Does Barroso think the UK has a euro future?
Lunch in store today with EU President Barroso.
The Portuguese politician has had a bigger impact on world politics than most of his predecessors. I’ve interviewed him before but not had this sort of an encounter.
It will be intriguing to see what he makes of the EU’s future, under siege from the disintegrating economies of the erstwhile eastern bloc – not to mention some of the more conventional “old members”.
And what of Britain? Hugely short-term advantaged by not being in the euro, so that our own dwindling currency allows outsiders to buy our goods cheap – except they aren’t buying.
I’m not alone in sensing that Gordon Brown, never very warm about either Europe or its currency, is belatedly seeing the value of cohesive international behaviour in the face of global events.
So is UK membership of the euro closer in the medium to long term, or will the union have fractured before we ever get there? In any case, has Britain’s opportunity ever to join the euro anyway now passed? Who would have us now?
Answer’s on a postcard (this blogger’s “post card”) later in the day.
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It’s too late now. The UK is f***ed and no-one wants this country in the eurozone. Poland and Bulgaria will be better.
Barroso was certainly not afraid to wade into the UK Tories taking their bat away by leaving the EPP – the centre-right Euro-party of which he is a member.
This has incensed the Tory blogosphere for some reason.
And you are quite right, Britain never needed to join the Euro more than it does now. There’s strength in the Euro and the Euro-zone. There’s clearly weakness in Sterling as we are discovering.
And no, I don’t think the Euro will fall apart; it appears to be getting stronger; to be more needed.
Euro miscalculation. After fudging for years over his ‘five economic tests’ on whether Britain should join the euro, sterling’s collapse after the Bank of England slashed interest rates to half a per cent in a matter of weeks, will make it more difficult to persuade lenders to invest in the pound and they will demand high returns – adding to the UK’s debt burden.
Britain’s gloomy economic vision and the plummeting pound is hitting businesses, devastating pensions for British retirees in Europe and squeezing holiday makers into deeper debt. The UK is no longer a big exporting economy like Germany so claims this will be good for exports are overstated. We are a major importing economy and the weak pound inflates prices. How will markets now judge the City of London’s financial competence, when it is a key part of the UK economy?
Now the Finance Select Committee discovers that the taxpayer could be liable for billions more in bank debts and assets denominated in dollars that have strengthened against the weak pound. We are back to the instability and speculation of the ‘90’s and may bitterly regret not joining the strong and stable euro Gordon Brown and George Osbourne disdain.