Euroscepticism in the United Kingdom

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The United Kingdom (dark green) in the European Union (light green).

Euroscepticism (opposition to the policies of supranational EU institutions and/or opposition to membership of the European Union), is a significant element in the politics of the United Kingdom (UK) since the inception of the European Communities —comprising the European Economic Community (EEC), the European Atomic Energy Community (EAEC) and the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC)— the predecessor to the European Union (EU).Contents [hide]

1 Attitudes towards the EU

1.1 Eurobarometer survey 2009

2 History

3 Press

4 Eurosceptics' criticism of the European Union

4.1 Democratic deficit

4.2 Claims of corruption

5 Support for withdrawal

6 See also

7 References

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Attitudes towards the EU

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Eurobarometer survey 2009

A survey in 2009 showed that attitudes toward the European Union vary greatly between countries. Overall, the majority of EU citizens supported their country's membership over 50% thought their country's membership was "a good thing", and only 15% thought it was "a bad thing".[1]:91–3[2]:QA6a; but while support was very high in Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Spain and Ireland, with about 70%–80% thinking that membership was a good thing, scepticism was high in Latvia, the United Kingdom, and Hungary, with only 25%–32% viewing membership as a good thing. In Britain, opinions were divided, fairly evenly, between those who thought that membership is a good thing, a bad thing, or neither good nor bad.[1]:91–3

Whereas overall the majority of citizens (56%) believed that membership of the EU had benefited their country (with a significant minority (31%) believing that their country had not benefited),[1]:95–6[2]:QA7a, in Britain only 34% believed that Britain had benefited from membership, on balance.[1]:95–6 Overall, about 48 percent of EU citizens tended to trust the European Parliament, and about 36 percent did not tend to trust it,[1]:110–2[2]:QA 13.1 but in Britain trust was lowest, at 22 percent.[2]: QA 14.1

Within Europe overall, a positive to neutral image of the EU dominated, with about 46% of citizens having a positive image and only 16% having a negative image; about 36% had a neutral image.[1]:130–3[2]: QA 10 In Britain, only 22 percent had a positive image, 33 percent had a negative image, and 38 percent had a neutral image.

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History

Ted Heath, the Prime Minister at the time of accession to the EEC.

Although at present a significant proportion of Conservatives are hostile to the European Union, it was the Conservative Party that took the United Kingdom into what then was the European Communities. Nevertheless, certain groups of Conservatives still opposed British accession to the Common Market. One of the earliest groups formed especially against British involvement in Europe was the initially Conservative Party-based Anti-Common Market League, whose president Victor Montagu infamously declared that opponents of the Common Market did not want to "subject [themselves] to a lot of frogs and huns".[3]

Conversely, much of the opposition to Britain's EU membership used to come from Labour politicians and trade unionists who feared bloc membership would impede socialism. However, many Labourites subsequently came to welcome the EU. This shift largely took place in the 1980s during the period of Margaret Thatcher's premiership, when she aggressively pursued right-wing policies whilst Jacques Delors in his role as President of the European Commission emphasised the idea of a "social Europe", particularly in his speech to the 1988 TUC congress.[4]

Although the British government was favourable to the creation of the European Communities, the United Kingdom did not become a founding member. However, trade with European Communities ended up accounting for more of Britain's trade than with the European Free Trade Association (EFTA), which had been established partially as an alternative to the European Communities. This led Great Britain to reconsider its policy, moving closer to the EEC and opening accession negotiations in 1961. French president Charles de Gaulle strongly resisted, arguing that the UK was closer to American policies than European ones,[5] and would therefore attempt to "sabotage" the community. Consequently, France vetoed the UK's membership bid in 1963 and again in 1967.

