Euroscepticism in the United Kingdom

Euroscepticism in the United Kingdom (UK) is a very controversial issue and has been a significant element in British politics since the inception of the European Economic Community (EEC), the predecessor to the European Union (EU). Eurosceptic views have not diminished following UK membership of the Union. However, their nature and bases have tended to change over the years.

Beyond party politics, most of the UK's mainstream magazines and newspapersndash not only tabloids such as "The Daily Mail", "The Sun", the "Daily Express" and the "News of the World", but also broadsheets such as "The Daily Telegraph" and "The Times"ndash regularly carry articles highly sceptical of EU laws and policies. Some pro-EU commentators argue that this critical coverage contributes greatly to Eurosceptic opinions in the population at large.Fact|date=May 2008 Others contend that it simply reflects the views of the mass readerships concerned.Fact|date=May 2008

Euroscepticism in the political parties

Though it was the Conservative Party ("the Tories") that took the United Kingdom into the EU (then the EEC), many Tories subsequently became hostile to the EU.

Conversely, much of the opposition to Britain’s EU membership used to come from Labour politicians and trade unionists fearful that bloc membership would impede socialism. However, many in the Labour party subsequently came to welcome the EU. This shift largely took place in the 1980s during the period of Margaret Thatcher's premiership, when she aggressively pursued right-wing policies whilst Jacques Delors in his role as President of the European Commission emphasised the idea of a "social Europe", particularly in his speech to the 1988 TUC congress [cite web |url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/sep/12/bringbacksocialeurope |title=Bring Back Social Europe |accessdate=2008-09-04|last=Katwala |first=Sunder|date=2007-09-12|publisher=guardian.co.uk] .

Although the (Conservative) British government of the time was, in principle, favourable to the creation of the EEC, it did not become a founding member. However, after some years, trade with EEC countries ended up accounting for more of Britain's trade than with the EFTA. Britain therefore reconsidered its policy, moving closer to the EEC and opening accession negotiations in 1961.

French president Charles de Gaulle strongly resisted, arguing that the UK was closer to US policies than European ones Fact|date=September 2008, and would thus try to "sabotage" the community. Such a fear was understandable, given the past declarations of prominent British politicians. Consequently, France vetoed the UK's membership bid (as well as the Danish and Irish bids) in 1963.

The Labour Party, then in opposition, spoke against the EEC. Party leader Hugh Gaitskell once regarded the EEC as "the end of a thousand years of history"Fact|date=September 2008. A second attempt was made in 1967, but it was again rejected by a French veto.

When de Gaulle stepped down from power, UK membership prospects improved. Labour changed its traditionally hostile policy against the EEC and became more favourable. After the party came to power, Britain applied to join for a third time in 1969. Finally, Britain joined the community under the Conservative administration in 1973.

Despite the decision to join the EEC, scepticism about membership prompted the Labour government to hold a referendum in 1975 on the permanence in the community. The question on the paper was:

"Parliament has decided to consult the electorate on the question whether the UK should remain in the European Economic Community: Do you want the UK to remain in the EEC?"

British membership of the EEC was endorsed by 67.2% of those voting, with a turnout of 64.5%.

Some advocates of EEC membership had argued that the EEC would be "no more than a trade agreement"Fact|date=September 2008, though the White Paper put before Parliament at the time also spoke of "political union" and "shared sovereignty".

The debate between Eurosceptics and pro-Europeans is ongoing in British political parties whose membership is of varied standpoints. The two main political parties in Britain, the governing Labour Party and the opposition Conservative Party, both have within them a broad spectrum of views concerning the European Union. However, the majority of Conservatives are typically Eurosceptic whilst most Labour Party members are usually centrist on the issue.

In the 1970s and the early 1980s the Labour Party was the more Eurosceptic of the two parties, having more anti-EEC MPs than the Conservatives. In 1975 Labour held a special conference on British membership and the party voted 2-to-1 for Britain to leave the EEC. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/april/26/newsid_2503000/2503155.stm BBC ON THIS DAY | 26 | 1975: Labour votes to leave the EEC ] ] In 1979 the [http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/area/uk/man/lab79.htm Labour manifesto] declared that a Labour government would "oppose any move towards turning the Community into a federation" and [http://www.psr.keele.ac.uk/area/uk/man/lab83.htm in 1983] they favoured British withdrawal from the EEC. Under the leadership of Neil Kinnock after 1983, however, the Labour Party dropped their opposition to the EEC and instead favoured greater British integration into European Economic and Monetary Union.

