What Use Parliment

Yes Mr Redwood, it becomes difficult to frame programmes that will interest all UK voters, when most of the areas of government are also influenced by the EU and other international bodies. You have posed a lopsided question by only referring to the powers lost to the regional assemblies in Scotland and Wales, (themselves an [...]

IPCC Talking about a Conflict of Interests – not

The head of the UN’s climate change panel – Dr Rajendra Pachauri – is accused of making a fortune from his links with ‘carbon trading’ companies
No one in the world exercised more influence on the events leading up to the Copenhagen conference on global warming than Dr Rajendra Pachauri, [...]

The NHS Controversy

There are a few different ways of approaching this:
What did Hannan actually say?  Was he suggesting abolishing the NHS or was he saying to the Americans, do not introduce the particular British system of heath care?
Hannan said in his column in the Telegraph:
“There is a difference between saying that the US shouldn’t adopt the British [...]

Conservative Eurosceptic MPs receive CAP payments

Responding to the news that three leading Conservative Eurosceptic MPs receive CAP payments totalling  £526,547 for their farms, Brendan Donnelly, treasurer of the European Movement, said:
“I think there is an irony, an inconsistency that there are some high profile Conservatives who benefit greatly from the workings of the common agricultural policy.”
We are thus invited to [...]

MP Expense Claims

I thought it might a good idea to look into the expense claims of my own local MP Phillip Dunn Ludlow Conservative.
The last time I met him he was doing a run around his constituency and stopped to say he could not possible go by my house without giving me a chance to shout at [...]

Clarke softens Tory line on Lisbon treaty

I have been waiting for the leadership of the Conservative party to set the record strait with regards to party policy on the Lisbon treaty.
It is clear that if the Treaty has not been ratified we have been promised a referendum by Mr Cameron, what was not clear until the weekend is exactly what the [...]

Fishing injustice

This from the letter section of the Western Morning News
THERE has been a profound miscarriage of justice with regard to Charlie McBride and Charles Jnr, fishermen from Northern Ireland who have been sentenced to two and three months in jail, respectively, for “contempt of court”.
The McBrides, owners of the fishing vessel Arcane N907, were [...]

Security Basic Rights and Porn

The fluff of parliamentary reporting, are we really interested in the fact that the Home Sectaries husband watched two porn films last April and is it really that important within the context of the amount these politicians are costing us as part of a failing institution,  that they then claimed the ten pounds cost of [...]

More on Mobile Coffins

I do not quite understand why the today the Times should be revisiting an extremely important but nevertheless such an old story as last Octobers resignation of Major Sebastian Morley.
Major Morley was at the time the most senior reservist SAS officer in Afghanistan,  and resigned because army commanders and Whitehall officials ignored his warnings that [...]

Malevolent voices that despise our freedoms

Malevolent voices that despise our freedoms
The new laws whisper:
You don’t know who you are
You’re mistaken about yourself
We know better than you do what you consist of, what labels apply to you, which facts about you are important and which are worthless
We do not believe you can be trusted to know these things, [...]

Nailing Jelly and EU Laws

I must confess that I had lost touch with Martin Coles of Ironies Too, I used to read his original Blog Ironies. Here Mr Coles has a blinder, the President of the EU parliament Hans-Gert Poettering, reacting angrily to the perceived insult to the EU metered out by Czech President Vaclav Klaus during his speech [...]

For the Love of England

Little Man in a Toque One of my daily reads, says George Monbiot informed us that you don’t have to be a nationalist to support an English parliament, you just have to be a democrat. I understand what George is getting at, for it’s certainly true that the campaign for an English parliament is a [...]

Sharia law

Thought For The World
Moreover, rather than promote ‘minority’ rights and social cohesion, Sharia law promotes fragmentation and social conflict. It imposes different standards and norms for ‘different’ people. It denies universal and equal rights fought for and established by progressive social and working class movements over centuries. It gives precedence to the most regressive cultural [...]

Those who Fought for Freedom

England has for many years been lifting her voice against the abominable practice of negro slavery; numbers of her great men have talked, have laboured, have struggled, until at length emancipation has been granted to her black slaves in the West Indies . When will they dream of advocating the cause of England ’s white [...]

Bill of Rights and new written Constitution.

