Former deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine went viral last week with his remarks that the UK will be suffering the greatest loss of sovereignty in its history with its withdrawal from the European Union.
Heseltine touches on the reason which had motivated me, Simon Busuttil, and thousands of other Maltese in our battle to secure our place in the EU – that membership in the EU is a means of holding our destiny more firmly in our hands, by being part of a constructive force for unity and common solutions around the table of members at the European Parliament and at the council.
Today more than ever, no member state alone, no matter how large, is capable of offering its citizens solutions on the management of migration flows, better paid jobs and better lifestyles unless it works in a larger grouping of states capable of having the upper hand in trade deals and relations with mammoth multinationals.
In this context, Brexit is tragic. We the Maltese know the UK better than many others. We know that the UK MEPs and the UK ministers in the council have been an important factor for creativity and additional ambition in the European project. Many achievements of the union today, from our emphasis on SMEs to more weight to innovation policies and many more areas, are marked with the UK’s input. The union today is indeed richer thanks to the UK’s experience and insight be it on security, internal market and environmental matters.
The UK itself has benefited greatly from EU accession. Entering as the sick man of Europe in the 1970s it is now one of its strongest economies with a strong export-focused services industry benefitting from a 500 million strong EU market.
On 23 June, all of these achievements were put into question. Prime Minister Theresa May’s interpretation of that referendum vote is radical and unforgiving. Her letter to trigger the withdrawal negotiations is equally misguided. With constant hints of repercussions like making security cooperation conditional to concessions on single market access and with unfeasible demands of opening the post-Brexit trade talks before seeing to other more impending withdrawal matters, May has set the scene for a hardening of lines by all actors in the continent.
The UK’s withdrawal will not change our common heritage and our shared values
This hard reality could not have been clearer in the European Parliament plenary. The Parliament had no other option but to react to May’s hard line with the union’s hard line. The EP resolution makes it clear that there will be no membership benefits without membership responsibilities, and that the UK should refrain from any trade talks before the withdrawal negotiations are settled.
As a Maltese representative in the European Parliament, my intervention in plenary highlighted the need to protect the strong bonds between the union and the UK. The UK’s withdrawal will not change our common heritage and our shared values. We should ensure that our values keep on guiding us into a new relationship based on trust and common interests.
This does not mean that the UK can have the cake and eat it. Membership privileges come with membership responsibilities. It is clear therefore that the upcoming negotiations have to draw difficult distinctions between the benefits that the UK can enjoy and the benefits that will have to be reserved to members.
Finally, assisting at the Brexit debate reminds us of our own road to accession before 2004 when so many Maltese put their energies behind our European dream and against the scaremongering of the Labour Party.
It would appear that the Labour Party today recognises its huge mistake of going against the European aspirations of the people of Malta, but as we know, appearances can be tricky.
We just saw the appeal made by the chairman of the Panama Papers inquiry committee Werner Langen to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat to ask Keith Schembri to testify on his involvement in the Panama Papers scandal, being met with arrogant replies by government apparatchiks.
This is only the last scene in a long series of act and omissions by this government from the sale of European citizenship to the proposal of candidates for members of the court of auditors rejected by the European Parliament to opaque back-room deals with third countries showing the dismissive and careless attitude of this government when it comes to projecting our country’s image within the EU.
All of us who appreciate our EU membership and who, like me, believe that this goes beyond mere commercial interests but relates also to our values as Maltese and Europeans will tell this government to reconsider this tone and bring us back in the fold as protagonists in the European project.
The tragedy unfolding in the UK tells us very clearly that union membership benefits are not a stone-clad guarantee. Our union membership benefits, from the millions we receive in EU funds to the infinite opportunities for our businesses and our youths, depend on our will to stand up for our achievements and to our governments when they put them at risk.
David Casa is a Nationalist Party MEP.