EU Referendum

Front page of The Times today (print edition) is a story headed, "Random breath tests to hit drink-drivers".

Repeated online, it tells us that motorists face random breath testing under government plans to reduce the toll of deaths and serious injuries from drink driving. Ministers, we are told, believe that giving the police the power to stop any driver, regardless of how they are driving, would be a powerful deterrent.

But hang on a moment. In May 2004, when this last came up, we had a robust statement from the Home Office, which insisted that random tests are not an efficient way of catching drink-drivers. Then, it saw no need for them to be introduced. What has changed?

What we do know is that the casualty rate from drink-driving has gone up in recent years, although many commentators put that down to the reduction in routine traffic patrols, as enforcement authorities give vent to their obsession with speed and replace uniformed police with entrapment robots, aka speed cameras. Random testing, therefore, is not the issue – the number of tests, and the need for routine patrolling is.

But, those with longer memories may remember that there is another agenda at work here. Back in May 2004, it was the EU which was demanding random testing. And, while the Home Office was resisting the idea, we wrote:

...and here is the crunch - the president of Tispol, the European Traffic Police Network, said the (EU) commission would attempt to make its recommendation a directive if it is not followed.

Says Ad Hellemons, also Dutch Assistant Commissioner of Police, talking to BBC Radio Five Live: "This is the first time the European Commission has made such a recommendation. The vast majority of member states already carry out random breath tests. We can’t understand why governments would want to protect drink-drivers".

"The European Commission has made it clear that they expect this recommendation to be followed. If not they will try to make it a directive". There you have it – you will do as we "recommend", or we will make it compulsory.

So, what does our government do? It leaves it a few years and then, out of the blue, it pops up with a proposal that just happens to bring it into line with the commission's demand. Coincidence? I think not.

But enough time has elapsed, however, for most people to have forgotten the original EU input, so it is seen as a UK initiative and the government can maintain the pretence that it is still in charge. Any EU involvement can be denied.

That is now the way our government works.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EU, road safety

It is too early yet to focus the blame on anyone in particular but, if there are any officials with brains and a sense of self-preservation in the EU commission's transport directorate, they will be looking very closely at the latest figures for road deaths in the UK.

These have been released by the Department for Transport and indicate that, in the 12 months to September last year, these deaths increased to 3,210, compared with 3,177 in the same period a year earlier. Much of the rise was concentrated in the summer months between July and September, when 840 people died on the roads, compared with 818 in the corresponding period in 2005 - up three percent. During that time, the number of fatal accidents rose by five per cent, from 745 to 780 crashes.

At least one media report notes that this increase has occurred "despite the proliferation of speed cameras", although some might argue that the increase has occurred because of the proliferation of speed cameras.

It is Kevin Delaney, former chief of the Metropolitan Police traffic division and now head of road safety at the IAM Motoring Trust who is sounding the alarm, declaring that, "Any figures that show an increase against a downward trend ought to be ringing alarm bells in Whitehall, in local authorities and in police headquarters."

Typical of his kind though, he does not seem to have appreciated that the European Union has, since 1991, gained competence over road safety and has recently started flexing its muscles in this policy area.

Why the figure should be of such great interest to DG Energy and Transport is that the UK is the "safe man of Europe" with historically the lowest fatality rate of the EU 15, standing at 6.1 deaths per 100,000 population in 2001, compared with 13.8 in France and a horrendous 21.0 in Portugal.

However, it is also the UK which has bought in most heavily to the "Speed kills" message, the government focusing most of its road safety effort on this single factor.

The rot started in 1991 when the then Conservative government launched its £1 million "Road Signs" TV advertising campaign in the October. The advertisements used "travelling" road signs to illustrate the different survival rates of being hit at 20/30/40 mph, promoting the slogan: "Kill Your Speed. Not a Child".

This progressed to a £2.3m TV campaign spend in September 1992, £1.5m in April 1993 and another £1.5m in September 1993, followed by a further £1.5m in April 1994 and £1.2m in September 1994. It was in that last September campaign that the advertisements carried the new slogan that has become so familiar: "Speed Kills. Kill Your Speed".

The spending continued, backing up the new slogan, with £2.5m allocated in 1995, and nearly £3m in 1996. The slogan transmuted into: "At times we all drive a bit too fast ... Kill Your Speed" and in 1966, for the first time a kill your speed "hand symbol" was designed and used in television advertisements and publicity literature.

With a change of government in 1997, spending increased to £3.5m for that year, but the "Kill your speed" theme continued. Currently, the spend is £2.1m, with the campaign focusing on counteracting "the widespread public perception that smaller increases in speed will not have the same repercussions as larger ones."

