The so-called agreement announced yesterday (19/3/18) proves just one thing. The Tory government has yet again kicked the can down the road on the Brexit negotiations. They should be dealing with the difficult issues first, not last, to avoid wasting time making agreements that can never be implemented. Many people realised months ago that this Tory Government is incapable of negotiating a fair Brexit deal and are spinning it out just to remain in power for a few months more. They know that admission of failure is likely to trigger an immediate general election, especially as they will lose the support of the DUP over the Irish border.
The big issues the Tories are not able to deal with and have therefore postponed:
1. The Irish border: there is no way that you can have a soft border with the Irish Republic unless Northern Ireland effectively remains part of the Single Market and the Customs Union. Green Leaves recognised this from the start and have been calling for an Irish re-unification referendum since before the 2016 EU referendum. The only other alternative is to move the customs border to between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a situation totally unacceptable to the DUP and Ulster Unionists. A referendum vote to re-unite with the republic is the only way that that Unionist veto can be over-ruled.
2. Fishing: under Article 125 of the agreement, the UK will not be taking back control of our fisheries when we leave the EU – something which the Government had previously promised. I predict every MP representing fishing communities will agree that we must have absolute control of our waters and fish from the end of March 2019 and anything less is totally unacceptable. As this must be put to a vote, there is no way that this will pass in the House of Commons.
3. The EU is suggesting that the EU Court of Justice should decide on any impasse between the UK and the EU. For instance if there was no agreement on Northern Ireland, the EU’s draft protocol for a ‘fallback’ option to resolve the Irish border would take precedence, which would see Northern Ireland remain in the EU Customs Union and aligned with much of the Single Market after Brexit. Again unacceptable to the DUP.
4. But the big issue: not even mentioned by the UK Tory negotiating team, is the massive trade deficit that the UK has with the EU and the unsustainability of this ever expanding trade to the world's environment. The UK must develop self sufficiency after Brexit; learn to live within its means if it is not to become bankrupt, both financially and environmentally. Financially its trade is in a worse situation than the likes of Greece, which has been crippled by austerity. Environmentally, we are still learning just what a horrific disaster 100 years of plastics have been and we know that drastic action to vastly reduce our consumption is needed now. Not in three years, ten years or fifty years. We should be campaigning for Brexit be the catalyst for action on the environment NOW!
Showing posts with label Europe. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Europe. Show all posts
Tuesday 20 March 2018
Tuesday 21 June 2016
BBC Lying on UK News
THE BBC ARE LYING TO THE BRITISH PEOPLE ON THEIR NEWS BROADCASTS IN SUPPORT OF THE REMAIN CAMPAIGN. The BBC News at 10 last night (Monday 20th June 2016) gave the "Remain" propaganda message that imports from the rest of the EU were roughly the same as UK exports to the rest of the EU. THIS IS A BLATANT LIE!
They also gave the Remain statistic that only 6% of EU exports came to the UK. That is also a blatant lie.
THE BBC ARE LYING TO YOU IN THEIR "NEWS" BROADCASTS AND I WILL PROVE IT.
The balance of payments deficit with the rest of the EU in 2014 was £104 billion. In 2015 it was £106 billion. The balance of payments is made up of the balance of trade and then other payments out to the EU, such as dividends from assets sold to them by Tory privatisations etc., such as the railways, now mainly owned by other EU governments.
So in 2015, the total trade in goods and services showed exports from the UK to the EU (from the UK Office of National statistics) of £223 billion. Imports from the rest of the EU were £291 billion. So the net trade deficit (not including dividends etc) with the EU in 2015 was £68 billion (in 2014 it was £59 billion). That is over 30% more than the UK exports to the EU. Not the same as the BBC reported. 30% more.
According to Wikipedia, the last figures we have for EU exports to the rest of the world were $2259 billion (£1526 billion). But of those, £280 billion were UK exports to the rest of the world, so the remaining EU exported just £1246 billion. If we add the exports to the UK of £291 billion, that makes total remaining EU exports to UK and the rest of the world of £1537 billion.
The UK proportion (£291bn) of the total (£1537 bn) is 19% of all the exports from the rest of the EU, not 6% as reported by the BBC. The BBC are just regurgitating the Remain propaganda without checking their facts.
And remember this is a percentage of a much larger figure than the percentage of UK exports that go to the EU, so comparing these percentages as the BBC did is misleading.
The fact is that the rest of the EU exports far more to the UK than the UK exports to the rest of the EU. Import Tariffs would be much more disadvantageous to the rest of the EU than to the UK.
By leaving the EU we could focus on boosting UK trade worldwide, including the EU, without any fear (falsely engineered by the BBC and their Remain friends) of punitive tariffs from the EU. The same threat was made to Norway when it had a referendum in 1994 and proved just as false.
WE WILL BE SAFER AND STRONGER IF WE LEAVE THE EU AND PUT THE UK FIRST!
PLEASE PASS ON THIS MESSAGE TO YOUR FRIENDS AND COMPLAIN TO THE BBC ABOUT THEIR BLATANTLY BIASED REPORTING. http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/
They also gave the Remain statistic that only 6% of EU exports came to the UK. That is also a blatant lie.
THE BBC ARE LYING TO YOU IN THEIR "NEWS" BROADCASTS AND I WILL PROVE IT.
