This is an editorial from The Business, a Sunday Business Paper, which says it all - almost:

PITY there were no cameras trained on Prime Minister Tony Blair when he agreed the communiqué which ended yet another European Union (EU) Summit on Friday, for it is reasonable to imagine a sadistic smile across his face that he would have preferred to keep to himself. By agreeing to revive the ailing EU Constitution by the end of 2008 in the guise of a new treaty, he dropped one of the most toxic issues straight into the lap of Chancellor Gordon Brown, his assumed successor. It will be Mr Blair’s treaty but Mr Brown’s problem; the Chancellor will not thank him for it.

Apart for a small Euro elite, who believe in a federalist future for the EU (or who simply seek a cushy second career in Brussels after a failed first one at Westminster), there is now nothing British politicians can gain from associating with Brussels and its sad collection of inert institutions and bumbling bureaucrats; Mr Brown, for all his other huge blind spots, understands that perfectly well. When President Bush arrives in Brussels next Wednesday, he will be hobnobbing with a Euro elite that has hit fresh depths in the esteem of the people it purports to represent: an EU-wide poll in March found just 25% (only 17% in Great Britain) believed a constitution was what Europe needs most.

It is entirely in keeping with the character of Europe’s small-minded, parochial and deluded establishment that it will press ahead with policies nobody wants; nothing, it seems, has been learned from the devastating “no” votes on the Constitution in France and the Netherlands, Europe’s sclerotic economic growth and industrial decline or its mounting social problems which periodically erupt in urban unrest. This is an elite as cut off from reality as the Senate in the last days of the Roman empire: at a time when even the basic foundations of its single market are crumbling because of a resurgence of economic nationalism, the EU is focusing instead on surreptitiously pushing through parts of a rejected Constitution by stealth.

With breathtaking arrogance and contempt for democracy, the Euro elite simply ignores the will of the people when the people have the temerity to defy the elite’s wishes. The European Defence Agency proposed in the Constitution is up and running, despite a lack of any legal basis; a Fundamental Rights Agency has already been set up to promote the Charter of Fundamental Rights, a core part of the Constitution; and moves to create a European Diplomatic Service (again, part of the Constitution) are under way with plans for a joint consular service. An EU Foreign Minister (proposed in the Constitution) is to be created in all but name by beefing up the role of the “High Representative”.

This is just the beginning. Under the timetable agreed last week, EU leaders will sign a declaration on the future of Europe in March 2007 in Berlin. This will involve the member states “setting out Europe’s values and ambitions and confirming their shared commitment to deliver them, commemorating 50 years of the Treaties of Rome”; in other words, a Constitution-lite. The German presidency of the EU, which starts on 1 January, will also draw up a plan to reach agreement on a new treaty, which will be agreed by the second half of 2008.

This is creating huge problems for Britain. Consider, for example, the fate of the $276bn F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jet, to which the United States and eight partner countries have signed up (with Britain the main one). A crucial hurdle remains: Britain failed last week to agree with the US details of a technology-transfer plan crucial to completion of the deal. Without such a transfer deal, Britain would need permission from Washington to maintain and upgrade its planes over their 40-year lifespan, which is clearly unacceptable. It is no secret that the Pentagon has been reluctant to hand over the technology because it worries about who will eventually get their hands on it if the EU continues to integrate its defence policy (and Britain becomes a key part of that integration).

There will be plenty more such problems to come if the Euro elite gets its way. As we argued during the Constitution’s first push, the most important reason to oppose it is because it attempts for the first time to give EU law primacy over British law. This is not the case at present, contrary to what many believe. The British Parliament has delegated certain powers to the EU and its courts – such as the right to make policy and pass laws on agriculture or the single market – by joining the EU and passing the European Communities Act 1972, since amended by all the new EU treaties. But the terms and duration of this delegation are defined by the British Parliament and courts, not the EU or European Court of Justice. EU law is not superior to national constitutional law; day-to-day EU law usually trumps domestic law – but only because Parliament allows it to do so. The British Parliament could choose to repeal the European Community Act in whole (and leave the EU altogether); or in part (and cease to delegate certain powers to the EU) – as long as it did so explicitly. The British courts would immediately give effect to it.

This fundamental plank of British constitutional law was reasserted as recently as 2002 by Lord Justice Laws in the Metric Martyrs Case. Parliament cannot give away its ultimate authority to any foreign jurisdiction even if it wished to and even if it passed an explicit act to such an effect; if it attempted to do that (thereby binding future Parliaments), the courts would reject it as anti-constitutional. Needless, to say, the ECJ does not agree with this

analysis; but it is powerless to do anything about it, something which it hopes the Constitution will change. Article I-6 states that “the Constitution, and law adopted by the Union’s institutions in exercising competences conferred on it, shall have primacy over the law of the Member States”. An explanatory note states: “The conference notes that the provisions of Article I-6 reflect existing Court of Justice case law”; in other words, the ECJ’s view that EU laws trumps even British constitutional law would prevail.

This is an extraordinary development. The European Court thinks that EU law is superior to national constitutional law, a position explicitly rejected by the High Court in London; the reference to “existing Court of Justice case law” therefore means that the British Government is asserting its support for the ECJ’s position and repudiating that of the British courts, which would trigger an almighty crisis in Britain and pit courts against government.

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Given what is at stake, the British Government’s despicable suggestion last week that there will be no need for a referendum after all, given the supposedly minor nature of the changes to be included in the new treaty, is a lie. Most of the other member states are committed to a major new treaty, which will contain many of the ideas in the rejected Constitution, including undoubtedly this central issue of legal primacy. Because Tony Blair is set to leave office before the end of 2008, he will be able to escape the ratification battle. The next European elections fall in mid-2009, the same time as (or certainly very near to) the next British general election, putting Europe at the heart of the campaign.

This is an issue which demands a robust Conservative response, starting now. David Cameron, the new Tory leader, should do as he promised during his leadership campaign and immediately pull his Members of the European Parliament out of the federalist European People’s Party. If he can’t find any suitable partners from other countries, the Tories should sit on their own in the European Parliament. Whether he will be as robust as he needs to be on the one policy he has articulated so far is open to doubt. Last month, the Tories rightly voted to support a deregulatory proposal which explicitly contradicted the 1972 European Communities Act, reasserting the sovereignty of Parliament and implicitly rejecting the Constitution; for some reason, this is something of which the Cameroons seemed to be ashamed and wish to keep a secret, as today’s story on the front page of this newspaper reveals.

This Tory backsliding comes after a watering down of the party’s opposition to the destructive Common Fisheries Policy and other climbdowns. Mindful of the fate of Senator John Kerry, the failed US presidential candidate of 2004, who was denounced as a flip-flopper and lost the election, Mr Cameron has so far protested he is all flip and no flop. We shall see. On Europe, he faces two tests. Will he remove the Tories from the European People’s Party? And does he support a looser relationship with the EU? The British public will soon be demanding clear answers.