Barroso lets his hair down - and British media loves it

Would the UK have zero influence outside the EU? 

Outgoing European Commission President José Manuel Barroso is in London, and he has made a few interesting remarks about the Tories, Brexit, EU free movement and Grant Shapps. Wading into the most intense debate on EU migration in the UK since 1066, he has really hit the headlines. 

However, Barroso no longer has any real say over decisions in the EU - it's Juncker's show now, and he has made addressing the UK's concerns a key priority, although it remains very much an open game. Also, remember, the bulk of Cameron's renegotiation won't be with the Commission - it'll primarily be with member states (though having the Commission on-side will certainly help). 

In any case, Barroso told the BBC's Andrew Marr Show yesterday:

"So far the British government has not presented a proposal, a concrete proposal [on reform of EU free movement rules]. There are ideas floating, there are rumours. I cannot comment on specific suggestions that have not yet been presented. What I can tell you is that any kind of arbitrary cap seems to me to be not in conformity with the European rules."

Barroso is of course right - restricting the number of EU workers coming to the UK, via quotas, would be illegal under EU rules - as we argued in our recent flash analysis and most people agree on. The question is whether changes to these rules are possible - this is a big discussion which we've looked at here. However, Barroso also tried to strike a more conciliatory tone when he stressed that there are "widespread concerns in the UK and elsewhere about abuse of free movement rights" and further changes could be made to address them, although "changes to [EU migrants' access to benefits] need all countries to agree."

Barroso had some less well-targetted comments, claiming for example, that the UK would be "irrelevant" and "have zero influence" outside the EU, while also appearing to link EU membership to Cameron's ability to fight the Ebola virus.

At an event this morning, Barroso was also asked about remarks made by Conservative Party Chairman Grant Shapps, who was sent out yesterday to dismiss Barroso's comments, calling the outgoing European Commission President “an unelected bureaucrat”. Barroso - now clearly free to let his hair down - went all in:

“Since I was 29 years old, I was elected in my country…I don’t know who this gentleman is, but certainly he has not more democratic legitimacy than I have.” 

Which begs the question, if Barroso doesn't know who Shapps is, how can he comment on the man's electoral record? Anyway, it allowed the Tories to play the 'we stand up to Brussels card'.

Foreign Affairs Select Committee welcomes "Double Majority" voting at the EBA as concrete example of UK influence in Europe

Double majority lock voting at the EBA was a
significant and valuable use of UK influence

In a report published today the influential cross-party House of Commons Foreign Select Affairs Committee commended David Cameron "for launching an ambitious agenda for EU reform". The full report, including evidence presented by Open Europe, also makes a number of sensible observations such as:

"the point of a Member State having influence in the EU is to achieve EU policy outcomes that realise its interests and objectives."

We agree - too often the EU is described by politicians in terms of "influence" and being "at the table" something that looks (and often is) of more benefit to politicians than those they serve - something we pointed out in our evidence:

"Open Europe contended that 'influence’ is a term too often used in a rather lazy and undefined way”. Open Europe argued that the debate on UK influence in the EU should focus on identifying the concrete cases where the UK should exercise influence and had or had not done so."

One case made of very tough concrete we brought to the MPs attention is the tricky issue of EU voting weights:

"Open Europe reminded us that from 2014 the Eurozone states will command sufficient weighted votes in the Council of the EU to muster the qualified majority required to take Single Market decisions alone."

For this reason we have argued consistently that the UK needs a new safeguard to protect itself from Eurozone caucusing. The test case for this was the adoption of "Double majority" voting in the EBA - originally proposed by Open Europe.

The achievement of this new "double majority" was therefore a genuine success for UK diplomacy and has a significance well beyond that of the EBA. We are therefore glad the Committee picked up on it. As they conclude:

"The agreement on the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) which was struck among EU Finance Ministers in December 2012 was significant on several grounds. It shows what the UK can achieve, in terms of protecting its position in the Single Market, through close and constructive engagement and innovative policy solutions."

"We note that the deal went some way towards entrenching the kind of safeguard against discrimination in the Single Market that the Government failed to secure in the December 2011 negotiations on the ‘fiscal compact’. We also note that the arrangements that were agreed to protect non-Eurozone states—on this occasion, for ‘double majority’ voting in the European Banking Authority—responded directly to a concrete proposal (in this case, one which gave rise directly to a risk of caucusing)."

They could not have put it better.