The leader of the Conservative Party proudly announced that he has a simply ambition for this country. It’s at the heart of what I believe, and what I believe our country needs.

Oh goody he is going to repeal the 1972 act of admission to the EU begin the rebuilding process of our nation state. He intends to return the power to run this country to our government the power to hold our government to account to our parliment and the power to elect our own government to the people of this country. Now that is a simple plan that should be at the heart of anyone standing for election as leader of a nation state.

Perhaps not the same one that Cameron has though.

Today I want to talk to you about a simple ambition that I have for our country. It’s at the heart of what I believe, and what I believe our country needs. My ambition is to make Britain more family-friendly.

I am sure that Sir Robert Atkins would agree with Mr Cameron family-friendly is the way to go.

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I have been reading and exchanging some views with NM on his blog, Nose Monkey`s EUtopia my blog being almost dormant.

I should say that on many issues I do tend to agree with the views as presented on the blog, until that is it comes to the EU, there I am afraid I tend to part company. It is not that NM is an out and out unthinking Europhile, he is to my mind rather an optimistic sort, who seems to think the EU can be reformed where I see the building blocks and scaffolding of the supra government the EU is fast becoming, NM only sees evidence of the inability of the EU to ever reach that goal. Whereas I do not believe the EU can be reformed because I just do not see any evidence historically or the present that any reform is on the cards anytime in future, NM sees great hope that at some point reform will take place.

His recent post

Cameron, the Tories’ confusing EU politics, and a chance for reform

Questions why David Cameron is still supporting a referendum after the other two parties backed down on the issue.

This is somewhat evidence, of the previously noted, mental ability that many who support the EU have of putting their own thoughts into the minds of others and then being or acting surprised when the others do not follow the forecast chain of events. In NM mind it was obvious that Cameron did not actually want a referendum and only supported one for political reasons. It is therefore inconceivable that the Conservatives should stick to their election promise when offered a chance to renege, hence the inquiry.

But now we can reflect that there must be another reason for Cameron sticking to the referendum promise. One I hasten to add that does not materialise for several paragraphs, (more later) but when we do eventually get there it appears, in the mind of NM at least, that Cameron has a cunning plan. If he succeeds in getting a referendum the likely outcome would be no. But now it is time for Cameron (who by this time has apparently been elected Prime Minster) to put his cunning plan into action, the no vote would enable Cameron to draw out the whole populist process for years with countless follow-up referenda. And it would also provide a handy buffer against the withdrawalists by taking away the Lisbon Treaty’s introduction of procedures by which a member state can quit the EU, meaning he can safely play around without the threat of having to take the EU-bashing to the logical extreme and giving up membership.

Now why would Cameron want to do such a thing, well apparently this would eventually bring about a multi speed or multi tiered EU something hinted at last year, so there you have it the Cameron plan revealed in all its glory.

In the intervening paragraphs NM explores the problems of Cameron not understanding realpolitik because if he did he would “realise that he needs to maintain good relations with as many EU political leaders as he possibly can if he’s going to have any hope of doing deals in Brussels when he becomes Prime Minister.

It’s basic diplomacy - act nice towards people, they’re more likely to accommodate your wishes.”

This apparently means that when we eventually do come to leave the EU we will get a better deal if we are nice to them. Mr Cameron’s plan it seems would “ piss off all the other EU member states no end. Cameron would position himself as the pariah of Europe, pissing everyone off by his obstructionism and stalling EU reform yet further.”

After we have negotiated the thoughts of Mr Camaron NM actually starts to speak to me; he says for the last decade we have been asking the wrong question we should be asking “have we got the right option for the EU” NM is pro EU but not this EU. Well on that last we can agree I am not pro this EU either, as I mentioned before I do not see it changing.

The problem is that no one with any influence is advocating an approach which would bring about the changes everyone is quite happy to go along with EU flow.

I strikes me that if they do not go with the flow then they are likely to piss off the rest of the EU and thus make our exit that much harder. It also seems to be the case that the only way to reform the EU would be to go directly against the flow, after all the flow is towards further political integration. I do not see how we are ever going to go against the flow and not at the same time piss off the rest of the EU.

This introduces a further point; if by going against the EU flow we piss off all the others, then obviously all the others do not want to go in our direction, otherwise equally obviously we would not be pissing them off, so going against the flow will be necessary to create reform of the EU but at the same time will make it harder to achieve that reform.

To be honest it looks very much like a catch 22 situation on top of wanting to have ones cake and eating it.

Would it not be simpler to decide what we want from the EU see if the Lisbon Treaty works towards that objective and accept or reject it on those terms. Then the EU can decide whether to work towards our objectives or ask us to leave.

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Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague said if the Prime Minister reneged on his party’s pledge to hold a referendum

“no one will trust him on anything else”.

I said if David Cameron reneged on his 2006 election pledge to remove Conservative MEP`s from the pro-constitutional EPP–ED group.

“no one will trust him on anything else”.

Alan Cochrane writing in the Telegraph says it is “good to hear the Tory leader reject the populist appeal of English nationalism.”

