Daniel Hannan MEP: Seven reasons why Conservatives must leave the EPP

Daniel Hannan is an MEP for the South East and blogs at Telegraph.co.uk.

Some of you may find this hard to believe, but I’m going to miss Christopher Beazley. The pro-euro MEP has decided not to seek re-nomination – mainly, he says, because he disagrees with the Conservative Party’s commitment to leave the European People’s Party (EPP) in 2009 and form a new, anti-federalist group in the European Parliament. All Euro-candidates have been asked to sign a statement in support of party policy. A lesser man might have held his nose and signed, or signed with his fingers crossed behind his back; but Chris has behaved with edifying principle. Heaven knows he and I have disagreed over the years. But he has never sought to disguise opinions which he knows to be unpopular with his constituents. Not every politician can make the same boast.

Now is a good moment to remind ourselves of why David Cameron has promised to leave the EPP, and why candidates are being asked to support him.

(1) The European Parliament lacks an Official Opposition
At present, every political alliance in Europe – the Communists, the Socialists, the Liberals, the Greens, the Christian Democrats – supports the euro, the constitution, a common foreign policy and an EU criminal justice system. Indeed, the EPP goes further than the others, demanding a single EU seat at the United Nations, a European army and police force and – my particular favourite, this – a pan-EU income tax to be levied by MEPs. Once there is a mainstream conservative bloc positing a different kind of Europe, the cartel will be broken. From that moment, Euro-federalism will cease to be inevitable, and become one among a series of competing ideas.

(2) Our message must be consistent
“I want Conservatives to be saying the same thing in Westminster, in Brussels and in Strasbourg,” says David Cameron. Spot on. In the past we have suffered electorally – especially at the 2004 European Election, when we got our worst share of the vote since 1832 – because we were thought to be dissembling. We fought Euro-sceptic campaigns in Britain and then, when elected, we scuttled off and sat with the most integrationist group in the chamber.

(3) An independent group will control its own resources
Every political group in the European Parliament receives millions of euros for political activism. Some of this money is passed on to the national parties to allocate as they wish; but a good deal is held back to spend on pan-European campaigns. So what does the EPP spend our money on? You guessed it: campaigns to promote the European Constitution, the Common Agricultural Policy, the Charter of Fundamental Rights and so on. A chunk of money – the money to which Tory MEPs ought to have been entitled – was spent in support of “Yes” campaigners when Sweden voted on the euro. Outside the EPP, we’d be free to create a campaigning machine to promote a completely different vision of Europe: one based on free markets, national independence and the Atlantic Alliance. This, of course, is what the other side fears.

(4) Leaving the EPP will put Conservatives in the mainstream
Nothing – nothing – could be further from the truth than the idea that the only parties outside the EPP are far-Right. The persistence of the notion that “Tory MEPs may end up with Italian fascists” is one of the most successful pieces of black propaganda I’ve ever encountered. No one has ever proposed such a thing and, for what it’s worth, the party that is descended from Mussolini’s, the Alleanza Nazionale, is currently applying to join the EPP. Nor does anyone deny that there were enough respectable parties to form a new group two years ago. This time, there are several more parties in play, including from Romania and Bulgaria, as well as others that have become uncomfortable with their existing affiliations. Giles Chichester, the new Tory leader in Brussels, has appointed Geoffrey Van Orden to help put the new configuration in place. The Brigadier is a Euro-sceptic of the most respectable and moderate sort, liked across the Parliament, and he is confident that the numbers add up.

(5) We mustn’t sit with extremists
Let’s look at some of the supposedly far-Right parties, shall we? Some do, admittedly, say unpleasant things. One of our potential allies, for example, ran election posters showing a gay couple with the slogan “Daddy and Papa? Say No!” Another has had hundreds of its MPs and councillors convicted in fraud cases. A third campaigned against the immigration of some computer programmers from India under the slogan “Children Before Indians”. But here’s the thing: all three of these parties are currently in the EPP. They are, respectively, Forza Italia, the French UMP and the German CDU. High time we found some more moderate partners, I’d say.

