eurealist.co.uk

Euro Regions to be Scrapped

Reports in local press in the North East and South West suggest that the Regional Assemblies – which are deeply unpopular in those euroregions – will be disbanded and their responsibilities and budgets transferred back to local authorities.

Conservative Regional Humbug

The Conservatives plan to abolish Regional Assemblies if they gain power in Westminster.

This is the headline news the Conservative party want to promote, but I have long become used to half arsed thinking from the leadership of this once great party, which has produced some outstandingly misleading policy beliefs

“No essential sovereignty will be lost” springs to mind, the bald statement leaving the public with the impression that “No sovereignty will be lost” but place the emphasis on the one word “essential” and you can read the statement in an entirely different light, it then becomes a matter of conjecture over what is and what is not “essential” but some sovereignty will be lost!

On several occasions I have made the point that the “Regional Assemblies” are only the body which was set up with the intention of allowing political oversight of the already existing “Regional Development Agencies” these are the agencies which were established at the insistence of the EEC to actually receive and control EEC funding onto the region, hence the supposed need for political oversight, and preferably from an elected Regional body, a development that was shelved after the debacle in the North East when the voters poured cold water on the idea of having a fully elected Regional Assembly.

The Conservative claim is they will abolish the “Regional Assemblies” leaving us with the impression that they will do away with the whole level of regional government, but they make no mention of the “Regional Development Agencies” are these unelected and unaccountable quangos to be left in place without any political oversight? or are they also to be abolished? If they are to be abolished then what about the impact on EU funding to the regions how will that be re-routed and to where.

Hurd welcomes new realism on EU from Cameron

The Foreign Office has been reciting the mantra that “Europe is reforming and coming our way” ever since the UK joined. The reality is that it is not and will not, unless (a) we stop kidding ourselves and (b) finally get a government (of whichever party) which is prepared to break the mould.

West Lothian question

Of course the EVoEM is an attempt to rectify the problem created by transferring powers away from Westminster to the Scotish parliament, if Jack Straw and co wish to prevent the break up of the UK perhaps they will consider taking back those powers so that all legislation passed in the UK parliament affects all of the people of the UK not just some of them.

Government is failing to preserve rights of citizens

‘NatWest Three’ case shows government is failing to preserve rights of citizens

The extradition of the “NatWest Three” has rightly stirred the awareness of the public that the Labour government has no interest in preserving the rights of British citizens. It has become so obsessed with trying to protect the public from terrorist threats and kowtowing to President Bush, that it has started to oppress rather than defend.

Labour’s naturally statist and centralising tendencies mean that it is going down the dangerous road of trying to control the population to such an extent that it is systematically destroying hundreds of years of hard-won rights in a matter of months, in a futile and misdirected effort to win the so called “war on terror”.

Now, by cravenly signing up to a non-reciprocal treaty with the United States, any British citizen who has ever worked or even visited the US could be grabbed by American police and hauled over the Atlantic to face charges that they will be ill-equipped to defend.

Conservatives half-brained over the EU

It looks as if the Conservatives are at it yet again; they do seem to live in a dream world in which the EU does not exist and can therefore be ignored, because the EU is a constant source of conflict within the party, the Conservative leadership wish it not be above the political horizon and do everything possible to make that happen.

The problem is that they then offer up for public consumption some plan or other that conflicts with EU directives or EU treaties, they then ignore the conflicts, as if they, along with the EU did not exist, and refuse to offer an explanation of exatly how they will put into practice their plans which would either break an EU treaty or run directly against an EU directive, or tell us what they would do when the ECJ fines the UK for breaking an EU directive.

They are not fines - so thats fine

Mr Booker is a little wrong on the Justice Laws ruling, which was that firstly there was a hierarchy of acts of parliament and secondly “constitutional statutes” could not be changed by implication. Government officials across the land will have heaved a sigh of relief last week at a High Court ruling by Mr Justice Andrew Collins, which gives them the power to impose arbitrary penalties on the public without having to justify them in a court of law.

More on Arrest Warrant

As the German Constitutional Court has ruled that the EU arrest warrant is not compatible with German law. It is thought that the Government will attempt to introduce a specific German law to allow a substantive hearing for suspects before they are deported thus effectively undoing a key feature of the arrest warrant.

It is not clear how this will work, but the German ruling may leave the EU arrest warrant open to legal challenge in other countries.

Each British soldier should be accompanied by a Professor of law

You ask: “How can a soldier be expected to do his duty, when he has to be asking himself constantly whether his every action is fully compatible with human rights law?”

The answer is simple. Providing British soldiers avoid committing acts of genocide, crimes against humanity or grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and the laws of war, such as wilful killing (ie, murder), torture and inhuman treatment, they have nothing to fear from the International Criminal Court Act.

Dr Gerry Simpson, Reader in Public International Law, London School of Economics, London WC2

All very laudable all very cleaver Dr Simpson, perhaps with your training and your knowledge, sitting at your desk in London, after a good nights sleep, with a nice mug of coffee and a stack of books and all the time in world to check the precise definitions of wilful killing or crime against humanity in any given circumstance is one thing. Do please try doing the same as a nineteen year old youth with no legal training in the field of battle, in constant fear of your own and you comrades lives, in hot dusty condition after not sleeping for perhaps two days, after having it drummed into you that quick decisive action - is what saves lives by a drill sergeant and your officers and see how well you score.