I find it rather odd that when writing about the elections to the Scottish Parliament it is somehow the English which are to blame for the present mess the Scottish raj which is controlling the reins of power in Westminster has made of the Union.

It was Scottish born and educated Tony Blair and his Cabinet stuffed full of Scots politicians who have created the imbalance in the British Constitutional settlement that has led to the increasing calls for an English parliament in preference to the regional break up of England.

One is tempted to ask what does David Cameron offer the English by way of redress? Are they going to remove the power of the Scottish parliament and the Welsh Assembly? Not on your life, all they are offering us is English votes on English matters (EVonEM) a policy that is shot through with its own problems and does not even begin to address the basic imbalance wrought by Blair and his Scottish cronies.

If Cameron means what he says, and he really does want to be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and not England, then he should be suggesting completely dissolving the regionalization adgenda including Scottish and Welsh regionalisation, and undoing the damage already caused to fabric of the nation, that however is not an option the Conservative Leader is prepared to accept.

John Redwood

has a post ridiculing a glossy brochure sent to him and doubtless many others, by Margaret Hodge, entitled “Creating prosperity in every region: England’s Regional development” Agencies”.

“She tells us the RDAs help to bring prosperity to all parts of England. Nowhere does she point out that the reigonal disparities have grown substantially during Labour’s period in office, with the regions that have least government interference growing much more rapidly than the ones with most. Her brochure lists a series of small initiatives which entail the RDA getting hold of some public money which some other branch of government could have spent, influencing conduct on the ground a little with the money, and then spending more of our money endlessly claiming credit for spending some of our money!”

Reiterating Conservative plans to abolish both the Regional Assemblies and the Regional Development Agencies, if elected, Redwood says:

“Margaret Hodge’s brochure did one good thing. It reminded me how important it is to abolish these insignificant bodies. The money spent on their administrative and PR budgets should be returned to taxpayers, whilst any sensible expenditure on development or education should be sent with all the other monies to HE or local Council’s development departments.”

Although I would agree with the plans to abolish both the Regional assemblies and the RDA`s, I wonder what if any thought has been given to the opposition to these plans which must be expected from both the Regional actors and the EU. It is obvious that the Conservative stance on abolishing the regional level of governance is at odds with the EU based aims of increasing regional power and EU integration, as can be seen from the recent Committee of the Regions “Declaration for Europe”

Eupolitix

“We are convinced that devolution and multi-level governance are among the best routes towards European integration,” the Rome declaration states.

“We are determined to support the heads of state and government in bringing the constitutional process and the necessary reform…to a rapid conclusion, without losing the ground gained by and for local and regional authorities.”

And it is not just the representatives from the regional government who think the way ahead is through more regional power and more EU influence at the regional level.

Hans-Gert Pöttering, president of the European parliament, told CoR members in Rome that the committee would “play an increasing role in the Europe of tomorrow”.

The new Europe we are building is one where regional and local authorities will matter more, not less, in years to come. The bodies you represent will be extremely important in delivering Europe on the ground.”

European commission president José Manuel Barroso echoed Pöttering’s thoughts, saying that local and regional authorities “continued to provide the basis of the bond of trust between the EU and its citizens”.

I have become so used to our politicians saying one thing on the EU and then when in power doing something else that I want to read the small print before I accept that they actually mean what they say. David Cameron has already a record of promising action on the EU to keep the EUsceptics in his party on board and then weaselling out when it comes to the crunch, that I have my doubts that they would if elected really go against the wishes of the EU leaders and the strong federalist objective of the Union and really abolish the vehicle of EU influence in this country. If he did, then of course as the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh assembly and the London Assembly have already grown beyond the initial regional assemblies, there would need to be some other questions asked as to their positions, if the British government does abolish all Assemblies and all RDA`s it would be reasonable to assume that would include those organisations as well as those in the rest of England.

Oh dear! David Cameron suddenly decides the Conservatives do “do the EU” after all. In a long batch of waffle in the Telegraph Mr Cameron assisted by the Prime Minister of the Czech republic sets out the Conservative vision for the future of the EU, a vision based on the formation of the new political grouping they are building in the EU Parliament the Movement for European Reform

There is nothing much to say about the Conservatives leaders thoughts on the subject that has not been said thousands of times before this does not prevent the commenters in both the Times and the Telegraph saying it.

No chance of the Tories winning the next election then!

Dream on Mr Cameron. You obviously don’t know your British history - still you wouldn’t as you’re only a boy!

I take it Cameron doesn’t want to win the election then. Most of us want out of the EU not in it in any way. I hope the people wake up and realise he is Blair MK2, he’s already been to the Bilderberg meeting,

Visitors from Mars would be bemused not only by the EU, but also by David Cameron’s policy on the EU.

Reform from the inside? We’ve been trying that for years and been ignored.

If he really is going to say these things then fair enough at least he has made a decision. That decision is one of closer EU integration, of accepting that parliament is no longer relevent and that his party will be no different to NuLab.

