If there is a test of political instinct, it might as well be spotting a man in a Newcastle United shirt in a crowd in a park on a flying visit to a foreign capital. “Oh, a Newcastle supporter,” said David Miliband, on his first trip to Romania, bounding up to the man, a local student, who looked bemused to find himself, walking by the lake, accosted by the British Foreign Secretary with the Mayor of Bucharest in tow. “You’re green, aren’t you?” asked Miliband, turning to the Mayor, striking a favourite theme of climate change, a constant strand of this week’s four-day trip to Romania, Turkey, Italy and Spain. “I am,” said the Mayor, pointing out that Bucharest was about to receive a torrent of European Union money to invest in environmental technology — earning laughter from Miliband.

The tour of Europe’s southern fringe, only the third trip Miliband has made in his new post , is a platform for arguing for the expansion of Europe’s borders and for Turkey’s eventual membership. That is a cause about which Miliband is passionate, and where Britain is making itself Turkey’s chief champion.

In Turkey yesterday, Miliband became the first Foreign Minister to meet the new President, Abdullah Gül, controversial for his Islamist-tinged past and the fierce opposition of the generals. “It’s great that Turkey has broken through the barrier that says Islam is incompatible with democracy and a secular public realm,” said Miliband. “My job as a politician is to win the argument that Britain is better off with Turkey in the EU.” That isn’t easy. Part of Miliband’s argument is that if the EU can let Romania in, then why not Turkey? Both are poor and rural, he says. But even Romania, which entered the EU on January 1 with Bulgaria, is still held at arm’s length; Britain has imposed seven-year restrictions on workers from both countries — a cause of great resentment.

Miliband said that Britain would reconsider the labour curbs at the end of this year. But this seems a formula, much as Romanians suspect, for not reconsidering them at all. Given public hostility to immigration and the unexpected arrival of hundreds of thousands of Poles since 2004, Britain is wary about letting in more, and Romania’s reputation for corruption does not help.

Since joining, Romania has alarmed Brussels by dragging its heels on reform, although growth remains high. Miliband said that he heard “no suggestion from the Romanians that they feel any slackening of pressure to live up to the mandate,” from business as well as Brussels.

Miliband is dismissive of those who say that Turkey, Muslim and huge, is simply not European. “This is a massive test of whether the EU is a closed, Christian club.” He added that the EU needs Turkey for security and help on climate change. But he will try to persuade Turkey to “breathe more deeply” on Cyprus, the main issue which has stalled talks.

Trips by any Foreign Secretary are an exercise in gregariousness with the hope of some future use for the capital acquired. Miliband, like Jack Straw, has a deliberate informality, albeit in a younger, bouncier model, but is far more fluent. In a two-minute video diary for the YouTube website, he showed a faultless populist touch, tucking facts about Romania into subclauses, while portraying the visit as full of adrenalin. “The pressures as Foreign Secretary to become stuffy and grandiose are quite large,” he said. “You go to work in a big building full of murals of 19th-century victories and disasters.” Although more cerebral than Straw, he too readily presses examples into service of his grand themes. Like Margaret Beckett, his predecessor, he asserts that “climate change is foreign policy — it will cause the wars of the future”, but is impatient at requests for substantiation. Romanian audiences were told that they must care about global warming given their recent floods and droughts, but asked whether he could show that climate change was the cause, he said: “No, I haven’t got any scientific evidence.”

It is a curious phenomenon that you have to go to Turkey to hear the voice of the British Government in full-throated advocacy of the virtues of Europe — one which might amuse France and Germany, getting ready for another tussle with Britain next month over the constitutional treaty, and who are both opposed to Turkish entry. In Romania and Turkey this week, Miliband was preaching to the converted on his vision of Europe (and to the tolerant, at least, on climate change). He has a more sceptical audience at home.

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