“It’s worth celebrating that 25 years ago we took a big step towards further economic and monetary integration. I see that as a positive development which was scuppered by the referendum in 2005, when the Netherlands and France said ‘no’ to the European constitution drawn up during the Convention between 2002 and 2003. I still consider it a political disgrace that the Netherlands didn’t sign; a fault line in the European project. Balkenende and the other Dutch politicians placed no value on it. If the Convention had come through we’d now have had more political integration, not just economic.”

Why is economic integration not enough?

“My view is that further integration, even with the Convention as a step towards political integration, was unworkable because it’s solely based on economic integration. The EU is founded upon treaties and agreements that foster prosperity and internal trade. Take the establishment of a single currency union and the Schengen Agreement, which promotes the mobility of people and goods. All these economic benefits have led not to more political unity but rather to the opposite. The more prosperity there is, the more people go in search of their own identity – a movement we’re seeing now.”

How can the Netherlands, as one of the founders and a staunch supporter of the EU, have become so anti-European?

“One reason is that the Netherlands has mainly gone in for self-interest: what are we putting in and what are we getting out? It’s a mentality inspired by the UK under Thatcher: ‘We want our money back.’ The economic calculations of what the Netherlands gives and gets in return, where we’re a net contributor, are distorted and inaccurate. Yet Balkenende propagated this line of reasoning, which puts national above European interests. As I see it, this contributed to the Dutch rejection of the Convention. The second cause of the Dutch turnaround was the criticism of the ruling ‘purple’ coalition of liberals and social democrats by Pim Fortuyn and others. This opposition to elitist governance culture emerged early in the Netherlands, and has been much harsher than in other places. But you see that same elite governance culture in Europe, in the distance between the European Parliament and the citizen.”

Why can’t and won’t Dutch politicians explain how important Europe is for us?

“I don’t know. I’ve spent the last 20 years being frustrated at the way Dutch politicians talk about Europe. For years the Dutch media have been giving huge amounts of airtime to critics of Europe; there’s a lot less of that in Germany or Belgium. That brings me back to the Convention, where not only politicians dropped the ball, but academics too. Ronald Plasterk, who was then still a professor, was president of a group of academics that spoke out influentially against the referendum. They saw the Brussels framework programmes, which distributed research funding, as too bureaucratic. No doubt about it, but that was no reason to vote down the Convention. Why is there so much bureaucracy? Because the European Court of Auditors requires the agencies responsible for allocating research funds in the EU to have you answer all sorts of questions, fill in all kinds of forms, declare your hours and so on. Check upon check upon check, all typical of Europe, but imposed by the member states because it involves European tax revenues that go to a number of member states. In my view, it’s the height of duplicity. Fortunately a lot of that excessive red tape has since been phased out.”