Further integration a non-starter

History in Europe has slowed down. Further European integration has been put on ice, it's a 'non-starter' because in a massive turnout, overwhelmingly French voters said "non" to a new constitution on Sunday.

The Dutch also said "No" in a referendum on Wednesday. In October, 2004, the 25 leaders signed up in Rome to what was to be a new set of rules to manage the enlarged European Union.

Existing rules and procedures for managing 10 countries are inappropriate, even unworkable, for the new 25 nation, 458 million wider Europe.

The 400-page constitution announced in ringing triumphant calls by leaders as the biggest, most historic decision in generations is now dead on arrival.

The constitution was put together by the political elites and led by former French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. It brought together sensible new procedures and then called for a European Bill of rights, a European President, a new foreign policy czar for Europe, and followed the infuriating European bureaucratic device of constructive ambiguity.

Thus it tried to be everything for everybody and therefore pleased no one.

I was in Europe during the run-up to the referendum and watched in awe as the politicians spoke to each other and over the heads of the people. The constitution was just too grand.

On one hand, they said it was simply about process and then said it was the biggest decision people would make in their lifetime.

The so-called constitution has already been ratified by 9 countries. However, it has to be unanimously accepted by all of the 25 member nations.

The people are now saying "enough is enough". With unemployment at 10 per cent in France and Germany suffering with 5 million unemployed, the scene is set for a major reaction.

It's normal for politicians to try and have it both ways. But when, for years, they attack the European bureaucracy in Brussels for all their domestic problems, and then ask the voters to give Brussels more power, it didn't wash.

Even after the result, some leaders were stunning in their condescension. A former president of the European Commission sadly shook his head and said he was displeased. Pardon?

Famous poem

Some leaders are already saying there should be another vote. A famous poem written by Bertolt Brecht after the suppression of the workers by the East German Government in 1953 comes to mind.

The head of the East German Writers Union proposed that "the people had previously thrown away the Government's confidence … and could only regain it through redoubled work".

Brecht asked "Wouldn't it be simpler if the Government simply dissolved the people and elected another?"

The glue that held together the original European Community was a generation that had experienced two devastating world wars.

The recent expansion of the European Union was driven by the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The genius and generosity of the European Union was that the rich countries, France, Germany, Britain and Holland opened their markets to poorer neighbours and paid out millions of dollars to help them restructure their economies that's how Spain, Portugal and Ireland have grown so dramatically.

This policy was supposed to be moved eastwards to rebuild former Soviet colonies. A big fear of voters was the noble objective of European leaders to get Turkey into the European family.

Turkey would become the largest country in Europe and it's 95 per cent Muslim.

High unemployment, fear of Polish workers flooding into Europe, competition from the rising economic giants, China and India, drove up the anti-migrant protectionists who, from the left and the right, attacked what they called "neo-liberal Anglo-Saxon economic strategies".

French President Jacques Chirac said liberal economics was as bad as communism!

Never mind that the countries that they slam for such policies have lower unemployment, lower inflation and less debt than their own.

It's not the end of the European Union. But the idea of a European superpower has been dealt a mortal blow. The Nation state has asserted itself and its sovereignty. The people don't want their political power outsourced.

Interestingly, all the "Non" voters wanted a successful Europe. Perhaps the argument is between those who want a sort of United Nations of Europe, but NOT a United States of Europe?

The world needs a strong, growing Europe but many of the old European nations just seem politically incapable of making the hard economic decisions that have successfully reformed New Zealand, Australia, Sweden, Britain and Holland.

Perhaps the worst thing the European Union and Brussels have done is provide an excuse for politicians of economic appeasement, allowing them NOT to face up to their own economic weaknesses and shortcomings.

Mike Moore is a former prime minister of New Zealand and a former director-general of the World Trade Organisation