Maybe Mr Cameron, who incidentally isn’t a leader and may never be, seems to think that having 70% of law made by the EU and not able to be repealed by any national electorate is democracy.

Apparently the EU ‘has helped entrench democracy and stability from the Baltic to the Mediterranean‘.

An interesting point - though somewhat at odds with the fact that we are not permitted a vote on our membership of it.

The Conservatives have already had their time to change the EU, they did not change anything then and they will not do it in the future. The only way for Britain is to repudiate the EU Treaties and then celebrate Freedom and independence.

Fifty years ago the people were lied to about the European Community. They are being lied to today.

The UK has paid its dues to the EU and then some. We now have no fishing industry. We have little agriculture. Democracy is now under a set of higher powers which inch by inch take more and more power.

Oh dear, so Dave thinks he can change the EU. Since 1973, after Heath sold this country out, governments have tried to change the EU without success. All they have done is reduced our sovereignty and under Blair, made sure we pay more.

An EU to be proud of’? The only one I can think of is one which we aren’t in.

It is a scandal that 80% of British law now comes from Brussels where there is no effective power of oversight.

Not so much a vision as a blurry haze of catchwords and jibberish. There is not a single substantive policy view here, not a position or an attitude. This was clearly written by a PR, buffed by a committee, with every shred of sense or meaning ripped from it and buried in trash.

There are a lot of words here, and some loosely stated sentiment, but as usual with Mr Cameron there is a complete absence of substance.

For God’s sake how many more times do we have too suffer some Tory leader saying how he wants an EU of independant states when such a thing has never been on the agenda and never will be.

If you are against further integration and protecting of the ‘nation state” then why not simply pass a law that guarantees parliament supremecy?

This is just more Cameron tosh . When will he realise that we don’t want the EU with all its corruption and sinecures . We have enough of that in this country .

Hmm! An apparently attractive philosophy, but one with all fine phrases and no specifics - sound familiar does it?

All good - that is if it had been written 15 years ago. Cameron knows this, but apparently felt that it was time to spin a bit for the benefit of the real Conservatives. The EU has other plans and is well underway to implement the United States of Europe. It would take a Margaret Thatcher to reverse the flow.

Same tired old propaganda, these statements have been debunked so many times I can not beleive they are still trying to use them.

This ‘vision’ is just the old one dressed-up to make it palatable to the individual in each state. It is more than apparent that Dave is part of a socialist agenda by these words.

Hang on! Didn’t “Dave” trot out a
similar load of tosh a few weeks
back? What has changed
meanwhile? Talk about flogging a
dead horse!

Another new idea and a fresh leader -into the meat grinder they go! How long will it be before we hear “We’re winning the battle of ideas, no really, we’re winning the argument…” Such enthusiasm, such futility.

Building “an EU to be proud of”….an oxymoron, surely.
Thanks Dave, see you at the ballot box.

Dave, you jest surely.

Denis MacShane (Matyjaszek)  Who still advises the government on European affairs (I think ePolitix must mean the EU) has said the Conservatives’ foreign policy is a "disastrous blow" to Britain’s national interest. In relation to the Tories’ ambition to split from the European People’s Party grouping of centre right parties, MacShane said: "David Cameron once said to me: ‘Denis, I am much more Eurosceptic than you realise.’ 

MacShane is not alone, not many of us realise Cameron is EUsceptic in the slightest. In fact Cameron is treading the same old path many of our politicians follow trying to appear EUsceptic at home without actually putting any meat on the bones, then when elected he will continue to put EU aims and aspirations above those of the people who elected him.

The ePolitix article allows Denis to put a few more lies before the public;

The Tories under Cameron are now further to the right than they were under Michael Howard or Iain Duncan Smith.

Firstly this is an outright lie, secondly MacShane is equating EUsceptics with the right wing which is nonsense.

The Tories’ rupture with political parties in Europe is a disastrous blow to Britain’s national interest,

 Well the Tories are not creating a rupture with the political parties in Europe, they are going to leave a particular grouping in the EU parliament because that group forces the Tories to agree to policies the leadership see as detrimental to Britain’s national interests.

 
if we want to solve many of our problems from crime and terrorism to immigration and the environment then we have to do it with Europe

There might be a need for our government to enter into some cross border agreements, but solving these problems does not require passing ever more power to a central government in Brussels. We the British people should decide what we want to happen in this country and not have to await the nod from either the EU Commision the ECJ or the ministers of 26 other countries we do not elect.

It is international agreements that have forced our government to release onto the streets of our cities foreigners who they belive are a danger to our society, it is EU agreements which prevents our government from choosing who will and who will not be allowed in the country, it is EU an agreement which are creating the problems with our waste disposal.

Always assuming “Conservatism” is not a contradiction in terms!

Many people have been saying for over three years now that the conservative party needs to address its image in the liberal left main stream media. The party needs to get through to the public what being conservative means, it needs to create a tranche of conservatives policies and get out into the country and sell both them and conservative ideals to the voters, to do so it must be prepared to challenge the cosy left wing assumptions that are so prevalent in today’s media, it must be prepared to challenge the distortions of the Labour spin machine, that the media are only to happy to sponsor.

