Sarkozy is man of the match amid domestic political games

A LOT of nasty little domestic political games were being played at Friday’s EU summit that was billed as the one to finally protect the euro.

Perhaps the nastiest was the internal domestic political ploys — and the man of this match must be Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president.

Take the issue of what is being called the “golden rule” in France — that countries put into their constitution or equivalent law, a debt brake saying that governments must run balanced budgets. In other words that they cannot spend any more on services for the citizens that they have in the kitty.

This idea is music to the ears of the thrifty Germans who like everything to be neat and predictably bound by rules. But it’s not in the make up of the French who still cling to some of the principle of their revolution, putting the welfare of their citizens above all else.

So the fact that Mr Sarkozy agreed to compromise on this particular issue seemed strange to many. But the fact that he is pushing it to have the wording agreed in March gives its own clue.

Mr Sarkozy is due to battle for a second term at the end of April, and he wants to be sure that whatever might bind him will certainly bind his Socialist rival, Francois Hollande, for the presidency.

He is hoping to put the Socialists into what he sees as an impossible situation — showing them up as spendthrifts if they vote against good housekeeping rules in their parliament, but being able to brand them as right-wing capitalists if they vote for it.

Mr Sarkozy’s re-election prospects are dominating a number of areas in the EU at the moment with, for instance, no progress expected on the €1,025 billion budget to run the EU’s programmes over seven years from 2014.

Everyone knows that final agreement will mean a cut in the amount available for agriculture, especially for France the biggest recipient of CAP funds, as more will have to go to new member states especially.

This, however, would not be a good message for Mr Sarkozy during his election campaign so it will be left to later in the year, when the Cypriots take over the presidency. But being such a small country it is more likely that the final deal will fall into the lap of Ireland’s presidency in early 2013.

And it will have to be finalised during Ireland’s term because whatever deal emerges must be done before the German federal elections in September-October 2013. Ireland could find itself in the unenviable position of having to work to keep Germany happy.

However, Ireland is getting quite good at seeing a challenge as an opportunity and hopefully domestic politics will continue to allow this. On Friday Taoiseach Enda Kenny mentioned his latest good idea for ensuring that Ireland emerges from the euro crisis and remains a wonder child for the austerity club. He was hoping to get some kind of political agreement on this, but his message was mainly conveyed on the sidelines to individual member state leaders.

A technical group is working away on it with the European Commission, the ECB and the bailout fund, the EFSF. They appear to have come up with a formula which unfortunately nobody appeared able to convey fully to the media on Friday.

It will be walking a tightrope for Irish civil servants as they try to find a way between making it worthwhile for members states — particularly Germany — to bring down the cost of Ireland’s debt. And, on the other hand, not doing a David Cameron on it and voting ourselves into the cold where France would be happy to wave goodbye to a minor irritant, and Ireland would lose a seat at the table that decides all things to do with the euro.