The balance of payments deficit with the rest of the EU in 2014 was £104 billion. In 2015 it was £106 billion. The balance of payments is made up of the balance of trade and then other payments out to the EU, such as dividends from assets sold to them by Tory privatisations etc., such as the railways, now mainly owned by other EU governments.
So in 2015, the total trade in goods and services showed exports from the UK to the EU (from the UK Office of National statistics) of £223 billion. Imports from the rest of the EU were £291 billion. So the net trade deficit (not including dividends etc) with the EU in 2015 was £68 billion (in 2014 it was £59 billion). That is over 30% more than the UK exports to the EU. Not the same as the BBC reported. 30% more.
According to Wikipedia, the last figures we have for EU exports to the rest of the world were $2259 billion (£1526 billion). But of those, £280 billion were UK exports to the rest of the world, so the remaining EU exported just £1246 billion. If we add the exports to the UK of £291 billion, that makes total remaining EU exports to UK and the rest of the world of £1537 billion.
The UK proportion (£291bn) of the total (£1537 bn) is 19% of all the exports from the rest of the EU, not 6% as reported by the BBC. The BBC are just regurgitating the Remain propaganda without checking their facts.
And remember this is a percentage of a much larger figure than the percentage of UK exports that go to the EU, so comparing these percentages as the BBC did is misleading.
The fact is that the rest of the EU exports far more to the UK than the UK exports to the rest of the EU. Import Tariffs would be much more disadvantageous to the rest of the EU than to the UK.
By leaving the EU we could focus on boosting UK trade worldwide, including the EU, without any fear (falsely engineered by the BBC and their Remain friends) of punitive tariffs from the EU. The same threat was made to Norway when it had a referendum in 1994 and proved just as false.
WE WILL BE SAFER AND STRONGER IF WE LEAVE THE EU AND PUT THE UK FIRST!
PLEASE PASS ON THIS MESSAGE TO YOUR FRIENDS AND COMPLAIN TO THE BBC ABOUT THEIR BLATANTLY BIASED REPORTING. http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/
Saturday 23 April 2016
Here is the Evidence that the UK WILL be better off after BREXIT
Over the last few weeks we have heard a cacophony of vested interests telling us that it was not in THEIR best interests for the UK to leave the EU. From the US President and US treasury, the IMF, the Bank of England and George Osbourne's minions, there has been an orchestrated message of dire warnings about perceived threats to the personal wealth of every man, woman and child in the UK.
But all of these warnings have been predicated on one hypothesis: that if the UK leave the EU, the UK's trade will reduce. This is not a fact, it is a forecast, a prediction, basically a guess. And lo and behold, what is the outcome of this hypothetical scenario? Why we all get poorer.
A reasonable hypothesis you might think, but is it? It is based on us losing, as we are repeated told, an export market of 500 million people. That, of course, is a lie. Nearly 66 million of that 500 million are in the UK market, so we are actually talking about are exports to a market of 430 million people. What the hypothetical models do not take account of is the dynamic between the UK market of 66 million and the other 430 million in the EU.
So let us look at that dynamic: something the EU does not do, because it is only concerned with the whole market, not with the individual members, and least of all individual people like you and me. That is why the EU forces poverty and unemployment on vast swathes of the EU, from Greece to Portugal, young people in particular are suffering from this emphasis on the EU market as a whole, not the wealth of individual countries.
When we joined the EU, in the days of Ted Heath and Harold Wilson, the most important UK national statistic was the Balance of Payments. The difference between what we, the UK, as a nation export in goods and services and what we import. Indeed for many of the post war years, as we struggled to pay off the biggest debts of any nation after WW2 (any nation that actually paid its debts that is), we had import controls, because as a nation, we decided that we could not afford imports.
You rarely hear of the balance of payments these days. Yes, it was mentioned by the Bank of England as the Financial Policy Committee (29/3/16) dutifully trotted out its carefully worded support for REMAIN and the interests of international bankers. But only as a footnote: it merely said it had "concerns" about the UK's balance of payments deficit(1).
Yes, deficit. Because ever since we joined the Common Market, we have had a deficit with the rest of the EU. And as the EU has got bigger and bigger, so too has our deficit with the rest of the EU.
So here's the rub. Here is the evidence that yes, we would be better off if we LEAVE the EU.
In the last three years alone (2013-2015), according to the UK Office of National Statistics(2) , we have had a balance of payments deficit with the rest of the world of £267 billion. Within that, our trade deficit with the rest of the EU has been a staggering £303 billion. Yes, we actually had a modest SURPLUS of trade with the rest of the world outside the EU, of £36 billion.
And that deficit with the rest of the EU is going up, from £89 billion in 2013 to £107 billion in 2015. If we REMAIN, and the status quo does not change, then over the next ten years, based on these figures, we will have a net deficit with the rest of the EU of over ONE TRILLION POUNDS (£1,000 billion).
So, how will we pay for this trillion pound spending spree? Well, the Bank of England told us. As a nation, there are only two ways to pay for this massive trade deficit. Either by flogging off our capital, or, by increasing our debt. Well, our national assets have gone to pay for the profligacy of the past. Margaret Thatcher started it by selling off our North Sea Oil too cheaply, such that last year whilst Shell paid Norway over $4billion, the UK actually paid Shell $123 million in tax rebates(3). Since then the railways, water, utilities and many other public and private assets have been sold and are now owned by overseas, particularly EU interests. The profits from which are, no doubt, squirreled away in Luxembourg tax avoidance schemes set up under the now EU Commission president, Jean Claude Juncker, when he was president of Luxembourg (free the "LuxLeaks" whistle blowers now under arrest in Luxembourg!)
