eurealist.co.uk

MEPs Sticking their Snouts In

I note from Euobserver (side bar) that MEPs have given the go ahead for the EU Constitution, well to be honest the headline is just a tad misleading, because it was not all MEPs but a committee of these expensive wastrels. Who voted 20/ 3 in favour of the thing, one is tempted to inquire, and did we expect a different outcome.

One could also ask what on earth the EU parliament is doing voting on the EU Constitution in the first place, it is actually nothing to do with them, at last count there were 25 member countries in the EU that is 25 separate parliaments have to ratify before they can go ahead not 26 (although 20 members of the new Commision have said that they intend to ignore the fact that they have no legal rights to go ahead and intend to treat the thing as already in place).

So the MEPs are taking it upon themselves to interfere in something that is not their business, any vote they take has absolutely no effect on the outcome of ratification, nothing they say can have any affect on the contents of the document, if they all voted it down it would not make the slightest difference, so why are they doing it, quite clearly, this is an attempt to start the ball rolling and to influence the member states decision to ratify, by the domino effect they hope will make those who are doubtful thin again the same method was attempted by the British government over regional assemblies.

Of course one effect of the EU Parliament’s debate is that the Constitution will be analysed in detail by dozens of legal and constitutional experts from every shade of the political spectrum across the EU. The results of their investigations are publicly available and may be drawn on by national parliaments to feed into their own debates. Yes well, in an EU parliament they will only be talking about what is good for the EU, we have to make the decision is it good for Britian, will it make the EU more open will it make the EU more democratic, will it make the more accountable and will it return the sovereignty to the British people to elect and dismiss their lawmakers and the MEPs have no place in that decision.

The pundits are forever wringing their hands in wonder at the apathy today’s politicians are bringing to political stage. We hear from all parties that the biggest enemy of their chances of getting into power is not the political opposition but the indifference of the people toward politics at all, and the loss of people’s belief in the political process the belief that all politicians are the same.

One thing these pundits all have in common is their inability to recognise that the apathetic are right, all British politics is the same, it matters not what your political preferences are, you could vote for any of the main parties and you will end up with just about the same policies, because we are into a situation where the main political parties all believe in the same things, so what ever spin these parties choose to put on their offerings to the voters we really do not have a choice when we enter the ballot box.

We are no longer offered a choice between political parties, more the choice of a change of management, we are continually bombarded with the results of polling from the different polling organisations, employed at great expense by everybody concerned, and these results are presented in the media as if they in some magical way convey a sense of democracy to the managements decisions.
One poll tells us that 80% of the people agree with the introduction of ID cards, another that 57% agree with fox hunting yet another that the Conservatives are loosing ground in the country another that the people prefer Tony Blair to Michael Howard as Prime Minister, and so on it goes, with each set of managers, taking only what they think will add to their credibility, from the results and ignoring anything that shows the opposite. Whilst at the same time ignoring the results of a real vote of all the people as in the North East Assembly referendum.

What these polls can not show is the real feeling of the British people about any issue, because they are conducted in such a way as to elicit the answers required. 80% agree with ID cards is the headline, so when Mr Blunkett introduces them he can be sure that he is complying with the wishes of the vast majority of the British people. Not on your life because the 80% who did agree was a percentage of perhaps only 1000 people selected by the polling organisation, and asked a question the organisation had devised, if we ask 1000 people “if the introduction of ID cards can be shown to reduce the threat of terrorism would you agree” we are going to get a different answer if the question is “do you agree with the government introducing compulsory ID and fining you £1000 if you do not tell them of a change of address, I suspect you are going to get an entirely different answer perhaps one Mr Blunkett would not appreciate. Then there is the basic dishonesty of taking the results from 1000, 2000 or even 3000, people and making laws based on those results for 57million people who were not asked to give their views.

The politicians can also look to their basic hypocrisy Tony Blair this week said that MPs are entitled to a private life, I do not think that many would disagree with that sentiment, however last week Margaret Hodge was enthusing about the need and the right for the Nanny State to be have a place in the homes of the British people, do we not have a right to private life as well.

Jonathan Lockhart has a post that I have not seen anywhere else about The hypocrisy of the Real rulers of the this country, apparently “Italian Trade union leaders are furious with $8bn in public sector spending cuts in next year’s budget, pushed through last week by Mr Berlusconi. The reason for this was because The EU Commission had warned Italy to reduce its public debt, which is the third largest in the world. But there is a familiar figure waiting in the wings to take advantage of the political fallout: The left-wing Mr Prodi is arguing against the budget cuts which he, in his previous incarnation as European Commission president, forced on the Italian government in the first place.

Which brings me round to the Elephant the term used “to describe the phenomenon whereby diverse commentators try to diagnose the ailments of society without recognising – or even noticing – that huge, brooding presence, the European Union”

Now even Europhiliacs are confirming that 70% of our laws are not made or controlled in Westminster but in Brussels. This is the basic reason why none of the main parties can offer a choice of policies, because any policy they do offer the voter must conform to the EU rules, otherwise it would be breaking the treaties and we will be heavily fined by our new supreme court the ECJ.

The results of this EU control can be seen in the annual fishing debate in the House. EU Referendum “Traditionally, it has always been held in December, over a full day, a means by which MPs could give the fisheries minister a negotiating mandate for the December fisheries council, when the annual allocations of national fish quotas were decided, from which a raft of regulations would then be drawn up. But, progressively, MPs – and the media – have learned that the debates are a waste of time. The House cannot bind the minister, and whatever the minister tells the House he will do can be overturned in Brussels, presaging a humiliating retreat”.

Until we realise and face up to the fact that as members of the EU, we do not need a fully functional parliament in this country, because our laws are made and enforced by the EU without any input being either necessarily or allowed by our own parliamentarians, then we will be faced with a continual falling interest in what our own politicians have to say about anything, because we can see that no matter what they tell us, once we have given them our vote they can do nothing to change the major things, and will therefore continue to make increasingly intrusive rules on the way we live our lives.