The FT has a headline this morning that says:
Eurosceptic ministers set to disown EU deal
Cameron calls cabinet showdown hours after planned signing
That I can recall a Prime Minister has never spent so much time on negotiating a deal that he claims good for the country and at the behest of his party to return home to chair a meeting that he knows will lead to its public rejection by members of his own cabinet.
If this is leadership, I am bemused.
If this is good politics, I am equally bemused.
And I know this is not good for the country.
For all its faults, and they are many, the EU was a relatively minor issue in UK politics and should have been left to stay that way. Instead it is now centre stage. Chaos and uncertainty will ensue, before and after any referendum. And we can be quite sure little will change in the EU as a result but much might in this country if we leave.
The decent into a chaos we never needed, do not deserve, and will definitely regret, has begun.
David Cameron may, ultimately, be a victim of it. The man who thought he was a unionist may ultimately tear this country apart, and leave it internationally shredded, in a way few could have imagined possible. But he will not be the ultimate victim in that case. There will be many more of those.
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Of all the epithets I thought I would apply to Cameron, ‘Politically Inept’ was never one; and yet, international politics is a void, an intellectual vacuum, a critical policy component of government that is, somehow, peripheral and irrelevant in latter-day Conservatism.
This is why Cameron is playing the politics so badly: there is no agenda, and no narrative for a coherent case that would drive a coherent and effective cabinet – for or against, or even in a workable accommodation with division.
I think the EU is another red herring diversion that takes the public’s eye of the real ball which is austerity economics. There is huge confusion over the EU because the broad public don’t distinguish between the EU and the EMU and, yet again, politicians are doing their best to make sure this ISN’T clarified.
The only reason for staying in, in my view, is for human rights legislation and environmental standards. ironically, austerity policies (World bank/IMF/ECB) fly in the face of both of these so they whole project is riddled with contradiction and is like an organism committing self harm.
As with the banking crisis there is no attempt at genuine elucidation of the maim issues.
Austerity economics along with the IMF/World Bank/ECB are not the only fly’s in the ointment when it comes to contradicting the European Project.
TTIP will drive a coach and horses through every other aspect of the Project which is worthwhile. And yet it is the institutions and the politicians of the EC who are negotiating and accepting this. Which means that not only has the UK State and establishment been captured by narrow vested interests but also the EC Project and it’s structures and processes. Swapping one set of poiticians for another gang will, as in the UK, not change this.
Such a state of affairs calls into question the Project itself. Can it be brought back on track even at this late stage or is it too far gone? TTIP when enacted will lock in a particular form of chaos in which it will be next to impossible whilever the structures, processes and personnel who have put it into place remain in place. This suggests that piecemeal reform will not resolve this undesirable situation and the only option other than total disintegration (there have been reports and rumblings that a British exit might well trigger a similar exit by other member states) is to systematically tear it down and rebuild from scratch.
Perhaps it would be easier to do so from a starting point of initial chaos rather than the locked in chaos which will ensue as the projects goals and aims and reason for being are sacrificed totally on the alter of TTIP?
Certainly a British exit would have major domestic repercussions as a majority in Scotland argue to secede to stay in the EU. Already we are seeing arguments being made in the Unionist media by people who only a short time ago were adamant that Scotland could not be admitted to the EU as an independent nation state, that Scotland could stay in the EU if England, Wales and Northern Ireland pulled out. Such a notion is not going to gain any traction which would likely result in a constitutional crisis and the break up of the other federal union project which began in the eighteenth century.
I wonder if you can still get a Anderson Shelter on ebay?
Only models and posters. However, I don’t know that we need be concerned by how things look today as a new political and financial landscape will form post-crash – which appears to have begun – and things will no doubt look very different then.
On maturer reflection, my previous support for Ed Milliband has metamorphosed into a quite angry condemnatory take on his leadership of the Labour Party, for his failure to rebut the Tory lies on the economy – to the detriment, not just of his Party, but the whole country, which, as Simon notes, remains mired in destructive ignorance on the economy and the EU – an ignorance that has now ossified into “incontrovertible fact”, calling on immense efforts to shift.
However, on THAT issue, the EU, Milliband was both right in refusing a referendum, and prophetic on the chaos and uncertainty that would ensue. Would that he could have shown the same sureness of touch on the economy, as Dave and his chums might not then now have been in Government, or certainly not in majority Government, which is proving so deleterious to the common good.
Cameron is between a rock and a hard place… Wall Street and much of the City are insisting that he keeps the UK in the EU whereas 70% (?) of the Conservative Party back withdrawal. If nothing else, this demonstrates where Cameron’s real loyalties lie.
It is a very odd predicament that Cameron has created for himself to appease those in the Conservative party and more importantly the more extreme right wing Tory voters, who were being swayed by the nationalist UKIP arguments.
The EU, especially the Eurozone members, have a much greater problem of restructuring the EU fiscal and monetary system if they are to stand a chance of holding the whole thing together without any real democratic accountability over the key financial decisions of each country.
I expect we will need another referendum in the next few years anyway as there will undoubtedly be major treaty change required if the EU is not to completely implode from the periphery inwards.
He’s in a pickle really, after decades of the tories and the right wing press using Europe as a scapegoat for all of our problems and blowing out of proportion the real problems with Europe, he now has to try and convince people that Europe is good for us on a whole (which it is).
All of this wasted time, money, diplomatic strength… all for petty internal conservative party politics. Let alone the potential damage to our economy (which could trigger more global problems) if he looses the referendum!
The proposal for an in/out EU referendum was always a distraction to keep the eurosceptic wing of the Conservative party in line up to the general election, and the so-called concessions that Cameron was seeking were always window dressing. Cameron needed (well, still needs) to manufacture a negotiating success so he can campaign to stay in, like he always wanted.
The idea that the UK would be better on its own, outside the EU, with a fax democracy like Norway, or bilateral deals replicating the EU rules, like Switzerland, is just fanciful.
Cameron won’t be a victim, whatever happens. He has said he will resign before the next general election anyway.
Because as different nations we are so diverse in outlook, the class structure here in the UK is one that the diehard conservatives long for, as it was, they always look back to the glory days. To leave the EU with all its developing faults will rekindle their passion. The harmonisation of everything admirable from our neighbours to improve many lives has not quite come off, rather it Is a gravy train from where I am sitting. Chaos is just the word to sum it up. And thrown in the mix is the dreadful plight of war torn people struggling to live a peaceful life. I think the EU is a failed experiment, missed its way, good Idea gone horribly wrong. Yanis Varafoukis, ( ? Spelling) now has other ideas. Just keep talking, negotiating, like with someone’s medication, stop it all when contra indications and side effects do more harm, then reappraise. Simples.