(6) British leadership in Europe
Don’t just think of it as leaving the EPP. Think of it as what it really is: leading the crusade for reform in Europe. Let me quote David Cameron again: “I want to apply the modernising approach that I am bringing to the Conservative Party to our approach to Europe. I want us to be the champions of change, optimism and hope in Europe as well as Britain. It is time for a Europe not of deals but of ideals. So we say to the moderate mainstream, who are not satisfied with the EU as it is today: come and join us – we have a future to fight for.” Hard to disagree, no?

(7) Conservatives keep their word
There are not many things an Opposition can do. There are plenty of things it can promise that it would do if it were in power, but precious few it can deliver in the mean time. This is one of them. We need to convince people that we mean what we say, so that when we promise to improve schools, cut taxes, or decentralise power, they have cause to believe us.

Comments

[Luke Douglas-Home]

All very well said Dan - but will Cameron-Hague listen, and do anything? They think the problem (expenditure, size, inward-looking EU) will just go away.

[Sean Fear]

One has no option but to make alliances in the European Parliament with people whose views you find in some way disagreeable.

The views of potential eurosceptic allies outside the EPP, such as Law and Justice, Northern League, Danish Peoples' Party, seem no more extreme to me than the views of some of the europhiles we're already allied with.

[George Hinton]

Well said Dan.
It really is time that the EuroParliament became a tad more democratic than the nodding donkey that it is.
Perhaps you might also campaign against the guillotine policy on debates, which restricts debate AND opposition.

[Alex Deane]

This is an excellent piece and I agree entirely with the arguments in it.

One wonders, given all of them, how it is conceivably justifiable that we have remained in the EPP for so long, and are still in it now, and will be until at least next year - particularly given the seventh point above...

[Harry Day]

As Daniel Hanham was the only MEP not vote for either candidate in the recent Conservative EP leadership elections, does that make him a minority of ONE ?....not a good starting point for forming alliances. If he believes his anti-EPP platform is so mainstream why didn't he stand himself?

[Lindsay Jenkins]

Dan makes good points but is crying in the wilderness.

And speaking of wildernesses, the key issue is what good can anyone do in Strasbourg.

My answer is nothing. I would like to see Dan go for a seat here - an MP. Anything he (and the sadly very few like him) do in Strasbourg merely reinforces the EU by acknowledging its legitimacy.

Is our only future as a province of the EU? Surely not Dan. Yet how can your being in Strasbourg help to get us out of the mess. It can't.

[Lindsay Jenkins]

Dan makes good points but is crying in the wilderness.

And speaking of wildernesses, the key issue is what good can anyone do in Strasbourg.

My answer is nothing. I would like to see Dan go for a seat here - an MP. Anything he (and the sadly very few like him) do in Strasbourg merely reinforces the EU by acknowledging its legitimacy.

Is our only future as a province of the EU? Surely not Dan.

Yet how can your being in Strasbourg help to get us out of the mess.
It can't.

[Mr Angry]

Everything that Dan says is or course totally coprrect. However we don't really need seven more reasons to leave the EPP because we already have one that is the end of that argument. It is that Cameron promised, no equivocation here, he cast iron promised that the Conservatives would leave that quiling organisation. The fact is that he has already broken part of that promise regarding the timing of such departure (he promised to leave within weeks not months and it has now been years) but if he breaks his promise entirely, ignores the wishes of his membership and the electorate, and stays in a eurofederalist grouping, then he and th4e party will lose, and deserve to lose, the support of a great many Conservatives to UKIP and he will deserve to.

Either Cameron is a man of his word fit to govern our nation or he is a man who will say anythign to get elected and then renege on his word which makes him totally unfit to govern anything.

[David Belchamber]

I agree with Lindsay Jenkins at 12.17:

"My answer is nothing. I would like to see Dan go for a seat here - an MP".

Dan has far too much common sense and ability to be wasted any longer on shouting into the wind about the EU.

David Cameron is being extremely idealistic when he says: "I want us to be the champions of change, optimism and hope in Europe as well as Britain".

