A comment on this blog has prompted me to argue against an EU wide referendum on the EU treaty, or anything else for that matter.
The EU treaty is called a treaty because it is an international agreement made between the member states, who are exercising their sovereign power.

The fact that EU treaties create a constitution of the EU and any debate about the ramifications following from the powers given to EU on our national constitution, are immaterial to the fact that calling for a referendum on a treaty from the body that is the recipient of the pooled powers, is both a waste of time and self defeating.

In the first place whether we are allowed a referendum is nothing to do with the European Union, a point confirmed more than once by the EU Propaganda Minister herself on her blog;

No doubt some readers will once again demand referenda but as I have said before that is a matter for each Member State.

Understanding that the EU is part of the decision making process when it comes to the treaties, but I would argue that they are overstepping their powers by interfering in these matters. And I would agree that the Propaganda Minister is being only legally correct when she makes her claim. As she is ignoring the interference emanating from the EU commission and the EU parliament. The EU Parliament for instance, was the first parliament to vote on and accept the EU constitution, just to get the propaganda ball rolling, they did this even though that parliament’s vote on the treaty has no relevance at all.

I recognise that that is a voice calling in the wilderness, because the EU Commission and the EU parliament are some of the main movers in the demands for more power to be invested in the EU, and the retention of the powers it already has. I know that the IGC of the heads of member states, is being conflated in the minds of many, with the Council of the European Union, and that the Council decided the details of the Lisbon treaty and mandated the IGC to agree those terms without change.

But in reality the EU itself has no legal power to force the member states to agree to anything relative to which powers they delegate to the EU. As those powers are delegated from the member state, it is a matter for internal debate and decision within the state.

So it is entirely a waste of time to build an EU wide pressure group in order to influence the EU on its constitution.

But worse than being a waste, it plays right into the hands of the federalists and helps them assuage their own desperation for a popular mandate. That is exactly what they need and all they will need to back their claim, that they have a popular mandate.

Because if the people can be persuaded to approach the EU that would be a tactic admission that we accept the EU as our government, that we accept that the EU has the right to speak for us to our own governments! we would be gifting the EU with its popular mandate.

That is why the EU Propaganda minister dismisses referenda within the nation state as being only a nationalist expression, but sees the possibility of an EU wide referenda having some benefit. The only benefit of an EU wide referendum or even individual state referenda all held at the same time, is to create a propaganda coup for the EU.

Now if you want a referendum in this country then I am behind you every step of the way.

Technorati Tags:
EU Commission, EU Ministry for Propaganda, EU Parliament, EU treaty, referendum
Add to: | Technorati | Digg | del.icio.us | Yahoo | BlinkList | Spurl | reddit | Furl |

Looks like Labour Movement for Europe trolls are out today.

This from the Independent

Sir: Marc Glendening is talking through his hat in when he mentions the “over-centralised structures of the EU” (Letters, 27 March). The EU can only legislate with the approval of the ministers from its member states in the Council and any legislation requires well over a two-thirds majority of their votes to be adopted - hardly a structure in which power is centralised.

The central administration itself (the Commission) has a smaller staff than Leeds City Council or the BBC. The commissioners are nominated by the member states.

The proposed constitutional treaty will not increase the areas with EU competence - the key political issues such as health, education, pensions and taxation will still be legislated on by national parliaments.

PAUL BLANCHARD

My letter to the Independent, with thanks for the stolen material Eureferendum I wonder if they will publish it?

Sir, I assume the Paul Blanchard who responded to Marc Glendening is the same Paul Blanchard who is also Labour Party councillor at the City of York Council and member of the Labour Movement for Europe. If so it is clear why he repeated the hoary old fiction concerning the size of the EU Commission Staff being smaller than Leeds City Council or the BBC, and inviting your readers to infer from that there is no over-centralised structures of the EU.

The very fact he mentions it indicates the centralization he is denying, in any case it is a specious argument there are many historical examples of very small numbers of people dominating large populations, not least the British Raj. When 300 million Indians were ruled by barely 1,500 British administrators of the Indian Civil Service, and perhaps 3,000 British officers in the Indian Army. Excluding British soldiers, there were probably no more than 20,000 Britons engaged in running the whole country – fewer than the number of permanent officials currently employ-ed by the Commission.

The fact is that those directly employed by the Commission are only the tip of a a very large the iceberg “Brussels” acts the centre of a network, linking thousands of other organisations throughout the Community, not least the civil services of all the member states. The preparation of much legislation and many of the technical reports is contracted out, or otherwise farmed out to outside agencies, ranging from paid contractors, universities and other academic institutes, think-tanks and even the growing legion of non-governmental organisations in the pay of the commission.

Mr Blanchard is also attempting to mislead when he writes that the EU can only legislate with the approval of the Council, it is the Commission who has the only right to instate legislation in the EU and QMV means that our ministers can and often are outvoted.

The EU Constitution in fact gives the EU sweeping new powers, not lease it allows the European Council new powers to change the treaty without recourse to national governments, it transforms the EU into an international actor in it own right, for the first time makes its laws and its constitution superior to states laws and constitutions. It extends QMV to 27 new policy areas, this means the loss of any national veto in theses areas, it makes Britain constitutionally committed at the Union level to the ultimate goal of a common defence. The Constitution gives the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, binding legal force. Etc.

Health, education, pensions and taxation might still be legislated by national parliaments but only under the overarching umbrella of the EU because the EU already influences all of these areas.

It would be helpful in any debate about the EU if those who are strong proponents for the project were to limit themselves to the truth instead of cloaking their intentions in a series of specious illogical and misinformed letters to the national press.

On this day when the Euro enthusiast are gathering to celebrate the 50th birthday of the European Project by patting themselves on the back for a job well done, whilst in the real world the real people of the European nation states have indicated in recent polls that they are not as enthused with the project as they are supposed to be. And in response to the silly 50 reasons to love the EU in the Independent this week, it occurred to me that now would be as good a time as any to post a few reasons why I oppose the EU.

