New labour, same old Britain? The Blair government and European Treaty reform

Among the complaints which surfaced in the campaign which led to the defeat of the European constitutional treaty in the French referendum of May 2005 were those related to the Anglo-Saxon bias of the constitution. While the reasons for the French rejection were multiple and perhaps not easily reducible to such a bias, this article seeks to explore the extent to which recent treaties agreed by EU leaders have indeed been influenced by an 'Anglo-Saxon' vision of the EU championed by the Blair government, particularly in relation to social and economic policies, and by UK policy preferences in general. This article argues that objectives pursued by the Blair government in the EU represent a clear continuity with those of previous UK governments across a range of policies. This involves advocacy of a pro-liberalisation position which nevertheless represents a striking shift in the 'social Europe' approach adopted by Blair's predecessors in the Labour leadership in the late 1980s and early 1990s. While the intergovernmental agreement on the constitution in 2004 appeared to demonstrate the success of Blair's commitment to pragmatic engagement with the EU in order to attain UK objectives, the impasse in the EU in 2005 following the French refusal suggests this approach may have its limits. © The Author [2006]. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Hansard Society for Parliamentary Government; all rights reserved.