ConservativeHome's Bournemouth 2006 Conference blog

Simon Chapman's message to Euro-realists: The MER can work – but it needs your support

When David Cameron and William Hague announced that the Conservative Party would wait until 2009 to leave the EPP they also announced that they were establishing a new organisation, the Movement for European Reform (MER) to promote a new centre-right vision for a flexible modern and open EU.

Euro-realists, bruised by what they saw as a broken pledge, have been sceptical about the MER. They point to the ED (the Conservative part of the current EPP-ED grouping) which was supposed to achieve the same things. One MEP told me at the time:

“The ED ended up with no officers, no staff, no meetings, no budget, no policies, nothing.  It produced a couple of half-hearted leaflets and a logo - nothing more.  I would like to believe that the MER will do better - but I doubt it.”

David Cameron gave the job of making the MER work to Graham Brady (who, as Euro-historians may recall, was as one of our youngest candidates amongst those Conservatives who included a personal pledge never to join the Euro in his 1997 election material). This week saw the first steps: the MER has been formally launched with its own website, and with public support on the main conference platform from William Hague, Timothy Kirkhope (Conservative MEP group leader) and Jan Zharadil from the Czech ODJ party.

I spent some time with Graham yesterday morning to ask him about the MER. He was keen to emphasise that, whilst there is an obvious linkage with the new group that the Conservatives will establish in 2009, he sees this as a broader and more important initiative. The MER’s object is to build relationships between politicians, parties, opinion-formers, business people and private individuals across the EU and even beyond.

They will come together to challenge the failed orthodoxies on which the EU is currently based and generate a new vision and institutional architecture that will enable the EU effectively to serve the peoples of its member states. Membership is open to people in the EU, EEA and accession countries. It is not limited to potential partners for 2009. Politicians from countries seeking to join the EU will find in the MER an assurance that the ever-close union model is not the only show in town. 

How will it work in practice? As yet there is no detailed budget or business plan. The good news is that this is Graham Brady’s first priority:

“the critical next step is getting the financial resources in place – it is essential to make this fly that we attract its own budget with permanent staff and organisers.” 

Initial events in London and Prague are being planned.

Graham was insistent that lessons have been learned from the ED experience. The MER is a serious and concerted attempt to establish a broad coalition of support for a new Europe. So what should Euro-realists do?

Let us remember that Hans-Gert Poetttering, Chairman of the EPP-ED group, spoke at a fringe meeting on Monday night here in Bournemouth. There are those in our party who, despite David Cameron’s pledge in July that "the agreement to form a new group is not an aspiration, it is a guarantee - and it will be delivered", still believe that the Conservative Party should remain in the EPP.

They are unlikely to do much to promote the MER. Their view is that the political arithmetic will be the same in 2009 as it is in 2006 – if it was difficult to establish a new group now nothing will have changed to make that easier in 2009.

Brady’s answer to that is that the party could have started the new group now, but that it chose to respect the request of our Czech colleagues. There is a broader point. If the MER is properly resourced and supported it will be a vehicle to set out a fresh and compelling vision for a 21st century EU that will attract new partners and colleagues.

Euro-realists have the contacts, the experience and (in some cases) the financial resources that the MER needs to succeed. Its prospects will be diminished without their whole-hearted support.

The stakes are very high. The EU desperately requires a new direction. For the Conservative Party, the row over the new grouping cannot be allowed to resurrect itself in the run up to the European (and probable General) election in 2009.

If Euro-realists can overcome their suspicion and make the MER succeed they will do their cause and the Conservative party a considerable service. If they don’t support the MER, who else will?

Simon Chapman: The best moment of the conference

I don’t mean the funniest, the most sliver-tongued oratory, the most effectively staged, or any of the other things we might sometimes mean by “best”. I mean it in the old-fashioned Buchan-esque sense of good and virtue; this was the “best” in that it was the moment that the party can be most proud of.

It came in the Foreign Affairs debate on Tuesday afternoon, when Zoya Phan spoke to the conference. She is in her early 20s. Her homeland is Burma, and she is of the Karen people. She told us of the day in 1995 when as a girl of 13 she awoke to find her village under attack by the Burmese army. She saw her friends and neighbours shot and her village demolished. She and her family fled into the jungle to hide and then survive.

That very day, she told us, a British business delegation flew into Rangoon to sign trade agreements with the same Burmese government that had done this to her and her people. There have been many other similar deals since then. The British government has done nothing to prevent British companies from helping to sustain a regime bent on genocide of the Karen. When, she asked, will the British government intervene and impose trade sanctions on the Burmese government? When will the international community take notice and the action? How many more of her people need to die? The Burmese government is continuing its attacks aimed to achieve the extermination of the Karen, and governments and some of our major NGOs are conspicuous by their failure to act effectively.

Zoya’s message was straightforward: the promotion of human rights and commitment to democracy is not about cultural imperialism; it is about her right, and the right of the Karen people and all those who face similar persecution to live in freedom without the risk of waking up one morning to see their families massacred and their homes destroyed.

There is immense power in the courage of Zoya Phan and the simplicity with which she lays claim to the same freedoms that we in the West are too often too jaded to value. Rightly she received a standing ovation. And next? The very least we can do is to support her in her campaign and demand immediate action from our own government.

Many other important speeches will be given this week. But this one will not be surpassed. I hope the Party will post a transcript of what she said on its website.

Simon Chapman: One of the Conservative Party's best-kept secrets

There are many well-kept secrets at Westminster, most of them concealed for less than laudable reasons. The work of the Conservative Party’s International Office has been described to me several times this week as “the Party’s best-kept secret”.