1. It is undemocratic

http://www.teameurope.info/FSno1-whyundemocratic-FINAL.pdf

2. It has created a political elitist class which is increasingly insulating itself and its policies from public accountability.

3. It has removed the sovereignty of our Parliament in most areas of government power and has therefore reduced our national political debate to the few areas that are still within the remit of the people we elect, which is why the main political parties are so close on so many areas of public concern.

4. It has removed the sovereignty of British Citizens to elect and dismiss their own law makers, by passing so much power to the EU we the votes cannot choose between different policies because the political parties simply do not offer us the choice as they are bound by the EU.

5. Reduced consumer choice- with its bureaucratic mania for controlling everything it has removed choice by insisting that all products conform to it own rules. Instead of equal recognition of products to allow each state to sell into every other state the EU has defined what they may sell.

http://www.google.com/search?q=illegal+tomatoes+&hl=en&start=10&sa=N

6 Harmonisation: Reduces the available produce on the shelf- by listing only those products which may be sold and the cost of having a product enterd on the list is prohibitive. Thus we loose the richness of historic fruit and vegetable diversity and miss out on new products.

http://www.cen.eu/catweb/cwen.htm

7. Mass immigration: uncontrolled mass immigration has a detrimental effect on wages and increases the pressure on our housing transport hospitals etc.

8. REGIONALISATION: The regionalization of Britain has only taken the course it has because of EU influence trough its funding.

9. Take over of Higher education system:

SOCRATES, DELTA, REMTEX, TEMPUS and EUROCIS European Commission’s Human Capital and Mobility (HCM) programme, and funding from the Training and Mobility of Researchers (TMR) and NECTAR programmes CEMP (Creation of European Management Practice) The Jean Monnet Project CORDIS, EU-funded Academic Associations and Organisations

10. Propaganda: The EU using our money to promote its-self trying to convince us that the EU is a wonderful project to us when we do not have the choice in the first place

11. European Document Centres and high street shops in order to “promote and develop the idea of the EU as our nation state and study in the field of European Integration

12. No demos There does not exist a single group of people in respect of whom the EU could be a democracy there is not an EU wide political party, there is not an EU wide press.

13. No mandate: Even if there were or is a European demos, what is done by the Commission is not in response to any expressed or felt need of the citizens. In normal democratic politics you have occasional elections, during which time certain issues are publicly discussed. Whoever wins power has some justification for carrying out whatever programme they were proposing while trying to get elected.

14.Accounts: The EU’s accounts have not been signed off for several years by the EU s own accountants.

15. Lack of Transparency

16. ECJ partiality

The Court of Justice of the European Communities (ECJ) is not an independent court but owes a duty of loyalty to the EU Commission and has been used ion the past to extend the power of the EU beyond the agreed treaties.

17. CAP Common Agricultural Policy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Agricultural_Policy

18. CFP Common Fisheries Policy and the destruction of our fishing industry http://ec.europa.eu/fisheries/cfp_en.htm

19. “new approach” to technical harmonisation. I see the affect of this as totally ridiculous, My electricitian is about 55 years old has been to college to learn his trade and has kept himself up to date by studying the latest proposals yet he is forced to pay an inspector to check hi work for a period of six months so that he can continue in business, my previous electricitian decided he had enough and looked for another job.

http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2004/11/more-hidden-integration.html

20. EU Arrest Warrant; now we can be arrested in our own home by our own police at the request of a foreign court and extradited to that courts jurisdiction without any protection from our own government even for crimes which are not recognised in Britian.

21. The Euro, although we are not a member of the euro region there is an ongoing attempt to create the Euro as the currency of the whole EU, if we remain in the EU at some stage we will have to convert to the Euro.

22. The EU Constitution, Voted down by the French and Dutch yet still in the background many EU based moves to represent it, either in is its entirety or piecemeal so that we do not get the chance of referendum. The Constitution refounds the EU as an international actor in its own right with its Constitution superior to member states Constitutions and for the first time recognises in a treaty that EU Law is superior to state law. The Berlin Declaration acknowledges the intention to refund the Union and has set a deadline goal of achieving a renewed common foundation for the European Union before the 2009 elections to the European Parliament. For we know that Europe is our common future. If we do then It would be very nice to actually have a voice!

23. Its anti Christian values : There is something fundamentally wrong with an organisation purporting to be democratic, when the view of the EU Parliament is that there is no place for the basic values of millions of its citizens.

24. Socialism; Nothing wrong with socialism but it should be recognised as only one form of political thought to place it at the heart of the constitutional settlement denies other political thought.

25. The cost of membership: The E U will cost every man, woman and child in Britain £873 this year the combined direct and indirect costs in 2007 will amount to £100,000 a minute, or £52.4 billion. Britain has given nearly £200 billion to the EU since joining what was then the EEC in 1973. Even the European Commission has admitted that excessive regulation could be costing up to 12 per cent of GDP. Put it into perspective, just £1 billion will pay for 222,000 hip replacements, or 46,893 nurses, or 38,782 teachers, or 34,585 police officers.

26. ID Cards

27. EU Passports

28. Forced Citizenship of the EU

29. Trade Deficit Before joining the EU the UK had a trading surplus with other EU countries. Today we have a visible trading loss of £100,000 million. Between 1973 - 1993 EU trade registered a £70,000 million loss.

30. Directives: It took 1368 EU Directives to create the Single Market. One directive can cost Industry £1,000,000,000 (e.g. Waste Monitoring. 94/62 - official estimate!). Such EU law is uniquely, and savagely, enforced by huge new armies of UK bureaucrats. Costs and threats of criminal sanctions ruin many small to medium sized firms. For example, 400 abattoirs (half the industry total) only serving local areas, never exporting, were forced to close! In 1973 there were 343 Regulations, 143 Directives and 194 ‘Other’ EU laws. By 1996 these figures were 3070 Regulations, 2964 Directives and 8037 ‘Others’. They bypass UK Parliamentary control using Statutory Instruments and Ministerial Orders. UK Civil Servants, “translating” EU law, always make things far worse.