So, as the BoE pointed out, the only way to pay for the £trillion pound balance of payments deficit with the EU expected over the next ten years is by debt. A debt that is frankly, unsustainable.
Yes, if the UK remain in the EU, within ten years the UK will be bankrupt.
So, what is the Brexit alternative? Well one alternative is to stop importing this stuff we don't need and start making ourselves the stuff we do need. We could stop importing quite so much and invest in our own economy instead; in steel, manufacturing, the NHS, local farming etc.. We can say good riddance to all these trade deals like TTIP whose primary purpose is to allow multi-nationals free rein to satisfy their greed for a privatised NHS, schools and other public works.
Another alternative is to stop worshiping consumerism and embrace conservation. We have the opportunity to be world leaders in sensible technology like renewable energy and home insulation.
Investing in the UK will cost us far less than the Trillion pounds the UK will have to find in the next ten years to feed our addiction to EU imports. That is why the world's vested interests are united in spending so much time and money on persuading us that our addiction to EU imports must continue, no matter what the cost to the British people. That Trillion pounds goes into the coffers of those same vested interests and further increases the servitude of debt into which every UK citizen is daily encouraged to fall.
The reality is that, after BREXIT, we will continue to trade with the EU, but on our terms, not theirs. The EU will still want its Scotch and other UK products, but more importantly, the EU cannot afford to lose all of that Trillion Pound bonanza it is expecting over the next ten years. The EU will be falling over itself to strike a trade deal with the UK, because it cannot afford to lose its largest export market. We just need to have faith in ourselves, in our country and have the courage to say NO to membership of the EU and stand on our own feet again.
References:
(1) www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/news/2016/032.pdf point 11
(2)www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/balanceofpayments/octtodecandannual2015 & previous periods
(3)http://www.standard.co.uk/business/nick-goodway-why-do-we-pay-shell-to-extract-our-oil-assets-a3228751.html
But all of these warnings have been predicated on one hypothesis: that if the UK leave the EU, the UK's trade will reduce. This is not a fact, it is a forecast, a prediction, basically a guess. And lo and behold, what is the outcome of this hypothetical scenario? Why we all get poorer.
A reasonable hypothesis you might think, but is it? It is based on us losing, as we are repeated told, an export market of 500 million people. That, of course, is a lie. Nearly 66 million of that 500 million are in the UK market, so we are actually talking about are exports to a market of 430 million people. What the hypothetical models do not take account of is the dynamic between the UK market of 66 million and the other 430 million in the EU.
So let us look at that dynamic: something the EU does not do, because it is only concerned with the whole market, not with the individual members, and least of all individual people like you and me. That is why the EU forces poverty and unemployment on vast swathes of the EU, from Greece to Portugal, young people in particular are suffering from this emphasis on the EU market as a whole, not the wealth of individual countries.
When we joined the EU, in the days of Ted Heath and Harold Wilson, the most important UK national statistic was the Balance of Payments. The difference between what we, the UK, as a nation export in goods and services and what we import. Indeed for many of the post war years, as we struggled to pay off the biggest debts of any nation after WW2 (any nation that actually paid its debts that is), we had import controls, because as a nation, we decided that we could not afford imports.
You rarely hear of the balance of payments these days. Yes, it was mentioned by the Bank of England as the Financial Policy Committee (29/3/16) dutifully trotted out its carefully worded support for REMAIN and the interests of international bankers. But only as a footnote: it merely said it had "concerns" about the UK's balance of payments deficit(1).
Yes, deficit. Because ever since we joined the Common Market, we have had a deficit with the rest of the EU. And as the EU has got bigger and bigger, so too has our deficit with the rest of the EU.
So here's the rub. Here is the evidence that yes, we would be better off if we LEAVE the EU.
In the last three years alone (2013-2015), according to the UK Office of National Statistics(2) , we have had a balance of payments deficit with the rest of the world of £267 billion. Within that, our trade deficit with the rest of the EU has been a staggering £303 billion. Yes, we actually had a modest SURPLUS of trade with the rest of the world outside the EU, of £36 billion.
And that deficit with the rest of the EU is going up, from £89 billion in 2013 to £107 billion in 2015. If we REMAIN, and the status quo does not change, then over the next ten years, based on these figures, we will have a net deficit with the rest of the EU of over ONE TRILLION POUNDS (£1,000 billion).
So, how will we pay for this trillion pound spending spree? Well, the Bank of England told us. As a nation, there are only two ways to pay for this massive trade deficit. Either by flogging off our capital, or, by increasing our debt. Well, our national assets have gone to pay for the profligacy of the past. Margaret Thatcher started it by selling off our North Sea Oil too cheaply, such that last year whilst Shell paid Norway over $4billion, the UK actually paid Shell $123 million in tax rebates(3). Since then the railways, water, utilities and many other public and private assets have been sold and are now owned by overseas, particularly EU interests. The profits from which are, no doubt, squirreled away in Luxembourg tax avoidance schemes set up under the now EU Commission president, Jean Claude Juncker, when he was president of Luxembourg (free the "LuxLeaks" whistle blowers now under arrest in Luxembourg!)
So, as the BoE pointed out, the only way to pay for the £trillion pound balance of payments deficit with the EU expected over the next ten years is by debt. A debt that is frankly, unsustainable.