An open letter from Anne Palmer
Dear Lord Onslow,
Re Proposed new Bill of Rights and possibly a new written Constitution.
I have already expressed my concerns about the proposals for a new written Constitution and a Bill of Rights yet I feel it important to write once more.
We already have a Constitution of our own plus a [...]

Preparing for a Police State

When the ex head of MI5 tells us that the government is exploiting the threat of terrorism to erode civil liberties, I believe it is time to listen to the growing throng of voices concerned for our historic rights.
But Dame Stella Rimington goes even further she openly says,
“It would be better that the Government recognised [...]

War on Terror or War on Public Freedoms

The Police who have already been harassing not only private photographers but media professionals will no doubt be delighted today to be handed a new tool by a government that does not recognise the concept of individual freedoms.
A new law goes into effect today in the United Kingdom which would make it illegal to [...]

Cameron refuses to say RDAs will be abolished

Ian Dale post that D Cameron has reinforced his pledge to abolish RDA’s and regional Assemblies
When asked
“you’re not in favor of regional development  agencies. They do a lot of the hard work for the Government at the moment out there, helping small businesses. Have you changed your mind on your views on them?
He replied
“No. What [...]

Fitna

I watched Fitna last night, one of the very minor consequences of the British government refusing entry to the country of a democratically elected MP from an EU state. Had they not done so I would never have watched that film, but because my government took this unprecedented action I wanted to see what al [...]

Protectionism! testing the hypocrisy

The government of Great Britain are elected to serve the people of this country and to defend the state. They are paid by the British people to defend our country us our Rights and our interests this includes jobs.
When a foreign owned company grants a construction job in Britain to another foreign owned company, who [...]

Trojan Horse party EU Payment on Hold

The European Parliament has put a decision to grant ” anti-EU treaty” group Libertas funding on hold after it emerged that the group may no longer fulfill the criteria for receiving the money.
The move to grant Libertas status as a European political party, entitling it to around €200,000, had already been taken by parliament officials [...]

BNP is the new Labour Party

Browsing this morning I came across this polemic on Conservative views of the BNP the writer launched into a harangue of abuse against Ian Dale for daring to mention that the BNP were more closely related to the left than the right. Not withstanding that such divisions are really meaningless, the radical Left do love [...]

Christians Fed to PC Lions

Old Holborn has a very good post about Caroline Petrie, who has been suspended for offering to pray for a patient.
Old Holborn
I have no religion, not even atheism. I don’t believe in anything and I see no need to convince anyone else of my view on the subject because, well, I don’t have one. I’m [...]

A Very Private Country

I have recently seen several letters in my local paper questioning the practice of outsourcing the provision of services; this practice of course does not just apply to local councils but also to central government.
As a basic concept I cannot see how these practices can be financially efficient from the point of view of the [...]

Would Britain be allowed to leave the EU?

Rupert Matthews a candidate to be a Conservative party MEP is the author of a two part article posted on Conservative Home Blog, comparing the similarities between the constitutional position of the states of the USA in the 1850s and that of the states of the EU today he says these are striking
The US supreme [...]

Conditional Cautioning

An interesting question arises from The Magistrate’s Blog who says
The seemingly unstoppable march of the Conditional Cautioning régime continues.
Apparently if those cautioned fail to meet the conditions they end up in court. No problem with that, but in the case mentioned one of the conditions was to pay compensation, this to me seems to [...]

Peelers Transformed

It seems to be a morning when the state of our civil liberties keep jumping out at me, this time it Peter Hitchings who is questioning:
“This horrible development, the transformation of our police into a state gendarmerie, and the way in which our politicians – and much of the public – [...]

Jury Government

However our leaders are chosen, we need rules to keep them in their place. In Britain, we developed these rules over many centuries, largely through struggles between kings and commoners (or kings and aristocrats). Trial by jury, habeas corpus, double jeopardy – all the rules that ensure our leaders can’t just grab us, torture us, [...]

Enraged at engrenage

EU Referendum: Engrenage again
The genius of engrenage, though, is that nobody notices. Each step can be justified, in isolation, on apparently good grounds – as long as no one understands that it is a process, and the end point is economic and then political integration. By such means are we thus enslaved.

PC Fire Service

A new one for me Obnoxio The Clown
Interesting post
Anthony Duggan, head of fire services at the LGA, said: “The fire service needs to be representative of the area it serves.
“It is important that the fire service attracts more women and ethnic minorities so that it can work more effectively in partnership with local authorities [...]

