Johnny Dymond: I asked Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister, whose country held the Presidency up until Britain about 4 or 5 months ago, what Britain needed to do to get a deal.
Jean Asselborn: Tony Blair said, a lot of times, and I believe him, that the UK is in the heart of Europe. So today and tomorrow Britain has to show if this is so or not, if this is right or wrong. Tony Blair is a statesman. In the history books you will find him as a statesman. And I also want that Tony Blair becomes tomorrow a European statesman. This issue is very, very important. And we have to move away from this small issue of the British rebate. The British rebate was born twenty years ago. And if we do nothing today, we’ll still speak again about in ten years - thirty years after Fontainebleau in 1984, when the British rebate was introduced. The rebate, this correction, was right at this time. Today, the UK has the second largest and second biggest economy in Europe.
Johnny Dymond: You raised the point about Britain’s role in Europe. How do you think this Presidency, the British Presidency has gone compared with presidencies in the past, not necessarily your own, but other presidencies?
Jean Asselborn: It was a very difficult Presidency, because six months ago the British side decided not to agree with our proposal. That was their choice. I don’t want to comment it. But then, after making this choice, they had, on the British side, the obligation to find a solution in December - now, today and tomorrow. And that’s difficult, very difficult.
If they fail, then the Presidency wasn’t a good Presidency. That’s right. You cannot say the 3rd October was a great success, that date was already fixed one year ago, for Turkey and Croatia too. So what will be the result of the British Presidency? I don’t know. Everything hangs on this deal. And I think the British know it. They will make efforts. Tony Blair will make efforts.