16/09/2016 Politics Europe

Time now for Politics Europe.

Hello and welcome to Politics Europe, your regular guide

to the top stories in Brussels and Strasbourg.

On today's programme: EU leaders meet in Slovakia to discuss Brexit

and other pressing problems.

Theresa May isn't there, so what deal will the remaining

members offer Britain

outside of the EU?

Britain may not be part of it, but will the EU soon

have its own armed forces, and do they threaten Nato?

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker orders free Wi-Fi for every

town and city by 2020.

Bold thinking, or a futile, grandiose gesture?

So all that to come and more in the next half-hour.

First, though, this week members of the European Parliament have been

meeting in Strasbourg for their regular plenary session.

So what have they been getting up to, and what else has been happening

over in Brussels?

Here is our guide to the latest from Europe in just 60 seconds.

We learned that the EU's auditors opposed Romania and Bulgaria joining

the EU in 2006, over concerns they couldn't spend funds properly.

The two countries joined anyway in 2007.

It is Budapest versus the Grand Duchy, as the foreign

minister of Luxembourg suggested Hungary should be suspended,

maybe even thrown out of, the Union, for failing to respect

the EU's values.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker used his State

of the Union address to warn that Brexit presented an existential

crisis to the EU.

But he had big ideas, too, like free Wi-Fi for every city

and village by 2020.

And goodbye Frontex, hello European Border

and Coastguard agency.

Member states approved the creation of a new 1,500-strong force,

which will take to the seas in October.

And with us for the next 30 minutes, I'm joined by Labour MEP Sion Simon

and the Conservative MEP Jacqueline Foster.

Welcome to you both.

Let's take a look at one of the stories in more detail,

this plan floated by Mr Juncker for free Wi-Fi.

I think even 5G, he was talking about, in every town,

city and even village of the European Union by 2020.

Is it too cynical just to look at that as a gimmick?

Not at all, because I think it was gimmick.

There we have somebody who's in charge of the Commission,

standing up doing a State of the Union address.

We have challenges on immigration.

We have member states with problems, banking problems in Italy,

unemployment, a key player has left the European Union,

ie we are leaving, the UK.

And then, partway through the speech, he starts

talking about Wi-Fi.

And ultimately it's all about more Europe, and I just found

it absolutely astonishing.

So it's not at all cynical.

What powers does the European Commission have to deliver free

Wi-Fi to every village in Europe?

They don't have the power.

Very few, if any, I don't think.

It would be nice if we could have it.

It'd be nice.

I don't think we're going to get free Wi-Fi in every public park

in 28 countries for 120 million euros.

Or 27 countries, now.

Or even five countries, to be honest, for that

kind of money.

So yeah, clearly it was a bit of a gimmick.

Although to be fair, the speech, it's kind of the equivalent

of a party conference speech.

So not serious?

Well, it's a bit of a laundry list.

It's got to have something for everybody in it.

He did talk about serious themes, and he also threw in a gimmick.

But I've got to say, given...

Coming hard on the heels of the actually more serious

and equally unedifying climbdown on roaming charges last week,

it seemed like an odd place for them to go.

Well, that seemed...

Because one of the things that we heard in the referendum,

one of the benefits of the EU would be the roaming charges,

which used to be huge.

But I saw earlier this week that apparently Mr Juncker had...

Because he hadn't been properly consulted or the papers hadn't come

to him properly, that these plans to improve the roaming charges

had been sidelined.

Is that right?

Well, possibly.

I rest my case.

They've talked about roaming.

I've been there for an awfully long time, really, since '99.

And fine, so a committee looked at roaming charges and how

expensive they were.

Then there was the consideration if, OK, it was OK for us

when we were travelling, or you are travelling,

that our mobiles were a bit cheaper.

But were the citizens of the United Kingdom going to be

paying for that?

Because their costs might go up.

So really, if I may just bring this back, whether it was roaming charges

or Wi-Fi, I mean, this was a State of the Union speech,

with huge issues, huge pressures, as you said.

Security, defence, immigration, and he is talking about this.

It was absolutely ludicrous.

And you know, if we had the President of the United States

doing the State of the Union, or a British Prime Minister

during the State of the United Kingdom, or another

leader in another country, I mean, I doubt whether any of them would be

talking about Wi-Fi.

I think I rest my case on that one.

To be fair, though, I remember one of...