EU Driving licence

Taglined “Exclusive” the Telegraph headlines the story that motorists will face a range of new health checks to determine whether they are fit to drive under the most comprehensive reform of the driving licence system in decades. Drivers will have to declare every 10 years whether they are medically able to get behind the wheel, [...]

Before Israel Responded.

The European Union has expressed its “grave concern” at Israel’s continuing attacks on the Gaza Strip that have killed close to 300 Palestinians and injured around 900, and called the airstrikes “unacceptable” while calling on both sides to halt military actions.
EUOBSERVER
I could be wrong, but I do not remember “The European Union” [...]

The Wrong Shadow Chancellor 3

John Redwood MP » RBS – now we will be paying for the government’s rushed folly
When the government first started briefing that it was thinking of buying stakes in several major banks I urged them to carry out due diligence, to ensure the assets they were buying were realistically valued. Why on earth, I asked, [...]

Civil Liberties according to Brown

Browns Speech on civil liberties
In a speech on liberty at the University of Westminster, Gordon Brown said:
I believe that by applying our enduring ideals to new challenges we can start immediately to make changes in our constitution and laws to safeguard and extend the liberties of our citizens:
” respecting and extending freedom of assembly, [...]

The Enforcement Agency

The last thing the police need is elections says Roger Graef described in the Telegraph as a filmmaker and criminologist. Although dressing up his comments with clearly leftists expressions, I would tend to agree that it is wrong to ask the police to be accountable to politicians, whether they be local Westminster or Brussels.

The police [...]

Labour Lies Decite and Spin

With the relatively recent debate in the media about our great presidents comments on Britain joining the Euro, it might be instructive to look a little more closely at the events leading to the ERM debacle, the day Britain left the European exchange-rate mechanism on September 16, 1992, and the Bank of England reputedly [...]

The Wrong Shadow Chancellor??

John Redwood MP » Is it my democratic duty to shop til I drop?
The authorities visited this crunch on us, because they judged we were collectively borrowing too much and spending too much. They hiked the interest rates and later told the banks to lend less for the level of capital [...]

Tongue in Cheek

From Scotland:
It is wrong to condemn the EU for requiring Ireland to have another referendum
This establishes an important principle. If (heaven forbid) Salmond’s rigged referendum on breaking up the UK results in a vote for Scotland to be cast adrift from the security of the UK, no problem. It would then be
clear that [...]

The Wrong Shadow Chancellor?

Please stop this nightmare spin

Thoughts on Human Rights

The concept of human rights are based on national sovereignty in that they were a control on the states power against its citizens. We the people give our state certain powers so that it can do the job we ask of it, basically to protect both the state and its citizens, but in order that [...]

About Borders

NM at Eutopia is worrying about the lack of voter confidence in European political systems and quotes controversial post-Marxian philosopher Slovenian intellectual Slavoj Zizek. NM says some of his ideas are well worth pondering at greater length, not least for those of us interested in the future of Europe.

“Under the illusion that the borders are [...]

On the issue of keeping one Commissioner per country,

Former President of the European Parliament Pat Cox writes that:
“This concession does not require a change to the Lisbon Treaty, which already provides the European Council with the right to decide the number of commissioners, subject to unanimity. What has changed is the spirit in which the rule will be interpreted.”
The spirit or [...]

The Trojan Horse Party

The new Libertas Party, which aims to run candidates in all 27 European Union states for the European Parliament elections in June 2009, says it wants to democratise the European institutions, with an elected commission and a president.
Mr Ganley told reporters on Thursday (11 December) When he insisted that the new party is not anti-EU [...]

EU Parliament votes to end Working Time opt out

Now that the EU Parliament has voted to remove the British opt out from the Working Times Directive against the will of the duly elected British Parliament, perhaps we should consider if the agreement reached at Maastricht should now be repealed in the British parliament, becasue the agreement made in that treaty has been [...]

Big Brother ECHR Ruling

The data sharing bill, which is going through Parliament in the next few weeks, will see government agencies passing intimate details of individuals and families between departments: Libertarians worry that these details will also end up in the hands of government contractors in private companies.
In any case, “The new law would remove the right to [...]