31. EU Law corpus Juris

32. it can’t last

http://eureferendum2.blogspot.com/2007/03/success-of-eu.html

33. It is attempting to create an armed force I do not believe such an anti democratic organisation should control military force.

34. Massive overregulation, of just about every area of life

35. There is a distinct feeling of alienation between the people and the political leaders.

36. Federalism:

37. The break up of Great Britian as a political entity and the destruction of Britian as our nation state.

38. Lies and misdirection.

39. Fundamental Rights, I do not want the EU to gift me the right to life or the right to freedom of speech etc. Which I already have, only to retain the right to remove it in the interest of the Union.

40. Life has got much worse since we joined the Union.

41. The working time directive: I do not want a Eurocrat in Brussels to dictate how many hours I choose to work.

42. Border control immigration, it is our nation state we pay the bills and we should decide who comes to live and work in our country.

43. Turning our back on our Commonwealth friends when Britian was in dire straits in the last two world wars it was people from our Commonwealth who chose to fight for us, we traded across the globe with these countries.

44. EU Embassies and diplomatic service: The EU is not a nation state it is not my nation state and I do not want it to represent me or my country abroad, I do not want to be forced to use an EU embassy and I certainly do not want to see one in London. There is no legal power for the EU to even set up this service it was one of the proposals in the Constitution which has not been ratified.

45. EU waste management:

46. Road Pricing the Galileo space programme:

47. Rapid Reaction Force: we are spending so much on preparation for this futuristic battlefield force that we have little left to correctly supply our troops for the actions they are being asked to undertake now.

48. Pushing the secular adgenda: Conflicting values, the right to religious freedoms and the right to abortion or gay marriage are contradictory principles. By choosing to promote the secular view the EU denies its own fundamental rights.

49: No perceived limits to the power of the EU: The EU continually extends its power, cooperation in one area is deemed to require cooperation in others the Monnet Method. So an open border policy will eventually lead cooperation in criminal law because we cannot prevent even know criminals from entering the country. This is calculated to eventually lead to the creation of one nation state with one central government.

50: Treason: The crime that dare not speak its name; out ministers swear allegiance to the British state not to the EU, after all we elect them and we pay them and they could not hold their positions of power without taking the oath of allegiance. They should therefore work only for the benefit of the British state and the British people. Instead they agree to proposals in the EU forum which do not benefit the British people and they agree to pass powers away from the British parliament, and allow those we have not elected and cannot dismiss to influence our nation state.

According to his Telegraph blog,a senior EU Commission official admitted to Daniel Hannan this week, that there are five countries where he and his colleagues are determined to avoid a referendum, I assume on the EU Constitution, they are Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Poland. Of course all five could and some most certain would vote against the Constitution, this would obviously create even further obstacles as they attempt to find a way round the democratic votes in France and Holland.

As it is they have been spending an inordinate amount of time and energy concocting various theories as to why their first attempt to force their Constitution failed, and then working out exactly how they are going to circumvent the democratic blockage and guard against any chance that the people might  vote the wrong way again. Whilst at the same time making sure that only those with a certain yes are allowed to proceed with the ratification process.

Now of course they are claiming that even though two countries have voted against and they stooped the process to prevent a domino effect in the rest of countries who might have voted no, thus denying us a voice, that we cannot be allowed to stand in the way of the democratic choice of the others. Of course in truth only 4 countries have allowed a referendum two vote in favour and two voted against. As it is their democracy argument stinks, the ratification of the constitution is based on the agreements made in the previous treaties which make it clear that each member Nation State must ratify before the Constitution can have legal authority. That means like it not, each member has a clear veto on treaty change, and it has absolutely nothing to do with any other member states decision, it is up to each state to decide for itself if it wishes to pass more power to the EU, if they do not they cannot be forced to do so by being compelled to accept a treaty change.   

Technorati Tags: eu-constitution, political-elites, better-of-out
Add to: | Technorati | Digg | del.icio.us | Yahoo | BlinkList | Spurl | reddit | Furl |

Well it’s taken a couple of years but finally the British government have had to cave into the EU Commissions demand that the British people must be subjected to Random Breath Tests.

Even though giving our police this power undermines one of our basic rights; that strange concept of the Presumption of innocence.

Back in 2004 when the EU Commision first announced its intention to force the British government to implement this proposal, The Home Office expressed opposition to the introduction of random breath tests for drivers, arguing that such measures are “inefficient” in catching drink driving offenders.

A Home Office spokesperson said: “The police are already quite adept at targeting drink drive suspects and the government would like forces to continue to use intelligence-based methods to catch offenders.”

Neither did the police feel they needed this power 24 may 2004

The Police Federation of England and Wales has warned against the introduction of random breath testing, arguing that officers already have sufficient powers to tackle drink driving.

Rod Dalley, vice chairman said: “We already have sufficient powers to request breath tests. The ability to carry out random breath tests would remove the need for police to justify their actions and may serve to further alienate the public. The answer lies in ensuring there are sufficient numbers of officers deployed to roads policing duties to enforce the legislation.”

An article by James Kirkhup in the Scotsman said;

THE government is facing a bureaucratic struggle to fight off a European Union proposal for British police to adopt Continental-style random breathalyzer tests of motorists to cut down on drink-driving.

The Home Office yesterday rejected as “inefficient” the introduction of random stop-and-search style policing, which is being recommended by the European Commission. Britain, Ireland and Denmark are the only EU countries where random checks are not legal.

Ad Hellemons, president of the European Traffic Police Network, warned that if the UK does not voluntarily follow the recommendation, the Commission will attempt to make the random-testing plan into a directive, giving it legal force over member states.

