Relaunching Europe: plan ‘S’

Fifteen months after the referendum on the European Constitution, we are still waiting for the famous ‘plan B’, the alternative project which Laurent Fabius promised us in the event of a ‘no’ vote. Yet the political consequences of its rejection, which were easy to predict, have already come to pass: France has lost influence and credibility in a stalled Europe. Because it became impossible to change the operating rules of the Union and adapt them to twice the number of Member States, we observe, month after month, week after week, the impotence of exclusively national action in many areas and the paralysis of Europe in situations where we most need it to act.

Take just three areas, of which even the most fervent champions of national sovereignty do not deny the European dimension.

The fight against terrorism? Every decision in Brussels has to be taken by a Council consisting of all the Foreign and Justice Ministers of the Member States: fifty Excellencies who can only decide unanimously! Result: since 11 September 2001, now that America has learned to protect itself from Allah’s madmen, our countries have become their main targets. In 2004 Madrid suffered the horror of Atocha station, which was followed by London the year after; and in the summer of 2006 Germany had a miraculous escape from a triple attack on its railways, while Britain was appalled to discover that an operation was being prepared on its soil which would have been even more spectacular and more murderous than the destruction of the World Trade Center.

Control of immigration? Here too, nothing is possible without the unanimous agreement of the same fifty Ministers. Hence practically nothing happens. Yet all our countries have now become immigration countries, and all would prefer immigration freely chosen to immigration forced upon them. But with no decision possible in Brussels each one adopts national rules, which are completely ineffective in a wider area where there is freedom of movement for persons. Everyone agrees that the problem needs to be dealt with at source, in the countries where these millions of desperate people begin their journeys. But what can little Luxembourg do faced with a country the size of Nigeria, Portugal confronted with Ukraine; and even a country like Spain, which only has diplomatic missions in six African countries? Clearly, we must pool our resources to provide aid to the countries concerned, and to put pressure and impose sanctions on them.

Energy? That is the major preoccupation of all the great powers today, and the primary cause of the decline in purchasing power of our peoples. But the current Treaties do not even allow the Union to coordinate national policies. Hence we muddle on, each ‘doing his own thing’ in an ineffective and ridiculous way, some relaunching nuclear programmes which others prohibit, some increasing tax on petrol while others lower it, and everyone queuing up in Moscow to conduct separate negotiations for the purchase of Russian gas.

There is now no time to lose. That is why, having consulted extensively in France and Europe, on 8 September Nicolas Sarkozy presented a series of initiatives in Brussels which could be launched as soon as next spring. The plan is to give the European Union:

– new rules of play. Since the constitutional route is blocked, he proposes that, instead of a new Constitution, a mini-Treaty be drawn up. This text would contain, in order not to pre-empt the nature of the Union (whether or not it is to be federal, liberal or social etc.), only the provisions of the draft Constitution which relate to the ‘rules of play’: who decides and how. Replacement of unanimity by majority voting, legislative power given to the European Parliament, appointment of a full-time President and a Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Union, election of the President of the Commission by the citizens via the European Parliament etc. These provisions are acceptable both to the countries which rejected the draft Constitution – they were not challenged in the referendum campaign – and to those which ratified it – since they were explicitly accepted. Collected within an ordinary Treaty, they could take effect as early as 2009 after ratification by the normal route of a vote in Parliament in each of the Member States, as was the case for the current Treaty of Nice.

– new financial resources. Nicolas Sarkozy is the only major leader to have ventured an approach to this difficult problem, which is as important as that of the institutions: the political crisis in Europe is compounded by a financial crisis, since the Union does not have the budgetary resources for the policies which it adopts. The reason is simple: the Community budget is financed by contributions from the national budgets. Now, in most of the large countries –starting, sadly, with France – the budget is heavily in deficit, so that none is willing or able to set aside more for European policies. Result: even a programme carrying top priority, such as Galileo, the future European GPS, is not assured of its financing until 2013! Fiscal resources must therefore be found which directly sustain the Union’s budget without draining the national budgets and without increasing the overall burden on taxpayers: this is what we call the ‘constancy principle’, which needs to be incorporated into the Treaty.

– clearly defined borders. Our peoples do not want to be part of a Europe with no frontiers and overwhelmingly reject the prospect of enlargement of the Union to include countries outside Europe, such as Turkey. The time has come to take account of that. And to define what we mean by the ‘privileged partnership’ we extend to neighbouring countries which we want to assist in their progress towards democracy and with which we wish to maintain peaceful and fruitful neighbourly relations. We propose a framework which could be advantageous to both Ukraine and Turkey, the Maghreb countries and even, when the time is right, Israel, the future Palestinian state and their neighbours in the Middle East.

– political projects. The areas mentioned at the beginning of this article (security, immigration, energy) will of course be among the priorities which the renewed Union must address. We should add the major issues of the environment, research on technologies for the future and a common strategy on all aspects of globalisation: development of a common defence organisation, policy on the euro vis-à-vis the dollar, trade policy vis-à-vis the emerging powers, defence of identities and different social models.

In France today, no electoral programme is credible unless it incorporates a European dimension. Nicolas Sarkozy has presented his. Let us hope ‘plan S’ encourages his competitors to do likewise. Then the French people will be able to reach their verdict with full knowledge of the facts: it is from their explicit support that the future President of the Republic will derive his authority in Brussels and on the international scene.

Alain Lamassoure, 9 September 2006.