There was a time a few years ago that he might have persuaded other countries to change the direction of the EU but it is now such a monolithic socialist bureaucratic (and thoroughly undemocratic) monster that it is now beyond hope.

Blair/Brown killed off our last chance by signing up to the EU's new constitution. A referendum on the issue that Labour promised the electorate has been overtaken by events and the only meaningful refrendum now is to stay in or BOO.

[johnC]

'The Brigadier is a Euro-sceptic of the most respectable and moderate sort'

Rather a dangerous juxtaposition of adjectives, implying that 'moderate' = 'respectable'. I would rather be assured that the Brigadier is a firm and unbending Eurosceptic, not given as so many MEPs to say one thing to his constituents and another thing in Brussels. Otherwise, I agree with everything Dan says.
Can he explain what is wrong with just joining the existing right of centre antifederalist Union for Europe of the Nations group ? Which of their members are beyond the pale ?

[Happy Tory]

Spot on, Dan. Only a strong opposition within the European Parliament can solve the problem of democratic deficit in Europe. Let the revolution begin! The sooner the better.

[James Dunlop]

Well Put Dan.

An optimistic analysis of what the conservatives can do to create a new, outward looking, EU.

Even europhiles should welcome the implied movement of the terms of debate. Hitherto we have had a choice between
'The socialist-bureaucratic-antidemocratic EU as is'
OR
'Leaving the EU'

This lead euro-enthusiasts like Timothy Garton-Ash to admit that they wanted support for an EU which was so undemocratic that it failed its own 'membership criteria' (as applied to countries applying to join).

Creating a genuine plurality of 'European visions', in which the french socialist-bureaucratic model competes with a free trading liberal model, will be a great step forward for all but 2 groups, viz.

- Euroskeptics wanting a stalinist 'The worse the better' EU that forces our eventual withdrawal

- Supporters of the Socialist-bureaucratic model who fear giving meaningful choice to the EU electorate.

[Eleanor McHugh]

Do the vast majority of EU voters want to see their nations abolished in favour of this super-entity that the Eurocrats seem intent on constructing? Referenda in recent years on issues such as the single currency suggest that they probably don't, and yet the Parliament which should be reflecting their views seems determinedly Federalist.

The sooner that the European federal project has a concerted opposition in Strasbourg the better for all of us. The Federalist establishment will be forced to explain their vision and the ways in which it will affect national life, and hopefully the people of Europe will reject it in favour of the more open Europe of strong Nation States that so many of us in the Conservative Party believe in.

[Tim Roll-Pickering]

I've always understood the pledge on the EPP to have been that we would transfer to a new group of Eurosceptic conservative free market atlanticists as soon as it could be formed, not that we would pull out immediately even if it meant sitting as an unaligned body. Others may have interpreted this differently - has anyone got the actual text of the pledge, specifically addressing the point (as opposed to a general "we will leave EPP ASAP")?

But I can't help but feel that all this focus on whether or not we sit in the EPP is rather missing a more fundamental point. The EPP is not a Conservative organisation but a Christian Democrat one, and indeed the European Union is very much a Christian Democrat project. Whilst for most Conservatives the EU was always supposed to be about trade as an ends in itself, for many Christian Democrats that is just a means towards the ends of European unity. This goes to the very different roots of the two traditions, creating the irreconcilable. If the EU is a Christian Democrat project and UK conservatives are unable to sit comfortably with Christian Democrats within it, then are we able to sit comfortably within it at all?

[Torygirl]

I agree with Lindsay Jenkins as well. The EU is unreformable so you are wasting your time. Better to march out with head held high and tell them you will no longer take part in this sham parliament.

[Torygirl]

I agree with Lindsay Jenkins as well. The EU is unreformable so you are wasting your time. Better to march out with head held high and tell them you will no longer take part in this sham parliament.

[prziloczek]

Congratulations on another excellent - and extremely well supported - article.
I have myself been bamboozled by the propaganda against leaving the EPP.
Now I shall just refer to this excellent article.

