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“At
the end of the day, the British don’t like to be told what not to
do” — EU diplomat.
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The
In crowd to Commission: Back off!
Fears
grow that EU involvement in UK referendum will be counter-productive.
By TARA PALMERI
10/21/15, 5:30 AM CET
Pro-EU forces in the
U.K. may be having trouble finding a message that will convince
British voters to remain in the Union, but they’ve agreed on a
clear one for the European Commission: Keep calm and stay out of our
way.
British In
campaigners say they are concerned that EU officials on a special
Commission task force dealing with the referendum will do more harm
than good if they get too publicly involved in the U.K. debate.
“The general
feeling is that the less the Commission says and does in public, the
better,” said Petros Fassoulas, secretary-general of the European
Movement International and former chairman of the European Movement
U.K., a leading pro-EU group.
EU officials are
clearly aware of the sensitivity around the issue, with the head of
the task force, Jonathan Faull, now acting as a kind of gatekeeper
authorized to control the Commission’s communications with the U.K.
This includes vetting commissioners’ travel to Britain, sources
said.
The task force
includes seven officials and according to its charter — spelled out
in an internal memo from Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker —
is engaged in coordinating EU strategy on the referendum and
“overseeing the Commission’s input to information activities in
the run-up to the U.K. referendum.”
It’s that last
phrase that set off alarm bells with British pro-EU forces, who say
that any public involvement from the Commission is potentially
counterproductive. In many U.K. media outlets, “Brussels” is a
synonym for bureaucratic meddling.
The memo language is
“Commission-speak for gathering and disseminating what it means to
be a part of the EU, like they want to inform the debate,”
Fassoulas said.
“At
the end of the day, the British don’t like to be told what not to
do” — EU diplomat.
The Commission
insists it is not campaigning in the referendum, and that there are
no plans to put Juncker or Vice President Frans Timmermans on a
Eurostar whistlestop tour of Britain any time soon.
Officials said the
Commission’s information efforts consist mainly of “myth-busting”
fact-check activities aimed at stories in British papers about the EU
— something they have tried to do since long before there was ever
a referendum debate. Now, with the new increased focus on the In/Out
question, there is a realization among senior Commission staff that
anything more than that would be “counterproductive.”
“It’ll be
incredibly sensitive for anybody with an EU salary to involve
themselves in the U.K. debate,” said an EU diplomat. “If Juncker
and Timmermans can bring forward a degree of honesty, they’re not
going to be stopped. But at the end of the day, the British don’t
like to be told what not to do.”
Debunking Euromyths
Faull, a 30-year
Commission veteran and one of the most senior Britons working for the
EU institutions, is in charge of making sure nobody gets carried
away. While commissioners have the final say over their own travel
plans, a spokesperson said, Faull’s team is “helping with the
provision of input for the briefings of the commissioners traveling
to the U.K.”
Sources said Faull
has also avoided getting personally involved in the debate, turning
down requests for interviews on British television.
But even with the
tighter controls on messaging, the EU isn’t keeping completely mum.
The Commission’s
office in London has been actively trying to counter some of the
press reports and messages from Out campaigners. This effort includes
a special web page that aims to debunk “Euromyths” as well as
leaflets and publications extolling the benefits of EU membership.
EU officials in the
U.K. are also not afraid to step in and spin journalists when they
see fit. In an October 9 e-mail entitled “Facts on EU legislation,”
the London office’s head of press, Mark English, responded to a
claim by Out campaign group Leave.EU that Brussels produced 20,256
legal texts this year.
“Here is some
factual background information on that,” English wrote to
journalists. “This figure is quite correct and has in fact
increased today alone to 20,504. BUT: ‘Published’ is the key
word. Most of these are NOT new EU laws and many of them do not
emanate from EU level at all.”
Too shy
Asked about the
message to British media, English said the “role of the London
representation is to explain EU policy to stakeholders and media in
the U.K. and — based on listening to people here — to report back
to Brussels so that views from across the U.K. can be better taken
into account.”
But he stressed that
neither the Commission’s U.K. office nor the institution as a whole
had a role in “campaigning in national referendums or in providing
funds for others to do so. This obviously includes the forthcoming
referendum in the U.K.”
That doesn’t
prevent the U.K. office from engaging in the broader debate about
Europe, including on social media channels. Last week the
Commission’s London representation took to Twitter with an
infographic showing an “alphabet of 26 false stories about the EU
banning things,” and launched a discussion with the hashtag
#euromyths.
The EU has not been
as reticent to get involved in other national political debates. The
institutions took a proactive role in the Croatian referendum on
accession in 2012 by assisting in spreading positive information
about EU membership including TV spots, web and radio quizzes and
leaflets. The Commission spent nearly €4 million on a public
relations campaign between 2010 and 2012 ahead of the enlargement
referendum, according to documents.
Some pro-Europeans,
however, worry that by staying too coy the Commission risks being
sidelined in the referendum discussion.
The Commission “has
a legal and political duty to see that the [referendum] conclusion is
positive,” said Andrew Duff, a former British MEP who is president
of the Union of European Federalists. “If it were seen as failing
to try, it would be seen as failing to do its duty.”
“Even the
pro-Europeans are so frightened of the EU that they can’t even
deploy it properly,” Duff added.
Authors:
Tara Palmeri
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