But the new government did not confine itself to mere advertising. Imbued with the "Speed kills" message, in December 1999 it announced the formation of what were to be called "camera partnerships" where local authorities, the police and the courts banded together in their areas, to run speed cameras and collect the fines, the bulk of which revenue they were allowed to keep. Eight trial areas were announced which began on 1 April 2000. The trials soon became permanent and now there are (as of April 2006) thirty eight camera partnerships in England and Wales covering forty-one police force areas out of a total of forty-three.

In 2004 - the latest year for which Home Office figures are available - 2.1 million motorists were booked for speeding. Drivers forked out £114.5million in fines last year, with a £60 ticket issued every 15 seconds. The number of cameras, from a mere handful in 1999, has grown to over 60,000, earning on average £36,000 each year.

The results have been all too obvious. From an annual level of 4,753 in 1991, deaths had dropped by over 1200 annually in 1999, to 3,564. But, in 2000, the decline started slackening off to 3,580. In 2001, it increased to 3,598 and in 2002, the figure was 3,581, still higher than the level in 2000. By 2003, it had only reached 3508 and the figure stood at 3,221 in 2004.

While some will blame the effect of speed cameras, there are obviously complex effects at play, not least the fact that as robotic speed enforcement has increased, there has been, according to the RAC, an 11 percent reduction in traffic officers between 1996 and 2004. Other estimates suggest cuts of up to a fifth in some forces between 1999 and 2004.

Furthermore, there has developed a kind of motoring "underclass" of two million drivers who evade camera fines by driving unregistered and uninsured vehicles.

Then, others – such as campaigner Paul Smith, founder of Safe Speed – argue that the emphasis on speed and an over-reliance on cameras for enforcement is making our drivers worse. Speed cameras and "speed kills" policy is badly affecting driver skills and driver attitudes, he says. "Drivers are so concerned about getting a speeding ticket that they are less likely to concentrate on the road ahead."

With opposition to speed cameras quite clearly growing, the EU has thus walked into a situation where, progressively, it is taking over a road safety policy that is not only highly unpopular but also – if the present trend continues – as failure. But rather than the government being seen as turning a success story into failure, as the EU increases its profile on road safety, it will undoubtedly attract some – and then an increasing amount – of opprobrium.

This is something we pointed up in April last year, when the EU commission had signalled its intention to take a much greater role in road safety.

But what signals in turn the inevitable failure of the commission - which has set as its target the reduction of read deaths across the EU in the ten years to 2010 – is an evaluation of the variations in road death rates across the UK.

In Glasgow, for instance, deaths have increased but the toll is in the number of elderly people knocked down and killed. This has almost doubled in a year, with Glasgow City Council reporting 11 pedestrians over 60 dying as a result of road traffic accidents in 2006. The year before, the total was six. The elderly deaths helped to push the overall death toll from road accidents in the city up to 18 pedestrians from 13 in 2005.

In Mid Devon, there is also a doubling of road deaths, with 11 people dying. The police report the single most frequent problem involved drivers or motorcyclists losing control while negotiating bends.

North Yorkshire, however, reported road deaths down by a fifth and, in this county, the success is put down to "an increasingly successful campaign" to drive down the number of fatalities after a concerning rise in deaths, especially among bike riders. Road deaths fall from 85 in 2005 to 68, while fatalities among motorcyclists have been reduced by 38 per cent – 13 died last year, compared with 21 in the previous 12 months.

Shropshire also bucked the rising trend, with 23 people dying in the year, compared to an average of 27 deaths per year between 1994-8. But the police were not abler to offer any specific reason for the fall.

The point here is that the actual causations of deaths throughout the UK are likely to differ significantly from area to area, so control strategies will also have to be different. Even in the UK, away from the "Speed kills" mantra, there is no "one-size-fits-all" quick-fix answer to road safety. For the 27 member states of the EU, the picture is even more varied, making road safety even less amenable to centralised EU treatment.

For the commission, therefore, the UK experience should serve as an early warning of what happens if its gets it wrong. Not, of course, that it will.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EU, road safety

You could say the column is about Euro-trash today. What continues to amaze is that, after the total shambles of EU environmental policy to date, anyone can possibly think that the EU is "good for the environment".

Then "think" – as in "not" - is the operative word. One does not think about the European Union, the "environment" and especially "global warming". They are all part of an increasingly complex belief system. To stay on board, you just keep taking the mantras.

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Labels: environment, EU

Speaking today to an audience of 150 EU officials who met to discuss European defence policies at a conference hosted by the German Foreign Ministry, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told them:

How do NATO-EU relations stand? Let me answer that by means of a little anecdote. A few weeks ago, one of my staff told me he had been invited to a conference on "frozen conflicts". And then he added with a smile: "Of course it's about the Caucasus, not about NATO-EU relations!"

