UK:DESPITE HAVING got to bed for just an hour at 7am yesterday, British prime minister David Cameron ended a long 48 hours last night by hosting a dinner for a group of Conservative MPs at Chequers, his country retreat.
The welcome offered to him was raucous. The few Conservative MPs around the House of Commons yesterday – a non-sitting day – were exultant. For once, they had a prime minister who would stand up to and defy Brussels and all of its demon works, even if – as they believe – they had to bully him into doing so.
Faced with charges that the UK is now the EU’s odd man out, one of them, Brigg and Gould MP Andrew Percy, scoffed: “Being ‘isolated’ from further EU integration is not bad. It’s what the public want.”
Standing alone, the Conservatives believe citizens in the other EU states will come to agree with them in time, once they realise the full scope of the deal reached in the early hours in Brussels.
"Budgets, taxes, spending are going to be increasingly decided at European level. That will cause a lot of concern to people in many countries," Conservative MP Damian Collins told The Irish Times.
For now, Cameron can glory in the applause, particularly when he comes back to the House of Commons on Monday to deliver his traditional post-summit report – an event that usually left his predecessors in a cold sweat beforehand.
However, euphoria may not lost long. In the days running up to the negotiations, the Eurosceptics insisted Cameron could stop everything in its tracks, and that the 17 euro zone states would make concessions to ensure a deal that involved the 27.
In the end, Cameron miscalculated. Angela Merkel did not make the concessions he believed she would. But without a guarantee the financial transaction tax would be killed off, Cameron could not have come home – so he had no choice but to say No to the deal.
Labour condemned Cameron last night, saying he had deliberately provoked the French and Germans by demanding at the last minute a return to national veto rather than qualified-majority voting on financial services regulations.
The issue now, though, is what has Cameron stopped? Certainly, the UK cannot be forced to accept the financial transaction tax – which would affect it more than any other country because of the dominance of the financial centre that is the City of London. But there is nothing to stop the majority from agreeing one together.
In time, it will affect the City of London by the back door. Most financial institutions operating in the City also operate elsewhere in the EU, where their operations will be subject to the tax. Will the tax be enough to force them to choose one or the other? Or, indeed, would they quit the EU entirely?
Equally, a plethora of other EU financial directives disliked by the UK, but which have been pushed through or are about to be, under qualified majority rules, will come into force – even more so now because the UK has few friends in court.
The political issue now is which part of this story will dominate in the UK. Is it that Cameron stood up bulldog-like against “the Europeans”? Or will it be that he stood up for “the bankers”, thus reinforcing the belief that he is a grandee with little knowledge or care for the ordinary guy in the street?
Former diplomat Sir John Kerr was one to ponder whether Cameron had acted too quickly, arguing he would have been better to have agreed to taking part in negotiations before combining with allies in the months ahead to stop the treaty’s most offensive parts.
Kerr’s strategy may make sense, but it fails to take account of the febrile atmosphere within the Conservative party and the mostly Conservative-inclined press, who would have slaughtered Cameron if he had tried it.
Not only that, but many in Cameron’s ranks want more: a repatriation of powers from Brussels and a referendum – and perhaps even a departure entirely from the European Union. Appetites whetted are hard to satisfy, but the odds on a non-EU UK in a decade’s time have shortened.