Or probably more than one of Tony Blair's early conference

speeches, when he couldn't do any wrong and he was the most popular

man in the country, and every speech he gave was in epoch-making triumph,

and they were always littered with a computer for every school,

and an information superhighway, broadband infrastructure.

But that was a party conference.

It was completely different, if I may say so.

I think they're quite similar.

We shall see.

We shall see.

I guess neither of you are going to take on a bet of 100 quid that

every village will have Wi-Fi by 2020.

I don't think you'd get very good odds.

We'll move on.

So the leaders are meeting in the Slovakian capital of Bratislava.

All leaders, that is, except Theresa May.

It is the first summit to exclude the UK since our referendum on 23

June.

And that is because this summit will be about how the remaining 27

will begin to consider what the Union should look

like after the United Kingdom leaves.

Clearly there is much to get through before that happens,

so what do know about the EU's negotiating position,

such as it is, at the moment?

The European Commission has appointed former French commissioner

Michel Barnier as its chief negotiator.

The European Parliament has its own negotiator,

too, the former Belgian prime minister, well-known EU federalist

Guy Verhofstadt.

The EU Commission President, Jean-Claude Juncker,

told MEPs on Wednesday that the UK cannot be part of the single market

without free movement of people.

He also said that he wanted Brexit talks to start as soon as possible.

But former EU Council president Herman Van Rompuy told the BBC that

substantive negotiations are unlikely to start

until after the German elections, and they are not until September

next year, a year away.

Let's talk to our Europe correspondent Damian Grammaticas.

He is at this meeting in Bratislava.

Damian, the purpose of this meeting originally was to begin to sketch

out what the EU 27's negotiating position would be.

But I get the impression there are so many other problems

crowding in on the EU at the moment that that is not the only subject

being discussed there.

No, you're right, Andrew.

It's not actually, really, the subject being discussed at all.

They are going to discuss sort of of the political fallout,

if you like, from the Brexit vote.

But what they'd always said, actually, was that this summit

was going to be about - not about Brexit itself,

but about charting a way forward for the EU after Brexit.

So this is very clearly meant to - being meant as a signal.

That 27 nations, without the UK here, without the British Prime

Minister, are meeting around the table, setting the agenda

for the future.

And that is going to be sort of broad brush strokes.

But very clearly what they want to do, they said,

is to try to address the sort of underlying issues that

led to Brexit.

So on the sort of broadest possible level, what they mean

by that is that they see a threat from this rising sort of tide

of Euroscepticism, and they want to reinvigorate the EU,

try to reconnect with European people.

But around that table now, of 27, with Britain not being there,

it would be fair to say that there are deep divisions

among that 27.

There is a Visegrad group of the East Europeans,

which takes a very different view from what you might call

the Club Med group, which in turn is very different from the Nordic

and northern group, which sometimes can include France,

or France may sometimes be in the Club Med group.

Even to such a stage that we had, this week, the Luxembourg foreign

minister call for the expulsion of Hungary.

So even without us they're not that united, are they?

No, and the leaders themselves know this.

They themselves have all been walking into this castle this

morning saying, what they have to do is show a message of unity,

to try to find the areas they agree on.

And interesting you mentioned Luxembourg.

The Luxembourg Prime Minister, walking in today, he said,

we need to remember that we agree on 90% of things.

There's 10% of things that we don't agree on.

So he was almost dismissing the idea that there is this sort of crisis

in the EU.

He was saying, keep an eye on the bigger picture,

on the fact that, in many, many areas, the EU delivers for people.

But, in the areas that sort of matter in some ways

at the minute, where the crises are focused, migration and border

security, economic issues, growth and jobs, there are very

different views, as you say, between the more sort

of austerity-minded North and the Southern European countries.

And also between the East, who want more controls on migration,

less - not willing to take refuge in quotas, and on the bigger

countries in the West, that want them.

All sorts of divisions.

Damian Grammaticas, in Bratislava.

I must say, the castle looks brilliant, it looks

wonderful behind you.

We will let you get on and find out what is happening

in the rooms there.

We are joined now by the Ukip MEP William Dartmouth,

who is part of our discussion.

There he is, down in...

Good day, good day.

It looks like a lovely day down in Bournemouth,

I can see you there.

So stick with us.

Let me...

It's a beautiful day, you ought to be here.

They don't let me out very often these days,

I'm afraid.

Let me ask you this.

