Euro-scepticism is alive and kicking. That was the clear message of a gathering in Brussels on Friday from all over Europe of some 350 "Euro-realist" activists, for that is what they prefer to be called, according to the tireless British Tory back-bencher, Mr Bill Cash. His, he said, was a "call to arms" in defence of the fundamental threat to democracy that the EU represents, and he warned that "we may in future have to take more extreme measures than to go on the box" to fight their corner. Mr Cash boasts that Euro-realists control all the positions on key Tory back-bench committees.
The meeting was convened using the parliamentary resources of the conservative Independents for a Europe of the Nations (IEDN) group of MEPs, a Euro-sceptical alliance established by the late Sir James Goldsmith, and the Mouvement pour la France party of Mr Philippe de Villiers. It includes Mr Jim Nicholson of the Ulster Unionists.
The conference also brought together the much wider spectrum of the European Anti-Maastricht Alliance (TEAM), from the Nordic green-left groups to Ireland's National Platform and Green MEP, Ms Patricia McKenna, to peace and anti-nuclear campaigners from around the EU and the more jingoistic fringes of British politics such as the UK Independence Party.
They make curious bedfellows. Mr Cash was introduced as one of the few Tories to retain his seat, and the spontaneous jeers blended most strangely with the warm applause. Yet what left, right and green share is a sense that they are fighting a losing, uphill battle against an establishment hooked on European integration.
Mr Rimantas Smetona, a leading conservative parliamentarian in Lithuania, is standing for the presidency on an anti-EU ticket. He equates the struggle for independence against Russia with that against the tyranny of being run by Brussels.
He is followed by Mr Andros Kyprianou of the Cypriot ex-communist AKEL party, who announces that his party has just decided to support membership, but on condition that the EU takes a tough line with Turkey.
The recurring theme of the meeting is to challenge what Mr Jens-Peter Bonde, a former left-wing activist from Denmark, calls "the fundamentally undemocratic Amsterdam Treaty". Drafted by unelected officials, driven by a centralising agenda from the European Commission, the treaty, he says, has been foisted on Europe's people.
The EU in its rapprochement with the WEU, he argues, "is becoming more and more like a military superpower."
Mr Ole Krarup, a fellow Danish MEP, insists that Europe's governments have no democratic authority to force the treaty on their populations despite majorities in most parliaments as EU issues are rarely at the forefront of national elections.
Ms McKenna, berating the media for having "sold out" to pro-EU arguments and for refusing to publish sceptical views, warned that the treaty will be sold by them as a lightweight treaty of little consequence. This is far from the truth, she said.
The provisions for the potential eventual merger of the EU and WEU "should the European Council so decide", Ms McKenna insisted, mean that the Irish electorate in voting for the Treaty will effectively give the heads of government the right to merge the two bodies without putting the ending of neutrality to a referendum.
A veteran Austrian Socialist and peace campaigner, Prof Paul Blau, said the role of small neutral nations had been very important as arbiters in conflict and could be so again, particularly in the context of EU enlargement. "There is an illusion being foisted on us," he said, "that all real power is military power."
Mr Hans Lindqvist, the Swedish Centre Party MEP, complained that the EU was taking on UN tasks of peacekeeping. "The UN should do them," he argued. "Despite our neutrality Sweden has been actively and successfully involved in global security."
Others focused their fire on the single currency, arguing that its creation would deprive sovereign governments of key instruments of economic policy.
Mr Cash reminded his audience that polls still show 60 per cent of the British public against the euro. "We can win the referendum campaign if we are organised. Tony Blair may be walking on water on domestic issues, but he will drown on Europe," he claimed.
Prof Hans Blokland, an MEP from one of the Dutch Protestant parties, said that the euro would exacerbate the unemployment crisis because of the inflexibility of EU labour markets which needed to be reformed ahead of monetary union.