It would undoubtedly be going too far to describe NATO-EU relations as a "frozen conflict". At least the logic of a European Security and Defence Policy is not in dispute today. The ESDP has meanwhile become an inseparable part of European integration.

Er… "the European Security and Defence Policy has … become an inseparable part of European integration."

Right.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: defence, EU

It's back again – that "God" question. Angela Merkel, we are told, has renewed criticism that the EU constitution does not explicitly refer to Europe's Christian roots, with a reference to God or Christianity.

This is according to an interview today, published in the German news weekly Focus. She talks with German cardinal Karl Lehmann, telling him that she "…would have liked to have seen a clearer declaration on the Christian roots (of Europe) … No one doubts that they significantly shape our life, our society."

You really do have to admire the tenacity of these people – if nothing else. Back in early 2004 when this blog was but a mere pup, God and the constitution was on the agenda then.

At the time, we though that this was primarily a ploy to exclude Turkey from the EU, or make it feel unwelcome – in the hope that this Muslim country would be dissuaded from joining.

The probably remains the case today, although Merkel has the sense to dress it up as an expression for her concern for the survival of Christianity. "I wonder, can we maintain the formative aspects of Christianity for day-to-day politics if the political sphere does not stand by them?" she ruminates.

Politics and religion, of course, is a dangerous mix but, when an idea is floated in the European Union, it does seen that you simply cannot say no. Like a recalcitrant child refusing to eat its breakfast being re-presented with the same meal again and again, the people of Europe, it seems, are to have God thrust into their lives – and a Christian God at that - whether they like it or not.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: constitution, EU, God, Turkey

On a bitterly cold and windy day, some 500 demonstrators formed a human chain around the Berlaymont, the main office of the EU commission in Brussels.

This is according to AP which tells us that the demonstrators were calling on "European Union foreign ministers" to take urgent action to prevent further bloodshed in Darfur.

This is typical AP and many other media outlets use the same terminology. But they are not "European Union foreign ministers". They are the foreign ministers of the EU member states – more than a semantic difference. In theory at least, they are supposed to be representing the member state interests.

Anyhow, why the demonstrators chose the commission building, heaven only knows, as the ministers meet in the Justus Lipsus building, which is a good ten-minute trot away.

But that did not stop Belgian Senator Alain Destexhe, with Belgian politicians and members of the EU parliament joining the protest, calling for the foreign ministers, meeting as the General Affairs Council on Monday, to take concrete measures to force Sudanese and rebel forces to adhere to a cease-fire.

"We want tougher action by the EU and by the United Nations," Destexhe said. "Darfur is the major tragedy ... We think the EU is not doing enough." But what does Destexhe and his fellow travellers think the EU could do? To misquote Stalin, how many divisions has Solana?

The best the demonstrators can hope for is yet another round of
grand but futile statements, denouncing whatever it is needs denouncing this time. But, when it comes to action, neither the EU nor the member states are going to do anything that has any chance of proving decisive. But then, it was always going to be that way. Perhaps we should get the Boy King back in to cuddle some more babies.

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Labels: Darfur, EU

On Monday the foreign ministers of the EU member states will meet to discuss various items, foremost of which will be a call from Italy's foreign minister for all EU members to push for a worldwide moratorium on the death penalty.

This is at the behest of prime minister Prodi, who made such a song and dance about the 30 December execution of Saddam Hussein. Foreign minister Massimo D'Alema will urge EU countries at a to agree on a common strategy to help stop executions around the world.

At the same meeting, we are told the ministers will express strong concern about the "intolerable" situation in Darfur, and denounce air strikes on civilians by Sudanese government.

It is now estimated that at least 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million driven from their homes during the four-year-old conflict in Sudan’s remote western regions, although the EU has refused to accept the United States view that this is genocide.

Strangely, therefore, the EU is putting itself in a position where it is calling for an end to the killing of genocidal maniacs but it refusing to call for an end of the genocide in Africa. As always, it is nice to know that it has it priorities right. And our views on its action have not changed.

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Labels: death penalty, EU, Saddam Hussein

Here we go again. After writing innumerable pieces saying that the European Union is "dead man walking", up it pops with another little jab at the member states' systems, sufficient to demonstrate that the "walking" bit is definitely right, and the Union is still alive and kicking.

We are talking here about vehicle tax and it was in April last year that we recorded EU commission action against Cyprus to purge it of the deadly sin of national discrimination, where it was charging higher taxes on imported second-hand cars than it was those bought new on the island.

