Blair: EU Post Schroeder and Chirac

[Annie]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1510170,00.html

Blair reaches out to the new Europe

PM prepares Brussels speech looking to a future without Chirac or Schröder
Nicholas Watt, European editor
Monday June 20, 2005

Guardian
Tony Blair will this week attempt to reach out to the next generation of European leaders when he travels to Brussels for the second time in seven days to declare that he is no Margaret Thatcher.

Bruised by his battles with Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröeder - who are now regarded in No 10 as yesterday's men - the prime minister will appeal over their heads to reassure their successors he is not an American-style free marketeer.

Mr Blair, who worked on his speech to the European parliament at Chequers yesterday, believes that Europe faces an opportunity with the likely departure of Mr Schröder in Germany's election in September. Mr Chirac, who came under fire in the French press over the weekend for focusing so much attention on Britain's budget rebate, will struggle on until the presidential elections in 2007.

Peter Mandelson, Britain's European commissioner, makes clear in today's Guardian that the Blair circle has given up on the two men. "A new consensus can be found in Europe. You don't have to know much about the political situation in France and Germany to realise that," he writes in a carefully worded article in which he refrains from naming anyone.

The prime minister will not criticise the French and German leaders when he sets out his plans for the British presidency of the EU, which begins on 1 July, in his speech on Thursday. But he will make clear he has his eye on the future as he attempts to reassure potential leaders - Angela Merkel in Germany and Nicolas Sarkozy in France - who are better disposed to Britain but still fear Mr Blair wants to impose a Thatcherite vision.

"The prime minister will challenge the idea that Britain is some Dickensian society with no social protection," one Downing Street source yesterday. "He will reassure them that every country has its own social protection and he is very proud of the minimum wage and extended maternity leave he has introduced in Britain."

Mr Blair, who returned to Chequers in the early hours of Saturday after the European summit collapsed amid bitter acrimony, knows he faces a delicate challenge on Thursday. With much of "old" Europe - and allies in "new" Europe - blaming Britain for the collapse of the summit, Mr Blair knows he must make clear that Britain is willing to negotiate over its £3.2bn EU budget rebate.

But he will make clear that his alternative - to channel much of Europe's £32bn farm subsidies into hi-tech initiatives and to reform labour markets - does not mean he is trying to impose a Thatcherite vision on Europe. Mr Blair is expected to say: "It is not a zero sum game in which there is a choice between a social Europe and a market Europe. That is a false choice. We need an effective Europe. We need a social approach which boosts the economic approach. They work together."

While the prime minister will choose his words carefully, he was delighted by articles in the weekend French press which criticised Mr Chirac for focusing so much attention on the rebate - criticism that may strengthen the hand of France's reforming interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, who wants to run for the presidency in 2007.

The German press was divided yesterday in its views of Mr Schröder, who sided with Mr Chirac in rejecting Britain's attempts to link any changes to the British rebate to reforms of farm subsidies. Mr Blair has given up on his former "third way" partner as he courts Angela Merkel, the centre-right opposition leader tipped to unseat Mr Schröder in Germany's general election in September, who is more sympathetic to Britain.

Mr Mandelson dismisses the Chirac-Schröder vision as outdated. "Europe is faced with a fundamental choice," he writes. "One way we sink into economic decline, losing the means to pay for our preferred way of life. The other way, we press ahead with painful economic reforms that can make us competitive once again in world markets."

But ministers know that they are in a for a tough ride after the collapse of the summit which prompted Mr Chirac to denounce Mr Blair for his "pathetic and tragic" attempt to hold onto Britain's rebate. Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, told Radio 4's The World This Weekend: "It's certainly a crisis - it's the worst crisis that I've seen during my four years as foreign secretary, indeed my more than eight years as a member of this government."

 

[nosarcasm]

with the expanding European union integrating alot of poor countries
that benefit from agrarian subsidies Blair faces an uphill battle.

But Blair got support from the Netherlands and Sweden to netto
payer into the Union that want to see the subsidies cut.

You can add Germany to that once the conservatives
take over.

 

[Annie]

with the expanding European union integrating alot of poor countries
that benefit from agrarian subsidies Blair faces an uphill battle.

But Blair got support from the Netherlands and Sweden to netto
payer into the Union that want to see the subsidies cut.

You can add Germany to that once the conservatives
take over.

I hope you are correct. I have thought that the German people would want a less socialistic, (not US style, rather European), tack than advocated by FR & GR leadership. Something has to kick the economy in the West.

 

[nosarcasm]

I hope you are correct. I have thought that the German people would want a less socialistic, (not US style, rather European), tack than advocated by FR & GR leadership. Something has to kick the economy in the West.

well imo the EU besides its nondemocratic roots has capitalistic goals
although not shown to the public.

The whole free trade within the EU reeks of the Washington consensus.,
All they need to do is get rid of the subsidy to agriculture game.

But the Us is no better in that field.

Congressmen from the midwest please stand up.

 

[Annie]

well imo the EU besides its nondemocratic roots has capitalistic goals
although not shown to the public.

The whole free trade within the EU reeks of the Washington consensus.,
All they need to do is get rid of the subsidy to agriculture game.

But the Us is no better in that field.

Congressmen from the midwest please stand up.

Oh I know all about the farm subsidies here. May have made sense in the depression, even for awhile after. The family farms are gone and we are subsidizing major corporations. I agree.

I don't like subsidies, nor most tariffs. The only time I would advocate tariffs, should be punitive/ratalitory.