Yes, if the UK remain in the EU, within ten years the UK will be bankrupt.
So, what is the Brexit alternative? Well one alternative is to stop importing this stuff we don't need and start making ourselves the stuff we do need. We could stop importing quite so much and invest in our own economy instead; in steel, manufacturing, the NHS, local farming etc.. We can say good riddance to all these trade deals like TTIP whose primary purpose is to allow multi-nationals free rein to satisfy their greed for a privatised NHS, schools and other public works.
Another alternative is to stop worshiping consumerism and embrace conservation. We have the opportunity to be world leaders in sensible technology like renewable energy and home insulation.
Investing in the UK will cost us far less than the Trillion pounds the UK will have to find in the next ten years to feed our addiction to EU imports. That is why the world's vested interests are united in spending so much time and money on persuading us that our addiction to EU imports must continue, no matter what the cost to the British people. That Trillion pounds goes into the coffers of those same vested interests and further increases the servitude of debt into which every UK citizen is daily encouraged to fall.
The reality is that, after BREXIT, we will continue to trade with the EU, but on our terms, not theirs. The EU will still want its Scotch and other UK products, but more importantly, the EU cannot afford to lose all of that Trillion Pound bonanza it is expecting over the next ten years. The EU will be falling over itself to strike a trade deal with the UK, because it cannot afford to lose its largest export market. We just need to have faith in ourselves, in our country and have the courage to say NO to membership of the EU and stand on our own feet again.
References:
(1) www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/news/2016/032.pdf point 11
(2)www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/balanceofpayments/octtodecandannual2015 & previous periods
(3)http://www.standard.co.uk/business/nick-goodway-why-do-we-pay-shell-to-extract-our-oil-assets-a3228751.html
Friday 15 April 2016
Jeremy Corbyn the Pessimist?
I have never known such a pessimistic Labour Party leader as Jeremy Corbyn. In his lack lustre speech about the reasons for his volte face over Brexit, he talked about the Tories as if they were destined to remain in power forever. He predicted that if we left the EU the Tories would immediately "dump rights on equal pay, working time, annual leave for agency workers, and on maternity pay". Even if we accept that the Tories could get away with such a change without the type of furore that we are seeing over their attack on disability benefits, surely he should be saying that if the Tories were so stupid as to attack the rights of working people, a future Labour Government would restore them and more. After all it was before the UK joined the EU that Barbara Castle championed equal pay!
That is the advantage of Brexit: a future left wing UK government can restore workers' rights and improve them. Compare and contrast EU law and TTIP. It is part of the EU Commission's president Jean-Claude Juncker's mission statement on trade to implement TTIP before 2019 (http://ec.europa.eu/commission/2014-2019/malmstrom_en). It will be done. And what rights do we, the British (or any European) people, have to reject TTIP or a future UK Government to repeal it? Absolutely none: once signed TTIP will remain at the whim of the EU Commission.
It is this lack of democracy and accountability that it is at the heart of Brexit. A Vote to Leave the EU will restore the rights of the British people to make and repeal our own laws at will. A vote for Brexit is a vote for Freedom and that is why I will vote to Leave the EU on 23rd June.
That is the advantage of Brexit: a future left wing UK government can restore workers' rights and improve them. Compare and contrast EU law and TTIP. It is part of the EU Commission's president Jean-Claude Juncker's mission statement on trade to implement TTIP before 2019 (http://ec.europa.eu/commission/2014-2019/malmstrom_en). It will be done. And what rights do we, the British (or any European) people, have to reject TTIP or a future UK Government to repeal it? Absolutely none: once signed TTIP will remain at the whim of the EU Commission.
It is this lack of democracy and accountability that it is at the heart of Brexit. A Vote to Leave the EU will restore the rights of the British people to make and repeal our own laws at will. A vote for Brexit is a vote for Freedom and that is why I will vote to Leave the EU on 23rd June.
Saturday 19 March 2016
The Case for Green Party Supporters to VOTE FOR BREXIT
I am deeply disappointed with the Green Party over the lack of opportunity to discuss the referendum on Europe. Ever since the referendum has been called, the Green Party has refused to debate how we should campaign in the referendum. Indeed the Green Party broke its own rules on emergency motions to push through a pro-EU vote at the Autumn 2015 conference. A vote in which the vast majority of the 66,000 Green Party members were excluded. Fewer than 1% of members voted for the emergency motion and ever since all debate on whether or not to campaign for or against Brexit has been stifled by the leadership. There was a time when the Green Party refused to have "leaders" and I now understand why. This official censoring of debate is undemocratic and dictatorial.
Mainly because of the more democratic voting system, it is clear that the greatest success that the Green Party of England and Wales has had, has been at the European Elections. The Green Party now has three times as many MEPs than the Liberal Democrats. It does mean, however, that this Europhile tendency does tend to dominate the corridors of power within the Green Party, grouped as it is in the South and East of England.
However, I do feel that in their Euro-enthusiasm, our leaders do tend to forget their own rhetoric.
Perhaps I could remind you of some of the things mentioned in the Green Party manifesto in 2015.
• "We have lost half the wild animals on earth in the past 40 years.
• We lose between 20,000 and 100,000 species every year. This is between 1000 and 10,000 times faster than the natural extinction rate.
• We are causing a ‘sixth extinction’. The other five occurred naturally. This one is down to us.