Now Poland has also attracted the ire of the Community, with a report yesterday that the ECJ has ruled a Polish second-hand car tax illegal. This is exactly the same issue which confronted Cyprus, where the Polish government levied a higher tax on second-hand cars imported from other EU countries than on vehicles registered at home.

And, as with Cyprus, the Poles thought they had a good reason for their tax. It was intended as a mechanism to curb soaring imports of cheap second-hand cars from Western Europe, which were harming domestic sales of new vehicles.

However, this is not the end of the game, as the commission has launched infringement proceedings against Hungary, Denmark, Cyprus and Finland, saying their car taxes were incompatible with EU rules. EU newcomer Romania may also be added to the list.

Gradually – and it is exceedingly gradual – member states are being reminded that they lost their tax autonomy in certain key areas when they signed up to the EU.

And, to cement this lesson into place, EU finance ministers are to discuss possible harmonisation of car tax rules in May. With a proposed directive already on the table, and car taxation rules already under discussion, this begins to look like a done deal.

It is certainly one to watch.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EU, Poland, taxation

An obscure German politician, of whom only a handful of people in the UK can have heard, is hardly going to set the world on fire when he tells us that democracy is in danger because of the direction in which the European Union is developing.

However, he is Roman Herzog, former judge and German president between 1994 and 1999, and he says it in the newspaper Welt am Sonntag today, where he writes, "EU policies suffer to an alarming degree from a lack of democracy and a de facto suspension of the separation of powers."

What is more, Herzog has a co-author, the director of the Centre for European Policy (CEP) in Freiburg, who goes by the name of Lueder Gerken. And among their criticisms is that the German parliament was not involved in European Union legislation as required by the German constitution.

They also say the European Union is undergoing "creeping centralization" and acquiring further powers, "often without due justification". The EU constitution comes in for criticism as well, as reinforcing the centralising tendency.

Merkel apart, I suspect there are a large number of German politicians who agree with Herzog. And when enough start saying the same things, we may start seeing cracks appearing in the edifice.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: constitution, EU

First, our political classes impose a Treaty which has profound implications on all of us, for generations to come. Amongst other things, it creates a right of "freedom of establishment" which permits the citizen of any member state freely to set up residence in another state. This is the "Europe without borders".

For sure, we get a referendum, but that was in 1975 – two years after our masters decided we should join the then EEC. That means that no one currently under the age of 50 got a vote, and there was never another, not even when the membership of nine – as it was when we joined - increased to 25 and then, on 1st January, to 27.

Thus it is that we are compelled to permit entry to the citizens of 26 other member states. The number that has taken advantage of this must be well into the millions by now. Perforce, it includes a goodly number of criminals who have upped sticks to pastures new, and fresh victims. And, in the absence of a system to ensure otherwise, and without compulsion and sanctions, there is no way the police can identify these people, or get access to their criminal records.

Thus it is that a judge, in desperation calls for an EU criminal records system.

This was Judge Stephen Robbins, who made the call after "serious difficulties" had been experienced in getting accurate information on the previous crimes of foreign offenders, saying that it was a "matter of pubic concern" that the courts in England were having these problems.

Trying to check on the previous convictions of two Lithuanians convicted of gun-running had shown how "very difficult it was to glean details, let alone precise details" from their home country, Robbins said. Despite all the efforts that had been made, it had not been possible to find out details of the criminal careers of the Lithuanians.

Nor had the police had not been able to determine whether a 10-year sentence that one of the men had received had been imposed for rape. Apart from confirming that he and his co-defendant had been in trouble before, a prosecution office in Lithuania had been able to provide nothing more than a useless list of penal codes, some of which were outdated.

The judge, who jailed three men at Southwark Crown Court in London last week for a total of 32 years, has deferred a decision on whether they should be allowed to remain in Britain amid concerns over "double jeopardy" issues.

Orestas Bubliauskas, 34, from Chigwell, Essex, and Andrius Gurskas, 26, of no fixed address, were each sentenced to 11 years, while Darius Stankunas, 34, who lived in Sheffield, was sentenced to 10 years.

They used a car fuel tank to smuggle an "assassin's armoury" of revolvers, silencers and ammunition from Lithuania, an EU member since May 2004. The Russian Baikal pistols, 20 rounds of ammunition and a silencer were then sold to gangs in Britain for as little as £1,500.

So it is that, in order to protect British citizens and to ensure that justice is done, the call goes out for a better system – and EU system. How logical that is and how unreasonable it would be to oppose it. And the EU commission would be delighted to implement a system. In the fullness of time, member state governments will agree to one.

