Blair to be first President of EU?

The Irish are being asked to vote again on the Lisbon treaty, apparently they gave the wrong answer the first time. If they do indeed change their minds, and vote yes, Europe will need a President.

Who will be the glorified unifier of Europe? The Independent have their money on somebody you may remember, Mr Tony Blair. Apparently he has a lot of support, from the right people.

A senior British official said: “He [Brown] will have to swallow hard to sit down in meetings once again with Blair. But he accepts that there needs to be someone from the UK in the new global architecture. There is no opposition to the plan. Things have moved on, people have moved on.”

Other European leaders are also broadly supportive because they want a high-profile figure to represent the 27-nation bloc in the new alliance with the US administration. Mr Blair remains a popular figure in the US.

After initially trying to block Mr Blair as a possible candidate last year, the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, has thrown his weight behind the former prime minister.

We didn’t get a vote on the EU constitution, we didn’t get a vote on the Lisbon Treaty. Then again I’m sure they’d make us revote until we gave the right answer anyway. Blair could be waved into a position which citizens of the United Kingdom did not get to vote for. He could be waved in, with the consent of a Prime Minister who famously bottled an election for fear of losing. Is this the sort of ‘democratic’ union we desire?