Brexit vote has Swedish leaders’ nerves jangling

Sweden’s prime minister and foreign minister have both warned of negative consequences for Sweden if Britons vote this week to leave the European Union.

Published: 20 June 2016 13:35 CEST

Brexit vote has Swedish leaders' nerves jangling

Prime Minister Stefan Löfven addresses the LO congress in Stockholm. Photo: Jonas Ekströmer/TT

Prime Minister Stefan Löfven voiced his concerns in a speech given to trade union confederation LO’s annual congress on Monday morning.

“We can’t be gripped with panic, but we are waking up to a new political reality,” he said.

A Leave vote in the June 23rd referendum could endanger the European Union’s future, the Prime Minister told news agency TT after the speech.

“We don’t know exactly what the effects will be or what forces they might trigger in Europe,” said Löfven.

He added that there was concern in the EU that a Leave vote in Britain would give fresh impetus to Eurosceptics in other countries to push to leave the union or to renegotiate their membership terms.

“It’s not a good time now to have divisions in the EU,” said Löfven.

The government was working on a plan for how to proceed if Britain left the EU, he said, with Sweden seeking to preserve its good trade relations with both the UK and the rest of the EU.

“But there’s not going to be an collapse, panic, or chaos in Sweden [if Britain leaves]. We’ll manage it,” he said.

Foreign Minister Margot Wallström was in Luxembourg on Monday for a meeting with her EU counterparts. Although the British referendum is not officially on the agenda, it was the main topic of conversation in the corridors, she said.

“On the fringes we’re talking about it all the time,” said Wallström.

With the result set to be announced on Friday, Midsummer Eve, she admitted: “It’s very exciting and I am a bit nervous.”

Wallström expected EU leaders to have plenty of work to do even if Britons vote to stay in the 28-member club, with negotiations set to begin within days on new memberships terms.

“It won’t be easy if they remain either – there’s a series of exceptions on which there are likely to be tricky discussions.”

Faced with Russia’s war in Ukraine, the potential return of Donald Trump as US president and competition from China, the new commission will need to steward the EU at a time of global uncertainty.

To confront the challenges, von der Leyen handed powerful economic portfolios to France, Spain and Italy — with a hard-right candidate from Rome taking a top role in a commission seen shifting broadly rightward.

“It’s about strengthening our tech sovereignty, our security and our democracy,” the commission chief said as she announced the team at the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

France’s outgoing foreign minister Stephane Sejourne was handed an executive vice president role overseeing industrial strategy, after von der Leyen ousted Paris’s first nominee.

Spain’s Teresa Ribera, a socialist climate campaigner, was also made an executive vice president, tasked with overseeing competition and the bloc’s transition toward carbon neutrality.

As Russia’s war against Ukraine grinds on through a third year, security and defence assumed a new prominence.

Former Lithuanian prime minister Andrius Kubilius landed a new defence role overseeing the EU’s push to rearm, making him one of several hawkish Russia critics in eastern Europe to receive a prominent position.

Those also include Estonia’s ex-premier Kaja Kallas, already chosen by EU leaders as the bloc’s foreign policy chief.

And Finland, another country neighbouring Russia, saw its pick Henna Virkkunen given a weighty umbrella role including security and tech.

As part of the bloc’s careful balancing act, the German head of the EU executive had to choose the lineup for her second term from nominees put forward by the other 26 member states.

That has meant treading a political tightrope between the demands of competing national leaders — and putting some noses out of joint.

The highest-profile casualty was France’s first-choice candidate Thierry Breton, who quit suddenly as internal market commissioner on Monday accusing von der Leyen of pushing Paris to ditch him.

Von der Leyen fell short in her efforts at gender balance, ending up with 40 percent women after pressuring member states for female nominees.

But women obtained the lion’s share of executive VP roles, with four of six posts.

Controversial Italian pick

The choice of who gets which job is an indication of where Brussels wants to steer the European Union — and the weight commanded by member states and political groupings after EU Parliament elections in June.

Cementing its status as parliament’s biggest group, Von der Leyen’s centre-right European People’s Party commands 15 of 27 commission posts — to the chagrin of left-wing lawmakers like France’s Manon Aubry who warned of a lurch “far to the right” in terms of policies too.

Among the powerful vice presidents is Italy’s Raffaele Fitto, handed a cohesion brief in a nod to gains made by far-right parties in the June elections.

Giving a top role to a member of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s post-fascist Brothers of Italy party has raised hackles among centrist and leftist groups — while Meloni said it “confirms the newfound central role of our nation in the EU”.

After Green party losses at the June ballot, whether climate would remain high on the agenda and which commissioners would steer green policy was a subject of scrutiny.

As well as Ribera’s overarching role, the centre-right Dutchman Wopke Hoekstra will carry on in a position handling climate and the push to make the EU carbon neutral.

Among other eye-catching choices, Croatia’s Dubravka Suica obtained a new role overseeing the Mediterranean region, and the enlargement gig went to Slovenia’s Marta Kos — yet to be confirmed as her country’s candidate.

Other important figures going forward look set to be Slovakia’s Maros Sefcovic, handling trade, and Poland’s Piotr Serafin, who will steer negotiations over the bloc’s next budget.

All would-be commissioners still need to win approval from the European Parliament, with hearings to start in coming weeks.

Lawmakers could flex their muscles by rejecting some candidates — or at least dragging them over the coals, as expected with Italy’s Fitto.

Chief among those suspected for the chopping block are Hungary’s Oliver Varhelyi, nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s man in Brussels these past five years, who received a diminished portfolio covering health and animal welfare.

The stated target is to have a new commission in place by November 1st, but diplomats say that looks ambitious, with December 1 more likely.