• We have increased CO2 concentrations from a pre-industrial 280 parts per million (ppm) to about 400 ppm.
• Global temperatures are due to rise between 1.5 and 4.8 degrees C by 2100. And that’s just the internationally agreed range without feedback effects. Many experts are predicting rises as high as 6 deg C.
For the first time in the history of the Earth one species is changing it forever – the human species. They call this new era the ‘Anthropocene’. We now have our very own geological epoch."
Now, such Armageddon type predictions suggest some pretty drastic changes are needed quickly to avoid a global disaster. But:
• you do not get change by voting for the status quo;
• you do not get change by being part of an economic union with economic growth as its over-riding ambition;
• you do not get change by voting for trade agreements like TTIP whose only purpose is to encourage unsustainable economic growth and further domination of the world economies by the increasingly avaricious global conglomerates;
• you do not get change when alternatives to unsustainable growth are not even on the European Commission agenda.
The EU as it is currently constituted is run for and by big business. The European Parliament continues to be dominated by right wing parties, paid for by big business. Even the UK "Remain" campaign is organised and paid for by the bankers and financiers of the City of London. The BSE campaign is financed by Goldman Sachs and J P Morgan and led by the former chair of M&S Lord Rose.
Even the "Vote Remain" campaign material being given out at the Green MEP stalls at Harrogate was paid for by British taxpayers via the EU levy, upon which British people have no vote and no say.
What we need, as the Green Party said at the General Election, is nothing less than a Green Revolution. Again from the 2015 manifesto:
• Make achieving international agreement on limiting climate change to within 2 degrees of warming a major foreign policy priority.
Foreign policy in the EU has been led by un-elected and unknown appointees like Catherine Ashton, who led us into the creation of conflicts in the Ukraine, Syria and Libya, but did nothing to foster international agreement on climate change.
• Invest in a £85bn public programme of renewable electricity generation, flood defences and building insulation creating more than 250,000 good jobs (in the UK).
Such a policy would not be allowed under current EU rules as it would create state subsidised unfair competition to the energy companies, now dominated by French, German and Spanish conglomerates.
• Support local sustainable agriculture, respect animals and wild places.
Again the EU rules do not allow the active support by member state of local food, at the expense of imports. An increase in animal welfare needs cross-EU support, as does the protection of habitats, so will take much longer to achieve within the EU, than if we just did it ourselves.
• Cut emissions by providing cheaper public transport, and encouraging cycling and walking.
The re-nationalisation and subsidy of the railways and bus services is not allowed under EU Directive 2012/34/EU.
The EU is all about economic expansion and enforced austerity, not public investment. Look what has happened to those countries faced with having to have a bail out to remain in the Euro. Massive levels of unemployment in Greece, Portugal and Spain. Even Ireland, touted as a success story, has effectively turned itself into a tax avoidance fiefdom of big business, emulating Luxembourg.
The Green vision for Europe is laid out the Manifesto for a Sustainable Society: the policy of the Green Party written by its members, not its leaders. This says:
EU110 To achieve the Green vision, Europe will need very different structures from those currently in existence. Europe should be made up of overlapping, co-operative, democratic, decentralised groupings of nations and regions.
This is not the EU and will NEVER be achieved with existing EU structures.
EU111 European institutions must be designed with care and with mechanisms for correction, to prevent the drift towards centralism that has repeatedly been seen in history.
The drift towards centralism has been a constant in the sixty year history of the EU and continues today.
EU112 Part of the way to do this is to have a multiplicity of independent bodies with clearly defined areas of responsibility, and with the possibility of membership by different groups of nations and regions. An example is the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe for conflict resolution.
Again, this is not found within the EU and is not part of any European Commission policy being considered .
EU113 Europe must not become a super-state or global power bloc.
But this is precisely how the "Remain" campaign define the EU: as a global power bloc: it is at the very heart of their rhetoric. But a power bloc for whom, comrades? For you? For me? Or a power bloc for the military industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about?
Why do you think Obama is actively campaigning for the UK to remain in the EU? A single European nation suits the US government, its multinationals and its military. One leader is a lot easier to deal with than many.
Finally, again from the Green Party manifesto (preamble page 8):
The Green Party knows that:
• It’s hard to be a citizen when life tells you that you are a consumer;
It is Green Party policy to persuade the UK to abandon consumerism and back conservation. Conservation of our environment by abandoning waste and the constant search for more and more "things" we do not need or really want. Never mind the quantity, look for the quality of life. Look for sharing the wealth we have, not concentrating it in fewer and fewer hands.
But concentrating power in fewer hands is precisely what the EU is designed to do. Getting change is such a slow process in the EU that in forty years of membership, the UK has failed to change any EU Treaty; absolutely essential if you are to change the EU in the ways envisaged by the Green Party.
So, please, Green Party members, do not just accept the propaganda put out and financed by big business and the EU. Please think for yourselves. Look at Green Party policies and decide whether you want a society dominated by the commercial interests across the EU or an independent UK, where we can campaign for that Green Revolution and the British people can decide for themselves whether to be consumers or conservers.
Mainly because of the more democratic voting system, it is clear that the greatest success that the Green Party of England and Wales has had, has been at the European Elections. The Green Party now has three times as many MEPs than the Liberal Democrats. It does mean, however, that this Europhile tendency does tend to dominate the corridors of power within the Green Party, grouped as it is in the South and East of England.