Well it seems that the message has finaly got though, at last the conservatives are doing something about their media image. Unfortunately instead of doing something about getting the conservative message across and challenging the media bias, David Cameron and his merry band of public school boys have decided the way ahead is to change the conservative party so that it fully embraces the cosy liberal left view of the world, in his own words; if there are members of the conservative party who do not like the direction he is perusing “tough”. The first thing I though when I read his comment was that Cameron will be pushing hard for public finance for political parties, because thus speak a man who obviously does not need the support of conservatives and is prepared to ditch conservatives on the alter of media acceptance.

The media has far given Cameron and easy ride, it is bestowing on him the crown which once adorned the brow of Tony Blair, until that is he stepped away from soft liberal left adgenda.

Just how much of an easy ride can be evidenced today in of all places the Torygraph, which contains an article by Melissa Kite on a special focus group for The Sunday Telegraph run by “the renowned American pollster” Frank Luntz. On the first anniversary of Cameron’s election as Conservative leader, Luntz has assembled a group of 17 floating voters to take the temperature of Project Cameron. The article turns out to be a puff for Cameron and his only policy to date of eradicating conservative theory from the conservative party. One or two conservatives within the group are not happy and want to replace Cameron but we already know the leaderships views on that “Tough” but labour LibDem supporters are warming to the new party.

Nazanine, 31, a television journalist who voted Lib Dem in 2005, says: “He’s providing the first credible opposition to Labour in years.”

Jane Broadfoot, 46, a public service worker who voted Lib Dem at the last election, said: “He’s very eloquent. I’m warming to him. He’s reduced the capital C in Conservatism to a small c.”

Alistair Smyth, 27, a researcher who voted Lib Dem last time, says: “He’s the first Tory leader in my life that hasn’t made me furious.”

Sharon Raymond, 35, a dental nurse who voted Labour, says: “He’s fresh. He’s a fresh face. I’m tired of Tony Blair now. Change it.”

However Colin is not convinced: “Fresh face or not, I would like to know what he actually stands for.” Good point Colin.

So it would seem that the Labour and LibDem`s support Cameron, Melissa Kite did not bother to point out the obvious problem that he is the leader of the Conservative party.

Not only has the Telegraph given the Cameron project of destroying the Conservative party thumbs up it has on the same day censored an alternative conservative view

From Eureferendum we learn that the Booker column in the Sunday Telegraph has this week been censored, Booker was told by the Sunday Telegraph that part of his column, an item attacking David Cameron was to be dropped.

But Richard North feels and I fully agree “the MSM has it own agenda” not one that is shared with the blogosphere.

So to put some balance into the media Cameron love in, below with thanks to Eureferendum is the part of the Booker column the telegraph chose to censor.

As David Cameron ends his first year as leader of the Opposition, there are clear signs that the greatest gamble in modern British politics has not come off. The little group of ex-public schoolboys who last year hi-jacked the Conservative Party have seemed to gamble on just one strategy. List everything the Party used to stand for – low taxes, the family, rolling back the power of the state, encouraging business, upholding our defences, curbing criminals, common sense – then go for the opposite.

The essence of the gamble has been the belief that, in wooing the support of Lib Dems, would-be greenies, Guardian readers and the supposed “soft centre”, they could take their supposed “core” supporters for granted. But as support for Cameron falters, all the evidence seems to suggest that those wished-for new recruits to his “Not The Conservative Party” are not forthcoming, while the Party’s former natural supporters are left baffled, dismayed and increasingly angry.

All this was neatly symbolised by the recent photo-opportunities staged by the three men now competing for the role of Britain’s prime minister. Mr Blair and Mr Brown, aware that defence and national security (not long ago rating 34 percent on a Mori poll) still rank very much higher as voter priorities than “environmental” issues (only 8 percent), flew out to the Iraq and Afghan battle-zones to pose in front of the largest guns they could find. Mr Cameron, at the same time, flew out to the Sudan, in Lord Ashcroft’s CO2 emitting private jet, to be pictured cuddling a little refugee child. It was the “Men from Mars” against “the Boy from Venus”. “Darfur Dave” did not come well out of the contrast.

The tragedy is that, confronted by the most corrupt, hypocritical, inefficient, illiberal, discredited government in history, what millions of voters are looking for is an alternative which might put an end to the sleazy, self-regarding sham of the Blair era by displaying some “masculine” firmness: in cutting back on the bloated public sector and the out-of-control bureaucracy which is destroying our health service, education and police; which might encourage enterprise; which might restore democracy to local government; bring back some balance into our public finances; sort out the shambles into which our Armed Forces are sliding; uphold Britain’s national interest, as we suffocate under the malfunctioning system of government represented by the European Union.

In other words, what much of the country is crying out for is a party which represents precisely those values which Mr Cameron’s Not-The-Conservative Party seems so hellbent on abandoning. As for what he stands for instead, almost the only clear message Darfur Dave seems to have put over to the voters is his sentimental “save the planet” greenery, on which his dotty little gimmicks and practical ignorance have simply made him a laughing stock.

