The President-designate of the European Commission, Mr Romano Prodi, yesterday touched off the fuse paper of the British Euro-election campaign with a controversial interview for the BBC that has had Tory Euro-sceptics reacting with fury.
And, responding to questions about whether he would be willing to use his new power to veto member-state nominees for the Commission, Mr Prodi warned that he might very well be forced to do so unless more women nominees emerge than are currently being talked of.
With four women in the current Commission, Mr Prodi is expected to make a strong bid for at least five out of the 20 commissioners - currently Ireland's Mrs Maire Geoghegan Quinn is one of the few women nominees being spoken of. Mr Prodi is understood to have spent the weekend in Florence discussing strategy with a small group of former commissioner friends including Mr Peter Sutherland, Mr Jacques Delors and Count Etienne Davignon.
Speaking on the BBC lunch-time On the Record in terms that were utterly unremarkable for either an Italian or a Benelux politician, Mr Prodi, however, used language about the Commission as "a government" and spoke of the eventual need for Europe to have its own army.
Both were enough to prompt a torrent of denunciation from the Tories and a discreet distancing of Downing Street from the man strongly supported by the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, for the job of reforming the Commission.
Mr Prodi, who, as Commission President, does not have a role in the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy, reiterated his view, expressed only last week in the European Parliament, that eventually Europe would need to develop its own army to enable it to act quickly to intervene in crises like Kosovo. He argued that despite Europe spending two-thirds of what the US spent on defence, European countries had only a tenth of Washington's military power.
Mr Prodi pointed out that mergers between European defence firms had already started a process of concentration of military power, but made clear that the prospect of a joint army which could deploy troops was "years and years and years" away.
He added: "It's a logical next step. . . The alternative you will be marginalised in the new world history. You will [have to] ask somebody else to defend you - this is the only alternative. I don't think that is part of the history of Europe." But Mr Prodi again specifically said that such new structures need not implicate or involve neutral countries.
Mr Blair has already called for greater co-operation between EU countries on a common foreign and security policy, but a spokesman for No 10 insisted: "As far as we are concerned, NATO remains the cornerstone of our defence capability. A European army is not something we are in favour of."
Asked whether the Commission should be more of a government than a bureaucracy, he replied with comments that have been seen by the Tories as suggesting that he is driving the EU towards a European super-state: "This is clear. You must have a government and a good civil service."
"The problem with the old Commission [was] that there was a grey zone, a grey area between political responsibility and civil servants' responsibility.
"Let's be clear, the commissioners have a political responsibility," he insisted.
In Brussels, the comments are seen as a reaffirmation of his repeatedly expressed view that he wants seasoned politicians as nominees and also that he expects officials within the Commission services to be held responsible for their decisions. Earlier in the interview Mr Prodi made clear that he wanted fewer decisions taken by Brussels and more, closer to the people.
The British Shadow Defence Secretary, Mr John Maples, condemned the comments and called on Europe's Prime Ministers to reprimand Mr Prodi, who was only been confirmed in his post last Wednesday.
Mr Maples said: "It is time for Europe's Prime Ministers to stop this nonsense and make it clear that Europe's defence policy will depend on the NATO alliance and nothing else. This is yet another step towards a federal European state," he said.