“We are aware that the UK is not happy about this, but at the end of the day we are talking about making our roads safer,”

And also suggested a reason for the Stirling defence of the British freedom to make its own laws.

With European Parliament elections and final negotiations for the EU constitution due next month, the government is keen to avoid the impression that Brussels is infringing on everyday British life, for fear of handing political ammunition to eurosceptic parties like the Conservatives and the UK Independence Party.

“We don’t need to be told by Brussels that we need to have random breath-testing,” said Michael Howard, the Conservative leader. “This is the sort of thing we will be fighting at next month’s elections.”

Labour also is wary of further antagonising motorists already angry at rising fuel prices and the widespread use of speed cameras.

But now with Tony Blair in his thankfully last days in power and almost certain to sign up to the new EU document to introduce the EU Constitution by the back door next month, such thoughts can be safely confined to the dustbin.

Now they have changes their tune as the Times story announcing the discussion paper says;

Ministers believe that giving the police the power to stop any driver, regardless of how they are driving, would be a powerful deterrent.

Research has shown that many drivers exceed the alcohol limit because they believe that they can still drive safely and they know that there is little chance of being caught. At present, the police can stop only those drivers who have committed a moving traffic offence or those who they suspect have exceeded the limit.

Not even a hint that the government have been forced into this climb down by the EU Commissions demands.

So the government did not want it- the police don’t need it- it undermines a basic human right- the presumption of innocence- but because the EU Commission demands it we are going to get it, so much for our democratic choice at an election.

When we can not longer elect those who make our laws and even those we do elect are forced into something against their will, we are living in an autocratic tyrannical oppressive state.

Further reading and background

EUOBSERVER reports 

EU parliament MEPs have reacted furiously to a UK parliament report which questions the right of the European Parliament to make laws on criminal and police matters due to the fact that most of its members are non-British.

Which is not quite the point made by the report but this slight myth is used by Andrew Duff to introduce a xenophobic line of attack on the “European Scrutiny Committee” Duff says the report is “fairly scandalous.”

“This challenges directly and explicitly the legitimacy of the European Parliament to legislate. It is an absurd idea that the parliament would have no right to legislate because it has ‘foreigners’ in it,”

The same line is used by Richard Corbett, UK Labour MEP, called upon like-minded pro-EU members of his party to “protest” against the report by writing to the chair of the House of Commons’ European Scrutiny Committee who is also a Labour member.

“If a matter is to be decided at EU level, then the European Parliament will be involved- and of course it contains non-Brits. Similarly the British Parliament contains non-Scots,”.

The Select Committee on European Scrutiny Forty-First Report; Actually did not mention foreigners or non-British they were quite specific- the problem is that European Parliament Members do not represent and are not answerable to the electorate of the UK.

In our view, the proposal for the use of the passerelle is of constitutional importance. Decisions on, for example, what constitutes a crime, what sanctions there should be for offences, procedural rights and other matters covered by Title VI of the EU Treaty concern national sovereignty. We share the Government’s concerns about the implications of the proposal for external competence and national security and about the need for safeguards. We note with alarm that, for example, the UK might not be able to make bi-lateral agreements with third countries for the extradition of terrorists.

50. Moreover, there is the question whether it would be acceptable for the European Parliament to have the right of co-decision on measures about police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters when the most of its Members do not represent and are not answerable to the electorate of the UK.

Passerelle clause Under this, the European Council would be able to agree to abolish all that remains subject to the national veto, decreeing that it be subject instead to qualified majority voting. Neither the House of Commons nor the British people would have any say in the matter.

But Mr Duff argues that if there is a problem in resisting change to QMV in fields where, under the protocol, we anyway have the right to opt-in or out of the decisions taken.

In other words he is suggesting that we would still have a veto for Britian. He is however ignoring the report which makes it clear that the right to opt-in must be made at the start of the negotiations and there is no possibility of opting out if we are not satisfied with the directions of the negotiations.

51. We have considered whether the “opt in”, described in paragraph 7 above, might provide a sufficient safeguard if the passerelle were used. We understand that the UK would not be bound by any measure on police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters unless it expressly opted into it. There could be cases where it appeared to be in the national interest to opt into a proposal soon after the opening of negotiations on it. Subsequently, however, amendments to the proposal might be agreed by QMV which radically changed the measure and were unacceptable to the Government. There is no provision for the UK to rescind an opt-in. So, once the Government had opted-in to a measure, the UK would be bound by it as it emerged from the negotiations.

This all about the proposal by The EU Commission to transfer criminal justice and policing into the first pillar of the EU’s treaties. This would abolish the national veto and would also greatly increase the powers of both the European Commission, European Court of Justice (ECJ) and allow the European Parliament to have a voice over the UK’s criminal justice system.

“The proposal that is being discussed would give the European Commission even more power than it would have gained under the rejected EU Constitution, and would also sweep away some of the safeguards contained in the Constitution such as restrictions to act only in a limited number of serious cross border fields – not the entire sphere of criminal justice as is proposed. The ECJ would become the highest court in the UK’s criminal law system and would begin to determine the substantive criminal law for EU nations.

As the EU legislates in particular areas it gains external competence over them. This means that it begins to represent member states in international negotiations on these issues. Which would mean the UK will lose its right to negotiate bilateral extradition treaties with foreign countries as well as deportation agreements. This could make it even harder for the UK to deport or gain custody of foreign suspects in the future.

In 1997 Tony Blair promised that he would not give up the veto on crime and justice. He said: “we have agreed better arrangements for co-operation on police matters, crime and drugs. However, such co-operation will remain intergovernmental and subject to unanimity” (Hansard, 18 June 1997).

In 2003 Peter Hain repeated the same promise: “Criminal procedures go the heart of our legal systems, and this is one area where we have got to keep unanimity” (European Convention, 3 April 2003).

The Report

And the Gangplank this is an alternative name used by the Select Committee for the description of the passerelle as a “gangplank” rather than as a “bridge” - the usual EU translation.