What we are seeing, therefore, is a system of integration which is incomplete and throws up all sorts of anomalies and inconsistencies – which can only be resolved by more integration. And through this means, step-by-step, as the problems are resolved, the political classes will get their full political integration, which they could not have been able to achieve in one hit.

That is called engrenage. Translated literally, it means "gearing". A more practical definition is "salami slicing". And we're looking at another example of it.

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Labels: crime, EU, immigration

It is turning out to be a little more than mere intrusion on private grief, as we first suggested. The new leader of the EPP, Frenchman Joseph Daul – who gave the Tory Boy Blog so much heartache – may turn out to be something more than a protectionist Europhile.

According to a story in The Financial Times - carefully, if lovingly planted by UKIP - the man may be a crook as well.

It is certainly and indisputably the case that the new leader of the EU parliament's biggest political group is under investigation for misuse of public funds in France – part of an inquiry into the diversion of €16m (£10.6m) of agricultural money in the 1990s that has also ensnared three former agriculture ministers.

Daul was head of the National Breeding Confederation, the beef producers' union, between 1993 and 1998 and was placed under investigation in 2004 for allegedly diverting money to finance the farmers' union, the FNSEA, and to pay his own staff. He is not accused of benefiting personally but of "complicity and concealment of the abuse of public funds".

Investigating magistrate Henri Pons, a key player in the Clearstream affair, France's latest political and financial scandal, is handling the case in Paris. Nicolas Jacquet, the head of the French grain producers' union, who first complained about the diversion of his members' money in 2000, said Mr Daul and his six co-accused had used every legal avenue to avoid a trial. However, he thought a trial would be delayed until after the French presidential election in May. MEPs could lift Mr Daul's immunity from prosecution if he were charged.

This is very reminiscent of the case of Jacques "Wheel" Barrot, the EU transport commissioner. Mr Barrot, another French crook from Chirac's UMP. In another story broken by UKIP, he failed to tell his boss José Manuel Barroso that he had been convicted of fraud in a party funding scandal, this one claiming as his excuse that fact that he had been pardoned by his pal Chirac.

One hesitates to declare that all French politicians are crooks, but it would be nice to have an example of one who was not. It would also be nice to think that the Tory MEPs – of which Daniel Hannan is one - now had enough sense to get out of the EPP pronto.

It is too late, of course, for the Boy as the publicity to come on this issue cannot but help remind people of his failure to honour the one promise he made of any consequence during his leadership campaign. He is about to learn the hard way that taking the easy way out in politics is never, in fact, the easy option.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: David Cameron, EPP, EU

It has been a constant refrain of this blog that we need a public debate on the role of our armed forces, with my colleague setting the tone by suggesting (nay, asserting) that we as a nation no longer have the stomach to be a military power and should disband our forces.

Not wishing this to be true (but accepting that it might) I had hoped that a grown-up Conservative opposition would lead such a debate and that the issues would be properly aired – even if I might have been less than satisfied with the outcome.

But, instead of a debate, we have one of the Boy King's loathsome "commissions" and for a shadow defence secretary Liam Fox, both of which has ensured that the issues have not been intelligently discussed – not least it seems because Fox seems to have no feeling for or understanding of defence issues.

But, in politics as in nature, vacuums are unstable things that are prone to be filled. In the absence of any sentient contribution from the Boy and his lacklustre chums, the gap is being filled by none other than our own prime minister (for the time being) Tony Blair who today spoke to the subject in Plymouth. There, at one of Britain's premier naval bases (for the time being) he opened precisely the debate we have been calling for.

According to the BBC website , Blair tells us that Britain must decide now whether it wants to be a major defence power in the future. Needless to say, he defends his own policy of intervention in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan but he also wants a debate on whether the UK should continue to send troops to trouble spots after he quits.

This is a bit rich coming as it does the day after the US announced it was sending more than 20,000 extra troops to Iraq and rumours abound that the UK is poised to withdraw over 3,000 troops from southern Iraq.

But what is fascinating is the sea-change in Blair's outlook. At the early stages of his prime ministerial career, he saw Britain's influence in the world in terms of membership of the European Union. To that effect – with enthusiastic support of his then defence minister Geoff Hoon – he was prepared to submerge the British military in the European defence identity.

Now, however, he is arguing that if Britain wants a leading presence on the world stage, it means continuing to send troops into dangerous places far away - with (and largely without) the involvement of the EU. In a interview with a local television programme, he declared, "There is a global terrorism that we face … I think it's right for Britain, alongside our allies, to be in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it is a big decision to decide to be in that game still."

The crucial issue for the Eurosceptic community is that the allies with whom we are working are not the European Union. They are Nato, the United States, countries like Pakistan – with whom we share the vital task of defeating the Taliban – and Anglospheric countries like Canada and Australia.