What many voters sadly begin to conclude is that Dave and his cronies seem so hopelessly ill-equipped to take on the serious business of government that, if we have to choose between one gang of PR merchants and another, better stick with the devil we know. Hence the evidence of the latest polls appearing to show that the gamble has failed. Ever larger become the number of would-be Conservatives sorely tempted to join that 40 percent who already feel so alienated from politics that they just stay sullenly at home. But the Guardian readers are scarcely flocking to replace them. So where does all this leave our country?

Anthony Giddens one-time director of the London School of Economic, suggests in an article for Prospect Magazine “Labour should use EU to split Conservatives” at the next election.

Open Europe reports that Giddens “argues that Tony Blair has consistently “avoided spelling out what he thought should be the future of the EU and Britain’s place in it. So has every other top Labour figure.”

He argues that Labour should use “Europe” as an issue with which to split the Conservatives in the next election. He claims, “Besides taxation, a key area where it will be very difficult for the Tories to establish a coherent stance will be the EU.

The “new Tories” of David Cameron are more vulnerable on Europe than Labour is. On the one hand, Cameron is pandering to traditional Tory hostility to the EU. On the other, he is trying to take a lead on the climate change and energy security agenda. How are these two positions compatible?

The Tories should be pushed to say in detail what Euroscepticism, as they practice or propose it, actually means.”

The answer is that Giddens is falling into the trap of his own way of thinking, if he believes that Cameron is pandering to Eusceptics he is not reading the signs. We also want to know in detail what the Conservatives stance on the EU will be. So we would be quite pleased if the Labour Party does take up on this suggestion at least the EU will get a look in at the next election.

An excellent article by Jeff Randle in the Telegraph on the cost of doing business in the EU.

I love some of the thoughts:

“For the sad souls who cling to the fast-disappearing hope of that headline ever becoming true, it has been another miserable week. Facts are stripping away the Eurofanatics’ clothing.

Very soon they will stand covered by nothing more than the jock strap of their own perverse desire to further erode British sovereignty.”

“We are self-asphyxiating with red tape, produced by useless European Commissioners – the likes of Neil Kinnock – who, if not luxuriating in Brussels, would be unemployable.”

“So when David Cameron next says the Conservative Party must start talking about the things that voters care about, instead of “banging on about Europe”, he would do well to understand that, while he and his metropolitan clique are showboating on climate change, British jobs are being choked to death by toxic emissions from Brussels.”

Anatole Kaletsky says the Dave’s not the Tory party “The Conservative Party has not just moved to the left, abandoning Margaret Thatcher and leapfrogging Tony Blair and Gordon Brown on to what David Cameron described as the liberal, progressive mainstream of British politics. No, the Cameron project appears to be far more audacious. He is trying to turn the “new Tories” into an unashamedly statist, high-tax, anti-enterprise party, with ideals that owe less to Blair or Brown than to Nye Bevan and Michael Foot.

The Tory policy has always veered toward less interfering small government, hence it has argued that government would need to spend less. If we take Dave at his word and why should we not then as Anatole Kaletsky says we should start to ask “When are you going to announce the details of the enormous tax increases you are so clearly itching to impose?”

So we now have three political parties proposing to take more of our money to spend for us on what they decide, what a choice come the next election.

Given that the same three parties also consider Britain’s place is in the shush don’t want to talk about it. socialist EU. We are going to find our options at the election booth are somewhat limited.

Well I for one now know who to vote for, even if they do not stand a chance of being elected, at least this party is prepared to talk about the EU, in fact many would have us think that is all they do talk about.

But it is no longer possible for the United Kingdom Independence Party UKIP to be so dismised because not only are the prepared to offer a way forward for this country which does not include becoming a sub state in the United State of Europe they are also offering radical new thinking on tax.

A flat tax system for Britain

• Make all taxpayers better off (mostly by £1,100 per year) and take a

further 4.5 million lower paid out of income tax altogether

- by raising the tax-free personal allowance to £9,000

- and merging existing income tax bands and employee’s National

Insurance contributions into a single flat income tax at a rate of 33%.

• Reduce the rate for capital gains tax to 33% and scrap inheritance

tax altogether.

• Finance the revenue shortfall by halting the growth in government

spending.

Now I do not even begin to understand the British Tax regime, I only know I always end up paying more than I think I should and a lot more that I want to, considering an increasing amount of the money goes in supporting an anti-democratic super socialist government in Brussels, who decide to spend a great deal on either supporting French farmers, Terrorist states and EU propaganda.

But I can recommend a blog which has looked at the UKIP proposals The Devils Kitchen

So there we have it there is a political party that is prepared to think outside of the EU box.

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The BBC reports on the fringe meetings at Bournemouth (well some of them anyway)

Apparently, the number of Tory MPs who want to withdraw from the EU is growing, thus claims Euro-sceptic MP Philip Davies and David Davies who is one of “six whole” Tory MP members of the Better Off Out group said: “There are now “10 whole” Tory MPs who will openly say that Britain should leave the European Union.

