It came out late on Friday, so most journalists would have missed it. Van Rompuy has transmitted to heads of government the results of the Task Force on economic governance. This was, you may remember, the result of ministers kicking certain controversies into the long grass in the summer.
The grass has now been mown. In particular, we can observe how there is a clear call for an increased use of “sanctions” to control government recklessness. We note with particular concern “These sanctions will be first applied to euro area Member States only” (my emphasis), and take the form of an interest-bearing fine. Given the existing net British contribution to the EU budget, and the prospect of voting rights also being suspended, I’m not entirely convinced the co-opted buzzword “progressive” quite fits the bill.
It also, crucially, appears that the Commission seems to believe that enough authority already exists for such sanctions to be applied under the current terms of the treaty, a stance which although highly dubious (even were one to consider the use of the “rubber articles”) is only to be expected given the 'minor democratic difficulties' that seem to accompany treaty change.
There is also this bold assertion, as has already been flagged up by Dan Hannan: “For the new sanctions that will be adopted in secondary legislation, we will move towards qualified reverse majority vote.” This means the Commission gets its way unless a blocking majority votes against it – the threshold for the majority vote is thus reversed, and, moreover, a deadline is attached to make it that little bit harder.
We are informed that “There have been some misunderstandings about this issue.” Quite so. Since the treaties don’t provide for it, this looks exactly like the sort of legerdemain that integrationists were involved with at the time of the Convention on the Future of Europe, where there was an attempt by the drafters to allow the treaty to be ratifiable without all the member states ratifying it.
It is as if the Commission has been spotted strolling into the storeroom in Rome where the EU treaties are held, carrying a rubber-tipped pencil.
Meanwhile, as a pointer to how the EU is developing a perverse form of subsidiarity in ever-closer union, this paragraph proves quite instructive;
In order to further reinforce national ownership of the recommendations issued under the "European semester", governments, when submitting the draft budget to the national parliament are expected to include policy recommendations by the Council and / or the Commission accompanied by an explanation of how these have been incorporated.
Let’s take a step back. What this all signifies is that we shall soon be able to judge the mettle of the Treasury – all the more easily if it publically releases its submission to the Task Force, dated 9 July.
Hopefully, ministers will stand up to this prestidigitation. If they do so, they have an opportunity to strengthen their negotiating hand elsewhere. Even better, they have a heaven-sent opportunity to renegotiate powers back to the UK.
Some of the suggestions on ConHome of late as to what should come back have been ambitious, but given the realities of the current coalition I think the proposals are meaningless because they are unachievable. It is not that they are undesirable, but that the terms of this debate and latent reticence in the FCO limit our reach even if not our horizons. I have suggested repatriation of Fisheries as an achievable quid pro quo that some Lib Dems might agree with as the price for our agreeing a deal on the Eurozone, providing that non-Eurozone countries are unambiguously and permanently kept out of the equation.
Others will have different, very possibly bigger ambitions. But the real argument is not over the price tag; first we have to wake up Treasury and Foreign Office ministers to the real dangers and equally real opportunities now before them. Carpe diem!