However, many commentators believe over-interest in the issue to be an important reason why the Conservative Party lost the General Election of 2001. They argue that the British electorate was more influenced by domestic issues than by European affairs. This is said to be illustrated by the poor performance of the breakaway Pro-Euro Conservative Party in the 1999 European elections.

After the electoral defeat of the UK Conservatives in 2001, the issue of eurosceptism was important in the contest to elect a new party leader. The winner, Iain Duncan Smith, was seen as more eurosceptic than his predecessor and concern was expressed that his victory could result in an inflammation of the issue within the party.

As opposition leader, Iain Duncan Smith attempted to disaffiliate the British Conservative Members of the European Parliament from the federalist European People's Party Group. As MEPs must maintain a pan-European alliance to retain parliamentary privileges, Duncan Smith sought the merger of Conservative MEPs into the eurosceptic Union for a Europe of Nations (UEN) group. Conservative MEPs vetoed this move because of the presence within the UEN of representatives of neo-fascist parties who do not share similar domestic politics. In 2004, Duncan Smith's successor, Michael Howard, emphasised that Conservative MEPs would remain in the EPP Group so as to maintain influence in the European Parliament. However Michael Howard's successor, David Cameron pledged to remove Conservative MEPs from the EPP Group.

The governing Labour Party is also split into eurosceptic and pro-European factions. Historically, the party tended towards euroscepticism, but under Tony Blair its policies became generally pro-European. However, a significant minority of Labour MPs have formed the Labour Against the Euro group, opposing British membership of the single currency. The group has support from minority parts of the Trade Union movement, while the majority of trade unions remain staunchly pro-EU.

The UK's third-largest parliamentary party, the Liberal Democrats, is strongly pro-EU, but is also open about the EU's flaws, and advocates institutional reform and a greater role for national parliaments in scrutinising EU legislation.

The United Kingdom Independence Party, which advocates the UK's complete withdrawal from the European Union, received 16% of the vote and gained 12 MEPs in the 2004 European Election. The party was subsequently weakened by a leadership struggle and the defection of prominent member Robert Kilroy-Silk. In the following General Election of 2005 neither UKIP nor Kilroy-Silk's new Veritas party succeeded in gaining a substantial percentage of the vote, or any seats in parliament.

The Scottish National Party has tended to be pro-European since the 1980s. As the SNP's heartlands tend to be in fishing and farming areas of Scotland, they have been seen as a real threat to the pro-European SNP. However, this has not yet emerged. Polls show Fact|date=September 2008 there is some Euroscepticism in Scotland, but neither UKIP nor the Conservatives have a significant level of support in Scotland.

Euroscepticism in the British press

In the UK, many newspapers, notably the "Daily Mail" and the Rupert Murdoch newspapers ("The Sun", the "News of the World", "The Times" and "The Sunday Times"), are eurosceptic along with the broadsheet "Daily Telegraph" and "Sunday Telegraph", and have published many stories highly critical of the European Union and its policies.Fact|date=June 2008 The accuracy or otherwise of these stories is hotly disputed, and in some cases the actions of international bodies with no connection to the EU have been attributed to it. Examples include headlines such as "Ludicrous EU officials ready to ban yogurt", The Daily Telegraph, 10 November 2003, where there were simply proposals on standard labelling and these proposals were initiated by the UK government, and reports in several UK papers in March 2000 that the EU planned to 'reduce' UK condoms to European sizes, when it was in fact the European Standardisation Committee (CEN) which proposed labelling changes, an organisation with no connection to the EU.Fact|date=June 2008In response, the European Commission has created a website dedicated to explaining its point of view. [ [http://ec.europa.eu/unitedkingdom/press/euromyths/index_en.htm Euromyths] , European Commission Representation in the UK]

