Reuters Long dismissed as “Little Englanders” living on the fringe of politics, Britain's vocal band of EU-haters sense that their moment may have come. Prime Minister David Cameron's decision to veto a new European Union treaty during a Dec. 8-9 summit has emboldened Britain's so-called eurosceptics, who are now pressing him to loosen ties with the bloc or even leave. Cameron insists that Britain must remain part of the 27-nation Union, with which the island nation does around half of its trade and which supports an estimated 3.5 million jobs. “Our membership of the EU is vital to our national interest,” Cameron told parliament last week. “We are a trading nation and we need the single market for trade, investment and jobs.” Many legislators from Cameron's Conservative Party, his Liberal Democrat coalition partners, and the opposition Labour Party, share the government line, which reflects a British establishment view formed over nearly four decades of EU membership. However, an influential and vocal section of Cameron's party dreams of Britain having a similar relationship with the EU to that of Switzerland or Norway — a free trade agreement which gives access to the EU's huge single market without signing up to what they see as a costly and burdensome bureaucracy. Public opinion is starting to move in that direction too. An Ipsos MORI poll in October found 49 percent of British voters would choose to leave the EU in a referendum, compared with 41 percent who would vote to stay in. A similar poll in 2007 found 51 percent of voters would choose to stay in. EU sources said Cameron, a relative novice to the delicate art of Brussels summitry, had not intended to cast a veto, intending only to use the threat of a “no” as a negotiating tactic to secure concessions for London's financial district. But the apparent diplomatic missteps which led to the veto have now presented the British premier with an unexpected problem: his defiance in Brussels may have infuriated Continental allies but it proved very popular at home, giving him and his party an immediate lift in the opinion polls. No one expects a British exit from the EU to be seriously proposed any time soon and the current fraying of relations between the remaining EU 26 nations over their fiscal pact could yet open the door for Britain to re-engage with Europe as the Cameron's coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, are demanding. However, the eurosceptics see a unique opportunity to refashion relations with Europe and create an entity which looks more like a free trade association than a political and fiscal union. __