Davis also said David Cameron is also happy for MPs to advocate that policy without fear of any sanctions inside the party.

Whoopee!

Of course Cameron is happy to allow a few back benchers to advocate a policy of leaving the EU, but 10 Tories do not make party policy, and whilst the 10 make anti-EU noises the leadership takes the party in the opposite direction, no doubt hoping that the anti EU noises will keep a few on board and keep a few from deserting to UKIP.

Simon Heffer questions whether Dave Cameron and his friends are on the right road although the new approach might be attracting a few younger people to the not the Conservatives, it is doing so at the expense of the core voters, I suspect the Conservative leadership thinking is, that many will bury their concerns and vote not Conservative anyway.

Heffer says;

“people who have never in their lives been asked to confront the question of their general wellbeing, or the work-life balance, or any of the other little obsessions invented by the leadership’s gimmick mongers. Still, what ()the much-reviled “core vote” – think of all this is simply irrelevant to Mr Cameron and his friends. All that matters is that the Leftist press and their co-religionists in the BBC can be persuaded not to be horrid to the party, and victory (so they believe) will follow.”

Heffer thinks there could be problems ahead and Cameron and his friends should “savour his inevitably rapturous ovation after his keynote speech today “for there may well be fewer of them in the months ahead.”

However Daniel Finkelstein Is “WORRIED about David Cameron. I fear he will have too much policy. I am concerned that there will be too much substance and not enough style.”

He suggests that the political parties should not bother with manifestos or policies but just rely on branding. After all he argues “policies don’t win elections, inform voters or help with governing,” “why do the media keep asking for them, and why do politicians keep offering them? Simple. To keep us all entertained.”

He does have a point when most of our laws are made at the EU level and not even debated in parliament the political goings on at Westminster do seem to be mere entertainment.

Hat tip to Tommy English for the link to this essay

…Our next general election should be about much more than schools and hospitals. Britain’s sovereignty is at stake. And although the Government wants to pull the wool over our eyes, we need an elevated debate on Europe…

Brian Durrant - Other articles
Mon 17 Jul, 2006

Imagine the next general election is held in 2009. David Cameron’s Conservative party beats Labour by two million votes, and gains enough seats to form a majority government.

But Gordon Brown refuses to go.

“I really believe that the electorate did not reject the Government,” he says. “Unfortunately the electorate did not realise what the General Election was about. Indeed, the voters have requested more Labour policies – not less. The rejection of Labour’s programme was a mistake, which will have to be corrected.”

Impossible to believe? It has happened in Zimbabwe, Haiti, Uzbekistan and Belarus. Thirteen months ago, it happened on our doorstep.

In May 2005, the French and Dutch electorates rejected the EU Constitution put forward by Brussels in two separate referendums. Yet a fortnight after the “non”
and “nej” verdicts, Luxembourg’s Prime Minister, Jean- Claude Juncker, said at a press conference:

“I really believe the French and Dutch did not vote no to the Constitutional Treaty. Unfortunately the electorate did not realise that the Constitutional Treaty was specifically aimed at meeting their concerns and that’s why we need to have a period of explanation for explaining this to citizens”.

Eight months on, Valerie Giscard d’Estaing, the architect of the EU Constitution, showed his contempt for the democratic process. In a lecture at the London School of Economics on 28 February 2006, he said: “The rejection of the Constitution was a mistake which will have to be corrected. The Constitution will have to be given a second chance…If the Irish and Danes can vote yes in the end, so the French can do too. It was a mistake to use the referendum process, but when you make a mistake you can correct it.”

If you thought that was bad, three months later, the former French President told the Financial Times: “It was not France that said no. It was 55% of the French people.”

This madness has afflicted the political classes in the other main nations of the EU, too. Italian Foreign Minister Giuliano Amato told Agence Europe that “[the no votes were] a request for more Europe not less”. In May this year the new German Chancellor, Angela Merkel,said: “The negative results of the referendums in France and the Netherlands were a setback, but this has no bearing whatever on whether or not we need a constitution. I say yes, we need the Constitutional Treaty.”

So there you have it – the contempt with which top European politicians view the popular will. They have responded to the free referenda’s result with wilful self-delusion, and they certainly won’t take “no” for an answer. Hopes that the French and Dutch verdicts would trigger reform of the EU have been dashed.

Indeed, the main topic of conversation in EU circles today is how – not whether – to bring back the Constitution. Over the last 13 months, the supporters of an “ever closer union” have chosen to interpret the “no”
verdicts as a protest against economic liberalism, opposition to further enlargement of the EU, and a desire for greater powers in Brussels. In short, they have chosen any interpretation other than the obvious one: that the people of Europe are against deeper integration of the EU. This is borne out by a recent opinion poll by BVA and Maurice de Hond. Two-thirds of voters in both France and the Netherlands want to either take back powers from the EU or leave it altogether.

