The Germans are coming at this from a different angle. They feel their "influence" is being eroded by the ever increasing power of Brussels. That's the thing about "ever closer Europe" aka a federal Europe, is that no one country does rule.
---------- Post added at 23:27 ---------- Previous post was at 23:19 ----------
I share your concerns about the different cultures of Europe and would have preferred if the "pace" of European integration were slower, a lot slower.
To answer your point about the benefits of being in the EU, we are part of a single market of 500 million people which is bigger than America and its worth 11 trillion quid. All without trade barriers like customs duties and tariffs. Plus, we broadly have to follow the same rules.
Remember all that guff about Brussels rules dictating that fruit has to be the same size, shape etc. Well, that's simply so that everyone in the EU can trade on the same terms with each other.
---------- Post added at 23:32 ---------- Previous post was at 23:27 ----------
Cameron wasn't surprised, it was all show for the cameras.
What Cameron should have highlighted is the massive rebate we get back from the EU, the one that was negotiated by Thatcher. We pay less into the EU per head of population than anyone else in the EU.
---------- Post added at 23:52 ---------- Previous post was at 23:32 ----------
It was never explained to our people in the 70s when that vote happened what "Europe" was all about.
It was never just about a common market but a means to integrate countries together (especially France and Germany) that had fought each other in WW2, so that war in Europe never happened again. Churchill was one of main people behind it, and despite her public musings, so was Thatcher. She signed
every single European treaty given to her.
Obviously, with this bill we have to pay, the subject of Europe is a thorny one at the moment, but that aside,
everything is going our way.
They mostly speak our language in the European parliament and comission. They have adopted our free market way of thinking and much of EU law is based on English law.
The EU is wasteful and their accounts haven't been signed off. But we'll win on all of this. We'll get the number of Eurocrats cut down and even decide on one place where "Europe" should be based, rather than the current nonsense of moving between two different locations with all the vast expense that carries.
And the biggest blinder of all, thanks to Major, we can enjoy all things Europe, without having to pay for many of its problems aka we're not in the Euro - Yay! They, in Europe, hate us for that and envy us at the same time.
If the Germans could do it all again, there is no way they would have voted to join the euro.
We have the best of both worlds, lets pay that damn bill and get on with it.