Abstract
To assess how far the parliamentary party, the media and the public affect the prime minister’s leeway in European policy-making, it is necessary to consider their attitudes to European integration, which is done in this chapter. But first the four prime ministers’ attitudes to European integration are outlined to understand to what extend their views concurred with or diverged from those of the parliamentary party, the media and the public.
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Notes
- 1.
Young, H. (1999), This Blessed Plot, Britain and Europe from Churchill to Blair, 2nd edition, London/Basingstoke/Oxford: Papermac. © Hugo Young 1998, 1999. Reproduced with permission of the Licensor through PLSclear.
- 2.
Interview with T. McNally, 22 March 2010.
- 3.
Interview with M. Butler, 22 March 2010.
- 4.
His political secretary Tom McNally came to a similar conclusion, see interview with T. McNally, 22 March 2010.
- 5.
In 1988 Thatcher gave a speech at the College of Europe in Bruges calling for co-operation between EC member states instead of European federalism (Thatcher 1988).
- 6.
Young, H. (1999), This Blessed Plot, Britain and Europe from Churchill to Blair, 2nd edition, London/Basingstoke/Oxford: Papermac. © Hugo Young 1998, 1999. Reproduced with permission of the Licensor through PLSclear.
- 7.
Interview with R. Liddle, 28 October 2010.
- 8.
Interview with S. Wall, 8 January 2010.
- 9.
For details of the government’s dispute with the trade unions over pay which culminated in extensive strikes by the unions during the ‘Winter of Discontent’ 1978/1979, see Hay (2009).
- 10.
67% voted for the UK to remain in the EC, 33% against it (Butler 1979: 151).
- 11.
In Parliament the government only succeeded with support of the opposition: 248 Conservatives, 138 Labour MPs and 12 Liberal MPs voted for Britain to remain in the EC; 145 Labour MPs voted against it, while others abstained (Norton 1980: 60).
- 12.
Since 1973 the European Commission twice a year does a survey of member states citizens’ views on European integration. Part of the Eurobarometer survey series is the question: “Generally speaking, do you think that (your country’s) membership of the European Union/European Community (Common Market) is…?” Possible answers are: a good thing, a bad thing, neither good nor bad, DK—don’t know.
- 13.
European elections are considered second-order elections: If voters, not much interested in the EU, choose to vote at all in them, they tend to do this on the basis of domestic not European issues and to use their vote to send a message to their national government (Curtice and Steed 2000: 240).
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Bujard, B. (2019). Attitudes to European Integration. In: The British Prime Minister in the Core Executive. Contributions to Political Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-89953-4_5
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