It shouldn’t be – because the work it does is entirely for the good. Nobody tries to keep it secret (conspiracy enthusiasts should look elsewhere): it’s just that in today’s publicity-ravenous political environment, if you don’t talk much about what you do, it tends to become a secret by default.

So, whilst huge attention has rightly been paid to John McCain’s platform appearance, rather less notice has been given to the centre-right politicians from 29 nations about the world who have come to Bournemouth this week, thanks to the International Office.

The International Office is funded through the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, which was founded by the last Conservative government in 1994. The Foundation’s driving objective is to build democratic capacity in emerging nations throughout the world.

It does this by channelling funds to all three main political parties to enable them to support and encourage sister organisations in countries where people are trying to birth democracy into life.

In the past the International Office has worked in Africa and Eastern Europe, working with parties in places like Poland, Slovenia, Serbia, Mozambique Uganda and Tanzania. Ghana has been a notable success story, with a centre-right party now forming the government.

Gary Streeter was appointed to chair the International Office by David Cameron. Under his guidance its work is now shifting focus to concentrate more on nations east of Europe stretching into the caucuses. Over the next five to ten years, he hopes to extend activities further into central Asia.

Ukraine and Belarus are high on his current list, and I met him fresh from a meeting with Belarus opposistion parties, who are waiting for the president Alexander Lukashenko, to call the next elections.

The International Office provides more than moral support. It funds training, equipment and advice. However it does not seek to re-create the Westminster model of democracy, insisting that the strategy to build democratic institutions be set by the organisations it is helping.

The politicians gathered in Bournemouth are here to learn from us - they are interested in campaign techniques, policy debates, ideas, in seeing democracy in action – and to network. Here, in safety, they can meet colleagues from about the world who face the same barriers to democracy and reform that they do – physical intimidation, imprisonment, corruption, and abuse of power being amongst them –share experiences, and build mutual support.

There is a global interest in this: building mature democracies in unstable regions benefits everyone’s security. Gary Streeter acknowledges that this is a slow and difficult business, but his passion for it is unmistakable.

He is planning to bring the International Office’s activities further into the light, and will be producing a DVD for next year’s party conference. He cites Francis Maude as a great encouragement. Francis: here’s to that DVD being a highlight of the conference’s main agenda next year.

Simon Chapman: Fox puts energy security at heart of defence and foreign policy

Had Liam Fox remained in the leadership race last October, the next speech that he would have delivered would have been on British energy policy. This is now becoming the central theme of his tenure as Shadow Secretary of State for Defence. In the summer he gave a speech at Chatham House, since published by the Party in the pamphlet “Over a Barrel”, in which he set out the need for Britain to develop a comprehensive energy strategy, based on 3 components: diversity of fuel; diversity of geographical supply; security structures to guarantee their safe transport. The West’s reliance on some of the world’s most unstable regions for the mineral resources that its prosperity depends on it a clear strategic threat.

Liam is now using the party conference to expand upon his message. He told the Bow Group on Sunday night that the West’s very addiction to oil and gas is Funding the Threat to its long-term strategic security:

“I want to begin by focusing on a different consequence of our addiction to oil and the security implications that result from it.

We are all too familiar with the fact that recent years have seen substantial rises in the price of crude. What is seldom discussed is the cumulative wealth shift that this represents, how it is being spent and the foreign and security policy implications that flow from it.

Let me begin with a few numbers. In the past five years Europe alone has pumped $49bn into the economy of Iran and an astonishing $232bn into the former Soviet Union, mainly Russia for crude oil alone. This does not include the financial transfers resulting from gas or petroleum product sales. Of these two examples, at a national level, Germany has contributed $54bn to Russia while Italy handed $10.1bn to Iran. The global figures are, of course, much greater still.

In both Russia and Iran this windfall has been used to finance military buildup. In other words we in the West find ourselves in a security Catch-22. Our dependence on oil means that we cannot avoid paying whatever price is demanded of us. That in turn produces huge financial flows out of our economies into those oil producers, some of whom may be hostile to us. They in turn use this to finance a defence build up. In other words, our addiction to oil results in us funding the potential threat against us and our interests. There is, in addition, the consequence that there is little incentive for a state like Iran to reduce international tension as greater uncertainty will inflate the oil price and keep revenues high.

Our inability to wean ourselves off our oil habit may be providing us with more immediate threats to our security and wellbeing than the effects that climate change may bring.”

Fox laid out some of the figures: Iranian defence spending has increased from $5.9 billion in 2003 to £8.5 billion in 2006. Russian defence spending is set to double over the same period. Each of Russia’s 4 main fleets is set to receive 5 frigates over the next 15-20 years. Russia is negotiating with Syria to return its Black Sea  fleet to the Mediterranean.

In answers to questions, Fox said that he is establishing a non-partisan expert review group to assess the extent of the risk that is being presented. He is considering the idea of establishing a supra-national grouping of energy consumers, based on the NATO model, to identify common interests and develop joint strategy. At the same time, we need to ensure that we have a broad and diverse range of energy supplies available. Oil gas coal nuclear and renewables all need to be part of the equation. None should be allowed to dominate at the expense of the others.

Conference-goers who missed the Bow Group last night can hear Liam Fox again on this theme tonight at Politeia – 6.00 pm at the Marsham Court Hotel. A pdf of the speech is available here. This is one of the most substantial and important contributions to the fringe in this or any year.