Cameron will ‘fight to end’ against Juncker
The British prime minister spelt out to Herman van Rompuy that he is determined to fight “until the end” the appointment as president of the European Commission of the former Luxembourg PM, who the British government regards as an ultra-federalist and a roadblock to reform.
Mr Cameron made clear that if Mr Juncker’s name is tabled on Friday, he will demand a vote on his nomination — an unprecedented move in a process which is normally agreed by consensus.
Following their meeting, Mr Cameron wrote on his Twitter feed: “I had a full and frank discussion with Herman van Rompuy. I told him there must be a vote on Commission president.”
Following the 40-minute meeting, No 10 said Mr van Rompuy had agreed to work through the practicalities of holding a vote after Mr Cameron made clear that he was not prepared to back down, despite facing almost certain defeat.
With a majority of EU leaders — including Germany’s Angela Merkel — throwing their weight behind Mr Juncker’s candidacy, Mr Cameron looks certain to be outvoted under the qualified majority system.
Downing Street made clear Mr Cameron regarded it as a matter of principle, with the so-called ‘Spitzenkandidaten’ process — which would see Mr Juncker chosen as the candidate of the biggest party in the European Parliament — marking a fundamental shift in the balance of power in Brussels.
“The prime minister explained that his view would not change. Simply accepting the Spitzenkandidaten process would be an irreversible step which would hand power from the European Council to the European Parliament, with the risk that the European Parliament would dictate the European Union’s agenda,” a No 10 spokesman said.
“I think there is a fairly odd phenomenon at the moment – which does happen, believe it or not, in politics – which is that people are saying quite a lot of things privately that they are not saying publicly,” Mr Osborne told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
As chairman of Friday’s meeting, Mr van Rompuy holds a key position in deciding whether the Juncker candidacy is put to a vote. The Council’s rules of procedure do not specifically state whether a vote must be held if requested by a single national leader, but it is thought unlikely Mr van Rompuy would reject Mr Cameron’s demand.
Meanwhile, Poland’s foreign minister has been caught on tape giving a stinging assessment of Mr Cameron’s “incompetence” in Europe.
Radoslaw Sikorski is claimed to have accused Mr Cameron of falling foul of “stupid propaganda” and trying to appease his critics by feeding them scraps, only for the strategy to backfire.
The colourfully-worded covert recordings, which were leaked to Polish magazine Wprost, apparently capture a conversation between Mr Sikorski and former finance minister Jacek Rostowski.
Mr Sikorski is reported to have said: “His whole strategy of feeding (his critics) scraps in order to satisfy them is just as I predicted, turning against him.
“He should have said, fuck off, tried to convince people and isolate (the sceptics). But he ceded the field to those that are now embarrassing him.”