What’s more, several European leaders are now arguing that the Constitution is legitimate because it has been ratified by 15 states, the latest being Finland which agreed the constitution on 1 July. But only two of these states, Spain and Luxembourg, ratified the Treaty after a referendum. Nine of the member states that ratified without a referendum are actually more euro-sceptical than France or Holland. You can see how popular opinion is being ignored. Britain, meanwhile has delayed its ratification process, as did the Czech Republic, Denmark, Ireland, Poland, Portugal and Sweden.

Of course, none of this would matter if the Constitution were merely as Mr Blair describes it – “a tidying up exercise”. It will enable Europe “to work more effectively,” he says. But let’s remind ourselves what the fuss is about.

The full text of the Constitution is available online, and in a reader-friendly version, at www.euabc.com. On page 3, in Article I-5a, it says, “This constitution shall have primacy over the laws of member states”. The doctrine of the supremacy of EU law is an invention of the European Court of Justice (ECJ). Until now, it has never been recognised in a treaty. But now EU governments have effectively sided with the ECJ against their own judges. In legal terms it makes the EU a state, and this state henceforth derives its authority from its founding charter, the EU Constitution.

This point is reinforced by the next clause, Article I- 6, which enables the EU to act as a state under international law. And now look at Article I-11: “The member states shall exercise their competence to the extent that the Union has not exercised, or has decided to cease exercising, its competence”.

Did you get that? Member states are allowed to run their own affairs, to retain sovereignty, only where the EU does not. Jurisdiction from Brussels is specified in transport, energy, trade, competition, agriculture, fisheries, space exploration, social policy, public health, employment policy, consumer protection, asylum, immigration, criminal justice and foreign affairs. No wonder our politicians waffle on about schools so much. It’s pretty much all that’s left!

And when our Prime Minister tells you there will be “no federal superstate”, he is half right. The EU will be a superstate all right, equipped with all the trappings of statehood that international law recognises – a defined territory, a citizenry, a legislature, a legal system and supreme court, a defence capability, a head of state, a flag, a national anthem, a national day (9 May), and finally a constitution. But it will not be a “federal state”, because member countries will have fewer powers than “federal” implies.

There was a great deal of characteristic self- congratulation when the Prime Minister removed the F- word “federal” from the draft. He claimed a victory over euro-fanatics. He shouldn’t have bothered. In federations there is clear demarcation between central and state authority. Once the EU Constitution comes into force, member states of the EU will in some ways have less freedom of action than the federated states of the USA. They can decide, for example, whether to retain the death penalty.

The Constitution also creates an EU foreign minister and diplomatic corps. It establishes a criminal justice system, with its own prosecuting authority and police force, as well as common rules on asylum and immigration. So if a politician tells you that the Constitution is a mere tidying up exercise, he’s lying.

Every time Britain is asked to sign a European Treaty, we are given assurances that our sovereignty is not under threat. And every time, we lose more autonomy to the integrationist cause. In the early 1990s Douglas Hurd called the Maastricht Treaty the “high tide of federalism”. Now the Constitution will remove our veto in 40 areas, including immigration. At the same time it fails to return a single power to legislate back to national parliaments.

It looks as though the Constitution will be revisited in the spring of next year, when both France and Holland have national elections, and pro-Constitution Germany holds the EU presidency. Member states, including the UK, have agreed that on 25 March 2007 they will sign a document on the future of the EU called the Declaration of Berlin. The Commission has made it clear that this declaration will be the precursor to a new Treaty and will be modelled on the Messina Declaration of 1955. That led to the founding of the Common Market. EU President Barrosso has said that the document will not only set out the values and ambitions of the EU, but also embody a shared undertaking to deliver these objectives.

The EU is meanwhile pressing ahead with all kinds of integrationist projects in the interim. The European Defence Agency proposed in the Constitution has been set up. The veto on asylum issues has been abolished, while the veto on justice and home affairs legislation is in the process of being abolished. Furthermore, a recent court decision has given the EU the power to propose criminal laws which are then adopted by majority vote.

The ambitious integrationist agenda has been proceeding stealthily in other areas. While it has not been formerly renamed, the EU’s diplomatic network has been expanding. EU Foreign Policy Representative Javier Solana said in May last year “that even if the Constitution was rejected in France, I think it is suitable to keep on working on the establishment of a European External Action Service. This service will certainly come into existence sooner or later.”

This de facto implementation of the Constitution by stealth works to build momentum for a formal return of the treaty. At last month’s EU summit, marking a 12- month period of reflection on the “no” votes of France and Holland, EU leaders agreed to sign a new treaty by the end of 2008. This treaty is likely to contain many of the proposals in the rejected EU Constitution.

There is still some disagreement as to the form of the re-heated Constitution. Those member states that have already ratified want to keep the text almost exactly as it is. Others like France, Denmark and the Czech Republic want to cherry pick and come up with a new slimmed down treaty under a new name which will include many of the features of the original Constitution. And at the other end of the spectrum is the Dutch government which has gone against the grain and accepted the will of the people. The Netherlands is the only country to have described the existing text as “dead”. Unfortunately Holland is isolated.