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro-European Conservative]

Let me highlight why Dan Hannan is wrong.

1. He says, "At present, every political alliance in Europe – the Communists, the Socialists, the Liberals, the Greens, the Christian Democrats – supports the euro..."

Why is this a bad thing? Seem like he wants opposition to the Euro for opposition's sake!

2. He rightly points out that "Our message must be consistent". At home, David Cameron is, rightly, trying to make the Party more inclusive and to broaden the Party's appeal. Sitting with homophobes and anti-Semites from Poland and other eastern European countries, as Dan would like, is not consistent with Cameron's aims in the UK.

He goes on,"In the past we have suffered electorally – especially at the 2004 European Election, when we got our worst share of the vote since 1832 – because we were thought to be dissembling. We fought Euro-sceptic campaigns in Britain and then, when elected, we scuttled off and sat with the most integrationist group in the chamber". Is he seriously suggesting that we've lost elections because we were not Euro-sceptic enough? The reversal is true. We lost elections because we were obsessed with Europe and not on improving our public services. People don't know - or care very much - where we sit in the European Parliament.

3. It is a myth to suggest that our MEPs would financially benefit (campaigning-wise) by sitting in a small group or sitting as Independents (with the likes of, I might add, Le Pen and Kilroy-Silk). We actually benefit from sitting in a large grouping, i.e. the EPP.

4. Hannan refuses to tell us who the sensible centre-right parties outside the EPP are. It's because they don't exist. All the major and successful centre-right parties from across Europe are aligned to the EPP. The reason why this new grouping has not taken off is that nobody in their right mind wants to quit the EPP to sit with a bunch of Middle-Englanders and, perhaps, a few unknowns from Romania. I suspect Geoffrey Van Orden knows what the score is but is going to 'try' to seek certain people happy.

5. To portray parties in the EPP, a big tent, as extremists is laughable. Hannan knows full well that the vast majority of parties in the EPP are moderate, sensible and committed to equality across Europe - as set out in the EPP's constitution.

6. I don't quite know what Dan's sixth point actually means. British Conservative MEPs were elected on a manifesto to stay in the EPP for the duration of the Parliament, which ends in 2009. Is this what he means about Conservatives keeping their word?

[Sally Roberts]

Good post, Justin! You are quite right to claim in point 4 that the sensible centre-right parties outside the EPP don't exist - apart from the Czechs who we have on side already! A great deal of hard work was done under the previous leadership to try and secure friends outside the EPP grouping and I doubt whether The Brigadier will have any more success - try as he might - than previous people did.

[Paul Rowlandson]

Dreadful article. Hannan is a pathological anti-European with little or no insight. Very good response by Justin.
I sometimes think a lot of the Colonel Sibthorp Little Englanders won't be happy until we have another fratricidal war. Their belligerence is appalling, and Cameron, an unprincipled cuckoo, repeats what he thinks will go down well with the most primitive elements.

[Martin Cole]

Eleanor McHugh at 15:27 makes the natural mistake of assuming an opposition is acceptable within the Parliament.

It is not allowed, full acceptance of all the EU as it bpresently exists is a condition of mambership.

The Parliament exists to recycle taxpayers funds back to the political parties who are betraying their citizen's democracies.

UKIP MEPs who have now effectively gone native once estimated the value of each MEP as one and a quarter million pounds per year. Other benefits flow from the party grouping system.

A democratic EU would be possible along the Swiss Direct Democracy lines with present internet technology, but this is not what the European ruling elites want.

Mr Hannan knows all this, Mr Roger Helmer is the best Tory MEP at explaining the truth. I suggest readers here subscribe to his regular news letter from Strasbourg.

[Sally Roberts]

"I sometimes think a lot of the Colonel Sibthorp Little Englanders won't be happy until we have another fratricidal war."

Paul Rowlandson, I fear you are right on that score although calling David Cameron an "unprincipled cuckoo" is quite out of order!

Martin Cole - Oh dear, you are not one of these conspiracy theorists are you who thinks that the EU is run by the Illuminati or people who shape-shift into lizards?

