ANNIVERSARY 1998-2018 The fi ght for liberal values Annual Report 2017 CENTRE FOR EUROPEAN REFORM 13898 BLUE White + RED CER annual report cover 2017.indd 2 06/02/2018 11:39 THE CER IN NOVEMBER 2017 About the CER FROM LEFT TO RIGHT, TOP TO BOTTOM: John Springford, The Centre for European Reform is a European think-tank with Ian Bond, its head offi ce in London. It seeks to achieve an open, outward- Christian Odendahl, Simon Tilford, looking, infl uential and prosperous European Union; and a Noah Gordon, Agata mutually benefi cial relationship between the EU and the UK. Gostyńska-Jakubowska, The Brexit referendum makes the CER’s work more relevant and Bea Dunscombe, Kate Mullineux, necessary than ever. The EU badly needs reform, while the UK’s ties Sophia Besch, Jordan with it need serious and sensible analysis. The CER favours as close Orsler, Sophie Horsford, as possible an economic and political relationship between the UK Beth Oppenheim, Lucy Slade, Charles and the EU, while respecting the result of the referendum. Grant, Nick Winning We are extending our reach geographically. In January 2017 we opened an and Luigi Scazzieri offi ce in Brussels, to house a third of our research staff . In October 2016 our Absent from the photo: chief economist moved to Berlin. Half our researchers are from EU countries Camino Mortera- other than the UK. Martinez In addition to our Brexit-related events and publications, we will keep working on the trials and tribulations of the eurozone; on the EU’s single market and its energy and trade policies; on its foreign, defence and security policies – including the EU’s relations with its neighbours, and with Russia and China; on the way the Union handles refugees and migration; on law enforcement and counter-terrorism in the EU; and on improving how the Union’s institutions work and relate to voters. The CER’s work will continue to be guided by the same principles that have served us well since our foundation in 1998: sober, rigorous and realistic analysis, combined with constructive proposals for reform. 13898 CER TEXT annual_report_2017 GB.indd 1 06/02/2018 11:12 13898 CER TEXT annual_report_2017 GB.indd 2 06/02/2018 11:12 ANNUAL REPORT 2017 February 2018 3 [email protected] | WWW.CER.EU ABOVE: (L to R) Starting again Wolfgang Ischinger, by Nick Butler Nick Butler and David Miliband th The young executive assistant was charming. “Here’s the cheque. Good CER 10 birthday luck. Sooner you than me though – must be a nightmare working with party, 2008: all those Europeans”. Suddenly the Centre for European Reform had its Hosted by the fi rst funds. Charles Grant dates the CER from the month that we fi rst then German Ambassador acquired an offi ce, in January 1998. But conception came somewhat Wolfgang earlier – in the back row of the post-lunch session of a conference in Ischinger, Königswinter on the Rhine in 1994, when two slightly bored attendees London started to whisper and pass notes to one another. But for the whispers I might have slipped out to climb the Drachenfels. The need for an entity designed to improve process will somehow be stopped or reversed, the quality of the debate on the EU in the UK, but the CER cannot realistically plan on that and to encourage Britain to lead the necessary basis. The strong likelihood is that in March 2019 process of change and reform in Europe – Britain will be out of the EU and into some form instead of standing on the sidelines criticising of transition process. In the eyes of the rest of – seemed obvious to David Miliband and me the EU we will be a ‘third country’, without a seat that afternoon. Creating that organisation at the table. The belief of those leading the CER took time, and required much help – not least – that the UK should be at the heart of Europe from David Simon, then chief executive of – may be unchanged but we will not be able to BP and a committed European. He made the work as if nothing has happened. In 1998, under introductions, then I made the calls and learnt a pro-European British government, everything the pleasures and pain of gathering the people seemed possible. Now, even if the negotiated and the money. settlement of Brexit keeps us reasonably close in terms of trade, the politics will be very Now, two decades on, we have to start again. diff erent. Europe will move on and so will the We might hope as individuals that the Brexit UK. Divergence between Britain and Europe 13898 CER TEXT annual_report_2017 GB.indd 3 06/02/2018 11:12 seems very possible and for some very welcome. themselves. The CER, starting again, should Instead of working with the grain, we will fi nd focus on the positive necessity and potential of ourselves working against it. engagement, looking to the future not the past. But that is not a counsel of despair. Politics To infl uence European policy we will have to be never reaches a permanent conclusion. The in Europe physically, which is why the opening 1975 referendum which confi rmed the UK’s of an offi ce in Brussels is so important and why position in Europe was not the end of the story. that step will probably have to be followed by Nor is the referendum of 2016. The political expansion in Berlin and an offi ce in Paris. For wheel keeps turning. the CER, however, being European and British does not involve any trade-off , or a hard choice The CER is not a campaigning organisation. between the two. We can and must be both, Others will do the campaigning – and one and one day there will be a British government hopes they will be more eff ective than they which will recognise the importance and value of were in 2016. The CER’s role is to present the the European relationship, and which will need facts and the arguments which substantiate objective and practical advice. our continuing belief that Britain and Europe belong together. In the post-medieval world, The techniques of persuasion will have to change sovereignty is an illusion. Economic, security and as well. We might like to think that a combination environmental issues don’t recognise national of hard facts and serious analysis expressed borders. They all require common responses in beautifully written pamphlets will always across Europe, and beyond. Splendid isolation triumph over sound bites and emotion, but we will not last long. must learn from recent experience that that is not always the case. We might not like populism The CER has long been writing not just about and the emotional side of politics, but we have Britain in Europe, but about Europe in the world. to fi nd ways to counter their eff ectiveness. We With America (before and no doubt beyond cannot allow those we disagree with to win just President Trump) wanting to limit its own global because we are too fastidious to take them on. role, Europe will have to step up or fi nd itself surrounded by a series of failed states. With China Accepting that we have not succeeded in determined to join the United States in playing achieving our original goals is the essential fi rst a leading role in the global economy, based on step. The quality of the debate on Europe in science and technology, Europe will have to Britain has not improved. UK politicians were develop a new competitiveness or fi nd itself not at the heart of Europe even before the Brexit undermined by unemployment and declining vote. The reforms across the European Union living standards. With the Middle East and North which were necessary then largely remain Africa destabilised by rapid population growth, necessary today. But recognising those facts religious confl ict and potentially by a new era is not a cause for the ultimate blasphemy of of low energy prices, the risk of new waves of despair. It is simply a realistic acknowledgement migration crises on Europe’s borders is high. of the point from which we (re)start. In our beginning is our next beginning. It is on those key questions that the CER can build a new agenda – demonstrating that Which takes me back to that fi rst cheque – a responses are possible as well as necessary but generous donation from Michael Green, the that the only eff ective answers will be collective head of Carlton Television, without which we and pan-European. We will need more Europe, could never have moved from conception to whether the UK is a formal member of the birth. The charming executive assistant remains European Union or not. in my mind. A young man in his fi rst job. I remember his name. Somewhere I must have Our agenda and aspiration therefore does not his card. I wonder whatever happened to change because it remains based in reality. David Cameron? But the context in which we are working will be diff erent. For the moment the details of Brexit are all important but time will pass, a deal of some sort will be done, and it is important that we do not waste time refi ghting old battles. Little purpose will be served by pointing out the negative Nick Butler consequences of Brexit – they will speak for Co-founder, CER 13898 CER TEXT annual_report_2017 GB.indd 4 06/02/2018 11:12 ANNUAL REPORT 2017 February 2018 5 [email protected] | WWW.CER.EU Continuity and change over 20 years by Charles Grant In 2018 the Centre for European Reform celebrates its twentieth ABOVE: birthday.