The term “gangplank” usually refers to a temporary bridge for getting on and off a ship, but in pirate legends, the plank would be used to force victims to walk into the sea. Corbett and Duff, said “I hope this is unfortunate drafting,” noting that a gangplank “is a thing you fall off to your demise – through suicide or murder. You will die after the fall.”

The president of the Commons’ EU Scrutiny Committee, however defended the word as “quite appropriate,” saying “once you go off the end of the passerelle, you give away the power to the commission…so it is like a gangplank more than a bridge. Once you plunge off it, it is difficult to get back onto.”

Our Health Service in Hock for many Years to come and for future generations to pay off. Anne Palmer 26.8.2006.

The Health Service WAS ours. We paid for it through our taxes and it remains (for now) free at the point of service. We pay for it in the same way we pay for our politicians to allegedly work for us, and they, on our behalf keep the National Health Service free at the point of delivery.

I am writing this to open the public’s eyes at the way EU law forces Member States to reorganise their welfare services, looking also at the affects of free movement and competition practices on health care. It tends to result in national welfare institutions being replaced by private providers. The process is not being discussed by the public because it is not being debated openly by our MP’s. What comes under “Welfare reform” is not being led by welfare reform at all. The major cause is that EU law as it stands authorises a great deal more interference in welfare than has been thought about. Our National Heath Service that developed here in the UK after the Second World War may be gone forever (if we do not fight for it to remain) and there may never be a public discussion about this but it may disappear without anyone realising it

Welfare is perhaps the last bastion of nationalism, but it is one nationalism that the vast majority of people will most definitely want to keep, it poses however, a problem for the European Union, for how can the Union, that is dedicated to the removal of national borders allow our welfare state to remain as it is when other member state’s welfare systems are not all free at the point of delivery? Are WE the odd one out, yet again?

Even now, although people are concerned at how many hospitals are closing and nurses and doctors are being made redundant, have no idea WHY this is happening, and even less understand perhaps why I am putting the first point of blame on to our involvement in the European Union and my second point of blame to the present Labour Government.

What happens to our Welfare system brings the EU right into our homes because there are very few people that get through life without at least one spell in hospital. I have only touched on the subject lightly because in everything else to do with the EU, it will eventually require our hospitals to be “liberalised”, “opened up” magic words, “open to competition” taken over in the same way that most of our great industries have been taken over.

There are two choices, one, just stand back and let it happen, or two, fight for your health service as those before you fought to get it put there for us all to use free at the point of delivery.

I can remember the day our National Health Service was born. Although it was the Atlee Government that created the National Health Service (NHS) based on the Beverage Report in 1942 Aneurin Bevan carried out the actual introduction of the Service for the launch July 5^th 1948. I never met the man although I spent one whole afternoon with Jenny Lee, his wife, in my mid 20’s when taking part in a fashion show. (Organised by the Local Labour group) She was a remarkable dynamic lady.

Before the introduction of the NHS, we as a family used to pay hospital ‘fee’s’ of one (old) penny a week, but at least we were able to have hospital treatment as long as we were ‘in the hospital fund’ club.

The NHS covers four separate (once) publicly funded systems, General Practitioners, Accident and Emergency, long term health care and Dentistry. Since 1948 we have all had the use of them and perhaps taken them for granted far more than we should have done.

There has always been Private Health care for those that could pay for it or prefer the privacy provided by private care. It is usually paid for through private insurance. NHS services on the other hand are “free at the point of delivery” paid for by our taxes and I understand the budget for 2006-7 is £96 billion. It employs over 1 million people and is reputed to be the largest employer in Europe if not the world, depending on who is the teller! We, the people, by way of our taxes, employ them all.

Things seemed to roll along fine until 1997, but the urge to join the euro by Prime Minister Blair started the changes I am writing about here. My attention was drawn to The Times (In 2003), which reported that if (and we may not have that option of “if” one day) we join the Euro, the European Central Bank had warned Britain it might have to give up its National Health Service. Even the Bolton Evening News, May 2003 reported that, “Britain would be forced to scrap the NHS if we joined the euro, so warns the ECB, saying free health care could be slashed to just emergency services”.

Also, “The ECB recommends jettisoning the NHS in favour of private health care, saying Britain’s aging population will send NHS costs soaring, and euro-zone rules would not allow Gordon Brown to borrow necessary funds to foot the bill”. Does Britain have an aging population more so than any other country?

But hold on, this is a Labour Government we are talking about and a Labour Government to boot, that brought the NHS into being, it was their pride and joy, yet we now have a Labour government that wants to end our Sterling currency by joining the euro, has signed up to an EU constitution and knowingly by their actions now, are destroying our NHS system. How can I say that? Because it is privatising our NHS “by the back door”. I have read two quite separate papers that refer to what they are doing as “Enron by the Thames”, and, “an Enron accounting system”.

An informative booklet on the “Services Directive” (A race to the Bottom) by Brian Denny, explains how EU rules attack public services, jobs, pay, pensions and collective bargaining rights”. Plain speaking indeed. “Following the exclusion of healthcare from the Services Directive, the EU Commission immediately announced plans for a new separate directive by the end of 2006 to open up health services to free market competition. Not surprisingly, the ECJ ruling have helped this process along by using internal market arguments first mooted in the Services directive.” If the EU does not get their way in one matter, they will get their way in another.

“Page 5”, “EU Health Spokesman Margaritis Schinas said that the ECJ ruling on patient mobility, ‘clearly states that there is scope for community action to achieve public health objectives’. He went on to claim that patent mobility was covered under Art 95 of EU Treaties covering internal market rules.

As already pointed out above, the ECB report from May 2003 called on Euro zone members to reform health services and although we are not in the Euro, we still have to abide by the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP). One way round the removal of the ability to “borrow” more money was to introduce Public Private Partnership (PPP) or, Private Financing Initiative (PFI) into the Health Sector and turning hospitals into Trusts. According to Brian Denny, these moves have already led to a cash crisis in the NHS and the loss of over 7000 jobs.