The Labour Party, then in opposition, spoke against the European Communities. The party leader Hugh Gaitskell once declared that joining the European Communities would mean "the end of a thousand years of history".[6] A second attempt was made in 1967, but it was again rejected by a French veto. When de Gaulle stepped down from power, British membership of the EEC became feasible at last. Labour changed from its traditional opposition towards the European Communities and began to support membership. After the party came to power, Britain applied to join for a third time in 1969. Finally, Britain joined the communities under the Conservative administration in 1973.

With Tony Blair at its helm, Labour became markedly pro-EU.

Despite the decision to join the European Communities, scepticism about membership prompted the Labour government to hold a referendum in 1975 on the permanence in the Communities. The question asked from the voters was:

"Parliament has decided to consult the electorate on the question whether the UK should remain in the European Economic Community: Do you want the UK to remain in the EEC?"

British membership of the EEC was endorsed by 67% of those voting, with a turnout of 64.5%.

The debate between Eurosceptics and EU supporters is ongoing in British political parties, whose membership is of varied standpoints. The two main political parties in Britain, the governing Conservative Party[clarification needed] and the Labour Party opposition both have within them a broad spectrum of views concerning the European Union.

In the 1970s and the early 1980s the Labour Party was the more Eurosceptic of the two parties, having more anti-European Communities MPs than the Conservatives. In 1975 Labour held a special conference on British membership and the party voted 2-to-1 for Britain to leave the European Communities.[7] In 1979 the Labour manifesto[8] declared that a Labour government would "oppose any move towards turning the Community into a federation" and in 1983[9] they favoured British withdrawal from the EEC. Under the leadership of Neil Kinnock after 1983, however, the Labour Party dropped their opposition to the European Communities and instead favoured greater British integration into European Economic and Monetary Union.

The financier Sir James Goldsmith formed the Referendum Party as a single issue party formed by to fight the 1997 General Election, calling for a referendum on aspects of the UK's relationship with the European Union. It planned to contest every constituency where there was no leading candidate in favour of such a referendum, and briefly held a seat in the House of Commons after George Gardiner, the Conservative MP for Reigate, changed parties following a battle against deselection by his local party. The party polled 800,000 votes and finished fourth, but did not win a seat in the House of Commons.

Many commentators [10] believe over-interest in the issue to be an important reason why the Conservative Party lost the General Election of 2001. They argue that the British electorate was more influenced by domestic issues than by European affairs.

After the electoral defeat of the UK Conservatives in 2001, the issue of eurosceptism was important in the contest to elect a new party leader. The winner, Iain Duncan Smith, was seen as more eurosceptic than his predecessor, William Hague.

Nigel Farage's UKIP aims to remove the United Kingdom from the European Union.

As opposition leader, Iain Duncan Smith attempted to disaffiliate the British Conservative Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from the federalist European People's Party Group. As MEPs must maintain a pan-European alliance to retain parliamentary privileges, Duncan Smith sought the merger of Conservative MEPs into the eurosceptic Union for a Europe of Nations (UEN) group. Conservative MEPs vetoed this move because of the presence within the UEN of representatives of neo-fascist parties who do not share similar domestic politics. In 2004, Duncan Smith's successor, Michael Howard, emphasised that Conservative MEPs would remain in the EPP Group so as to maintain influence in the European Parliament. However Michael Howard's successor, David Cameron pledged to remove Conservative MEPs from the EPP Group which has now been implemented.

The Labour Party is also split between eurosceptic and pro-EU factions. Historically, the party tended towards euroscepticism, but under Tony Blair its policies became generally pro-EU. However, a significant minority of Labour MPs have formed the Labour Against the Euro group, opposing British membership of the single currency. The group has support from minority parts of the Trade Union movement, while the majority of trade unions remain staunchly pro-EU.

The UK's third-largest parliamentary party, the Liberal Democrats, is strongly pro-EU and advocate institutional reform to advance European federalism with a greater role for national parliaments in scrutinising EU legislation but a reduced ability (through the raising of Qualified Majority Voting blocking thresholds as in the Lisbon Treaty) to block or amend it.