[Andrew Lilico]

Of *course* we must leave the EPP! We've made ourselves ridiculous by staying in it so long. We've almost nothing in common with these other parties on issues to which the EU is relevant - that two parties both call themselves "centre right" doesn't mean they agree. Cameron was quite right to promise to do this - a demand of Eurosceptics for years - though the fact that we've taken so long to get about it is perhaps indicative of some of the practical difficulties it will imply (losing funding, losing committee positions, and so on).

Furthermore, if we are privileged enough to win the General Election, and (assuming Brown puts through the Treaty/Constitution) Cameron and Hague go off on day 3 to renegotiate our relationship with the rest of the EU, our position in the EPP (which is already ridiculous) will become quite untenable - indeed, I suspect we might even be kicked out!

[Buckinghamshire Tory]

Would it be so bad if we were kicked out?

We could still be a part of the economic community, like Norway and Iceland.

[Andrew Lilico]

I meant kicked out of the EPP, not of the EU!

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro-European Conservative]

Norway, by the way, is becoming increasingly pro-European. It's only a matter of time before they join, too.

[Sean Fear]

"Why is this a bad thing? Seem like he wants opposition to the Euro for opposition's sake"

Failure to challenge bad ideas is always a bad thing.

"Sitting with homophobes and anti-Semites from Poland and other eastern European countries, as Dan would like , is not consistent with Cameron's aims in the UK."

But sitting alongside homophobes and racists, so long as they're *europhile* homophobes and racists is consistent with Cameron's aims?

"We actually benefit from sitting in a large grouping, i.e. the EPP."

I've yet to see those benefits materialise.

"I suspect Geoffrey Van Orden knows what the score is but is going to 'try' to seek certain people happy"

Geoffrey van Orden has made it absolutely plain that he wants to leave the EPP. In fact, he is enthusiastic about it.

"Norway, by the way, is becoming increasingly pro-European. It's only a matter of time before they join, too."

Given that they've voted No, twice, in referenda, I'd say that's wishful thinking on your part.

Face it, Justin, the Pro-Euro Conservatives won 1.1% of the vote in 1999, and their support hasn't risen since.

[Sean Fear]

"and Cameron, an unprincipled cuckoo, repeats what he thinks will go down well with the most primitive elements. "

Cameron is simply adhering to his commitment at the time he stood as Leader.

[Buckinghamshire Tory]

"Norway, by the way, is becoming increasingly pro-European. It's only a matter of time before they join, too."

No, that is not correct.
First of all, the latest Norwegian opinion polls show that Norwegians are increasingly anti-EU.
Second of all, Norway will not apply for a EU-membership for a long time. Simply because a debate about the EU would destabilise the current center-left government greatly.
The Norwegian Right is not especially interested in a debate either, since that would make it even harder for them to piece together a government after the election in 2009.

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro-European Conservative]

The result from Norway (on joining the EU) in 1994: 52.2% (yes) 47.8% - very close indeed.

Norway's North Sea oil and gas revenues are due to tail off soon and growth is expected to weaken. Norway may yet join us..

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro-European Conservative]

Sean, you won't be surprised to note that I disagree with you. The Pro-European Conservative Party was a breakaway party from the official Conservative Party (you know how it was formed). They did indeed score a paltry 1.1% in the 1999 Euro elections. 98.9% of pro-European Tories actually voted for the official Conservatives. Yes, we're in a minority (although I suspect more Tories would vote to stay in the EU than not - as in '75) but we're still a force to be reckoned with.

[Gubbins]

Hinchcliffe - The Pro-EU Conservative Party amalgamated into the Lib Dems a few years ago. Can I suggest you do the same?

[Sally Roberts]

Gubbins - you may disagree vehemently with people's views but whatever happened to the Conservative Party being a "broad church"?!! A little courtesy might be in order?

[Gubbins]

Roberts - I don't mind the party being a broad church composed of fiscal, social and national security conservatives. I mind the party turning into a marquee sweeping in everything to the right of Michael Meacher.

