There are some Labour-supporting Brexiters who like to think that Britain is peculiar among European nations, and that differences of language, culture and history mean it should never have found itself inside a common market, let alone a union, with its continental neighbours.
Jacques Delors’s speech to the TUC in 1988 positioned the UK inside a family of like-minded nations. And it had the effect of converting not only much of the UK trades union movement to the benefits of a marriage between social protection and regulated markets, but also much of the Labour party.
Looking back, the Lexiters can see what they knew at the time: that this was a fallacy promoted by an isolated intellectual – then president of the European commission – whose powers were waning.
Far from being havens of leftist social democracy, France and Germany were moving towards the right to become the main pillars of a neoliberal elite, based in Brussels, that dictated, and still dictates, an adherence to free-market dogma.
The introduction of the euro cemented this view. Lexiters argue that it is a recipe for permanent austerity as policymakers seek to maintain the integrity of an internal currency bloc that is dominated by France and Germany.
President Emmanuel Macron has proved to be just the latest example of a fake leftist. He has acceded to employer demands for a more liberalised workforce and cut back on benefits. In Germany, workers’ wages have risen for a skilled minority, but the rest of the workforce is being left behind, and those in the former communist east are out in the cold, with few jobs and a fraction of the wealth enjoyed in the west of the country.
Like France, Germany is dominated by a centrist government, under Angela Merkel, and challenged by opposition parties that are even further to the right. A move leftwards in these dominant countries is as likely as Jacob Rees-Mogg singing the Internationale.
What can an EU supporter say to these arguments, especially now that rejection of Theresa May’s deal is more likely, and a second referendum is gaining traction?
One response is that Lexiter efforts to cast Britain in a different light from France and Germany is to deny that they all face broadly the same economic problems. It also denies that voters in all three nations have shifted to the right.
The link running from the Bullingdon club cavaliers of Osborne, Cameron and Johnson back, via Blair and Brown, to Major and Thatcher is strong in one important respect: all these politicians understood that voters were unwilling to pay more income tax or share their wealth.
Today, most countries in the developed world have ageing populations and are rapidly running out of money to cope. The funds do exist; it’s just that those self-same ageing voters refuse to address the difficulties posed by their longevity by handing over any of their income or wealth.
Last week’s call by Macron for a closer union between European nations, and his more specific proposal for a joint European army, revealed the controlling tendency of the EU elite, according to many Brexit supporters, and was another good reason for the UK to quit. Except his main motive was to put forward reforms to overcome the euro’s flaws and separately share the costs of military hardware as the bill escalates beyond the finances of any one country.
Of course, Britain is outside the euro and could easily take the same stance as Sweden and Denmark: wish the euro members well while retaining an independent currency.
As for the military, without going so far as to advocate that the UK throw its lot in with a European army, voters need to recognise that a 21st century military carries an exorbitant cost.
Inside or out of the EU, Jeremy Corbyn could meet rising costs – from welfare to the NHS – with increases in investment, skill levels and productivity, and thereby increase tax receipts. However, even if voters hand him the keys to No 10, they are not going to give him any money. That is what Macron found, and Corbyn will find the same.
Would the EU elite help a Labour government? Well, however rightwing they are painted, they are tackling the same problems with a closer eye on social cohesion and poverty than any UK government of the past 10 years. And they are still pursuing an economic agenda that is a world away from Donald Trump’s America or any other country that trade secretary Liam Fox has mentioned as a potential economic ally.
So Europe remains the best option for any Labour member.