However, I do feel that in their Euro-enthusiasm, our leaders do tend to forget their own rhetoric.
Perhaps I could remind you of some of the things mentioned in the Green Party manifesto in 2015.
• "We have lost half the wild animals on earth in the past 40 years.
• We lose between 20,000 and 100,000 species every year. This is between 1000 and 10,000 times faster than the natural extinction rate.
• We are causing a ‘sixth extinction’. The other five occurred naturally. This one is down to us.
• We have increased CO2 concentrations from a pre-industrial 280 parts per million (ppm) to about 400 ppm.
• Global temperatures are due to rise between 1.5 and 4.8 degrees C by 2100. And that’s just the internationally agreed range without feedback effects. Many experts are predicting rises as high as 6 deg C.
For the first time in the history of the Earth one species is changing it forever – the human species. They call this new era the ‘Anthropocene’. We now have our very own geological epoch."
Now, such Armageddon type predictions suggest some pretty drastic changes are needed quickly to avoid a global disaster. But:
• you do not get change by voting for the status quo;
• you do not get change by being part of an economic union with economic growth as its over-riding ambition;
• you do not get change by voting for trade agreements like TTIP whose only purpose is to encourage unsustainable economic growth and further domination of the world economies by the increasingly avaricious global conglomerates;
• you do not get change when alternatives to unsustainable growth are not even on the European Commission agenda.
The EU as it is currently constituted is run for and by big business. The European Parliament continues to be dominated by right wing parties, paid for by big business. Even the UK "Remain" campaign is organised and paid for by the bankers and financiers of the City of London. The BSE campaign is financed by Goldman Sachs and J P Morgan and led by the former chair of M&S Lord Rose.
Even the "Vote Remain" campaign material being given out at the Green MEP stalls at Harrogate was paid for by British taxpayers via the EU levy, upon which British people have no vote and no say.
What we need, as the Green Party said at the General Election, is nothing less than a Green Revolution. Again from the 2015 manifesto:
• Make achieving international agreement on limiting climate change to within 2 degrees of warming a major foreign policy priority.
Foreign policy in the EU has been led by un-elected and unknown appointees like Catherine Ashton, who led us into the creation of conflicts in the Ukraine, Syria and Libya, but did nothing to foster international agreement on climate change.
• Invest in a £85bn public programme of renewable electricity generation, flood defences and building insulation creating more than 250,000 good jobs (in the UK).
Such a policy would not be allowed under current EU rules as it would create state subsidised unfair competition to the energy companies, now dominated by French, German and Spanish conglomerates.
• Support local sustainable agriculture, respect animals and wild places.
Again the EU rules do not allow the active support by member state of local food, at the expense of imports. An increase in animal welfare needs cross-EU support, as does the protection of habitats, so will take much longer to achieve within the EU, than if we just did it ourselves.
• Cut emissions by providing cheaper public transport, and encouraging cycling and walking.
The re-nationalisation and subsidy of the railways and bus services is not allowed under EU Directive 2012/34/EU.
The EU is all about economic expansion and enforced austerity, not public investment. Look what has happened to those countries faced with having to have a bail out to remain in the Euro. Massive levels of unemployment in Greece, Portugal and Spain. Even Ireland, touted as a success story, has effectively turned itself into a tax avoidance fiefdom of big business, emulating Luxembourg.
The Green vision for Europe is laid out the Manifesto for a Sustainable Society: the policy of the Green Party written by its members, not its leaders. This says:
EU110 To achieve the Green vision, Europe will need very different structures from those currently in existence. Europe should be made up of overlapping, co-operative, democratic, decentralised groupings of nations and regions.
This is not the EU and will NEVER be achieved with existing EU structures.
EU111 European institutions must be designed with care and with mechanisms for correction, to prevent the drift towards centralism that has repeatedly been seen in history.
The drift towards centralism has been a constant in the sixty year history of the EU and continues today.
EU112 Part of the way to do this is to have a multiplicity of independent bodies with clearly defined areas of responsibility, and with the possibility of membership by different groups of nations and regions. An example is the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe for conflict resolution.
Again, this is not found within the EU and is not part of any European Commission policy being considered .
EU113 Europe must not become a super-state or global power bloc.
But this is precisely how the "Remain" campaign define the EU: as a global power bloc: it is at the very heart of their rhetoric. But a power bloc for whom, comrades? For you? For me? Or a power bloc for the military industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about?
Why do you think Obama is actively campaigning for the UK to remain in the EU? A single European nation suits the US government, its multinationals and its military. One leader is a lot easier to deal with than many.
Finally, again from the Green Party manifesto (preamble page 8):
The Green Party knows that:
• It’s hard to be a citizen when life tells you that you are a consumer;
It is Green Party policy to persuade the UK to abandon consumerism and back conservation. Conservation of our environment by abandoning waste and the constant search for more and more "things" we do not need or really want. Never mind the quantity, look for the quality of life. Look for sharing the wealth we have, not concentrating it in fewer and fewer hands.
But concentrating power in fewer hands is precisely what the EU is designed to do. Getting change is such a slow process in the EU that in forty years of membership, the UK has failed to change any EU Treaty; absolutely essential if you are to change the EU in the ways envisaged by the Green Party.
So, please, Green Party members, do not just accept the propaganda put out and financed by big business and the EU. Please think for yourselves. Look at Green Party policies and decide whether you want a society dominated by the commercial interests across the EU or an independent UK, where we can campaign for that Green Revolution and the British people can decide for themselves whether to be consumers or conservers.
