Graham's newsletter Friday 9th December 2011 (Western Counties Liberal Democrats)

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Graham's newsletter Friday 9th December 2011

December 12, 2011 9:18 AM
Originally published by Sir Graham Watson MEP

Greetings

This is a week in which so much has happened here I can hardly do justice to it in a newsletter which endeavours not to exceed one side of a piece of A4 paper. The preparations for the EU summit, the jockeying for position of the major players, the clash over a heads of state and government supper which went on far too long last night and the denouement leave nobody with much credit. The EU's traditional way of doing things is a big loser. But among the member states the UK has lost the most.

To start with the good news, for there is some. The process of instilling budgetary discipline among EU countries moved forward. New rules will commit countries to run balanced budgets. The bailout fund will be topped up and will become permanent from the middle of next year. The IMF will be asked to assist, which requires neither treaty change nor going cap in hand to China. Countries will co-ordinate their fiscal and economic policies more closely.

The bad news is that, in the process, the European Commission and the European Parliament are at risk of being sidelined. Even worse news is that Britain failed to get its diplomacy right and ended up marginalising itself by opting out, when the 26 other countries will likely all opt in (there is a question mark over Hungary). Under pressure from his backbenchers, Cameron was poorly placed at the start. Having withdrawn his troops from the European People's Party he was absent from their conference in Marseilles earlier this week at which consensus was forged. At the European Council meeting itself, by appearing to resist any regulation of the banking sector, he quickly lost the sympathy of others; in rejecting a proposal by Council President Herman van Rompuy to improve fiscal discipline without changing the treaties he lost credibility; and in tabling at the very last moment a series of demands to move from qualified majority voting to unanimity as a basis for making decisions about the single market he broke all the rules of successful diplomacy. So now there will be a new treaty, to be agreed on by the 17 countries of the euro zone and any others which choose to follow, which will probably bring the number up to 26. Britain will find itself ingloriously isolated.

I started my week early last Sunday in Cape Town at a conference of legislators concerned about climate change; I moved on that evening to Durban, where I chaired a meeting of MPs from fifteen countries in my Climate Parliament network. I spent two days in the conference centre of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and in the tented city around it in which thousands of people using hundreds of tongues spoke one global language of climate concern. It was a fascinating and hugely enriching experience; and despite the serious problems of bringing the USA or many large fast-developing countries on board for a new treaty to curb greenhouse gas emissions, some progress was visible. Sadly I had to cut my visit short to bring together Liberal leaders in the EU ahead of Thursday's summit start - my first task in my new position as Leader of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party. (For more info see www.eldr.eu.)

Tomorrow I speak to a congress of Dutch Liberal Democrats in Utrecht. Next week Parliament meets in Strasbourg for our final session before the Christmas break.

Regards

Graham