EU leaders and bureaucrats under pressure to reform the union

London

WHETHER Britain remains in or leaves the European Union (EU), growing disenchantment among the populace in the member nations is pressurising leaders and bureaucrats to reform.

Such is the nervousness about the possibility of Brexit that German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble acknowledged in an interview with Der Spiegel that if the British were to vote to leave the EU, "we should understand it as a warning and a wake-up call that we simply can't go on as before".

His remarks suggest that the EU establishment may be acknowledging that there is considerable grassroots hostility towards austerity, unfair regulations and the bureaucracy of the EU.

Indeed, a poll by the Pew Research Center in Washington shows that the Greeks, French and Spaniards are even more dissatisfied with the EU than the British. The survey, which polled around 10,500 people in 10 EU nations that account for four-fifths of the region's population and economy, shows that only 51 p…