The EU also wants more power over healthcare, which does not surprise me at all. Alan Milburn once said though, “As long as there is a Labour Government, the NHS will be funded from general taxation and health care available according to need and not ability to pay”. I think he forgot to mention that the Health Service as we know it would be gone, that it would be slashed with hundreds of excellent nurses and Doctors abandoned, Hospitals closed, with not all medicines available to all.

Is this what all this is about? To come into line with the ECB? So that we can abandon sovereignty over our sterling currency and reserves or the authority to control our interest rates? Only the rich will be able to have peace of mind if they fall ill for they will be the only ones that will be able to afford to pay. The elderly, old and poor will no longer be cared for. Vote for Labour?

According to the World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3860 March 2006 (By Jack M Mintz and Michael Smart), “Incentives for Public Investment under Fiscal Rules” (page 10) “To produce health services, governments employ doctors and nurses and construct hospital buildings. The hospital buildings are obviously capitol inputs used in producing health services and should be amortized under capitol budgets and doctor and nurses salaries should be expensed. The health services, however, are arguably consumption goods to reduce pain and suffering even though an element of public capitol might be entailed if current health services improve the long-run productivity of workers (who later remit taxes to the government). Some judgment is needed to determine whether any health service expenditure should amortise under public accounts since a majority of health expenditures tend to be focussed at the end of a person’s life”.

(Page 12) “The Maastricht Treaty contains a provision requiring member states to avoid running “excessive” deficits, whether or not they have adopted the euro. A protocol to the treaty specifies in turn that members’ fiscal stance is to be judged by two criteria; whether the budget deficit is less than 3 percent of GDP, and whether the total government debt exceeds 60 percent of GDP. If the Council determines a deficit is excessive, there is a procedure to encourage its elimination. The Council may issue warnings and impose deposit requirements and, eventually, fines. The SGP corresponds to the provisions of the Maastricht excessive deficits procedure, but it clarifies the terms, introduces monitoring procedures, and it gives the Council greater teeth in the event of violations. Under the SGP, deficits may exceed the 3 percent level if the excess is “exceptional, temporary, and limited in size”. Some discretion is accorded to the Council in determining whether this provision should apply”

(Page 13)“The UK has also moved to accrual accounting for financial reporting. For budgetary purposes, the UK Government focuses on two main “flow” measures of the fiscal stance.

(i) adherence to the golden rule is measured by the current budget surplus, defined as difference between tax revenues and current public spending (including depreciation):

(ii) the government also reports public sector net borrowing (PSNB). Both measures are accrual-based concepts: the PSNB can be contrasted with the previous use of the Public Sector Net Cash Requirement (PSNCR), which was essentially the cash deficit.

“ In particular, proceeds from privatisation and other asset sales are excluded from the PSNB, but not the PSNCR. Both the current budget surplus and the PSNB are cyclically adjusted before the fiscal rules are applied”.

“These rules impact on public investment spending. The UK for example is WELL WITHIN the 60 percent gross debt limit specified in the Maastricht Treaty (its own 40 per cent net debt limit is surely more binding). Net borrowing in the UK is currently about 1,8 percent of GDP, and substantially less on cyclically adjusted bases. While an increase in investment there is planned, it may be that the UK Government’s reliance on largely off-budget Public Finance Initiatives means that the Maastricht deficit limit is unlikely ever to be more binding than the golden rule policy” End of quotes.

Although this paper is mainly about the NHS, and the mess we are in through PFI/PPP, the latter two have been used in many areas, the London underground for one major venture. Recorded in Hansard for the 24^th July 2006, Col 1387W A question was asked about PFI Contracts. The answer given was, “There are currently over 500 projects that have been signed and are now in operation. Around a further 200 projects have reached financial close, but are yet to become operational. The combined capitol value of all signed projects is over £48 billion. Information on PFI projects that have reached financial close may be found from the ‘PFI Signed Projects List’ on the Treasury’s public website”.

“At the time of the Budget around 80 projects were at the preferred bidder stage and around 155 had yet to appoint a preferred bidder. The estimated capitol value of these projects is around £26 billion”. End of Quote.

I am looking at PFI as, ‘on the never, never’. If I ran up hire purchase debts into the hundred thousands, it would not just take me thirty years to pay off, but it seems as if I might expect my children and grandchildren to continue paying off my debts long after I have left this earth. From all the businesses that I have found, this Country will ‘be in hock’ if not bankrupt, and what for eh? So that we can either eventually join the euro, and/or stay in the European Union and be governed by it forever? How can one Government, a Labour Government at that, that is supposed to be all for the people, run up so much debt and what on earth for? Labour has taken something very special from which each and every one of us at some time in our lives, have been glad the NHS is there for us, yet is prepared to see it trashed just to remain in what is, without doubt, about turning into a federal, political state and a totalitarian state at that. Many MPs we now know, (and can prove) knew that from before we joined the European Community.

My poor father, a very strong true Labour man, must be spinning in his grave. Mind you, he would not recognise these men of Labour as the Labour’ he once so admired.

George Monbiot woke up to what was going on in this field on 27^th June 2002 when he wrote, “PPPs are a Public Fraud”. He began his article with “Poor visibility corrupts; invisibility corrupts absolutely.” He wrote, (please remember this was written in 2002), “ As the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) points out, the government allows public bodies to reclaim the VAT on privately funded projects, but not on publicly backed schemes, thereby favouring private finance by 17.5 percent. National health Service trusts have to pay the Treasury a 6 per cent “capitol charge” on the buildings they own. Private builders have no such obligation. The Government gives local authorities an annual grant of 11.5 percent of the value of the Public Finance Initiative scheme they commission, but there is no corresponding sweetener for publicly funded projects. Private financiers are permitted to use “discount rates” way out of line with inflation. This false accounting masks the appalling value for money offered by private finance. As the British Medical Journal (BMJ) report shows, 39 per cent of the price of PFI hospitals is incurred by the extra cost of borrowing. Governments have a better credit rating than corporations, so they can borrow more cheaply. As interest is levied across the 25 or 30 years of the project, small differences in rates contribute vastly to the cost.”