The role of the UK in the debate about the future of the Constitution has been almost non-existent. The UK government is in denial and has got its head in the sand. It knows that if it holds a referendum, the verdict will be a resounding “no”. Meanwhile, several EU leaders talked about the need to put “pressure” on the countries resisting the Constitution.

The infamous Mr Juncker said: “It is absolutely possible that the EU will move forward without the British if they reject the Constitution.” An editorial in Handelsblatt, the German equivalent of the Financial Times, said: “The British will have to be confronted in the end with the alternative of approving the Constitution or leaving the EU. And there’s only very few people on the Eurosceptic island who want the latter.”

Oh really? Our government is looking for the coward’s way out. In April 2004 the Prime Minister confirmed that the British people would be offered a referendum on the new European Constitution. The pledge itself was a spectacular U-turn as calls for a plebiscite were gaining an unstoppable momentum. Indeed it was rumoured that Rupert Murdoch had warned Mr Blair he would not let his newspapers support Labour’s re-election unless a referendum on the Constitution was offered.

Furthermore, the Prime Minister insisted at the time that a referendum would go ahead, even if the voters of other EU countries rejected the Constitution. Rupert kept his side of the bargain, but Tony has no reason other than integrity to keep his. Now the UK government has indicated it plans to drop Mr Blair’s 2004 pledge to hold a referendum.

Last month, in an interview with the Financial Times, Europe Minister Geoff Hoon said: “Britain could accept an overhaul of European Union institutions without putting the changes to a referendum”. He went on to say that allowing a referendum on changes to EU treaties would depend on “how comprehensive and extensive they are”. But the Government’s suggestion that there will be no need for a referendum in Britain, because it contains only minor tweaks, is a fantasy.

In the past Europe was an issue that divided and embarrassed the Conservative Party. Now it’s New Labour’s turn. The process leading to a new text for the Constitution should be well under way by the time Mr Blair leaves Downing Street. Indeed, the Prime Minister might well appreciate the irony of locking Gordon Brown into a new treaty. It will be Blair’s baby, but Brown’s problem.

Our next general election should be about much more than schools and hospitals. Britain’s sovereignty is at stake. And although the Government wants to pull the wool over our eyes, we need an elevated debate on Europe. Not only will there be a row about the new treaty towards the end of 2008, the next European elections fall in May 2009. That could coincide with the next general election.

Before then, in December this year, the Government plans to give up Britain’s veto over the police and justice system. That will be a source of embarrassment for New Labour. Then at the start of next year, the EU Budget deal passes through parliament. You may recall that last December Tony Blair brokered a seven-year budget deal at the end of Britain’s EU presidency. Treasury officials claimed that Gordon Brown was dismayed at the outcome.
Britain is giving too much away. The Chancellor is now fighting a rearguard action to save money.

But when Gordon Brown finally takes over at Number 10, he will have a torrid time defending an unpopular return of the EU Constitution. A reheated meal can give you food poisoning but a reheated constitution will be fatal. Bon appetit.

Regards,

Brian Durrant
for The Daily Reckoning

In a letter to the FT Douglas Hurd argues that “David Cameron, with his colleagues, certainly understands that the tide of opinion in the European Union, including part of the European Commission, has swung in favour of liberal reform. (This has been clear to some of us for 15 years.) Like all compromises, his decision on the European People’s party has drawn fire from both ends of the argument. It must be read with William Hague’s recent policy speech. Together they are the most positive statements on the EU from our front bench since 1997.”
Hurd goes on to say that, “Gone are the unrealistic proposals to uproot this or that essential part of the structure. What is now said comes as a breath of fresh air to those of us who believe that a Conservative party firmly rooted in the EU is needed for these modern tasks which, if we are serious, we have to tackle as Europeans - energy, enlargement, completing the single market, climate change and a foreign policy based on partnership with the US.”
Comment: from Open Europe
Hurd argues that the EU has been swinging in favour of liberal reform for the last 15 years. Really? The rhetoric from Jose Barroso may be more market friendly, but the reality is that things have got worse. Since the start of 1990 the EU has passed 18,061 new directives, regulations and decisions. Since the Government started to measure the direct costs of such regulation in 1998, EU legislation has cost the UK economy a minimum of £37 billion. Over the last 15 years spending on the CAP has risen in real terms: up by more than a third, from €82 billion in 1990 to €108 billion in 2005 (which is why Oxfam keep complaining).

It’s true that CAP spending has fallen as a share of the budget, but only because other spending grew even faster: correspondingly the UK’s contribution to the EU has risen from £6.5 billion in 1990 to £10.5 billion a year now (even when measured in today’s prices). Over the last 15 years the EU has gained all kinds of new powers which British politicians on the left and right did not want it to have: from the Conservatives’ defeat on the working time directive to the Commission’s recently gained power to propose criminal laws which are passed by majority vote. Despite referendum defeats in Denmark, Ireland, France and Holland, the drive to ‘ever closer union’ shows no sign of stopping. Next March we will have the “Berlin declaration” and then a new treaty.

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.

FT letter