In short, the best way for the UK to maintain its semi-detached relationship with the core EU countries such as France and Germany – and ward off encroaching political integration - is to remain immersed in fighting the "war on terror", from which the EU powers have largely opted out.

This being the case, it can be no surprise that the most strident critics of the Iraq war are the Europhile Lib-Dems, supported in the Tory ranks by such arch Europhiles as Ken Clarke. Likewise, with what are clearly emergent Europhile tendencies, it is entirely in character for the Boy King to go soft on the war and to support a policy of rapid disengagement. Equally, the Tory hierarchy are not opposed in principle to greater military "co-operation" with the EU.

The trouble is that there is not only a political divide between the European and the US-led approach, but a growing schism in military philosophies – a divide between conventional "warfighting" and counterinsurgency operations.

Between the two, the Army – in particular – sees the wizz-bang, shoot-em-up warfighting, with its tanks, artillery and other toys as "proper" soldiering. It hates counter-insurgency and treats it as an aberration, hence its reluctance to gear up for it and to develop appropriate and effective tactics. It wants to get it over and done with so that it can get back to its traditional role of breaking things and killing people – preferably "real" soldiers who have the decency to use green (or sand) painted toys and wear uniforms.

Perversely, it is the "soft power" European Union which offers the military the best prospect of equipping and maintaining a modern "warfighting" army, in its grandiose plans for the European Rapid Reaction Force (ERRF). Because the ERRF is a theoretical construct, unhampered by having to be structured and equipped to deal with a real enemy in a known theatre, military planners can indulge in their flights of fancy.

Actively supported by the major equipment manufacturers, who are salivating at the thought of major European programmes, they are focusing on the high-tech end of warfare, developing things like Future Rapid Effects System (FRES). These have no relationship to the conditions in real-life theatres where there are actual wars going on. But they are comfortingly expensive and complicated, and will provide for many industrial jobs and shareholder profits.

Although fighting an insurgency, requires often fairly straightforward (and cheap) equipment - £250,000 for an RG-31 or equivalent as opposed to £8-10 million for a single FRES medium-weight wheeled armoured vehicle – the Army is not really interested in the quantity and suitability of its kit. It will happily discard that which does not fit with its own image of what its role should be, in favour of less capable equipment which accords with that image.

Thus, the debate is not actually about whether we should fight the war on terror but whether we should continue so doing or pull out in order to pursue the more acceptable - to some - programme of European defence integration. But, because the dreaded "E-word" is never mentioned, we have a wholly distorted and unreal debate, with the real issues being avoided and the parties indulging in proxy arguments.

On the one side, we have Europhile Liberal Democrat peer Lord Garden (illustrated), a former assistant chief of defence staff, who agrees that the UK should pay much more of its national income towards defence. He is then supported by Air Chief Marshall Sir Michael Graydon (retd), who also says that "We mustn't fall into the trap of becoming a peace-keeping militia." He declares that, "An ability to conduct full-scale military operations is the foundation for successful peace-making and peace-keeping."

Both of them – representative of their two factions – are thus opposed to deeper involvement in Iraq but for entirely different reasons. Nevertheless, they come together with a common objective which makes them temporary allies.

What they need to understand though is that, since the Korean War in the 1950s, it is the conventional shooting war which has been the aberration. From Aden to Iraq via Malaysia, counter-insurgency has been the norm. Therefore, if we are to have a place in the councils of the world - which really mean anything - then we are going to have to ensure, whether they like it or not, that our armed forces are properly equipped and structured to deal with what is also called asymmetric warfare. And that, coincidentally, is the best way to break the grip of the EU - by developing a world view that does not accord with that of the "little Europeans".

More specifically, with current defence expenditure, we have the finance to equip our armed forces for conventional warfighting or for counter-insurgency, but not both. Clearly, the Europhiles would prefer the former - as that takes us in the direction of the EU. Also, the hierarchies of the armed forces desperately want to keep a warfighting capability and, forced to make a choice, would dispense with their counter-insurgeny roles. (As for the Tories, they do not seem even to be in the debate as they seem largely unaware of what is going on.)

Whatever the merit of retaining a significant conventional warfighting role, it has to be said that the urgent need for the here and now is to improve our counter-insurgency capability. And, by happy coincidence, promoting the development of that capability is the best way of scuppering the ERRF.