[Sally Roberts]

Gubbins - I am so sorry I don't know your first name otherwise I would have been polite enough to address you by it - marquees can be great fun...some of the best parties I have attended have been in marquees - but then perhaps you don't get out much?

[Sally Roberts]

Sorry for that, Editor! Perhaps it was a little childish and personal - but really there are some very rude people about.

[Editor]

I'll delete further comments that aren't about Dan's article.

[Sally Roberts]

I do not blame you in the slightest, Tim!

[Sally Roberts]

Anyway - to get back to Mr Hannan's article... I think we will just have to wait and see what, if anything, The Esteemed Brigadier manages to put before his colleagues! I wait with bated breath.

[Malcolm Dunn]

As I've said before if Geoffrey can't find suitable allies it's better that we sit on our own. The EPP brings no benefits at all to Britain and for us to remain inside it is unprincipled and counter-productive.

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro-European Conservative]

So, Malcolm, you want us to literally sit next to the likes of Le Pen and Kilroy-Silk? That's what we would have to do if we sat as Independents!

[Tim Roll-Pickering]

And sitting on the opposition benches at Westminsters means we sit on the same benches as George Galloway. It's just one of those things.

But happening to sit next to those sorts is a very different thing from caucusing with them.

[David Parker]

Justin Hinchcliffe, Unlike remaining within the EPP; as an Independent just because you may sit beside someone unpalatable does not mean that you have to share or endorse their views.
Like Tim Roll Pickering I would also like to see the original wording of Cameron's promise to leave the EPP, I seem to remember that,at the time, it sounded pretty definite and unequivocal.
Sally Roberts, a "broad church" is one thing, but this does imply as sharing of the same principles of faith, even though we may differ upon details.However, the difference between those who believe in a government dedicated to a sovereign independent nation state and those who believe in the supremacy of a supra- national government abroad is so great that I seriously doubt that we share the same faith.

[Mike Turvey]

Much of the most common criticism of the our membership of the EPP-ED is belied by the following passage from the RULES OF PROCEDURE OF THE GROUP OF THE EUROPEAN PEOPLE'S PARTY(CHRISTIAN-DEMOCRATS)AND EUROPEAN DEMOCRATS IN THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT:

"5. Members of the European Parliament may become allied members of the Group if they subscribe to the basic policies of the Group of the European People's Party and European Democrats and if they accept the Rules of Procedure (European Democrats).

The Members under this Article have the right to promote and develop their distinct views on constitutional and institutional issues in relation to the future of Europe."

http://www.epp-ed.eu/group/docs/rules/rules-procedure2007_en.doc

This is taken from the 2006 version but is, as far as I can tell, unchanged from the earlier 2003 version. The Conservative Party has always been able to have its own policy on constitutional and institutional issues...

[John Wilkin]

Justin, the EP chamber is so rarely packed that the number of occasions when our MEPs would 'literally' need to sit next to anyone would be few and far between.

[Justin Hinchcliffe - Pro European Conservative]

Mike, spot on.

[Dale]

This is pathetic, the facts of the matter are that david cameron pledged to withdraw the tory meps from the epp and the vast majority of grassroots want the tory meps to leave the epp. The eurosceptics have won the battle, thats the end, it has been decided, the people have spoken and no matter how many times sally roberts and justin hinchciffe try tell us otherwise the country, party, and leadership are all in agreement.

BTW Has anyone told justin the libdems policy on europe is by far their least popular policy?

[Malcolm Dunn]

Oh Justin, for once give yourr brain a chance before opening your mouth. I really don't give a toss who our MEPs sit next to.
I do care very much however that we do not support a group whose ideas and interests are so bad for Britain. That is exactly why our party leader has pledged to get us out of it. He's right as usual, you're wrong.

[Roger Helmer]

Dan is absolutely right, as always, and this piece is even more important than many articles he writes. As the only Conservative MEP who is NOT also in the EPP, I think of myself as a pioneer of David Cameron's policy to leave it.

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

What hubris, Roger.