Eurosceptics accuse us of being europhiles. Europhiles accuse us of being eurosceptics. The truth is that we are neither.
The problem is that politicians and pundits simply don't understand where Libertas sits in the political spectrum. There is a very simple reason for this: Libertas isn't in the existing political spectrum.
The EU debate, especially in Britain, is one dimensional. At one end, we have the extreme UKIP view of total withdrawal from the EU. At the other end, the Lib Dems favour total integration into a European superstate. The Tories and Labour sit somewhere in between, arguing over how many powers to give away.
The common theme is that all four parties are simply talking about the EU in terms of "more or less".
But Libertas isn't talking about "more or less"; we are talking about "better".
We want a different system of European cooperation. And so do most of the citizens of Europe. There is no reason at all why we have to accept the future for Europe set out in the abysmal Constitution/Lisbon Treaty. Nor should we have to put up with the awful anti-democratic system we have now.
What we want is a system of willing cooperation between sovereign nations, founded upon real democracy. We are pioneers forging a new kind of Europe.
That's pro-European.
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4 comments:
One of the most important political debates taking place in Europe today is whether more decisions should take place at the European level or at the nation state level. This is essentially the spectrum you outline above.
To say that Libertas has nothing to say about this debate is nonesense: they have a clear stance in favour of moving powers towards member states - as you mention elsewhere.
Rather than making a fuss about pro-Europe vs euro-sceptic you'd be better off trying to redefine the terms - perhaps euro-centralist vs. euro-devolutionist?
That's an excellent point. There is a genuine problem with loaded terminology that we will have to combat.
I think that perhaps there is a slight confusion in your comment where you say 'they have a clear stance in favour of moving powers towards member states'. That isn't exactly where Libertas stands. We are in favour of giving nation states the *option* of having more power in their own hands.
We would be in favour of some powers being returned, but would probably encourage other new areas to come under European level control; the key is where these can best be run from. As long as nations have the option of veto, opting out or proper democratic influence, we have no problem with this.
Here's an independent analysis of the original Libertas No campaign:
http://www.cer.org.uk/pdf/bn_irish_ref_hb_4june08.pdf
"[Libertas] argues that ratifying the Treaty of Lisbon would bring the good times to an end by reducing Irish voting power in Brussels, harmonising its low corporate taxes upwards... the central message of the Libertas campaign is that voters should say No to the Lisbon treaty in order to secure a special protocol to protect Ireland’s low rates of corporation tax."
Corporate tax is one example of this debate. Euro-centralists want tax rates harmonised (deciding tax ranges at the centre). Libertas want tax rates decided at member state level."
So when I said "Libertas have a clear stance in favour of moving powers [in this case keeping powers] towards member states" I wasn't wrong was I?
I wasn't trying to claim that you were wrong, merely that your comment wasn't a complete picture of what Libertas is advocating. If there was any offence caused, I am sorry.
In answer to your second comment:
Firstly, that was part of the Lisbon Treaty No campaign, and you shouldn't assume that this will determine the policies of the pan-European Libertas party which is a much larger organisation with a different purpose. Until Libertas (the party) releases its policies, nothing should be assumed to be policy.
While the example that you gave *may* form part of those policies, there may be other examples where Libertas will advocate policy being run at a European level that isn't currently.
In other words, the fundamental premise is that things should be run from the best place to run them; it's not simply about returning powers. We want to give nations the ability to make those decisions for themselves.
So no, you weren't wrong, but it wasn't quite the whole picture either. :-)
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