Number 10 bungling leaves Britain lectured by Von der Leyen on the rule of law

“Britain does not break treaties. It would be bad for Britain, bad for the rest of the world and bad for any future treaty on trade that we might need.”

Though uttered this week by the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, the words are not hers but those of Margaret Thatcher, spoken ahead of the 1975 referendum on Britain’s membership of what was then the Common Market, or EEC.

Political historians will be familiar with Mrs Thatcher’s views on the necessity for integrity in international relations. It is, however, somewhat to be doubted that Boris Johnson took them into account when considering the amendments to the EU Withdrawal Agreement enshrined in this week’s Internal Market Bill.

Mrs Von der Leyen delivered the quote with understandable relish and to spontaneous applause from MEPs. Delivering her first State of the Union speech on Wednesday, she made clear that neither the Commission nor the European Council, representing the member states, was ready to compromise on the terms of the withdrawal agreement. Either Britain accepted it in full or there would be no future trade deal.

“This withdrawal agreement took three years to negotiate and we worked relentlessly on it, line by line, word by word. And together we succeeded. The result guarantees our citizens’ rights and the integrity of the single Market, and, crucially, the Good Friday Agreement.

“The UK and the European Union jointly agreed it was the best an only way to ensure peace on the island of Ireland. We will never backtrack on that.

“This agreement has been ratified by this House and by the House of Commons. It cannot be unilaterlly changed, disregarded or disapplied. It is a matter of law and trust and good faith.”

It was at this point that the shade of Margaret Thatcher was summoned.

In Britain, Lady Thatcher is better remembered in terms of European politics for her Bruges speech and its aftermath in which, in contemplation of Ever Closer Union, she declared, “No! No! No!” The fact that she was, rigidly, a woman of her word sometimes gets lost amid the enthusiasm she engendered in those opposed to any extension of the European Project. But the fact remains, she would not have countenanced the approach to the Withdrawal Act that is now her successor’s declared policy. She might very well never have agreed the Northern Ireland Protocol in the first place, but having done so, she would have kept her word.

The Commission President could have gone on to quote Mrs Thatcher’s own use of a comment by her predecessor Harold Macmillan when he sought to slap down a previous rebellion on Europe by Tories bent on revoking the 1972 Act that took Britain into the EEC.

“We used to stand for good faith, “Macmillan said. “That is the great strength of our commerce overseas. And now (in 1975) we are being asked to tear up a treaty into which we solemnly entered.”

It was a case of déjà vu all over again, except that on this occasion it was the Commission President reminding a reluctant UK of one of its proudest boasts.

What impact her words will have on Downing Street remains to be seen.

Turning to other issues, and from English into French, Mrs Von der Leyen did her best not to let her entire 76-minute address turn into a plea for Europe to come together in defeating Covid-19. Lessons had been learned in dealing with the virus, she said. What mattered now was that Europe should construct a “future-proof and properly funded health programme, together with a reinforced European Medicines Agency and a strengthened European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).

MEPs nodded in agreement. How could they not? Nor did they demur when she pledged to build a European agency for biomedical research and called for EU competences in the field of health to be included in the upcoming (and all-singing, all-dancing) Conference on the Future of Europe.

Looking further ahead, her speech was marked mainly by the repetition of much of what she said in her inaugural address as Commission President back in the dim and distant days of November, 2019. Then, it was all about the so-called NextGenerationEU, with its concentration on climate change, the digital revolution, mass immigration and respect for the rule of law.

This time there was more on race and gender, including an optimistic elevation to the level of “EU crimes” of all forms of hate crime and hate speech, whether based on race, religion, gender or sexuality. Europe would use its diplomatic strength and economic clout to broker agreements that made a difference on ethical and human rights issues, as well as on the environment.

This evoked much nodding from the left and centre of her audience, combined with scattered applause – but none from the governing parties of Poland and Hungary, who, predictably, murmured their disapproval when she went on to underline that migration was a challenge for the whole of Europe in which every country had to play its part.

Evoking the EU equivalent of motherhood and apple pie, she expressed the wish that Europe should be “a global advocate for fairness”. In this context, the Commission would pursue a global agreement on digital taxation and would go it alone if that could not be achieved.

Again, much nodding all round. Not even the Poles and Hungarians could object to that.

The speech was hard-nosed and serious, with no jokes. Delivered as it was amid the privations of Covid and the onrush of the worst economic recession since 1929, it could hardly have been otherwise. There was a reference to “new beginnings with old friends,” directed at both the UK and the US, and a call ­­– surely not more than perfunctory – for the “revitilisation” of the UN, WTO and WHO. Other than that, it was a question of more of the same. It was as if she looking at the  world through a kaleidescope that contained the same pieces, rearranged in a different order, with the sole addition of Covid-19.

It would be untrue, and unfair, to say that she sat down to silence.The applause was genuine. MEPS, barring the usual suspects and minus the British delegation, were not minded, as a body, to express any meaningful disapproval. What matters now is what follows from the rhetoric, or lack of it. Britain has been warned of the consequences of its actions. The ball is now firmly in the British leader’s court.