Told you so…

Writes Professor Iain Begg in The Times this morning, "You draw attention in no uncertain terms to the findings of the study commissioned by the Treasury that UK companies are being denied access to public contracts in other EU member states."

"The problem", Begg avers, "is not a lack of clear and sensible laws, but the fact that member states routinely flout them. The obvious remedy is for more effective powers of enforcement to be granted to the European Commission. More Brussels, anyone?"

Now flash back to our posting yesterday when we argued that the report plays into the hands of the integrationists who would like nothing better than to see the commission given more power to interfere in the affairs of member states.

Herein lies the crux of a problem, we wrote. Like Blair, we cannot have it both ways. Either we allow member states to make their own decisions, and use public money to purchase from whom they think fit, or we subscribe to a supranational authority which has the powers to over-ride national preference and direct governments as to what they can and cannot do.

As long as companies see any merit in an EU solution, they are buying in to political integration.

Told you so!