From the Eurosceptic stance, therefore, Blair is suddenly the ally - as are those who support the continuation of the war in Iraq. The Lib-Dims (the Conservatives) and the military – each for their different reasons – are the opposition. But, with the real issues ill-defined, the real opposition is ignorance. That is where we are going to have to focus, bringing it home to people that there is a real world out there. The EU is not part of it and, if we wish to be part of the real world, we cannot be part of the EU.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: defence, EU, FRES

National Review has the full low-down but I prefer this version, carefully crafted to have Chrysler veteran chief economist Van Jolissaint "appearing" to attack "quasi-hysterical Europeans" for overexaggerating the risks of global warming.

But DaimlerChrysler shifted into damage-control gear after Jolissaint had been quoted by the BBC as saying that, since he started spending more time at the company's headquarters in Stuttgart, he had been shocked by European attitudes towards global warming. He described environmentalists as having "Chicken Little" attitudes. Jolissaint was also said to have described the Stern Review as based on "dubious economics".

Thank goodness National Review has cleared it up. Jolissant didn't say those dreadful things – honest guv! His reference to "quasi-hysterical Europeans" was simply an example of a view that "some people might have". He specifically said, "not me, of course".

Jolissaint's non-statement, however, represents a profound truth. While the Americans are engaged in a number of real wars, their commitment to the global warming hysteria is in inverse proportion to their commitment to fighting terrorism. The Europeans, on the other hand, are obsessed with their pretend war against climate change. Fighting global terrorism comes way down their list.

Perhaps, if they focused a little more on reality, they would have a little less time to worry about the sky falling in. Could we convince them that terrorists (terror-warmers?) are the real cause of global warming... like in Kuwait? And wasn't the world going to end then?

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Labels: climate change, EU

The Londoner’s Diary in today's Evening Standard has a delightful story of a minor though undoubtedly expensive mishap in Brussels and other, minor, capitals of the European Union. (That includes London, in case you are wondering, as well as Edinburgh and Cardiff.)

It seems that the official EU pocket and A4 desk diaries “distributed to workers throughout the EU” have been found to have a bit of a slip-up. Apparently the capitals of the two new members, Romania and Bulgaria, have been exchanged. Terrific. They don’t even sound the same.

A particularly delightful aspect of the story is that nobody noticed this, until the erratum messages went round all those workers (though not peasants, apparently) with various stickers to be placed in the rather hefty diaries with the right addresses.

It seems nobody carries round or consults those blue diaries with gold lettering and, no doubt, gold stars. Derek Scott, director of the London office of the European Parliament is quoted as explaining:

It’s not helped by all that Cyrillic print. I don’t use the diary because I contact people by e-mail.

The words brewery and p*ss-up spring to mind.

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Labels: EU

The commentators over on the Tory Boy Blog are tearing each other apart over the appointment of a rabid protectionist Frenchman (is there any other sort?) as president of the EPP – the EU parliament political group to which Daniel Hannan and the rest of the Tory MEPs belong.

If it wasn't so funny, it would be tragic. But do they need to ask why Tory peers are joining UKIP?

EU Serf has more.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EPP, EU, Tories

I was talking to a power supply engineer the other day, and asked him whether it was worth getting a back-up generator to protect against the possibility of power cuts. The answer was a most emphatic "yes", and he is by no means the only one who has given that answer.

But what is just as worrying is that the likelihood of anything intelligent being done about the problem has just receded. According to a Eurobarometer poll released yesterday, only 20 percent of those polled throughout the EU are in favour of nuclear energy, 80 percent back solar energy and 71 percent are in favour of wind energy. Which just goes to prove that the majority can be wrong (and most often is).

But with that level of hostility towards nuclear, and those sort of percentages in favour of renewables, the chances of any politicians (apart from the French, who don't give a damn) making the "tough decision" and going hard for nuclear are extremely slight.

The poll itself has been published as a curtain-raiser to the publication of the EU's strategic energy review, copies of which have already been leaked. But first sight indicates that it is not going to become a runaway best seller.

In fact, a study of the document simply affirms that the EU is not in control and the key decisions – as always – are going to have to be made by member states. And they, it would appear, can be as bad as the EU when it comes to making the right decisions.

That generator is looking more and more like an essential as days pass.

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Labels: energy, EU, wind

According to The Sun a London man has died after two ambulance crews could not be sent to his aid - because they were on EU-enforced lunch breaks.

The man collapsed in a betting shop, five minutes from his local ambulance station but the two teams there were on their break so a paramedic was sent in a car from the more distant Enfield station. When he arrived, he realised that the 73-year-old man – as yet unnamed – was having a heart attack. He called for an ambulance but, by the time it arrived, the man was dead.

On the face of it, this is another of those dreadful EU stories – the potential effect of which The Sun warned about last December.

