Tuesday, June 07, 2005
In defence of the EU
Jack Straw's defence of the European Union on Radio 4 this morning was quite depressing.
The EU has led to increased prosperity and jobs across Europe. Do the French, Germans or Italians currently agree with that statement? A free trade area would have been as effective. We can thank the United States for their injection of Marshall Aid in the wake of World War 2 for kickstarting Europe's recovery. Stalin rejected Marshall Aid for the countries Russia "liberated".
The European Union has ensured peace across Europe. NATO, another ruinous European War, limited German "punishment", a common Soviet threat and American support clearly played no role in fifty years of peace.
What's left? For just £12bn per year we get unrestricted travel across Europe and UK citizens can now live in Spain or France!! Maybe the EU should include the United States so UK citizens could live there too!!
Jack even tacitly admitted that the EU currently has too much power, saying that the EU constitution proposed giving more powers back to the local ie Nation states.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
you point to france, germany and italy as examples of the EU not delivering prosperity but one could just as easily highlight Ireland, Spain, Portugal etc. The current economic failings in France and Germany surely have far more to do with domestic policy than the EU or even the euro?
Furthermore, a simple free trade area wouldn't have achieved similar levels of increased prosperity. The distribution of the structural funds, for example, allows poorer members to be more competitve and take advantage of the opportunities offered by free trade. No?
Jacob, I agree with you that current French and German economic failings are due to domestic policy rather that the EU. My point is that once these domestic policies have been corrected, how can the EU claim the credit for increasing prosperity and more jobs as Jack Straw implies? By being in the Eurozone, such countries gave up domestic control of their interest rates to manage their economies, a policy option still available to Britain.
With respect to Ireland, Spain, Portugal and structural aid, my knowledge is limited to Ireland's relative economic performance. It has certainly gained from Europe's generous structural funds but has this aid been spent appropriately? I prefer markets to allocate capital maximising returns rather than Brussels based bureaucrats. Ireland has also gained by offering companies a very competitive tax base for their European operations, this could have happened whether Ireland was in the EU or not.
Why do you think structural funds make poorer countries more competitive?
Jack Straw makes me ill.
Post a Comment