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Britain
Blair gives up on his EU dream
2005-06-05
Tony Blair has given up on Europe as an issue worth fighting for, senior allies of the Prime Minister have told The Sunday Telegraph. A leading Blairite cabinet minister made the admission last night as the European Union descended into deeper turmoil, with doubts surfacing over the future of the single currency.

Mr Blair, who will seek to shift the focus of his administration on to poverty in the Third World this week during talks with President Bush, has told his closest allies: "Africa is worth fighting for. Europe, in its present form, is not."
Once again, Tony nails the essence. Now if we can just get him to see the real problem in Africa ...
The signal is an astonishing U-turn for a leader who said three years ago that the euro was "our destiny" and who announced a British referendum by proclaiming: "Let the battle be joined." But one of his closest allies said that Mr Blair no longer believed that putting Britain at the heart of Europe could be his legacy: "Europe is back to the drawing board. Africa will become more important."

Mr Blair flies to Washington tomorrow to try to secure support for proposals to tackle poverty ahead of next month's G8 summit in Gleneagles. But the Prime Minister is unlikely to be able to divert attention completely from the chaos over Europe's future.

The crisis widened beyond the document alone, with a media offensive being mounted to bolster the euro after German officials and an Italian minister openly discussed its possible demise. In the first rumblings of a call for the franc to be reinstated, Nicolas Dupont-Aignant, a member of Mr Chirac's ruling UMP party, said: "France, Italy and Germany would be in a better state without the euro. However, I don't believe we should ditch it now.

"But either it is reformed, and the central European Bank kick-starts growth by lowering interest rates and pursuing a more American-style monetary policy, or the euro will explode in mid-air."
"American style"? There's the kiss of death ...
The governor of France's central bank, however, rushed to the euro's defence. Christian Noyer said that the currency was "in no way under threat" following its fall in value since the No votes of the past seven days. He dismissed as "absurd" the idea of a temporary withdrawal from the euro by individual states. "The euro is a solid currency which brings us a lasting guarantee of stable prices and thus the maintenance of purchasing power for our wages and savings," he told Le Parisien newspaper.
Who said anything about 'temporary'?
The markets have been slowly adjusting to the possibility of the break-up of the euro, with the spread between government bonds in different countries widening. Last night, John Redwood, the leading eurosceptic Tory MP, said: "You can't have a single currency without a single government. They are in a mess because they have only done half of it and they are now discovering in a painful way what that means."
Posted by:Steve White

#5  Well, Tony Blair saw the handwriting on the wall about the demise of the EU dream, soooooooo.....on to Africa. He better look toward an overhaul of his own country first, before it is lost.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2005-06-05 11:35  

#4  rember,2b."There can be only'
one"(Highlander).
Posted by: raptor   2005-06-05 09:07  

#3  that Mr Blair no longer believed that putting Britain at the heart of Europe could be his legacy:

I find it amusing how each one of these leaders thought himself to be the "heart" of Europe. Each humored the others thinking ultimately they would be The One.

France, Germany and England - each one of these leaders saw a personal opportunity to wear The Really Big Crown.

All their delusions of glory shattered in one week. such a pity.
Posted by: 2b   2005-06-05 03:50  

#2  The 'thud' sound of that other shoe dropping was a pleasant one! Blair has a small amount of egg to clean off his face.
Posted by: smn   2005-06-05 01:20  

#1  When boiled down to it's very essence, the whole EU movement is now and always has been about one thing: Hatred and Jealousy of the US.

This can only carry you so far, as Chirac has undoubtedly realized. Even in Europe, you have to give people a more convincing argument than beating those damn Americans before they give up their sovereignty.
Posted by: Unose Whavitle7547   2005-06-05 00:10  

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