Friday 29 October 2010
EU Budget Farce
Forgive me if I treat David Cameron's boast of saving money from the EU with some scepticism. When our local services are likely to be cut by 28% in line with the cut in Local Government grants, a 3% increase in the EU budget is hardly to be celebrated. When 600 jobs may be lost among Armed Forces support staff at Catterick, local people should rebel at such EU profligacy.
Thanks in part to Tony Blair's spiteful hand back of our EU rebate as he was hounded out of office in 2007, this country will still be forking out £6.5bn every year to pay for the EU. What does that pay for? Among other things an increase in EU bureaucrats' entertainment budget! And the extraordinary thing is that the EU budget has never been properly audited. Millions are lost every year and the EU budget office fail every single year to account for it, leaving the EU with qualified accounts (i.e. inaccurate).
The Tories and Liberal Democrats should honour their pre-election promises and have a referendum on our EU membership. As the Germans are insisting on an amendment to the Lisbon Treaty to facilitate the latest Euro-zone bail out of failing economies like Greece and Portugal, the coalition has the perfect opportunity. After all it was part of the Con Dem coalition agreement that there no further powers would be handed to Europe without a referendum.
Will we now see the will of the majority of the people prevail and Britain at last throw off the shackles of EU membership? Don't hold your breath. How many other promises have the Con Dem coalition kept?
Thanks in part to Tony Blair's spiteful hand back of our EU rebate as he was hounded out of office in 2007, this country will still be forking out £6.5bn every year to pay for the EU. What does that pay for? Among other things an increase in EU bureaucrats' entertainment budget! And the extraordinary thing is that the EU budget has never been properly audited. Millions are lost every year and the EU budget office fail every single year to account for it, leaving the EU with qualified accounts (i.e. inaccurate).
The Tories and Liberal Democrats should honour their pre-election promises and have a referendum on our EU membership. As the Germans are insisting on an amendment to the Lisbon Treaty to facilitate the latest Euro-zone bail out of failing economies like Greece and Portugal, the coalition has the perfect opportunity. After all it was part of the Con Dem coalition agreement that there no further powers would be handed to Europe without a referendum.
Will we now see the will of the majority of the people prevail and Britain at last throw off the shackles of EU membership? Don't hold your breath. How many other promises have the Con Dem coalition kept?
Saturday 21 November 2009
Europe Shamed by Rompuy Pumpuy
Well, I’m afraid that it is no good just saying, well thank God that it isn't Tony Blair! The selection of a so-called President of Europe (one of three in fact, if you include the President of the European Commission and the President of the European Parliament) is a slap in the face of democracy. The vast majority of the population of Europe were not asked if they wanted this appointment. The British Government reneged on a manifesto pledge to give the British people a referendum. And this is the result. We have as the unelected President of 500 million people in Europe, a short-term leader of a divided country smaller than North Yorkshire (Belgium), the unknown Mr Rompuy Pumpuy.
To add insult to injury the newly created European Foreign Secretary’s job has been given to a career opportunist, who has never faced an election in her life and who owes her political career since 1989 to patronage by the Labour Party. Plucked from obscurity, she has no Foreign Policy experience but Catherine Ashton had the temerity to claim that she was the best person for the job.
The truth lies elsewhere, I think. Reports in the French newspaper Le Monde suggest that Gordon Brown cut a deal with President Sarkozy at this week's Brussels summit. In return for French support for her the Prime Minister is said to have agreed to hand Ms Ashton’s highly influential old job of Internal Market Commissioner to the former French foreign minister Michel Barnier. Both Barnier and Rompuy want to scrap Britain's EU rebate, a rebate already massively reduced by Tony Blair as a spiteful present to the UK just before he quit as PM.
Ms Ashton had only had that job a short time, put in as an inoffensive apology for quitter Mandelson, when he jumped the EU ship to take over the running of Westminster. Yet another unelected official lording it over us.
The divine right of Kings, or in this case European Heads of State, to make shady deals behind closed doors has made the famed Democratic Deficit at the heart of Europe now a yawning chasm. In any other job such blatant patronage would be illegal. These appointments are an embarrassment for the whole of Europe & we should do our best to shame these flunkies into an early resignation.
So my message to the new President and “High Representative” (accompanied by the “Agincourt Salute”) is “GO AWAY, WE DON’T WANT YOU, WE DID NOT ELECT YOU SO RESIGN.”
To add insult to injury the newly created European Foreign Secretary’s job has been given to a career opportunist, who has never faced an election in her life and who owes her political career since 1989 to patronage by the Labour Party. Plucked from obscurity, she has no Foreign Policy experience but Catherine Ashton had the temerity to claim that she was the best person for the job.
The truth lies elsewhere, I think. Reports in the French newspaper Le Monde suggest that Gordon Brown cut a deal with President Sarkozy at this week's Brussels summit. In return for French support for her the Prime Minister is said to have agreed to hand Ms Ashton’s highly influential old job of Internal Market Commissioner to the former French foreign minister Michel Barnier. Both Barnier and Rompuy want to scrap Britain's EU rebate, a rebate already massively reduced by Tony Blair as a spiteful present to the UK just before he quit as PM.
Ms Ashton had only had that job a short time, put in as an inoffensive apology for quitter Mandelson, when he jumped the EU ship to take over the running of Westminster. Yet another unelected official lording it over us.
