03/05/2014
I wonder if Mr Cameron is even capable of understanding the irony of his citing a non-existent treaty veto as proof of his good intentions on his 2017 referendum. But, whether he means it or not, the prime minister is certainly talking the talk, as if he really intends to have his referendum.
However, Dick Taverne â one of the original SDP MPs and now a Lib-Dem peer -
thinks that Mr Cameron's "solemn promise" confirms his profound ignorance of the way the union works and of the formidable obstacles in the way of his plans to renegotiate the terms of British membership. And Taverne thus thinks that a victory for the Conservatives in the next election is likely to lead to Britain's exit from the EU â a disaster in his terms.
To help us on our way, we are told of Lord Kerr's belief that, "You would be plumb crazy if you seriously thought that the right year to bring to a climax a renegotiation ⦠was the year of a French presidential election and a German federal election". Polls in France and Germany show public opinion overwhelmingly opposed to a special deal for Britain. Furthermore, repatriation of major powers from Brussels almost certainly requires a treaty change.
Cameron's timetable for achieving this can only have been conceived in cloud cuckoo land, says Taverne. First, he would need a majority of the 28 member states to agree to hold a convention â the last convention took 18 months. The next stage would be an inter-governmental conference â the Maastricht inter-governmental conference took a year.
Then a deal would have to be ratified by all member states, several of which would have to hold a referendum of their own. No one can assume that all would vote yes. And have Conservatives forgotten that it took Margaret Thatcher five years of arduous negotiations to secure Britain's budget rebate?
This is not news to EURef readers, but Taverne concedes that there is a general mood for change within the EU. Nevertheless, different countries want different changes, and from the start of his premiership Cameron has gratuitously offended his potential allies, to the extent that he cannot rely on any support.
The odds are, therefore, overwhelmingly against achieving a deal by 2017, in which context Cameron could hardly recommend a vote for staying in if he came back from Brussels empty handed - or so Taverne says.
He thus thinks Mr Cameron's "europhobic party" would never let him push back the referendum date, and if he defied them they would enthusiastically kick him out and replace him with a "proper europhobe". An anti-European Conservative government would then strongly argue for a no vote, "supported by a stridently europhobic press".
The circumstances, he says, could not be more different from 1975, when the leadership of all three parties and a majority of the press campaigned for Britain to stay in, and when there was no UKIP.
A referendum would make sense when negotiations are complete and we know what sort of union we should be in or out of. But Cameron's impossible timetable destroys the central pillar of his European strategy, Taverne concludes. He thus declares: "Only those who want us to leave, come what may, can wish for a Conservative majority in 2015".
And that, it would appear, is the view from the europhile "bubble". But there is no reason to believe that Taverne is any better informed than
Iain Martin, the man who only latterly found out that the polls were favouring the "inners".
On the basis that bubble-dwellers tend to be more ignorant than we realise, it is quite possible that Taverne is not yet up-to-date with the way the polls are shifting. Nor is he correct in assuming that we have a "stridently europhobic press". The chances are that the press will support continued EU membership, and even more so the europhile BBC.
As to the "europhobic" Conservative party, my guess is that it will rally behind the leader. In Wilsonian style, it is quite possible that Mr Cameron could cobble together an "agreement" to take the place of treaty change, sufficient to deceive those willing to be deceived.
Taverne's fear of a disaster, therefore, may be justified, only not in terms of an "out" vote. It remains eminently possible that, given the opportunity, Mr Cameron will fudge the renegotiations, put a referendum to the people and come away with vote to stay in the EU.
"Only those who want us to leave, come what may, can wish for a Conservative majority in 2015," says Taverne, but it could be the other way around. As it stands, I have no confidence that we could win a referendum. A Conservative victory, under current conditions, could have the anti-EU movement fighting for its life.
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