We need an intervention on Canada-EU

I spent much of this past weekend shouting at my computer and TV screen reading and watching reports and commentary from seemingly articulate and intelligent folks discussing a news report about Canada seeking associate membership of the EU.

In fairness the government did come out some days later and say it isn't seeking such an arrangement! One presumes principally because there is not, never has been and never will be 'associate membership'. And no, Norway and Iceland do not have 'associate membership'. They are full members of the EU single market, required to follow rules made for them in Brussels, enforced by a European court, which national parliaments and courts have no power to overrule.

Canada is not, would not be allowed to and nor should it want to join the single market, especially not if sovereignty is what we are all about these days.

Returning to the real world though, there is something very odd about the obsession in some Canadian quarters of responding to the current US trade frictions by constantly talking up the EU. Fundamentally, this is based on the flawed idea that the EU is the antithesis of everything the US is at the moment.

For sure, the EU doesn't adopt the language of a spoiled toddler and the behaviour of a hormonal teenager as some in the US administration do, but Canadians would do well to remember too that the EU does not act out of benevolence when it comes to trade.

• The EU cares no more about the success or otherwise of the Canadian domestic economy than the US does! I am perhaps being provocative, but the truth is, like every nation or trading bloc, any EU interest in deepening relations with Canada will be based not on sentimentality related to Canada's current issues with Washington. They will be based on the cold hard economic or security interests of the EU.
• For all the warm words, Canadians should look at some of the language adopted by European politicians when the EU was negotiating and seeking approval of the current EU-Canada trade deal (CETA). Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in Berlin, Brussels and elsewhere demanding the EU reject the trade deal with Canada. Green Party MPs in Ireland went to court to try to get it blocked! The French Senate rejected it. Some of them were quite rude about Canada!
• Ten years after the signing of this deal (which took 7 years to negotiate), 10 EU countries still have not ratified it. It remains controversial.
• Anti-trade blocs are winning increasing electoral support across the EU, on both the left and right which means any future deepening of the Canada-EU trade relationship will face potentially even greater hurdles than a decade ago.

Of course there are areas for further cooperation and closer ties and the PM is right to pursue these, but please, can we just ensure the debate is rooted in reality?

Canada is not joining the EU. Now, may we dispense with any further such nonsense talk?