REFERENDUM: MANDY GETS WINDY
A new EU Constitution should not be put to the people, EU Trade
Commissioner Peter Mandelson has insisted.
He told
E!Sharp magazine
"Anything that crosses the threshold of requiring a referendum will
immediately run into difficulties... We have to come to terms with the fact that getting any constitutional
treaty past a referendum in our member states will be an uphill struggle."
Yet Mandy was gung-ho that the British people would back the EU Constitution in January 2005.
(Irish news archive TCM, 26.1.05).That was before the resounding Dutch and French 'No' votes, though.
It has been said that New Labour only supports democratic referendums if they are calculated to give the desired result.
As a MP, Mandy backed people being given a choice on
Welsh devolution and an elected assembly in the
North-East. He even called for a referendum on
Proportional Representation.
When trumpeting his democratic credentials at Charter 88's
Make Votes Count lecture (28.6.00), he even admitted that devolution outside England was "a radical constitutional innovation"... "the key measures were endorsed by referendum, to ensure the widest and most enduring support for the changes."
However after the weight of concerned public opinion made Blair offer a referendum on the EU Constitution in 2004, Mandy joined forces with MPs Alan Milburn and Stephen Byers to whinge:
"...there is nothing to be gained by giving ground to these people.... defeat in the referendum would be disastrous for Labour"
(Guardian, 27.4.04).
At least he got the last bit right!
Implementing the Constitution by stealth
TORIES' BLIND SPOT OVER ENGLISH VOTES
A Daily Mail website
article on 2.7.06 reported that the Tories launched a new campaign to prevent Scottish MPs voting on legislation that applies only to England and Wales.
Shadow Trade and Industry Secretary Alan Duncan said that it was 'absolutely right' to stop Scottish MPs voting on issues that did not affect their constituents - noting that the former "are not in any way accountable for the effects their actions have in England".
Duncan has yet to twig that his party's support for EU membership means that our laws across the UK are determined by European Commissioners and a European Court that "are not in any way accountable". Perversely, they are happy to have MEPs of at least 25 nationalities voting on our laws.
Putting aside the case for 'English devolution', the Tory approach is 'penny wise, Euro foolish' as it ignores the fact that most of our laws are 'Made in Europe'.
If senior Tories indulge in petty party-tribalism at the expense of the bigger picture, they have only themselves to blame if they lack voter credibility.
EU legal order
MORE TORY INCONSISTENCY
On 15.5.06, many Tory MPs backed a largely symbolic Bill over the
Disapplication of European Communities Act 1972 (No 2).
However, the Daily Telegraph, 8.6.06, reported that the Tories had dropped
their commitment to pull Britain out of the EU Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) that has decimated our fishing industry. Apparently, David Cameron had just been warned by "colleagues and experts" that
CFP withdrawal would have been unachievable without provoking a legal crisis
within the EU.
The paper observed that Cameron was "trying to tone down his party's
hostility to the EU while retaining a strong euro-sceptic edge".
On 7.6.06, Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague told an OpenEurope
conference that with the "right priorities", the EU could open up freedom and
opportunity for our citizens...". Apparently, the Tories would like to see EU
members finding their own level of integration and "Britain has the opportunity
to drive a new agenda for the future of Europe".
There is nothing new about the 'new agenda', as the Tories (at the highest level)
have long been talking up 'reform' while accepting greater integration - either
through swallowing new Treaties or by refusing to pull out of a 'European Union'
deepened by New Labour.
On 25.4.06, David Cameron announced that anyone who advocated EU withdrawal
would not serve on his front bench.
There was one clear promise in Cameron's leadership campaign - the early removal of his MEPs from the federalist EPP-ED group. As-yet
unfulfilled, the situation is being
watched with interest. It allegedly threatens to split his party, but
the party has long been a broad church and hardly united on the issue. In
any case it's a distraction from a far more important issue.
THE BIGGER ISSUE
If he ever becomes PM, Cameron will find it difficult to deliver against
Hague's insistance that EU integration had gone far enough, and that there
would be no Treaty changes transfering more competences to the EU without
a referendum.
Because a past Tory government gave the European Court (ECJ) free
rein to interpret Treaty obligations - it has come up with innovative means of
extending the EU's powers through the back door.
Taxation is one area where sovereignty has been compromised - also where an 'internal' (EU-wide)
policy has been agreed, the EU must have an 'external' (foreign) policy to go with it (ref: ECJ, Case 22/70).
As power has been transferred in virtually every other area, and our veto discarded,
European integration would not stop - the ECJ has ruled that accepting this goal is
a binding commitment of membership. (remember the "Ever closer union" in the Maastricht Treaty
that Hague supported?).
