Growing Worries about a European Super-State

The Conference for the Future of Europe displayed a lack of expertise on the limitations of EU powers as enshrined in the Union’s constitution.
The Conference for the Future of Europe displayed a lack of expertise on the limitations of EU powers as enshrined in the Union’s constitution.

Two Members of the European Parliament, Dr. Gunnar Beck, (Alternative für Deutschland) and Cristian Terhes (Romanian Partidul Național Țărănesc Creștin Democrat), are expressing grave concerns about an emerging European super-state. The proposals to grow the EU at the expense of nation-state sovereignty are embedded in an initiative called Conference on the Future of Europe. 

According to Dr. Beck, Breitbart London reports,

many of the conference’s proposals on the likes of taxation, defence, and migration represent a serious threat to the sovereignty of the EU’s individual member-states, with potentially devastating consequences if even only some of the suggested measures come into force. 

The German MEPs also questioned the democratic legitimacy of the Conference initiative itself, having previously referred to it as a “democratic farce.”

According to Breitbart, Cristian Terhes, MEP from Romania, referred to the Conference for the Future of Europe as “a political sausage maker hoping to turn the European Union into a new Soviet Union.” Mr. Terhes’s parliamentary group, European Conservatives and Reformists, left the Conference over what the group identified as highly problematic bias in selecting Conference participants. 

Among the bias problems, the group explained, was a lack of expertise on the limitations of EU powers as enshrined in the Union’s constitution. 

In the Breitbart interview, Mr. Terhes sees the Conference on the Future of Europe as “a pretext to circumvent the EU treaties” to accumulate more power in the hands of Brussels bureaucrats. The Conference has also been characterized as a “roadmap for unhealthy government growth.”

Sven R Larson, Ph.D., is an economics writer for the European Conservative, where he publishes regular analyses of the European and American economies. He has worked as a staff economist for think tanks and as an advisor to political campaigns. He is the author of several academic papers and books. His writings concentrate on the welfare state, how it causes economic stagnation, and the reforms needed to reduce the negative impact of big government. On Twitter, he is @S_R_Larson