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EU project destined to fail: Analyst

Saturday, 17 September 2016 6:07 AM [ Last Update: Saturday, 17 September 2016 8:30 AM ]

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French President Francois Hollande (R) and German Chancellor Angela Merkel leave after delivering a joint statement after the European Union Summit of 27 Heads of State or Government in Bratislava, Slovakia on September 16, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

Press TV has conducted an interview with Robert Oulds, director of Bruges Group, and Marat Terterov, director of European Geopolitical Forum, to discuss the European Union's (EU) situation as it is struggling to find a way forward without the United Kingdom.

Oulds believes the European Union is fundamentally an “anti-democratic project” which is “destined to fail”, adding that it is time to recognize this project was a “mistake”.

He also states the EU has learned nothing from Britain’s vote to leave the European Union and it is only pushing ahead its agenda.

“Whenever there is a referendum, people reject further European Union integration but the European project continues, it carries on regardless because they do not care about the public will,” he says.

“All they care about is amassing more power amongst the institutions in Brussels, in Luxemburg and pushing more powers away from nation states to bureaucrats who are only really responsive to corporations and their own self-interest,” the analyst adds.

Oulds goes on to say the unemployment queues in parts of Europe and enormous debt burden that countries have largely because of the European single currency prove the EU is failing.

The analyst further says one of the key problems for Italy is the crisis regarding the euro and if the country goes under, it is too big to be bailed out and it can bring down the whole European project in terms of the single currency.

He also notes the free movement of labor within the European Union is really in a sense “social dumping” and it does not help the economy.

Oulds also argues the EU decision-making is causing “great division” within the member states and it should be for national governments to determine their own policies.

Terterov, for his part, believes the EU is in a “critical situation” and it needs to sow the seeds of reform in order to strengthen.

However, he says, the project is certainly not “down and out” and it would be wrong to think that the EU is a “sinking ship”.

According to the analyst, to say that the EU project has failed is a little bit “far-fetched” because many Europeans really do associate themselves with kind of a European identity and many of the very practical benefits that the European Union has given them.

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