An uphill task” “

A summit dominated by uncertainty and by a weakened pro-European spirit: that’s the image presented by the European Council of Ministers on 15-16 December to half a billion citizens of the Union. Irrespective of what results come out of the negotiations between the 25 heads of state and of government, the process of European integration faces an uphill task. INVITATION FROM Tony Blair. In a letter sent from number 10 Downing Street, and personally signed by him, the current President of the European Council, British premier Tony Blair, had invited his “colleagues” to the summit to “seek a political agreement” on the EU’s Financial Perspectives for the period 2007-2013, i.e. the Union’s plurennial budget. But the revised draft of the budget, transmitted to the governments of the member countries and also to the candidate countries on 5 December, had aroused largely negative reactions: too meagre a budget – that was the almost general reflection – to be able to satisfy the ambitions of the EU, the many challenges that need to be tackled together, and the many EU policies (agricultural, regional, instrastructural, research and development, cultural, international cooperation, etc.) that now form an essential part of the common mission. THE “PRINCIPLES” ENUNCIATED BY BARROSO. The President of the European Commission, José Manuel Durao Barroso, in preparation for the summit, had also put pen to paper, and in turn addressed an “open letter” to the current President of the Council, maintaining the need to aim at a “clause of global revision”, that would be valid both for “reaching an immediate agreement, and for permitting a complete revision of the EU budget in the mid term”. According to Barroso, “there exists a wide consensus in favour of a budget aimed at the future, that would produce effective results, and reflect our values of equity and solidarity”. On these aspects we need, according to the head of the Executive, to “improve our proposal”, and seek an agreement between the heads of state and of government, to avoid a new failure. Barroso then listed the “principles” that in his view “need to be respected with a view to final agreement” on the budget: ambition (“the final agreement must involve a significant increase of total expenditures”, to be allocated to economic growth, employment, and the needs of citizens); equity; modernization; coherence, flexibility; “the optimisation of the financial resources and their sound management”. A BUDGET THAT LOOKS TO THE PAST? The clash between the United Kingdom and France was evident to all. It was apparently focused on the content of the budget, but was in reality an expression of different ways of understanding the future of the EU. London defends her own budget “rebate”, obtained by the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984, while Paris has no intention of surrendering even a cent of the huge subsidies paid out by Brussels for French agriculture. At the same time, the new accession states are claiming additional funds to boost their own economic and social level. Berlin, for its part, under its new Chancellor Angela Merkel, though judging an “agreement difficult but possible”, seems tempted to ask why Germany should remain the main moneybox from which to draw funds to balance the books of the Union. Few voices were raised, on the other hands, in support of the budgetary items more addressed at the long term: training, research, technological innovation, social cohesion and environmental protection. FOR A FEW EXTRA BILLIONS. The summit was preceded by a series of unilateral vetoes. Jack Straw, British Foreign Minister, was the most explicit of all: “There cannot be any fundamental changes to the rebate granted to the UK without an overall reform of the common agricultural policy”. This declaration was spelt out clearly in tandem with the presentation of the latest draft of the Financial Perspectives on 14 December. The new financial package for the period 2007-2013 re-introduces some cohesion and development funds that would be to the advantage of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. The modest increase in expenditure (2.6 billion euros in all, which would raise the EU budget from a total of 846.7 to 849.3 billion euros, equivalent of 1.03% of EU GDP) would also favour Spain. But even this draft was rejected by almost all the European leaders, by Barroso and by the European Parliament. THE FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEMS REMAIN. “Better no agreement than a bad agreement” is Jack Straw’s refrain. It’s an acceptable position if some basic doubts did not emerge. First, without the Financial Perspectives, the EU is in effect deadlocked, with the prospect of enormous practical damages at the level of EU policies. Second, how can this Union, which only a year and half ago opened its doors to several former Communist countries, justify itself to the “new arrivals”, having promised them aid for development that it now seems unable to provide? The third, and perhaps most decisive doubt is this: after the stalled process of constitutional ratification, national egoisms are re-emerging: what future will European integration have in this situation?