He asks, “So why is the Government forcing public bodies to fleece the taxpayer? In 1997, it claimed that the purpose of the PFI was to reduce government borrowing. But PFI does not reduce borrowing: instead it defers and extends it.” One of the headlines used was, “The policy has the potential to bankrupt the UK”, and I believe that to be true. End of quotes.

How on earth did we get into this mess? Under funding of the NHS to begin with? In the mid 1990’s, under the Conservative Government of John Major, a number of hospitals effectively opted out of central NHS to become Trusts. Can anyone else remember the waste of money on new logos? At around the same time we started to see or hear of hospitals and medical centres being built using PFI. Which as we already know involves the building of public buildings by private companies, which are then “rented back” to the NH Trust at a higher long-term price which is only to be expected because the firms have to make a profit to stay in business. Under the NHS, the taxpayer owns the hospitals and paid the salaries. Where is our compensation for losing that asset? We are expected to pay far more now under PFI.

This disastrous PPP/PFI adventure has almost gone off the scale, under New Labour. To me, we are beginning to see ‘rationing’, we are being kept fit, we have to lose weight (might we not be treated if we are overweight?) We have to stay healthier so we are discouraged every which way from smoking. (Will we be refused treatment if we DO still smoke?) Our children may not be allowed the “Gob-stoppers” we once used to stuff our mouths with because the “We are watching what you eat” patrol are on the lookout, what the children eat at meal times. (Animal farm was but a comic compared to today’s lot)

In the “Health Unions Briefing for MPs”. July 2006, it becomes obvious the Unions are concerned, for they “recognise that across England (Scotland etc are devolved) NHS organisations are being forced to make cuts which affect patient services. Trusts have been told by the Government that they have to pay off their debts by the end of the year and are having to cut jobs and services in order to meet this target”. “Nearly one third of all trusts are in debt. There have been a growing number of compulsory redundancies in trusts across England. Although these have, largely, been dealt with through freezing posts and natural waste there are a whole range of measures taking place such as closure of departments and severe cuts in education and training, which will have a huge impact on standards of care and services to patients, both in the short and long term.”

Although there is a great deal more to this subject, I will say ‘finally’ in looking to Hansard on the last day before recess in the House of Commons where there is a mixture of questions and comments from different MPs that reveal what is happening (or not happening) in their area re Health care and in the hospitals. It is not only enlightening, but also frightening. It may well bring anger in the revealing. The closing of wards, beds and hospitals could be prevented if we came out of the European Union now.

We could build and pay up front for the hospitals we need if we did not have to obey EU laws or pay our alleged “Share” of the EU budget that is wasted, wasted, wasted. We could do what we liked with our own money; we most certainly would not have to be held back by the Stability and Growth Pact. We would become a sovereign State once again and our own politicians would have to do the job we pay them for from the day they are elected. The Union is still attempting to become the all-powerful state it wants to be, (It is stealthily and undemocratically working toward that end now) it must become one without the United Kingdom of Great Britain for we will indeed be “Better off out”. Anne Palmer.

Notes: Others quoted in the paper above. Jack Mintz is the Deloitte and Touch LLP Professor of Taxation. J L Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto and President and CEO of the CD Howe Institute. Michael Smart is Associate Professor, Dept of Economics at the University of Toronto. The paper was prepared as part of the World Bank’s Latin American Regional studies program.

Last day before recess,

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmhansrd/cm060725/debtext/60725-1069.htm I urge you to read it.

Works noted and read, from Dr Mica Panic (Fellow, Selwyn College Cambridge and Vice Chairman, UN Committee for development Policy. George Monbiot is the author of Captive State: The corporate takeover of Britain. He is also honorary Professor at the Department of Politics in Keele.

Bevan Brittan LLP. Works of Sir Peter Gershon. Works of Professor Allyson Pollock in Chair of Health and Policy and Health Services Research at UCL and Director of R & D at UCL Hospitals NHS Trust. Work of Michael Burnett, Lecturer-EIPA Maastricht. Government Research Papers on PFI

COM(2004) 327 (30.4.2004)

Margot Wallström informs us on her blog that “The Commission launched an internet discussion last Monday 27th on the future of Europe as part of our “Plan D” which of course stands for Dialogue, Debate and Democracy.” The EU commissioner for Communication / propaganda tells us that she wants to “encourage everyone who has a point of view on Europe and the European Union to take part in this debate. This is the chance to have your say about the future.

The results of this discussion will be added to the results of other debates taking place around Europe – in Member States, in town halls and so on. They will be discussed at the European Council in June.

How very thoughtful of the unelected EU Commission to consider the people, but it takes an American commenter to point out the obvious:

I am struck about how you and the EU go on and on about democracy and how great it is, yet each time the EU constitution is struck down, the EU has nothing to try and rewrite but to only keep putting it to a vote over and over again. My own country is starting to become filled with politicians that think like that. In fact our President behaves in such a fashion. If he thinks that he is right, then to hell with what us the people think. That Ms. Wallstrom is not how democracy or even a republic is suppose to work. If you are serious about dialogue, debate, and democracy, then you have to be willing to reevaluate the constitution, the role of the EU etc. in connection with what the people of Europe think on the issue. Now I know I really have no say in EU politics as it should be, but I could not let the hypocrisy of always talking about democracy yet doing the opposite go uncommented.

One comment from the UK was much more succinct:

I don’t want ‘to have my say’ - that is just an excercise in faux-democracy and sham ‘consultation’ - I want you to actually listen to me (and others like me).