Is it not, Sion Simon, going to take a long time?

The British Government is just at the foothills

of what its negotiating position is going to be.

We still have no idea.

And the Europeans may actually be even further behind.

They have no idea what their negotiating position will be.

I've never come across anything in my...

I'm 47, I've never seen anything in which everybody has got so little

idea, still, now, what is it, going on three months

since the referendum?

I don't think the British Government has got the slightest idea

what it's doing.

Neither the Prime Minister nor any of the Secretaries of State has said

anything coherent about Brexit at all.

And I don't think it's any different at all in the Commission

or the other member states.

Everybody I talk to, it's complete chaos and blankness and confusion.

It's really honestly made me wonder what it used to be like in the War.

And I've concluded that there was a much greater sense of purpose,

and understanding what we were doing, actually,

in wartime than this Brexit.

William Dartmouth, are you concerned about the lack of clarity?

And how long...

It is like a phoney war situation at the moment, isn't it?

How long can this continue?

Well, the principal reason that there is a lack of clarity

is because the Cameron-Osborne government, totally irresponsibly

made no preparations at all.

I have written extensively about this, and hopefully one day

I get a bit of coverage on the BBC for what I'd actually have written.

But I mean, what is necessary is that there should be a supremacy

of English law, controlling our borders, and a return of fishing,

and no contributions to the European Union budget,

as an absolute minimum.

Otherwise this isn't really a proper Brexit at all,

which is what people voted for.

Is that English law is going to be supreme in Scotland as well?

I, well, I think that we can have an interesting discussion

with the difference between Scots and English

law.

I think the Scots would want their law to prevail over

European law.

You may have to go back and rewrite that.

You may have to go back and rewrite that bit of your paper before

we talk about it further to get it right.

At the moment, we seem to be in a situation

where particularly in the European side, there's, the kind of sticking

out, not a bargaining position, but a bargaining attitude.

So a well known anti-Brit is appointed, Mr Verhofstadt,

who loved to tangle with the Brits as well, and Mr Juncker too.

All of this is pretty meaningless.

It's the Council of ministers that is tasked with being in charge

of the negotiations and that means Mr Tusk

and Angela Merkel.

I think is a fair point to make, Andrew.

And what is particularly ridiculous about all of this is,

you know, the voters have spoken.

And whether other members, other countries like it or not,

that's the decision that was taken UK.

I do not believe it's in the interests of the other member

states to end up having a virtual civil war

with the UK, determining what the outcomes should be

in the negotiations.

I do feel, slightly reassured in terms with Donald Tusk,

in the meeting today, because I think, genuinely,

the other member states, albeit with different

pressures, want to try to get decent conclusions.

When you look at the message, and if we put

Jean-Claude Juncker to one side, and as you said, Michel Barnier

to be the negotiator from the commission's

side, and Verhofstadt, who actively can't stand us,

and even less since our political group, the British

Conservatives, wiped them out in the last European election.

It's like putting an arsonist in charge

of a firework factory.

If we want to be grown-up on this, we need a good

sensible constructive debate from all parties.

Let me go back to William Dartmouth in Bournemouth.

Is there not a danger from your point

of view, there's a vacuum on the British side,

a vacuum on the European side as well.

Let's stick to the British side.

The longer you allow a vacuum to persist,

isn't there a danger that forces start to

fill it, over which you have no control, and the government have no

control, and the people begin to get disillusioned and wonder

control, and the people begin to get disillusioned and wonder if it's

going to happen.

How long can we go on like this?

That's actually a very perceptive question.

First of all, the appointment of Barnier and Verhofstadt

is an attempt by the commission of the European Parliament to fill

that vacuum and it's not very helpful at all.

It's just posturing for position.

That doesn't belong in a serious way.

Because no preparations were made, it's in one

sense reasonable that a little bit of a time is taken.

It really shouldn't be for very much longer.

I must make the point we should commit to the UK

leaving the single market.

So long as we stay in the single market, the 85% or more

of the British economy that doesn't export to the EU

countries is nonetheless bound by the whole panoply of EU

regulation we have to concede.

We'll leave it there.

And I think it's important that is clearly

understood.

I understand and you made it clear.

That will be part of the debate if and went the government tells us

roughly what their bargaining position is going

to be.

William Dartmouth in Bournemouth, thank you for joining

us.

It's got his own court, the civil service in Parliament.

Does the EU need its own armed forces.