The divine right of Kings, or in this case European Heads of State, to make shady deals behind closed doors has made the famed Democratic Deficit at the heart of Europe now a yawning chasm. In any other job such blatant patronage would be illegal. These appointments are an embarrassment for the whole of Europe & we should do our best to shame these flunkies into an early resignation.
So my message to the new President and “High Representative” (accompanied by the “Agincourt Salute”) is “GO AWAY, WE DON’T WANT YOU, WE DID NOT ELECT YOU SO RESIGN.”
Wednesday 4 November 2009
It’s your vote. Use it to vote for a Referendum on Europe
So now all three English Westminster Parties have broken their promise to hold a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. Both Labour and the Liberal Democrats promised a referendum in the 2005 General Election manifestos, but were quick to renege on that promise once that election was over.
David Cameron made a "cast-iron guarantee" to the public in 2007 on behalf of the Tory party, that he would hold a referendum on the treaty. Today he has broken this promise, saying only that if Europe tries to amend the constitution again, he might then give the people a referendum. A stern “don’t do it again “ from Mr Flip Flop. Yet another policy of appeasement on Europe from the Tory Party, just like David Cameron’s predecessor Neville Chamberlain.
Is it any wonder people are sick to death of politicians who time after time break their promises and focus only on lining the pockets of themselves and their friends? Unlike the Green Party, Conservatives, Labour and Liberals all rely on “donations” from big business to survive. No wonder then that they support a European Union set up to bring even bigger profits to the multi-national companies. Many local jobs have gone in the UK, as manufacturing and now service jobs are being exported to cheaper parts of Europe and the rest of the world. The City of London, once touted as the saviour of the British economy has had to be bailed out by the British taxpayer, leaving us with higher taxes for years to come.
Despite claims to the contrary, the EU is a fundamentally un-Green institution. Even if we ignore the millions of pounds wasted on flying powerless politicians and European bureaucrats around Europe, we have further billions wasted on inefficient European Common Policies. In particular the Common Agricultural Policy, which subsidises meat production, a major source of greenhouse gases and which undermines Fair Trade in the developing world. The EU spends far more on supporting a cow in Europe, than it does in supporting a human life in Africa.
The EU encourages large supermarket chains to sell brands on a European wide basis, undermining local production. We should be switching back to local production of food and local production of consumer goods, to bring useful jobs back into the UK. Similarly instead of European wide monopolies of water, electricity and gas, who declare that big power stations (including nuclear power) are the only solution, we should be encouraging everyone in this country to generate their own power through solar panels, windmills and underground heat pumps. Even the Americans, under Barak Obama, are offering US citizens $25,000 to do just that.
If you voted Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat in the last General Election, please make up your mind now to not vote for them at the next General Election. If you care about your country and the environment and want a referendum on Europe, then you should vote for the Green Party.
But even if you cannot bring yourself to support the radical and sensible solutions of the Green Party, please do not just stay at home. Make sure you vote for someone, anyone, who will allow you a say on our future in Europe. And that means voting against the cock sure Tories as well as punishing the liars in the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats.
David Cameron made a "cast-iron guarantee" to the public in 2007 on behalf of the Tory party, that he would hold a referendum on the treaty. Today he has broken this promise, saying only that if Europe tries to amend the constitution again, he might then give the people a referendum. A stern “don’t do it again “ from Mr Flip Flop. Yet another policy of appeasement on Europe from the Tory Party, just like David Cameron’s predecessor Neville Chamberlain.
Is it any wonder people are sick to death of politicians who time after time break their promises and focus only on lining the pockets of themselves and their friends? Unlike the Green Party, Conservatives, Labour and Liberals all rely on “donations” from big business to survive. No wonder then that they support a European Union set up to bring even bigger profits to the multi-national companies. Many local jobs have gone in the UK, as manufacturing and now service jobs are being exported to cheaper parts of Europe and the rest of the world. The City of London, once touted as the saviour of the British economy has had to be bailed out by the British taxpayer, leaving us with higher taxes for years to come.
Despite claims to the contrary, the EU is a fundamentally un-Green institution. Even if we ignore the millions of pounds wasted on flying powerless politicians and European bureaucrats around Europe, we have further billions wasted on inefficient European Common Policies. In particular the Common Agricultural Policy, which subsidises meat production, a major source of greenhouse gases and which undermines Fair Trade in the developing world. The EU spends far more on supporting a cow in Europe, than it does in supporting a human life in Africa.
The EU encourages large supermarket chains to sell brands on a European wide basis, undermining local production. We should be switching back to local production of food and local production of consumer goods, to bring useful jobs back into the UK. Similarly instead of European wide monopolies of water, electricity and gas, who declare that big power stations (including nuclear power) are the only solution, we should be encouraging everyone in this country to generate their own power through solar panels, windmills and underground heat pumps. Even the Americans, under Barak Obama, are offering US citizens $25,000 to do just that.
If you voted Conservative, Labour or Liberal Democrat in the last General Election, please make up your mind now to not vote for them at the next General Election. If you care about your country and the environment and want a referendum on Europe, then you should vote for the Green Party.
But even if you cannot bring yourself to support the radical and sensible solutions of the Green Party, please do not just stay at home. Make sure you vote for someone, anyone, who will allow you a say on our future in Europe. And that means voting against the cock sure Tories as well as punishing the liars in the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats.
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