When the EU told Slovakia that her nuclear relics of the Cold War had to be safer before any application of membership could be considered, Slovakia immediately made noises about old nuclear power plants being shut down. Lithuania and Bulgaria quickly followed. (The latter did not stop there. Along with Romania and in a bid to seem that they are modernised nations, the two countries agreed to build a bridge on the river Danube.) When the EU continued to be reluctant about Slovakia's integration due to her political instability, the old system destabilised to the point of collapse andwas replaced with a solid, Euro-approved system.

When the EU warned Turkey that her entry would not be processed because of a poor human rights record, a massive debate over the use of the death penalty for Abdullah Ocalan followed, resulting in his life being spared. Relations between Turks and Turkish Cypriots improved, as did those between Turkey and Greece. Greek rescue workers operated in Turkey following the earthquake last year. Greece openly supported the Turkish application for membership.

And when the EU said that ex-Croatian Prime Minister Franjo Tudjman's neo-fascist ideology would be unwelcome, the Croatian populace voted in a centrist Prime Minister, Ivica Racan, who brought with him EU supported economic reforms. He also made encouraging remarks about the Western European Union and NATO.

Considering its popularity, you would think EU members would be upbeat about its benefits. You would be right, but there are two nations where a significantly large proportion of the population ignores the socio-economic advantages that membership offers and constantly address the political pitfalls: Britain and Denmark.

Although little has changed recently in Denmark, in Britain the power of the anti-Europeans appears to be all-engulfing.

On the 21st February, the "Britain in Europe" campaign, a cross-party pro-European alliance, set up in 1997 to promote Britain's entry into the Single European Currency, was revamped to promote Britain's continuation of EU membership. That followed months, if not years, of right wing propaganda via the press, - fervently by the Times, the Mail, the Sun, the News Of The World, the Spectator and the Telegraph - a few powerful businessmen, and various Conservative MP's.

The rest of the press, and many more MP's and businesses, only quietly and mildly countered all the hysteria. The strength of the skeptic movement meant that opposition to joining the Euro doubled in the space of 18 months to 69% of the British electorate.

But has the right wing press created a monster? As it supports EU membership whilst opposing the Euro, it cannot express its views readily since they not evoke the same emotional, jingoistic and nationalistic reaction as anti-EU propaganda does, and in the case of the Murdoch press, it does not want to be seen to support the Conservative Party, so it has focused on anti-EU disinformation.

For example, the Mail made an issue over a story about Germans spending more money on vacations than any other nation on the 9th of April, 1997, with the title "Germany is taking over the world." In the article it said, "only the combined strength of wartime allies, Britain and America could knock them off their perch."

Furthermore, the EU's decision to take France to court over its refusal to buy British beef, whereas the rest of the world refuses to do so, is surely a victory for the Euro-philes. Yet the Sun and the Mail ignored the EU's institutions in their reporting, focused on viewing France as showing signs of aggression, and launched French boycott campaigns.

These misinformation campaigns have led to, at the last count, one in three Britons wanting their country to leave the EU.

The result of growing anti-European feeling has meant that Tony Blair has had to cool his pro-European views while suffering cross-party criticism by Roy Jenkins, John Major, Chris Pattern, Paddy Ashdown, Charles Kennedy, Edwina Currie, Leon Britton and Neil Kinnock. This cabal argues that unless he pushes Britain further into Europe it may never shake off its potentially dangerous tag of being an awkward partner. Blair is reluctant to do that as it could play into the right wing driven Conservative's hands, whose "Keep the Pound" policy seems to be their whole agenda at the next General Election.