Pro-Europeans allege that some coverage of the European Union by UK tabloids is xenophobic, particularly through what they sometimes regard as conscious attempts to influence British politics by denigrating foreign countries (Such as Daily Express's article about renaming Waterloo Station in London, as it could offend the French). [ [http://www.cec.org.uk/press/myths/myth127.htm Redirection Page ] ] Many eurosceptics reject this allegation as a slur. Tony Blair, the former British Prime Minister, once said to Jose Manuel Barroso "See what I have to put up with?" regarding the British Press' unfavourable cover of the EU Budget 2007-2013.Fact|date=June 2008

The daily newspaper of the hard-left, The Morning Star (connected to the Communist Party of Britain) takes an internationalist, Marxist eurosceptic position. Under the Editorship of Mark Seddon, Tribune, the journal of the Labour Movement, tended to give space to eurosceptic contributors, including controversially, Marc Glendening of the Democracy Movement. This position was defended by other centre-left eurosceptics who also spoke on platforms with the Democracy Movement once the Democracy Movement had successfully given direct assurances that it was not xenophobic, racist or sympathetic to extreme nationalists.weasel-inline

Arguments for British EU withdrawal

The strongest eurosceptics – both inside and outside of the political parties – advocate British withdrawal from the EU altogether. [Lewis F. Abbott, "British Withdrawal From the European Union: A Guide to the Case For", ISR/Google Books, 2002. ISBN 978-0-906321-23-2. [http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=iJZH94wM-RkC&dq=isbn:0906321239] ] Supporters of withdrawal today regard the EU as:

* lacking in democratic process, overburdened with bureaucracy, and threatening to national sovereignty;Fact|date=September 2008

* a barrier to business and market deregulation, fiscal reform, and global free trade; and Fact|date=September 2008

* generally economically costly and dysfunctional. Fact|date=September 2008

Globalist or internationalist opponents of EU membership are in favour of pan-European free trade but are against political and bureaucratic centralization. The latter is opposed on basic liberal democratic groundsFact|date=September 2008.

Many critics of the EU including MPs maintain that the British judicial system is more liberalFact|date=September 2008 than that of Continental European countries – and thus oppose trends towards harmonisation in this field as fundamentally regressive. Basic rights and freedoms under the rule of law would be undermined in Britain as a result of the adoption of Continental civil law systems that did not provide comparable presumption of innocence and other protections of liberty such as habeas corpus.Fact|date=June 2008

Opponents of EU membership argue that the economic costs of EU membership to Britain have always exceeded the benefitsFact|date=September 2008, and that further bloc enlargement (etc.) will not alter this in the future. The argument that political economic unification brings benefits simply because of larger scale is dismissedFact|date=September 2008. There is no correlation between the size of political economic entities and their success. Around the world, there are many democratic and prosperous small countries and many unstable, undemocratic, and impoverished large ones. It is not just the European Union that is an anachronistic attempt to politically and economically unite a whole continent. Centralised blocs in general are becoming outdated in a world where globalisation is increasingly the norm.

Recent UK polls show that the majority of the British electorate is opposed to UK membership in the euro.Fact|date=June 2008 The country is divided over whether to remain in the EU. In a recent poll, only 30% of the British population as a whole viewed membership positively, against 32% who viewed membership as a 'bad thing', the same poll showing that exactly half of those polled believed that the UK had not benefited from EU membership, with only 36% perceiving benefits from membership. [ [http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb/eb69/eb_69_first_en.pdf Standard Eurobarometer 69 - Spring 2008] However, attitudes vary across the constituent countries of the UK.

Opponents of the EU also accuse it and the politicians and civil servants who make it up of being wholely corrupt. One example of such claims of corruption comes from the fact that the EU has not had it's accounts signed off for the last 13 years by it's own auditors, [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/11/14/do1402.xml] ] which has resulted in billion of Euro's being unaccounted for. Further claims of corruption have been aimed at the highest level. In 2005, Nigel Farage MEP requested that the European Commission disclose where the individual Commissioners had spent their holidays. The Commission did not provide the information requested, on the basis that the Commissioners had a right of privacy. The German newspaper Die Welt reported that the President of the European Commission, José Barroso had spent a week on the yacht of the Greek shipping billionaire Spiro Latsis. It emerged soon afterwards that this had occurred only a month before the Commission approved 10.3 million euro of Greek state aid for Latsis' shipping company [http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article223215.ece] .

ee also

* Factortame case
* Euroscepticism

References