ABSTRACT
Administrative planning for the British Presidency of the EEC in the first half of 1977 had begun three years earlier. The British Government’s objectives for the Presidency were in fact quite modest. Ministers had decided that—unlike some previous Presidencies—the British one should not set itself grandiose targets for the ‘building of Europe’. The British Government had to steer a path between its responsibility as Presidency to produce consensus among the Member States on Portugal’s bid for membership, and its desire to continue to show Portugal its support. The French would regard it as intolerable that, as one consequence of enlargement, they would have the Presidency of the Council only once every six years. The Belgians, said the Ambassador, had been disappointed by Owen’s failure as Chair of the Foreign Affairs Council to engage, qua Presidency, more actively on behalf of Community representation.
