Good morning.
When the EU faces emergencies, it is usually much quicker to act than its critics would have you believe.
Shortly after the start of the eurozone debt crisis, a bailout mechanism was created despite initial warnings that this would be illegal.
Then, when the scale of economic damage that the Covid pandemic would cause became clear, the EU27 agreed to temporarily drop their objections to the Brussels executive issuing its own debt, allowing it to set up a loan fund worth more than €700bn.
Similarly, when US president Donald Trump threatened to pull the plug on military support for Eastern Europe, the EU was abruptly shaken out of several decades of underspending on defence.
To its credit, the von der Leyen Commission moved to set up a €150bn soft loan facility and an €800bn joint defence procurement programme.
Yet when it comes to fixing outdated legislation, the EU moves more like a tanker ship.
As someone who had assumed that the EU’s single market was comprehensive, it was a shock to learn earlier this week that the EU does not have common rules for the licensing and certification of defence equipment.
For example, a commercial vehicle can travel across the EU without being checked at any border. But put some camouflage or military hardware on it, and it faces swathes of red tape.
The result is that the EU, and the majority of countries that do not have a defence industry of any note, pays a premium of around 30 percent on its equipment.
If the EU is serious about creating a ‘defence union’ and reducing its reliance on the United States, fixing such bottlenecks is as essential as harmonising procurement and making it easier for defence firms to access finance.
Otherwise, as German MEP Tobias Cremer, who has drafted the European Parliament’s blueprint for a single market in defence, put it, “we will carry on paying more for less”.
Benjamin Fox, trade and geopolitics editor
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