[ARTICLE 22a]

SINGLE MARKET:

FAILED EU PROTECTIONIST INTERNAL MARKET SET TO CONTINUE

WITHOUT ANY OF THE MUCH NEEDED RADICAL REFORM<= /p>

[ARTICLE 22a]

AMENDMENT TO: Treaty of Lisbon amending the Treaty on European Union and t= he Treaty establishing the European Community (Lisbon, 13 December 2007)<= /span>

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Policy Area: Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, Part Three Policies and Internal Actions of the Union, Titl= e I – The internal market, Article 22a

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Amendment:<= /o:p>

Clause 2,&n= bsp; page 1, line 12, after ‘excluding’, insert—

‘(i) Arti= cle 2, paragraphs 40 to to 45 , inserted Title I and Articles 22a and 22b, renumbered Title Ia, amen= ded Article 23(1), inserted Chapter Ia and Article = 27a TEC (TFEU) relating to the internal market; and

(ii)’.

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<= st1:City w:st=3D"on">Lisb= on Treaty: =

“= ;41) An Article 22a shall be inserted, with the wording of Article 14. Paragraph= 1 shall be replaced by the following:

"= 1. The Union shall adopt measures with the aim = of establishing or ensuring the functioning of the internal market, in accorda= nce with the relevant provisions of the Treaties."”

Consolidated Treaty Article(s):

“Article 14

1. The Community shall adopt measures with the aim of progressively establishing the internal market over a period expiring on 31 December 1992, in accordanc= e with the provisions of this Article and of Articles 15, 26, 47(2), 49, 80, 93 an= d 95 and without prejudice to the other provisions of this Treaty.

2. The internal market shall comprise an area without internal frontiers in which the free movement of goods, persons, services and capita= l is ensured in accordance with the provisions of this Treaty.=

3. The Council, acting by a qualified majority on a proposal from t= he Commission, shall determine the guidelines and conditions necessary to ensu= re balanced progress in all the sectors concerned.”

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Expl= anation:

The existing Article 14 created a com= mon basis for the internal market. In the Lisbon Treaty, Article 14 merely becomes Article 22a, WITH the word Community being replaced with Union, the word Treaty being replaced with Treaties and obviously the reference to the expiry date of 31 December 1992 for completion of the internal market being deleted. The Union shall adopt measures = not only aimed at establishing but also ensuring the functioning of the internal market.

It should be noted that protectionism= is still an inherent problem in the internal market and, as a regional protectionist trading bloc itself, the Union has proven not to be a workable model in the new globalised economy. Internally= , it has created an unworkable and overregulated economy. It needs an urgent and rad= ical reform which has not been provided by within this provision or any of the o= ther provisions in the Lisbon Treaty.

EU protectionism is part of a wider problem of the European landscape, namely the failure of the European economic project, wh= ich includes the Lisbon Agenda. Far from achieving its objectives, the Agenda i= s characterised by low wages, low growth and high unemployment in the eurozone, two issues that played a primary role in the rejection, by the various peoples of Europe, of the original European Constitutional Treaty. The fact is that the Europe= an economic policies do not work.

Under the Single European Act, European legislati= on would have become oppressive unless much more was done to counter it by way= of ministerial involvement and extra information to Parliament from business. = The oppression is becoming acute. The question now is why there is such a refus= al to acknowledge its source. Perhaps it is the fear of accusations of R= 16;europhobia’, or a belief that the national interest is not worth rocking the boat for. Either way, the conspiracy of silence is itself a significant example of the effect Europe has on our daily lives.

Under Nice, the standard justification for the proposed massive extension of QMV at the Nice IGC is that the veto would “imperil the single market” in an enlarged EU. It seems in real= ity that the “single market” has come – quite conveniently, f= rom Brussels’ perspective – to be understood as including virtually every aspect of= EU business. The removal of barriers to trade and obstacles to the free moveme= nt of people has become a convenient excuse to centralise= more and more powers at EU level.

To top it all, the Lisbon Strategy, which was supposed to make the single market the most competitive knowledge-based eco= nomy in the world by 2010, has been a fiasco and a failure. Initiatives like the Lisbon Agenda are presented in the language of globali= sation, but beneath the surface, they are based on the old, bloc-ist thinking. The hightax, high-regulation, market interventionist system of governance must be radically reformed if Europe is to flourish in the 21st Century. The Lisb= on Treaty enshrines that failing economy, which carries with it disastrous consequences for Britain and Europe.=