon how obstinent certain politicians want to be.

[Spiffor]

BeBro:

I think there are two main reasons for a EU-wide referendum:

1. Technicalities and convenience. IIRC, your own constitution bans referenda. This comes from the trauma of hitler's rise to power. For Germany to accept a referendum would need a serious change in the political culture. Not easy. I suppose some other countries aren't trusting of referenda too.

2. Sovereignty. The big bone of contention. What if 70% of the Brits say No, but the text passes anyway because it has the majority support in other European countries? Many European countries would be very very reluctant to have something decided by the others.

I hope we have a Europe-wide referendum one day, and I hope that such referenda will be a relatively usual way to amend the constitution. However, I'm not holding my breath. Too many sovereignists for it to work out.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Oerdin
He runs around parroting Chirac and trying to light the fire of anti-UK hysteria. His recent diatribe which included large doses of blaming the budget impasse on the UK then claiming the UK was doing it because it didn't want a united Europe was just rubbish.

However, it's perfectly true. We're witnessing a brutal hit against the principle of quiet consensus. In the latest years, reaching consensus has been increasingly frustrating, but possible. Now, we're at the crossroads, and consensus will simply not work anymore.

The EU as we know it is in crisis. The budget row is a mere collateral damage of a much more serious symptom: the consensus isn't working.

[CapTVK]

Yes, sell more euros. It will help exports. The effective US/Euro trading rate is almost at parity.

[BeBMan]

Yeah, I know the problems, I mean - until we get a real Europe-wide referendum - then they could at least make all national referenda (in those countries which hold them) at the same day Europe-wide. IMO it would at least remove the problem that the vote in one country could influence the decision in the next countries.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Spiffor

This can be done but it can't be done in a...

...EU that encompasses Britain, Poland, Denmark, Sweden, etc... Many people are not at all ready to sacrifice their sovereignty.

What you are saying is you only want countries which won't challenge your political views to be in it. The others do want a union though they want to preserve their independence in certain areas. This is understandable and can be accomidated in a federal system but you won't have a highly centralized federal state like France. Instead certain foreign policy decisions, much of tax policy, and even most of military policy will have to remain with the national governments. The Federal state will be the junior member but it will exist and pass binding laws without having to worry about national vetos. Anti-market socialists on the continent will have to become more practical in order to get measures passed while free marketeers will have to accept that a limited amount of additional government involvement.

In the end it will work but politicians, like Chirac, who never seem to do anything useful and instead just run around trying antagonize his partners in order to increase his popularity at home will not be able to bring this about. Germany too will need a more practical leader in the mold of Helmet Kohl but who actually has the backbone to make tough choices.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Germany too will need a more practical leader in the mold of Helmet Kohl but who actually has the backbone to make tough choices.

Kohl hardly ever made hard choices. A large part of our problems today is due to 16 years Kohl without structural reforms in social swystems etc. Thats why he was voted out finally, since after the unification the problems became worse quickly. He handled the unification (foreign-politics-wise) as such excellent, but failed miserably to reach what we call the "inner unity" of Germany (economy, social politics etc.). In domestic affairs the later Kohl years were just lost years for Germany.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Oerdin
What you are saying is you only want countries which won't challenge your political views to be in it. The others do want a union though they want to preserve their independence in certain areas. This is understandable and can be accomidated in a federal system but you won't have a highly centralized federal state like France. Instead certain foreign policy decisions, much of tax policy, and even most of military policy will have to remain with the national governments. The Federal state will be the junior member but it will exist and pass binding laws without having to worry about national vetos. Anti-market socialists on the continent will have to become more practical in order to get measures passed while free marketeers will have to accept that a limited amount of additional government involvement.

I'm afraid you don't understand the problem. The problem is not so much a question of agreement/disagreement on policies (though it doesn't help). The problem is to what extent the countries want to lose their sovereignty.

There are only a few areas of policy where the member-States have lost their sovereignty to supranational institutions. Trade policy is one, and it was fairly difficult to make it accepted (despite the fact that it only makes sense to pool trade policy in a common market). Monetary policy is another one, for the Eurozone countries, and it was extremely difficult to have it accepted in some places. Britain definitely rejects the Euro, and Sweden recently voted against joining it. A strong anti-Euro resentment remains in Euro countries, notably in the Netherlands.

If we made the EU supranational on plenty of matters (such as the EU's budget), you'd have a major opposition from plenty of countries, because the populations in these countries think that these decisions must be met by their country, but not by the Brussels Eurocrats.

For the sake of comparison with the US, remember that you had a whole civil war over the question of federation vs confederation. This is the question we'll be forced to sort out at one moment.