But, it seems, other ambulance services have opted out of the Working Time Regulations, on the basis of an exclusion for where their duties "inevitably conflict" with the provisions of the Regulations.

Then one finds that the public sector union Unison argues that the duties of its members working within the police service, ambulance service and fire service do not conflict with the Regulations. So this begins to look more like union idiocy than the EU.

But then you read two detailed comments from ambulance workers, here and here, the perspective changes again. The problem then seems to have a great deal to do with the combination of a "penny pinching" new working contract in the NHS called "Agenda for Change" and the bureaucratic inflexibility of the system.

What started out as a quickie "shock! horror! probe!" story about the EU thus gets bogged down in all sorts of complications. The one thing you can say with certainty though is that the death of this man was not the result - directly at least - of "EU-enforced lunch breaks".

But I do wish we could be like the MSM. We could then ignore all the complicated details and go for the quick, easy kill – heedless of the fact that the story is wrong.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EU, NHS, woking time directive

The Times tells us that a superstore tycoon and avowed Eurosceptic has defended his decision to hire more than 30 workers from Poland.

Bruce Robertson, who owns Trago Mills and is a member of the UK Independence Party member, employs the workers at his complex near Newton Abbot in Devon.

He said: "I have no alternative than to employ foreign workers to keep our business going. Increasing legislation by our own Parliament and the EU has provided a mass of red tape for employers."

Some of that legislation was the EU's metric law, which made it an offence to sell – amongst other things – Brussels sprouts by the pound. Bruce's response was to set up a vegetable stall selling – amongst other things – Brussels sprouts by the pound, with a counter to record the number of offences committed. And what fun we had, with not a Trading Standards Officer to be seen.

But, given the quality of staff he was then reduced to "hiring", it is no wonder he is now happier with Poles. They, at least, will have no problem with metric.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: EU, metric, Poland, UKIP

According to a mediafax report, Romania's finance ministry paid the country's first monthly contribution of 254.82 million lei (EUR1=RON3.3560) to the European Union's budget, finance minister Sebastian Vladescu said Wednesday.

Vladescu said Romania, which is EU’s newest member state along Bulgaria, is to receive a RON89.8 million aid from the E.U. in January. In 2007, Romania is to contribute some EUR1.1 billion to the E.U. budget, while the commission allotted the country up to EUR1.4 billion in 2007 funds.

The only trouble is that "someone" does not include this writer.

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Labels: EU, Romania

What is it with David Cameron? Is he a kind of Rip van Winkle? Has he been asleep for years, if not decades?

Every time he comes up with a policy, those of us who have been paying attention sigh with weariness: been there, done that. The latest idea? Conservatives will ensure that food labelling will tell people that food is grown and produced in this country and locally.

Does the man not know that food labelling is an EU competence and has been for years? As we speak, a multi-annual plan for consolidating EU food labelling regulations is being rolled out. No Conservative or any other government can do anything about it. Most of it does not even go through Parliament, being EU Regulations rather than Directives.

Has the man forgotten or, come to think of it, did he ever know about the Little Red Tractor label that was supposed to signify “Assured Food Standards” but was slyly marketed by the NFU as an assurance that the food was British grown and British produced until told that it was illegal in the EU to discriminate in this way? The truth is that no food producer from any country whatsoever wanted to apply for the Little Red Tractor label and, after several relaunches, it died a peaceful death, rather like the tractor production industry in this country.

The Boy-King’s speech to the Oxford Farming Conference is full of shibboleths that were trendy a year or so ago and waffle. What it does not have is hard information. No amount of waffle about local production, the Slow Food Movement or the French not losing their link with food production (a debatable proposition) can hide the fact that the man either knows nothing or has chosen to ignore the following interesting facts: agriculture, food production (actually quite successful in this country), health and safety, labelling, environment, veterinary rules, are all EU competences.

There is no mention of the CAP, of the unrolling food labelling consolidation, of endless veterinary rules, of the meat hygiene directives, of the fact that according to the Treaty of Rome we are not allowed to discriminate against any other EU member state. I could go on but shall not. Read the whole speech and marvel at the man’s fatuity and ignorance even if “he was brought up in the country”.

Actually, given his much-boasted upbringing he ought to know that farmers in this country make up one per cent of the population (and around two per cent of rural population). A goodish number of them export their produce and are not likely to want to play protectionist games. And an even bigger number vote Labour, have always done so and will always do so. Why, therefore, should a man who does not think it worth his while to address the CBI, that is the wealth-producers of this country, go off to blather at this annual conference is anybody’s guess.

What a good thing I abandoned my resolution not to attack the Boy-King and his miserable party.

COMMENT THREAD

Labels: David Cameron, EU, food policy