European Commissioner’s loyalties

Nosemonkey poses an interesting question about the constitutional issue raised by sending Baroness Ashton to the EU as a commissioner, he asks:
The question of where a European Commissioner’s loyalties lie is a vital one. He says Eurosceptics will leap on her first justification for her appointment: That she steered the Lisbon treaty through the [...]

No Point in Changing Brown

My thoughts on the Brown situation are covered by this in the Telegraph, it is not just Brown but Labour polices it seems that most people agree with me that changing the Present PM for a new face would not achieve
anything meaningful for either the Labour party or the country.
The only bright light would be [...]

British Police Arrest Holocaust Denier

The problems forecast with the EU arrests warrant are becoming a reality, with the news of the arrest of Dr Toben at Heathrow airport by British police on a warrant issued in Germany for the a crime of Holocaust denial.
The action and offence under German law was committed outside of Germany in a country (Australia) [...]

Rulings under the Human Rights Act

The Telegraph complains about being shackled by the judgments based on the Human Rights Act of 2000 and specifically on conflict between Article 8 – which recognises the individual’s right to privacy – and Article 10, which recognises freedom of expression. The balance of judicial decisions in the subsequent eight years has swung markedly towards [...]

Conservative running interference for the Federalists

John Redwood asks why the English Democrats stood against David Davis in the by-election, and wonders why they would want to stand against an obvious Eurosceptic or his party, a party which has voted No to Nice, No to Amsterdam and No to Lisbon.

Implying that if they stood against Conservative in a [...]

Cameron Deep Clean

The controversy over the Tory leaders demands that MEP must fill in a right to know form on expenses twice a year, has thrown up an important point;
The Tory MEPs according to the leaked memo are prepared to challenge the idea based on rule two of the EU parliament which says that MEPs have an [...]

Scramble for publicity

Ian Jack looks at the prospects for the Davis campaign in the Guardian he makes a point that has been concerning me since Davis resigned;
Haltemprice will elect David Davis because of his party, but the popularity of his beliefs will remain unproved. As an independent newcomer campaigning for liberty he might struggle, like Miss [...]

If we belive the spin

There is another way of looking at that resignation- it does not make sense for the prospective home sectary to resign in order to fight the government. When all he had to do was to wait a while and he would have been in a position to see through a real defence of civil liberty [...]

The Pot and the Kettle

THE European Commission described Zimbabwe’s presidential run-off yesterday as a “sham” and said it did not recognise the election or its outcome as legitimate.
Rearrange these words – Pot -The – Kettle – Calling – Black -That
As they both refuse to listen to the voters the only difference between the EU and Robert Mugabe is the [...]

Conservatives’ Achilles heel

Note to Shadow Cabinet. Climate Change, and it’s supposed causes, are nowhere on voter’s lists of concerns (apart from a few people who would never vote Conservative in a million years).
By all means teach children about issues like respecting the environment and energy costs but yet another group of politicians preaching about something that many [...]

Stuart Wheeler looses case

Stuart Wheeler looses case
Even a pessimist like me has a small degree of hope that an obviously lost cause would be reversed in the end however unfortunately that is not to be as the high court have now rejected Stuart Wheelers case against Gordon Brown for not holding a referendum.
From Press reports Lord Justice [...]

ID Card and the National Register

David Davis made points about the national register;
There are many good reasons for not wanting to be on the national identity register, which involves a large number of pieces of data about each individual being put on a single Government database, many of them the access keys for other Government databases. That is the important [...]

A Cast Iron Promise from David Cameron.

Today, I will give this cast-iron guarantee: If I become PM a Conservative government will hold a referendum on any EU treaty that emerges from these negotiations. Link
That was David Cameron in September 2007 by the July 2008 less than a year later he is however singing from a different song sheet,
Telegraph

David Cameron [...]

Targeting all opposition

Targeting extremists
From: Richard Corbett, Labour MEP for Yorkshire & Humber.
MIKE Hall is wrong to state that the EU is attempting to stop the Independence and Democracy Group having a say in the European Parliament (Yorkshire Post, May 30).
The measure to which Mr Hall refers is my proposal to raise the threshold needed to form a [...]

Only pay MPS for their responsibilities

Conservative MP Peter Lilly it attempting to bring in a private members bill to reduce MPs pay in line with the transfers of powers between Parliament and European Union institutions.

As reported in the Telegraph Reading his bill he makes the point that;
In virtually every occupation, it is recognised that pay should [...]

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