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Blair: EU must reform or fail
RELATEDQUICKVOTEYOUR E-MAIL ALERTSBRUSSELS, Belgium (CNN) -- The European Union must reform itself fundamentally to meet the challenges of the modern world or face failure, British Prime Minister Tony Blair has said. In a keynote speech to the European Parliament in Brussels setting out his vision for Britain's EU presidency on Thursday, Blair insisted he was a "passionate pro-European." His speech was met with some applause but also sporadic heckling. He denounced those claiming that Britain was pushing for the EU to become simply an economic free trade zone, saying it was a "misrepresentation" and that he also backed a modern social Europe. "Now almost 50 years on, we have to renew and there is no shame in that. All institutions must do it and we can, but only if we re-marry the European ideals we believe in with the modern world we live in," Blair said. "The issue is not between a free-market Europe and a social Europe, between those who want to retreat to a common market and those who believe in Europe as a political project," he said. "This is not just a misrepresentation. It is to intimidate those who want to change Europe by representing the desire for change as a betrayal of the European ideal." Blair was blamed by some EU leaders for blocking a deal on the EU budget last week after he refused to accept demands led by French President Jacques Chirac to give up Britain's annual rebate. Blair has said that he will only discuss the rebate as part of a package of wider reform, sparking a furious clash with Chirac, who remains determined to defend EU payouts to French farmers. There had been hopes among some leaders that agreement on the budget would inject some fresh political momentum into the beleaguered European project after the crushing rejection of the new EU constitution by French and Dutch voters. CNN's European Political Editor Robin Oakley said: "If there was a single message it was that Europe should spend less time on politics and more time on economics. "His message is that Europe's leaders have not been listening enough to the people, and that those people are crying out for new leadership." Britain's Chancellor Gordon Brown set the tone for Blair's appearance with an uncompromising warning that Britain was determined to pursue its reform agenda. He used his annual Mansion House speech to City of London business leaders on Wednesday to denounce EU economic thinking as "not just out of date but counter-productive" and call for an end to "inefficient and counter-productive" farm subsidies. He warned that with growing pressure from emerging economies like China and India, as well as the United States, the EU could not afford to delay on market reform and liberalization. "While the old assumption was that we would move from economic integration at a national level to economic integration at a European level, it is in fact global -- not European -- flows of capital that now dominate, the global -- not European -- company and the global -- not European -- brands," he said. "As Europe enters the second stage of its history as a union it is finding that, as a result of globalization, the agenda relevant to its first phase -- the era of a trade bloc -- has changed utterly. "The challenge for Europe now is that of global competition." 
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