eurealist.co.uk

“Yesterday Foreign Secretary Jack Straw needed only an appearance before the Commons European Scrutiny Committee to make his case for the Constitution.”

I have read this exact sentence from many media outlets this morning, I wonder where it came from, possible a government briefing paper? as it clearly make the case that the case can be made for the Constitution, and it is so easy to do so, that it require ONLY one appearance.

Little Englanders

A comment allowed on the Yes Campaign Blog tackles one of the Pro EU augments that EU realists are nationalist and isolationists of course this is a PC Term for “little Englanders” and one we will be hearing a lot of as the referendum draws closer
(I say allowed because they vet the comments before posting them and remove arguments they do not like)

There are some assumptions in your post that warrant comment:

Peace is kept by countries engaged in freely entered into and mutually beneficial trade agreements. It’s also maintained by some of the powers (UK and France) having the wherewithal to nuke the living daylights out of a potential aggressor. Finally, peace is maintained because the last two wars have finally taught us that domination (by warfare, at least) is a lost cause. The EU has NOTHING to do with this. Do you seriously and honestly believe Hitler would have decided against exterminating Jews if he’d had to face the wrath of the ECJ?

You deride EU-realists as ‘nationalists’. Either you have no idea about the basis of our objections to the EU (in which case you really ought not to write about them) or, worse, you do know why we object but you seek to deceive your readership (an ability to deceive being a positive attribute in the EU, of course).

Assuming the former, let me help you out: we seek to be *global* players, not isolationists in a federal Europe. We want to be close enough to our law-makers - be they on the left or the right - that we can remove them easily from office if we disapprove of them. We object to a body we have little or no influence over issuing directives at the rate of thousands a year which simply are unknown to us until we fall foul of them. We want to be masters of our own destiny as part of a free world, overseen by accountable leaders who govern only the area of the world they most understand - their own country.

It’s worth pointing out also that governance by bureaucratic means is essentially a European idea and is alien to our culture and history. British law tends not to grant ‘rights’ but simply allows everything unless it sees fit to ban it. In this way, we the people can remove bans if we really want to by voting appropriately. Bureaucracy – the EU culture - is a method of governance via unelected officials seeking to create fixed procedures and methods by which the governed should live. ‘Rights’ are something granted to us by these people. And something granted by bureaucrats one day can be removed by bureaucrats another day.

The desire to be able to influence our own lives and to hold our rulers to account is not the product of nationalism. It’s the common aspiration of many people who would not consider themselves even patriotic. The EU is fundamentally undemocratic and *that* is one of the primary reasons why so many of us find it objectionable.

Your two assertions – that we’re nationalists and that we loath other countries – are statements typical of pro-EU people with little to add to reasoned and proven objections to their favourite federation. That you feel compelled to say such things demonstrates the lack of solid argument in favour of the EU. What is much more sad though is that your politically-correct slurs against Euro-realists and supporters of freedom, democratic accountability and free association with all the world’s peoples will be swallowed hook, line and sinker by many of your casual readers. It suggests that maybe that’s the best you can hope for as, maybe, you realise the argument is already lost

Buried in the middle of this article is the astounding information that the Parliament will not debate the Constitution.

Scotsman.com News - Latest News - MPs Lock Horns over EU Constitution

Labour MP for Grimsby Austin Mitchell – chairman of the Labour Euro Safeguards Campaign – complained that the Government was “trying to pull a fast one” by smuggling the enormous 448 article Constitution through Parliament in the form of the five clause Bill on the referendum.

Mr Mitchell said: “The European Union Bill has been presented to Labour’s strong group of Eurosceptics as something they should support because it provides for the referendum.

“We are being conned because it is far more than this. The Foreign Office … has announced that ‘no further legislation will be required for the enactment of this treaty’.

“So Parliament rushes this Bill through, and bingo! the Constitution which Tony Blair has already signed is in force without further discussion, if the people vote for it next year.”