The United Kingdom Independence Party, which advocates the UK's complete withdrawal from the European Union, received 16% of the vote and gained 12 MEPs in the 2004 European Election. The Party did even better in the 2009 UK European Election, coming in second, above the incumbent Labour Party [11]

The Scottish National Party (SNP) has tended to be pro-EU since the 1980s. As the SNP's heartlands tend to be in fishing and farming areas of Scotland, they have been seen as a real threat to the pro-European SNP. However, this has not yet emerged.

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Press

Among Britain's main national newspapers, those that take a broadly Eurosceptic line are the Daily Mail, Daily Express, The Daily Telegraph, The Sun and The Times,[12] as well as their respective Sunday sister publications. These newspapers tend to oppose further European integration and have called for ratification of the Lisbon Treaty to be subject to a referendum. In November 2010, the Daily Express became the first British newspaper to formally call for withdrawal from the EU.[13]

The Daily Telegraph and The Times are widely seen as belonging to the "quality press".[14] On the other hand, the Daily Express[15] and the Daily Mail[16] are seen as regularly fabricating false stories which present the EU in a bad light. The former withdrew from the PCC's self-regulatory system in early 2011.[17]

The hard-left daily The Morning Star takes an international-Marxist eurosceptic position. Under the editorship of Mark Seddon, Tribune, the journal of the Labour Movement, tended to give space to eurosceptic contributors, including controversially Marc Glendening of the Democracy Movement. This position was defended by other centre-left eurosceptics who also spoke on platforms with the Democracy Movement.

The European Union has accused the British Press of circulating inaccurate stories which it calls "Euromyths".[18] Although they usually have a grain of truth in them, they often arise from misunderstandings or when the actions of a different European organisation, such as the Council of Europe, are erroneously attributed to the EU.[18]

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Eurosceptics' criticism of the European Union

Individual complaints about the EU made by Eurosceptics include rising costs of membership,[19] the alleged negative impact of an EU regulatory burden on UK business (including claims that this also affects those businesses engaged in purely domestic exchange or exporting to non-EU markets), and claimed corrosive effects on democracy within all EU member-states, including Britain.[20]

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Democratic deficit

See also: Democratic deficit in the European Union

Some British eurosceptics believe that the supremacy of EU law overly restricts national parliaments' freedom to legislate. They also object to provisions that EU legislation must be proposed by the European Commission, which they claim lacks democratic legitimacy because it is elected by the European Parliament[21] and not directly by voters (much like the Cabinet of the United Kingdom).

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Claims of corruption

Opponents of the EU also accuse its politicians and civil servants of being corrupt. They often claim that the EU has never had its accounts signed off by the European Court of Auditors.[22] Nevertheless, over the recent years the EU's accounts have actually been given a clean bill of health by the ECA,[23] and this claim stems from a confusion on the part of eurosceptics about the difference between a "clean bill of health" and an "unqualified statement of assurance".

Further accusations of corruption have been levelled at the highest level. In 2005, Nigel Farage MEP requested that the European Commission disclose where individual Commissioners had spent their holidays, which the Commission rejected on the basis that they had a right to privacy. Eurosceptics have also accused the President of the European Commission, José Barroso, for spending a week on the yacht of the Greek shipping billionaire Spiro Latsis only a month before the Commission approved €10.3 million of Greek state aid for Latsis' shipping company.[24] However, this decision had been made by the previous Commission body, before Barroso had been appointed.[25]

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Support for withdrawal

A recent (2010) YouGov poll found that 47% of voters in the United Kingdom would vote to leave the European Union, while 33% would vote to stay in (with 14% undecided and 5% unwilling to vote).[26] Support and opposition for withdrawal from the Union are not evenly distributed among the different age groups: opposition to EU membership is most prevalent among those 60 and older (57%) but dwindles steadily to only 31% among those aged 18–24.[26] Finally, the results of the poll showed that London is the most pro-EU region whereas the Rest of South region is the most eurosceptic.

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