There is a renewed push for integration

within the remaining members.

Including a push for EU armed forces.

The prospect of an EU army was a hot topic during the referendum

campaign.

You're being asked to make a decision that is irreversible,

we are being sold on the lie.

The lies about the European army, because we

got a veto on that.

They are not going to change course on anything.

They are still progressing with the European army plans.

The UK always stood in the way of greater military

co-operation within the EU, but June's referendum result removed

a major obstacle, paving the way for the members keen on more

integration to pursue their ambitions.

TRANSLATION: We should work towards a common military force,

and this should be in complement with NATO.

Forces from the member states are already working together,

Operation Sophia tackling people smuggling in the Mediterranean

is one example.

It would be more effective against threats both

within and beyond EU borders.

I think the first challenge we face is terrorism.

It's also crisis and very deep crisis in the south,

the Middle East, near east, northern Africa, central Africa,

these are challenges that we can tackle as European,

without requesting help from others.

And could closer co-ordination lead to

an EU army?

That's my dream.

I think that national armies aren't from

this time anymore.

Germany won't invade Belgium.

In the long-term, it should be a European defence,

a European army, with one headquarters, one military command,

with one political control.

Now, Britain with its veto is out of way.

Other countries opposed, including historically neutral

Sweden and Ireland, are concerned.

They co-operate.

We are not all the same.

We are not homogenous.

We have different histories.

Having the single foreign policy, it doesn't make

sense.

It puts citizens at risk, we believe.

Ireland's history is as a neutral country.

Friday's summit in Bratislava is likely to address

faster deployment of services overseas, coordinating strategic

assets such as planes and helicopters and sharing data

from satellite reconnaissance.

But getting co-operation is difficult.

Excuse me, you're on BBC News.

Following the Brexit vote, what are your plans

for an EU army?

We are working on the European defence together.

And the idea of fighting under the EU

flag, rather than separate national banners, is controversial.

Our armies are always co-operating in the fields,

in the battlefields.

And you know, we're talking about dying for Europe,

fighting for Europe, but what are we fighting

for when we were fighting together in Afghanistan?

It was under the NATO flag.

The people in the military, they know what they were fighting

for.

Military co-operation could just be the start.

Now the UK, with its many fears and objections,

is leaving, the EU may have closer union in other areas too.

Emily reporting there.

Bringing you the news that Germany is not going to invade Belgium.

So that means they'll be sleeping soundly

in Brussels tonight after that scoop.

When interviewers like myself raise the prospect of a European army,

more integration with Remainers like yourselves, we were assured

it's a pipe dream, Brexit propaganda, never going

it's a pipe dream, Brexit propaganda, never going to happen.

There's moves towards it.

I never thought it wouldn't, not necessarily happen.

And I think that have moved very quickly.

It's again, it sounds like another gimmick.

It's a headline grabber.

And the only thing it would do is undermine NATO.

I think the European Union had defence on the cheap for decades.

That's from the Americans.

Absolutely.

You know, everything the Americans do is wrong,

but by the same token, they were quite happy

for the Americans to assist and there are many member states

who have contributed financially, very,

to any budget and so the fact they want their own military hours,

which would undermine, I think, NATO, when

we already have great co-operation, I think,

again, is just another story.

The Americans are putting Europe under great pressure

to contribute more.

America contributes 70% of NATO's capability.

It's higher than it was during the Cold

War.

I don't understand how Europe can do that and afford to build

a separate command structure.

I don't understand either.

I think the discussion that the Americans want

is a reasonable one and it should be about European countries,

member states of the EU and non-member

states of the EU paying a more equal share into NATO and making a fairer

contribution to NATO.

That is less likely, post-Brexit.

We've been a big break on this thing.

Take us out and it's more likely this will

happen.

It wouldn't be a European force, it would be a French force.

The only real military that matters in Europe are the French.

The German forces, half of them don't work.

The French, other than ourselves, the French are the only one country

with formidable defence capability.

Absolutely.

And France had nothing to do with NATO for years.

They have only recently come back in.

I think the French actually really want, I think they are quite nervous

about all of this.

The French?

Absolutely, yes.

They will be dumped with a lot of this.

Unless this exit strategy is done in a grown-up way,

Britain will be

playing a key part.

Or they build a big headquarters and get some

uniforms but don't have much of a European army.

At least it's now on the agenda and interesting to cover.

That's all for now.