This week Britain’s Parliament is finally beginning to debate the European Union’s new constitution. This will mark the start of a slow but profoundly important process that could, by the end of 2006, see Britain close to leaving the EU. This would be an extraordinary turning point in British foreign policy and a major weakening of its international influence.

So says Dr Kirsty Hughes in the International Herald Trubune in an article “The skeptics could push Britain out of the EU” Hughes argues that…

“A British “no” is highly likely to reflect a general anti-EU vote by the British public, not a disagreement with specific constitutional elements. So there will be no tweaking of the new rules that could allow a second vote. Nor is it possible for Britain to stay in the union and opt out of the constitution”.

Of course there would be no Constitution if we voted No, so there is no chance of opting out. Hughes goes on to lambaste Tony Blair because he has “failed in almost all aspects of his European policy. He has failed to make Britain a leader in the EU, not least since the country still maintains its opt-outs on two major policy issues - the euro and the border-free Schengen zone.”

“Britain’s pro-Europeans are in disarray - hamstrung by the government’s desire to keep the issue off the agenda for now, by differences over how to sell the EU to the public and by a lack of confidence and money. Blair and his colleagues take a line that dangerously accepts much of the skeptic position - arguing that the constitution limits the powers of an otherwise rampant, interfering “Brussels.” Business and unions are noticeable by their silence. Meanwhile, the anti-Europeans are well funded, highly motivated and already in third gear”.

Ah so sorry to wish to have a debate on the nature of our involvement with this Union which we were told would only be a trading block. I understand that for the EU intergrationalist the people should not be given a chance to speak, and all this should be left to those who understand what is best for us.

“It seems that the government hopes that a short, sharp campaign, presenting the issue as a vote for being either in or out of the EU, will win the day. The British public aren’t too keen on Europe, but they’re even less keen - so Labour hopes - on being left out of things. It is a minimalist and perilous strategy. If 24 member states vote yes, a “no” from Britain could see it in a special partnership with the EU by 2007 - no longer a member proper”.

The question is not about in or out it is about accepting or rejecting the EU Constitution if we vote No we will still be in the union as will any other country that votes No.

“The implications for Britain are enormous. To stay in the single market, Britain, like Norway, would have to abide by the rules without being in on making them. It would no longer be part of nascent EU defense and foreign policy developments, nor could it influence EU policies from trade to development to counterterrorism strategies”.

This is yet to be decided, if we are not in the EU we can make our choices with whom we trade and which rules we will obey. Have these people never herd of international treaties, we could choose which suited us at what time on our own agenda not the Unions.

“In an extraordinary historical shift, Britain would retreat to the global sidelines, confused, nationalistic and rather powerless. This is the challenge for the “yes” side. It needs to be taken up immediately: The consequences of continued passivity are immense”.

No becoming a state in the “United States of Europe” would mean retreating to the global sidelines when was the last time the President of Texas had and international treaty agreement, we would increase our power, it is not possible to increase power by giving it away to a higher authority, and joint action is only in our interest if we agree to the action, if we do not then it is against our interests.

The Offensive Jack Straw 11

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw attacked the Conservatives’ position on Europe on Tuesday, saying its policy of rejecting the treaty with a view to renegotiating it was “fantasy”.

“Claiming that Britain can accept the bits of being an EU member it likes, and withdraw from all the others, is not a serious policy,” he told a news conference.

Well actually Jack Straw is wrong; the British government has the power to agree or not to agree with demands from the EU or the other states to pass more power to the Union and therby give up its own authority. Straw himself has confirmed this Tuesday in the FCO fact sheet? Myth Three: ‘Primacy’ means that the EU controls our laws”, in which the FCO argues against the supposed Eusceptics claim ‘Primacy’ means that the EU controls our laws “These rules aren’t inflicted on us – we help write them”.

Without the willing compliance of British governments with the ongoing EU internationalists agenda, the British government and the British Parliament would still retain the powers it had in 1973.

Apart from that the primacy of EU law has never been in any of the EU treaties and has been rejected by other member states as such the argument that it creates a level playing field is nonsense.

For a full response to this particular claim from the FCO see EU Referendum