Image from 'DontWalkAway' Facebook event. Supplied by author/ some rights reserved.That Europe is in urgent need of reform is beyond question. At risk of being lost in the current British public debate, however, is the discussion as to the type of reforms that Europe needs. The focus on David Cameron’s ‘wish list’ of demands has established an accepted discourse that presumes that these demands reflect ‘British interests’. It also presumes that were Cameron to win European acceptance for all of his demands, then this would be ‘a good deal for Britain’.
One of the key benefits of European integration are the non-discriminatory labour rights and social provisions between member states, which allow European workers to access the same benefits as ‘natives’ when working in one another’s countries. By seeking to ban EU workers in the UK from accessing in-work benefits until they have lived in the country for four years, Cameron has been attempting to roll back a fundamental achievement of European integration. If this were only happening in Britain the future of the union would not be in question, but all across Europe a rising tide of nationalist sentiment – and with it the inevitable lurch towards discriminatory practices aimed at non-nationals resident in the ‘home’ country – is putting in question Europe’s unity.
Those of us on the left who believe that workers of all countries have common interests, that they should all enjoy the same rights and protections and that they are being failed badly by a broken economic system, face a particular difficulty when looking at the current state of the European Union. None of us support the status quo; we all recognise radical institutional and political change is needed. Most of us also know, however, that a British exit would leave workers even more vulnerable to a Tory government and would not be a step towards the social Europe we believe in.