If the Tories want to be taken seriously over 'consistency' or 'intellectual renewal',
they must start by taking due responsibility for the current mess and stop trying to
kid themselves and the public.
Cameron's dilemma...
Renegotiation - can it be done?
Why we don't need a new Bill of Rights
INVESTING IN DEMOCRACY?
NO, PRIME MINISTER
The Labour Party has launched a
consultation
on state funding of political parties. It appears to be
aimed at members of the public as well as the party.
Their document, The future of party funding, notes that
the Labour Party believes that political parties play an
essential role in sustaining our political institutions, without which
we cannot have a healthy, participatory democracy.
It feels that the new institutions being created at local, regional
and European levels 'need relationships with politicians' and 'there has
to be investment at all these levels' to ensure healthy democracy.
Just who are they trying to kid? Unelected regional government
continues in defiance of public rejection, and planning powers have
been taken away from local councils. Regionalisation of Fire, Police
and Ambulance services speeds ahead, regardless of well-voiced concerns
over the potential cost and
loss of life.
THE DEMOCRATIC DEFICIT
The promised referendum on the EU Constitution has not materialised,
and the government is introducing parts of the latter by
stealth.
The Labour Government is also under fire over the
Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill
which set out to let government ministers rule by diktat without
consulting elected MPs.
The document admits that, over the past three years, the main parties
(Lab/Con/LibDem) have already
taken around £20 million of our hard-earned money. At the highest
level, all of them dogmatically support membership of the EU.
Unaccountable European institutions not only make over half of our laws,
but can actually over-rule a democratically-elected government.
Perversely, the Government has increased
funding
for the same EU institutions despite rising job losses of health services
workers at home. Public service funding after 2007 will come under pressure.
Party funding already exists indirectly - if someone leaves, say, a
£300,000+house to their children, the children must pay inheritance tax.
However leaving the same house to the governing political party does not
give that party any tax liability.
The law requires trade unionists to freely decide to pay any political levy.
Why should taxpayers not receive the same courtesy and protection?
HAVE YOUR SAY...
You may send your thoughts on state funding for political parties to
the Labour NEC, 39 Victoria St, London SW1H 0HA by 31 July.
There is also a national website on the subject; a
consultation
has been launched under onetime senior civil servant and
European Commission employee, Sir Hayden Phillips.
The response deadline is also 31 July.
Footnote: Tory
policy
again continues to baffle - on 31.3.06, Party Chairman
Francis Maude
called for an 'extension of state funding'. This in spite
of a report he mentions ('Clean Politics') by his colleague, Andrew Tyrie MP, that noted:
"the public strongly supports parties being financed by their own fundraising
rather than being supported by the taxpayer".
POWER TO THE PEOPLE?
WELL, NOT QUITE...
In March, a study known as
the Power Inquiry
released a report on public disillusionment with politics,
much to the excitement of The Independent.
Although it made several very interesting observations, the document,
Power to the People, was constrained by a block on considering
whether Britain should be a member of the EU. This is of far more
strategic importance than whether Parliament should sit for a longer term
(e.g.) - contrast this with a
BBC study in 2002.
The report (second version, May 2006) did reproduce some damning
comments,
"...whatever we might say, we know that the idea of
democratic Europe is not one that we can sustain"
(Tony Wright MP, Chair of Public Administration Select Committee).
"Supranational bodies and processes... such as the EU have gained
extra powers at the expense of nationally and locally elected
representatives..."
Although the report fudged the issue of EU powers by talking of
greater 'scrutiny', the website concluded:
"It is clear that there is a huge appetite across the country
for democratic power to be returned to the people."
How it can be done
HOME OFFICE HYPOCRISY
In March 2006, the Home Office launched two high-profile advertising campaigns.
One concerned
forced marriages,
the other concerned statutory rape.
That the Home Office is indulging in two campaigns to indicate the drastic
consequences of compulsion seems rather hypocritical, as it wants to compel us
to have EU-inspired smart/ID cards through the back door.
At the highest level, the Government is implementing the European Constitution
piecemeal without the 'consent' implicit in the referendum commitment.
Given that the Constitution would allow the EU-state to take away our
'human rights' makes it doubly wrong - just read their campaign Press Releases.
Another area where 'consent' has not been given is regional government
(at least in the English regions outside London - and in the case of
the North-East, it
continues in defiance of voters' heavy rejection).
Does 'No' really mean no, Messrs Blair, Clarke and Prescott?
More EU connections
Footnote: In an
article for the Sunday Telegraph, 11.6.06,
'This is a betrayal of Asian women', Ross Clark notes that the
Home Office has decided not to legislate against forced marriages -
despite its press release describing this as 'a clear abuse of human rights'.