Subverting the euro
It's odd what gets people annoyed in Brussels. Your correspondent inadvertently provoked fury in some visiting German academics who suggested that it is "inevitable" that Britain will join the euro and that "you just need time." Without meaning to annoy, I remarked that it is far from inevitable, given the state of the opinion polls. This display of myopia in the face of the grand sweep of history caused irritation-"You think Britain can stay out, do you? Just try and sell your exports in ten years' time."
Ruminating on this odd conversation, I concluded that the Germans and other Europeans may want Britain in the euro-zone more than they are letting on. A Britain that stays outside and does not face collapse is subversive of the whole euro enterprise, which is often sold as an unavoidable reaction to globalisation. And if British refusal to join the euro is irritating, Switzerland's rejection of EU membership is also hurtful and undermining. A recent Eurobarometer poll of EU citizens asked people which countries they would like to join the EU. The only two which commanded strong support were Switzerland and Norway-the two richest countries in western Europe and the only biggish ones to resist the EU's embrace. (Don't worry about the Swiss. I have it on the authority of a European Commissioner that they will join us eventually. Apparently it's inevitable.)
Many EU policymakers-including Romano Prodi-find it hard to accept that British opinion on the euro is anything more than a feeble excuse dreamt up by Tony Blair to disguise his own weakness of will. As a senior German diplomat put it to me, big decisions on Europe are too important to be left to the vagaries of public opinion: "If we'd had a referendum on the Treaty of Rome it might have been rejected because it raised the price of bananas."
Spice Girls split over EU integration
A British referendum may be swayed by much more fundamental issues-such as which celebrities endorse the Yes and No camps. At a party at the British Embassy in Brussels I encountered a man who is working on finding celebs who might endorse a Yes vote. Apparently Eddie Izzard and Ally McCoist (a footballer, M'Lud) are Europhiles; but Kriss Akabusi, the telegenic black hurdler, is so anti-European that he voted for the Referendum party. And tantalisingly the Spice Girls appear to be split on the euro. Indeed, political divisions are said to exist even within the Posh and Becks household. Apparently he's Labour, but she won't let him say so.
Gordon and Frits
Gordon Brown's behaviour in Brussels continues to baffle. For a man who says he is committed to getting Britain into the euro, he seems to go out of his way to give the Commission a kicking. On the day the election was declared, Brown was in Brussels lambasting Eurocrats for daring to criticise his policies. One of the chancellor's favourite targets over the last few years has been Frits Bolkestein, the Dutch commissioner in charge of tax, who was accused of threatening the City's Eurobond market with his plans for a withholding tax on savings. Whatever the rights and wrongs of that dispute, Brown had better mend some fences fast, because Bolkestein is emerging as a key ally on the next big tax battle-a minimum rate of corporation tax. This idea is backed by Germany, France and Italy. Fortunately for Brown, his old adversary Frits is opposed. And so, for now, the Commission is siding with Britain.
Feverish MEPs
The life of an MEP is a miserable one. First, you have to maintain bases in three places-Brussels, Strasbourg and your constituency. Second, there is the knowledge that despite all your frenetic travelling, nobody much cares where you are or what you are doing. Some MEPs respond by feverishly publicising their every move; others retreat into Walter Mitty-style fantasies. Andrew Duff, a Lib Dem MEP, combines both strategies. He recently sent out a press release headlined "Duff in crisis talks with Turkey." Translation: Duff is going to Turkey with a group of European Liberal Democrats.
Cypriot scenarios
The EU likes to think it is all about peace and prosperity. So some Eurocrats find it a touch unsettling to see men in military uniform wandering around the council of ministers. The soldiers are, of course, part of the new effort to put together an EU "rapid reaction force." Inside their new "situation room," they are presumed to be pushing counters around large-scale maps.
One situation that the EU should probably be thinking about rather harder is what happens if and when the EU admits the Greek half of Cyprus. Greece has threatened to veto the entry of any new members to the EU-Poland, the Czech Republic et al-unless the Greek half of Cyprus is let in at the same time. The EU may well go along with this, rather than let the whole enlargement process fail. The question the "scenario-planning" boys have to think about is what Turkey will do if Greek Cyprus gets into the EU. Washington apparently thinks that the minimum Turkish reaction will be formally to annex northern Cyprus. Another scenario they have sketched out involves a naval blockade by the Turks. That would give the new military staff something to think about.
