The image to the right, which is used to promote the EU's African aid policies, was brought to my attention this week by a colleague who had stumbled across it whilst doing research into aid spending.
As well as being immensely patronising, and betraying the EU's love of exactly the kind of imperialism that its supporters so love to claim it counterbalances, the image is one of staggering hypocrisy. Whilst the European Union does distribute aid money, its far more notable impact on Africa is one of huge economic damage.
The Common Agricultural Policy, and the trade barriers that make it possible, do untold harm to millions of farmers who would dearly love to sell their produce to European consumers. It is sickening that while British and other European people are hit by spiralling food prices, a continent of farmers who could provide cheaper goods are effectively barred by massive tariffs from doing so.
This is one area where eurosceptics must take the EU on, and could do so to great effect. Morally, fighting against the protectionism and dumping of subidised produce into African markets that kills large numbers of people and impoverishes millions more is clearly the right thing to do. Strategically it has benefits, too.
There is a lot of manufactured tension between euroscepticism as a supposedly old-fashioned view and the new ideas of a rebranded Conservative Party. When David Cameron urged people not to “bang on about Europe”, he did so on the basis that rejecting eurosceptic politics would cast him as a moderniser.
It is wrong to accept the smear that euroscepticism is inherently old-fashioned our out of date, though. Ironically, one of the new issues the Conservative Party has moved onto instead of euroscepticism is international development and the alleviation of African poverty. Given the devastating impact of Brussels’ trade policies and the CAP, however, the fate of Africa is inextricably linked to the European issue.
Instead of making an artificial choice between being eurosceptic or being in favour of international development, it is essential to be the former in order to be the latter.
This is a big opportunity for the Conservative leadership. They are walking a tightrope: on one side is the urge to take on new issues and continue to brand the Conservative Party as being up to date with the concerns of the 21st century, and on the other is the danger of alienating supposedly old-fashioned grassroots Tories. What better way to keep their balance than by encouraging all Conservatives, new and old, to unite in a common cause against this traditional enemy for new reasons?
