Jacques Delors has been remembered as a “towering” political figure who built the modern European Union, in tributes paid after his death at the age of 98.
Former prime minister Boris Johnson said the “dazzling panache” of Mr Delors saw him create a new federal structure for Europe during his decade as European Commission president – describing the EU as the “house that Jacques built”.
Mr Delors was hailed as a “statesman of French destiny” by French president Emmanuel Macron, while Tory former chancellor Ken Clarke recalled the battles between the European chief and Margaret Thatcher.
Homme d’État au destin français.Inépuisable artisan de notre Europe.Combattant pour la justice humaine.
Jacques Delors était tout cela.
Son engagement, son idéal et sa droiture nous inspireront toujours. Je salue son œuvre et sa mémoire et partage la peine de ses proches. pic.twitter.com/3D5FBvdduh
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) December 27, 2023
Mr Delors played a key role in European integration, including in the design of the euro and creation of the single market, during his time as president between 1985 and 1995.
He was also involved in several memorable skirmishes between Brussels and Britain.
In 1990, then-prime minister Mrs Thatcher said “no, no, no” as she issued a Commons rebuke to Mr Delors as he sought greater Brussels control.
In the same year, a front page of The Sun – under the headline “Up Yours Delors” – urged readers to face France and shout the insult in a bid to protect the British pound.
While Mr Delors was depicted as a Euro bogeyman by Mrs Thatcher, the former French finance minister was once hailed by the TUC as “Frere Jacques” for his crusade over the social charter, which guarantees fundamental social and economic rights.
Mr Johnson, who played a key role in the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, said: “Jacques Delors was the pre-eminent architect of the modern European Union, and whether you agreed or not with his vision he was a towering political figure.
“Without Delors there would have been no Maastricht treaty and no euro. Indeed without Delors there would have been no single market.
“He harnessed post Cold War anxieties about Germany to create a new federal structure for Europe and he did it with dazzling panache.
“His ideas were never right for Britain, as he himself later seemed to concede, and there are many on the continent who have doubts about the direction of the EU.
“But no-one can doubt his legacy today. Whatever you say about the modern EU, it is the house that Jacques built.”
Labour former leader Neil Kinnock said Mr Delors sought to emphasise common interest and shared sovereignty.
Recalling the exchanges with Mrs Thatcher, Lord Kinnock told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme: “To represent him as some kind of fanatical federalist who wanted to create some country called Europe with all the trappings of that was extremely misleading, but it suited her political purpose at that time.
“And of course the caricature stuck. That wasn’t Jacques at all.”
He described Mr Delors as a “very polite, calm, highly intelligent man, a problem-solver”, adding: “He wouldn’t let his judgment of what was possible, what was practical, what was doable, be clouded by personal reservation or dislike.”
Lord Clarke of Nottingham said Europe had its “most powerful and reforming leadership” during the era of Helmut Kohl as German chancellor, Francois Mitterrand as French president, Mrs Thatcher and Mr Delors.
He told the same programme: “Margaret’s own contribution was the single market, because Margaret was in favour of economic Europe, she was in favour of a total free trade Europe, she never talked about leaving the European Union, she saw it as an economic thing to make us more prosperous by giving us a big free trade bloc.
“She suspected Jacques, as she revealed in that extraordinary outburst in the House of Commons, of going beyond that and being in favour of a political Europe, which she was against, which was going to be a sort of united states of Europe, a superstate and all the rest of it, which I agree with Neil – I don’t think Jacques was interested in that at all.”
Pro-European Lord Clarke went on: “The truth was that Jacques Delors and Margaret Thatcher deeply disliked each other personally, they hated each other for personal and political reasons.
“If you saw them together it was painful. He thought she was a silly right-wing woman and she thought he was an irritating French intellectual obsessed with creating a united states of Europe.”
Lord Clarke said this caused Mrs Thatcher’s “final explosion” in Parliament.
Former MEP Nigel Farage, who led Ukip and the Brexit Party, told the PA news agency: “Jacques Delors had a vision that turned the EC (European Community) into the EU.
“For Eurosceptics like me he was an important figure who helped propel me into a political career.
“My only regret is not doing battle with him on the floor of the European Parliament.”
A UK government spokesman said: “Our thoughts are with the family and friends of Jacques Delors. A great statesman who had a profound impact on millions across Europe.”