The point being that the EU Commision in the absence of real democratic legality or accountability are trying to invent the idea that they have these things simply because they allow us the great unwashed, to write to them, big deal! We can write all we want, but they will just continue to ignore all comments that do not agree with the concept of a United States of Europe. As Greg Lance-Watkins says;

DIALOGUE; Dialogue is not just a matter of talking to a minority who it pays to listen!

DEBATE; The Minister clearly has no understanding of either the word Dialogue or Debate in the English language. It is not a matter of feeding bits of cake to the peasants and then totally ignoring them apart from occasionally sending in paid lakeys to make noises.

DEMOCRACY; from the unelected Commission so redollent of the USSR’s Politburo through to the EU Duma with its Massively Expensive Parasites appointed from Party lists and representing their own interests as salesmen for the entire corrupt scam that keeps them over paid with generous pensions,

Clearly there is not the vaguest understanding of the meaning of the word DEMOCRACY.

The entire corrupt edifice is kept up by greed, self interest, fear and corruption as it destroys so much of value to mankind - Liberty, Freedom, Rights, Justice, Independence, Sovereignty, Self Determination, Self Sufficiency, Initiative, Progress and self respect.

Saturday’s Mail reported that the EU Commission has threatened member states with legal action if they impose GM-free growing zones in their countries, saying they would violate trade rules by making the cultivation of GM crops “practically impossible”. The EU has also postponed legislation on GM/ conventional crop co-existence until 2008.

EUpolitix

If this isn’t “dictatorship, I don’t know what is. Do they now read of the problems re growing GM seeds? Where are our “rights” to eat GM free foods?Anne
GM-free Zones
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will make a statement on the powers of the EU Commission to overrule the wish of member states to declare GM-free zones or regions following the recent European Court decision. [20770]
Mr. Morley [holding answer 21 October 2005]: Under existing EU law, in order to declare a GM-free zone, that is a region where GM crops cannot be cultivated, a member state has to prove that there are special reasons 25 Oct 2005 : Column 200W to introduce national measures. Austria applied for a derogation from Directive 2001/18/EC to declare the region of Upper Austria a GM-free zone. However, the European Court of Justice ruled against this measure, as the Austrian Government failed to prove that the region of’ Upper Austria had a unique ecosystem which might justify a specific local risk assessment.
EU law, as agreed by EU member states, sets out procedures which allow an individual GM crop to be approved for cultivation throughout the whole of the EU only if a detailed assessment confirms that it does not pose an unacceptable risk to health or the environment. Under current EU law, as agreed by EU member states, the only legitimate grounds for narrowing the geographical scope of an approval to prevent cultivation in a defined zone are the production of clear evidence that the GM crop involved poses a particular risk to the specific area in question. In the Austrian case, the European Court of Justice found that Austria had not demonstrated the existence of any such risks to the region of Upper Austria.
************************************************************
“I’ve sprayed my Roundup beans twice this summer and I can see maize still growing in the fields….. You know how life is supposed to go full circle? I’m back to hand-hoeing maize out of soyabean fields…. I got it [RR maize] and I never bought it!”Illinois FarmerFarmers Weekly, August 27- September 2, 2004

From Anne Palmer

Europe wins the power to jail British citizens The Times

Criminal sanctions to enforce EU law http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/09/14/weulaw14.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/09/14/ixnewstop.html”>The Telegraph

These are the headlines that announce the ECJ decision yesterday that the EU commision will have the power to enforce regulations in environmentallaw. The Times makes the point in its leader “Legal trespass
The European Court has gravely undermined the sovereignty of EU states”
“For the first time in its 53-year existence, the European Court of Justice has given the Commission in Brussels the power to impose criminal sanctions. In a landmark ruling that is as ominous as it is deluded, the Luxembourg-based court yesterday overruled the governments of EU member states, removing from them the sole right to impose their own penalties on people or companies breaking the law, and giving the unelected EU Commission an unprecedented role in the administration of criminal justice.”

But for a more balanced and insightful view turn to Eureferendum which says that “reviewing various press comment, it is clear that all the reporters and editorial writers are having difficulty in understanding what, in fact, is an extremely complex issue, and are also demonstrating their basic lack of understanding of the nature of the European Union.”

“The Times headline is way off the mark with its: “Europe wins the power to jail British citizens”. The Guardian is closer to the mark with: “Brussels wins right to force EU countries to jail polluters”, as is The Telegraph, with “EU laws could be enforced by prison”.

Even these latter two headlines, however, do not actually convey what is happening, and has already happened. Within the treaties, there has always been a requirement that member states enforce community law. Much (in fact most) of the EU law transposed into UK law comes within the criminal code and thereby makes provision for custodial sentences.

The issue here, therefore, is something different. We are actually dealing with a dispute between the Council and the Commission, the former having decided that the power to determine minimum penalties for environmental law resides with it – the ministers of the member states acting collectively as a community institution.

In this, the Commission disagreed, arguing that, since the environment is wholly a community competence, the power to decide penalties resides not solely with the Council. It must fall within the institutional framework, where the nature of the penalties must, in the first instance, be proposed by the commission and then approved, under the co-decision procedure, jointly by the Council and the EU parliament.

What this boils down to, therefore, is a turf war, where the Commission has come head-to-head with the Council, arguing about the powers held by the different institution. In this instance – as so often – the ECJ has come down on the side of the Commission.

In so doing, the ECJ is probably entirely correct, as it acknowledges that reality of what the member states had conceded when they gave the commission the power in the first place – that they had turned it into a government with the right to propose our laws.

As to the end result, for the putative offender, nothing has changed – it is only of academic importance whether they are sent to jail as a result of a Council “framework decision” or a directive of the Council and European Parliament. The fact is that British people have, ever since we joined the Common Market, been subject to EU law and some have been sent to jail as a result, and will continue to be locked up for breaking it.

Our newspapers, therefore, have generated great heat, but little light.