We must renegotiate our role in the EU

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/19/britain-must-renegotiate-role-in-eu

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I spend my days crisscrossing the country and talking to businesses, large and small. In recent months, the future of Britain's relationship with the European Union has been a fast-growing topic of conversation.

What may surprise some in the Westminster bubble is that the view from the coal face is different from the one trotted out by some high-profile captains of industry and the chief executives of multinationals. In fact, it doesn't follow either the classic Europhile or Europhobe lines.

Britain's business community, many of whom export, wants to see real and substantive change in our relationship with the European Union. While four out of five insist that they want to remain part of the European single market, an even larger number say they are against further integration and transfers of power from Westminster to Brussels.

The prime minister's preferred approach of "renegotiation and referendum", then, is an option that chimes with the thinking of many pragmatic businesspeople whose primary interest in the European debate is ensuring that they can trade, hire, export and flourish. Forty-seven per cent of our members, a large plurality, think this is the right approach. In the simplest terms, a settlement that supports their business interests would simultaneously safeguard the UK's economic interest.

It is premature to talk of extreme solutions to Britain's European question. Only 9% of our members think we should throw our lot in with the "core" countries of the Eurozone, and only 12% think we should withdraw from the EU altogether. The theme tune to the business debate is emphatically not "should I stay or should I go now?".

Yet maintaining the status quo, which both Europhiles and approximately one-quarter of companies favour, is simply not a viable option. Europe is changing. Britain cannot expect the EU to simply stand still while it navel-gazes and debates its future involvement. Nor can it just seek to negotiate favourable reforms within the club's existing rules, because the club's rulebook is changing.

If Britain does nothing to renegotiate its position now, it will be dragged down the road of ever-closer union in the wake of the Eurozone. That raises the spectre of an "in/out" referendum in future that no pro-European campaign could realistically hope to win.

So renegotiation, with powers returning to Westminster alongside a redoubled commitment to the single market in both goods and services, is the only realistic and pragmatic course to take. The prime minister may fear ripostes from the commentariat and from other European capitals, but he need not fear the reaction of most of the business community.

Although the prime minister starts with a strong hand, given Britain's trade deficit with the rest of the EU, renegotiation is invariably a high-risk strategy. Britain's businesspeople are not keen on walking out the European exit door, but they recognise that in a negotiation, all options have to remain on the table. That means having the courage to take tough decisions and facing the consequences at the ballot box. It also means bringing the debate to a conclusion within a reasonable timescale.

In business, the best negotiators start out by setting crisp red lines, but remain inscrutable on the details. If Mr Cameron can manage this, and work constructively to bring other European leaders around, Britain stands a chance of recasting its European relationship in the national interest. Unsurprisingly, that's what businesses across the whole economy really want to see.

John Longworth is director general of the British Chambers of Commerce