Neither the prime minister, nor the foreign secretary (Mr Bevin was in hospital), nor the chancellor of the exchequer, nor the lord chancellor, were present at the ministerial meeting which took the decision against British participation in the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC).
In 1950 the national executive committee of the Labour party declared: "In every respect, except distance, we in Britain are closer to our kinsmen in Australia and New Zealand on the far side of the world than we are to Europe".In his maiden speech in the house of commons, Mr Edward Heath urged the government to join the ECSC.
Despite the lack of mineral resources, the Italian government opted to join the ECSC at its inception, and skeptics watched as Italian steel developed so quickly that by 1980 it accounted for 21.5 percent of production in the EEC (which by then had nine members) and in western Europe.
When the treaty expired in 2002, the ECSC was dissolved.
It did so in rather halting steps, the first of which was the creation of the ECSC in 1952.
With six members Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, West Germany, France, and Italy the ECSC was the first modern, wide-scale economic coalition in Europe.
The attainment of sovereignty by the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) in 1954 ended all Allied control over German industry; the only remaining restrictions on Ruhr industries were exercised by the ECSC and later by the European Economic Community.
The first treaty was that of Paris, signed in 1951, establishing the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC); the second, the Rome treaty, signed in 1957, establishing the European Economic Community EECC); the third, the Rome treaty of the same date establishing the European Atomic Energy Community Euratomm).
A clause in the ECSC treaty provides for the complete independence of the members of the executive organ from the governments that appoint them.
The headquarters of the ECSC were in Brussels.
In the initial sitting of the Common Assembly of the ECSC in 1952, members voted along ideological rather than national lines, encouraging the formation of ideological groupings within the organization's institutions.
