Conservative Party - Press release
"William Hague: The future of Europe: freedom and flexibility
In a speech to Open Europe this evening, Shadow Foreign Secretary, William Hague, will say:
'This is an important time for Europe. One year ago the EU Constitution was rejected by French and Dutch voters, in an unprecedented shock to the process of European integration. Treaties have been rejected in referendums before, but never by two countries, let alone by Member States from the founding Six.
The impact of the shock was matched by the importance of the document the referendums rejected. It was not the first Treaty to signify a great change to the European Union, but it was intended to be a turning point. Quite apart from the changes to voting or EU competences, the attributes it would have given the EU - legal personality, the Charter of Fundamental Rights, a foreign minister, the fact that it was a Constitution, not a simply a Treaty – would have revolutionised the EU. As the German Europe minister at the time described it, it was 'the birth certificate of the United States of Europe', or, in the Belgian Prime Minister's words, the 'capstone' of a 'federal state'."
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