Across The EUniverse – Number Sixteen

Winston Churchill called for deeper integration of Europe. He said, during a 1946 speech to the students of the University of Zurich, that ‘[t]here is a remedy   which … would in a few years make all of Europe…free and … happy. It is to re- create the European family, or as much of it as we can, and to provide it with a structure under which it can dwell in peace, in safety and in freedom. We must build a kind of United States of Europe.’ Churchill also famously said ‘Never let a good crisis go to waste’.

Taking Churchill at his word, Across the EUniverse believes that despite the rise  of the national sovereignty movement in the US and in many EU Member States, a movement that could be seen to undermine European integration, there is a need to accelerate the integration of the EU within a constitutional framework with common institutions and common laws. The EU must press ahead to complete the banking union, the energy union, a fiscal union. We must build on the common values which we share and have cited in the Lisbon treaty. We   must go back to the reasoning that underlies the Cassis de Dijon ruling of the European Court of Justice.

There is crisis in the air. There is doubt and uncertainty. The EU can only be bold in addressing this air of crisis. The EU must not be blamed. She must be praised and raised as the bulwark for strong values and the rule of law.

In this issue we address …