Brussels, 27/03/2014 (Agence Europe) - At a conference at the College of Europe in Bruges on Thursday 27 March (see other article), British Liberal Democrat MEP Graham Watson argued it was in the interest of the United Kingdom to remain a member of the European Union. “We have not reached the limit of UK integration in the EU and nowhere near”, he said to Liam Fox, a British Conservative MP and former defence minister. Fox stated that London could move closer to integration if two conditions were met - a majority wanting this in the House of Commons, and the will of the British people being expressed through a referendum. Nevertheless, he does not believe this will happen for a single moment.
Trying to take a positive approach, Fox said that he wanted “to be able to cooperate where our mutual interests tell us to do so” and to proceed differently where British interests prevail. He stated that he wanted two things for his country - security and prosperity.
As regards security, Watson argued for a common European policy, although Fox adopted a position that was diametrically opposed, believing that NATO was “the natural place” for this issue and that giving competencies to the EU on this would be duplicating and expensive. Watson stated that there was good reason to work together in this domain. “It is safer if taking decisions together than apart”, he said, speaking generally (Watson is president of the European Liberal Democrat Party). Fox broadly shared this opinion, but preferred bodies like the G7 or NATO where, in his opinion, “the outcome matters more than the process”.
Lastly, on the economic level, Fox believed that the euro had neither followed the political model nor an economic model in the strict sense, considering that even countries not respecting the Maastricht criteria could make their way to joining the single currency. He stressed that the eurozone had had to come to the aid of four of its members. Watson recalled that the starting point of the crisis had been marked by the collapse of the American Lehman Brothers bank. Two months away from the European elections, Watson stressed that each European party had chosen a figurehead for the campaign, except the Conservatives. It is Guy Verhofstadt from Belgium who will lead the Liberals. The candidate from the party that has won the elections should - in principle - become the head of the European Commission, although the Lisbon Treaty remains vague on this point. Tony Blair's government made the mistake of choosing the portfolio of foreign affairs rather than an economic portfolio, said Fox, who implied that the UK should have “some sort of economic commissioner role” in the next Commission. (EL)