“EU averts crisis as budget talks end in success,” EUobserver writes today on the late night settlement of the budgetary crisis. “We have an agreement on the financial perspectives,” said Tony Blair, the British PM at 3:00 a.m. in Brussels on Saturday (17 December) after two days of nervous negotiations.

Calling the negotiations a success shows how low expectations are in Brussels. Though the deal averts the threat of deep political rifts within the EU and delays in further enlargement, with Macedonia gaining EU candidate status on Saturday, simply avoiding political rift is hardly sufficient to call the deal a success. Unless of course the targets are so low that just having the EU Heads of State agree on the lowest common denominator qualifies as a huge success. Unfortunately, if the European Union is to secure economic growth it needs more than a stalemate on the budget – it needs genuine reform.

The compromise reached last night limits EU spending in 2007-2013, so that it will not rise above 1.045 percent (€862.4 billion) of the union's gross income; the UK will give up €10.5 billion of its rebate; there is no commitment to reform either the UK rebate or the common agricultural policy (CAP) before 2013.

The latter, however, is exactly where the problem lies – the CAP is highly problematic and any budgetary negotiations which do not secure a reform of the CAP cannot be described as a success (unless of course you mean for France, but I was assuming that the EU had actually moved beyond the sole representation of French interests).

The CAP is harmful to the efficient farmers in the EU, and is detrimental to third world countries – it increases prices for all European consumers and benefits but a few small and inefficient farms in the middle of nowhere. A success – hardly!

French president Jacques Chirac stated: “We have a deal, a good deal for Europe, which provides sufficient means to finance its ambitions for the European Community and for enlargement.” It is possible to set ambitions too low – and clearly this is what Europe is doing.

European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso seems to be one of the few honest EU-leaders. He said that the compromise was “not everything the commission wanted,” but that at least “Europe avoided paralysis.” How can avoiding paralysis be a measure of success?

The budget deal allowed EU leaders to approve official EU candidate status for the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, which France had threatened to veto in the event of there being no budget deal. One might wonder why Macedonia wants to enter an economic area where not breaking a leg is regarded as the greatest possible success. Perhaps the limousines that the tired EU leaders climbed back into after the negotiations have made the EU leaders forget how to walk – so that is their new standard.