The EU

Update: as a result of 'Super Thursday' (the EU and local elections on June 10th), the results of the European elections for the UK are as follows:-

We don't know the results for Scotland or NI, but England and Wales have produced a substantial Eurosceptic vote. With Conservatives on 27.4% (its worst result since 1832) UKIP on 16.8% and Greens on 6.2%, that makes 50.4% Eurosceptic.Labour polled 22.3% (its worst result since 1910) and the Lib Dems were up 2% on 15.1 making a combined pro European vote of 37.4%. The Lib Dems probably picked up protest votes from pro European Tories. But the message is IMO clear. We want no more.

I wouldn't favour total withdrawal from the EU except as a last resort. But Michael Howard's idea that he can retake control of fisheries policy, reform the CAP and end the scerotic inefficiency and corruption in the European machine from within while remaining a full member is a pipedream. If nothing else, both Tony Blair and Michael Howard with have some soul searching to do this morning. That is the result I hoped for in this election. This country must have the European isssue put to the democratic test for the first time in more than a generation.

The Common Fisheries policy in particular is madness and has decimated the UK's fishing industry. 70% of EU water is around Britain and Ireland. Any policy which requires the burning of our fishing fleet while allowing the Spanish and Portugese fleets to further decimate stock is utter madness.

The CAP by which European food is 20-30% more expensive than on the international market is in the interests of no European citizen other than those who are living off the subsedies. The old trade off between a rapidly industrialising Germany who wanted markets in France, and the French peasant farming sector wanting protection against modernisation set in the fifties is an outdated model for a community of 25 nations in which new membrs such as Poland are given inferior rights over agriculture to what France expects.

Also, Neil Kinnock has failed to deal with the corruption in EU finances which costs us all billions. The EU is such a lumbering bureaucratic giant that it is utterly sclerotic. The British, as an island race, have always been aloof from Europe. Even in our imperialist expansionist phase, we never sought to expand within Europe apart from strategic places such as Gibraltar, Malta and Cyprus, but plied our trade on the high seas. This led to our admission to Europe on highly unfavourable terms.

My personal opinion is that the Uk should renegociate its relationship with Europe. We should trade freely, as do Switzerland and Norway. We should cooperate on matters of security, criminal intelligence etc. But we should not sign up to any constitution. We most certainly should never abandon our ancient rights to presumption of innocence and trial by jury to any European Prosecutor. The likes of Valery Giscard D'Estaing and Romano Prodi would make a USE with common laws and tax policies. It is an idea I utterly oppose for this country.

Both the US and Canada have said that they would look favourably on any British application for membership of NAFTA. As the originators of the concept of free trade, it would be fitting for the Uk to negociate free trade agreements with both the EU and NAFTA. We are barred from approaching NAFTA by our EU commitments. The time has come to seek our freedom from the crushing straightjacket of EU regulation.

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

Maybe, maybe not. The Euro elections in the UK are done by Proportional Representation,in contrast to the 'First Past the Post'/ 'Winner Takes All'/'Spoils System', which means that a party only need muster around 10% of the vote to win seats. The General Elections in both the US and UK are not PR and therefore do not favour minor parties, which is why most UKIP voters, like me, will be voting Conservative in the General.

And now for that other Euro result...dare I admit it?...France 2 England 1 :-(

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

You're absorbing Irish idioms - 'cracker'! Next you'll be adding "to be sure" after every statement!

I couldn't believe that wecould throw the match away in just two minutes in injury time. It really made me want to weep!

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

That's a pretty tall order, so it is, Roger

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

Back to the main topic - I think one quite astute commentator, with a twinkle in his eye, said that the European elections in the UK were a contest between the two main parties to see who could perform the most disastrously. The Labour Party's result was the worst since 1910 and the Tories' the worst since 1832!

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

Hmmm...doesn't bode well for Ulster politics either...Paisleys DUP on the one hand who at least have the distinctive of not being ex-terrorists and Sinn Fein on the other...

Yours in Christ

Matt

 

I would take issue with that. Blair returned trumpeting that he'd had a Big Fight with Chirac and Schroeder and defended our 'Red Lines' but what we have in reality is the following:-

1. The EU is now a single legal personality rather than a mere collection of sovereign states bound together by treaty; for the first time, we have a country called 'Europe'

2. The consitution gives the EU a single jurisdiction, a single criminal code and provides in art 1.5 express supremacy of EU laws over national laws.

3. Despite Blair arguing for 'Red Lines', one of these, the creation of an EU Public Prosecutor, has been circumvented by the constitution creating a body of EU law and 'prosecuting authority', with scope to create a European polic force.

4. A second 'Red Line', the non-applicability of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, has been overruled, not by the politicians meeting at Brussels, but by the European Court of Justice which, like the computer that becomes self-aware in Terminator 3, has assumed a life and power all of its own and made it clear that, no matter what the politicians decide, the Charter WILL apply in the domestic law of member states.

5. Another Red Line was foreign and defence policy. Intact? Er...no: "Member states shall support the common foreign and security policy actively and effectively."

6. So that just leaves only one of Tony's formidable Red Lines intact:tax. Well, kinda sorta. The EU has common rules on vat (that's sales tax to you guys on the western end of the Atlantic), and on external tariffs, permissible budget deficits. So that's ok then...

Basically the EU can now do what the heck it likes, and there's stuff all we can do about it. Thanks, Tony, even worse than the not-Nice Treaty

Yours in Christ

Matt