26 Jun 2015

Europe – ‘engaged’ and yet split  

David Cameron ended up getting the prestigious 11pm slot to speak for about 5 minutes last night about Britain’s renegotiation. A government source said the Prime Minister didn’t notice if anyone had left the room. Only the Belgian Prime Minister chipped in to say he wanted all individual countries to be kept in the loop. The European Council President Donald Tusk said the process now moved into discussions between officials and the all-night slug-fest over migration resumed.

Chancellor Merkel in the early hours referred to the lengthy session on migration as “engaged.” I think that is using “engage” in the rugby or military sense. Worth watching out for when she deploys that euphemism in the future.

Jean-Claude Juncker took a lot of the flak in what were a series of skirmishes in the room. Countries wanted to know why when the national leaders had agreed in April that only a voluntary redeployment of refugees would be acceptable the European Commission had then come up with a compulsory scheme.

The flak then flew at Eastern Europeans amongst others who the Italian Prime Minister seems to have accused of betraying European principles as they resisted taking part in reallocation of refugee programmes.

David Cameron chipped in a few times to try to help to broker a deal even though Britain has said (along with Denmark and Ireland) that it won’t take any refugees from this scheme.

The compromise they have agreed is that 40,000 refugees who have landed in Greece and Italy will be reallocated to other EU countries over the next 2 years. On this year’s (much increased) migrant arrival numbers, that is about 3 weeks’ worth of refugee arrivals. It is a drop in the ocean. There will be an additional scheme for re-settling 20,000 UNHCR refugees who are mainly from Syria and Iraq.

Much has been written before about the “treaty change” issue in the UK renegotiation. David Cameron has always said that all his legal advice is that he does need it. His political advice is he needs it not least because he’s publicly committed to needing it. The most expected route for that if it went ahead is a post-dated protocol along the lines of the one the Danes got over the Maastricht Treaty and the one the Irish got over the Lisbon Treaty. The EU leaders shake hands on a legally-binding agreement that can only be undone by unanimity. It is tacked onto the next Treaty when that comes along.

But does it give legal cover from the moment it is signed? If, say, Britain tried to change its benefit laws before a full treaty ratification process, would that be challengeable in the courts? And what happens to the Protocol if the Treaty it was expected to be tacked on to never comes along because it comes to a shuddering halt when a national parliament or national referendum rejects it?

Amongst the many pieces that has been looked at this here is a particularly detailed one. We could be in a grey area which Mr Cameron’s opponents are already friskily exploiting on the twittersphere.

David Cameron had hoped to talk to President Hollande about Calais this morning but has told him he can see the President clearly has more immediate problems to address in Grenoble so that chat has been postponed.

One other footnote: Donald Tusk in the early hours of this morning let the “R” word pass his lips. I hadn’t heard a Brussels figure refer publicly to the David Cameron’s project as a “renegotiation” before. It’s not an option Brussels want to encourage countries to think is available as it seems to play to the “a la carte” approach which folk here worry could unravel every deal ever made. “Addressing British concerns” was the euphemism of choice. Maybe it was the late hour or maybe Mr Tusk doesn’t share the general Brussels squeamishness.

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