An essential part of the EU project is the denigration of the very idea of the nation states corralled into the ‘Union’. They are redundant, useless, past, relics that need to be replaced by the bureaucrats and braggadocio of Brussels. For a good example, here’s the Belgian Prime Minister, Guy Verhofstadt, explaining to George W Bush why a federal Europe is necessary:

“…Europe can do little or nothing unless it is united and cooperates. To paraphrase my illustrious predecessor, Paul Henri Spaak, Europe consists solely of small countries. There are some who know it. And there are some who are now beginning to understand – just like James Madison and George Washington understood in 1787 in Philadelphia – that a loose confederation must be forged into a strong union.”

Solely of small countries, Mr. Verhofstadt?

Well, speaking as you do, as the prime minister of a petite, not-quite-country (ask the people of Flanders what they think of your ‘Belgium’) which is no longer even a full democracy, I can see why that’s your perspective. Other countries (ahem…) might see themselves in a rather different way.