2007
EU 2007 page 3
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EU 2007 page 3 |
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EU 2007 |
EU 2007 Latest
20 July 2007
Telegraph EU will
take Britain's UN seat, says Hague
"It would seriously compromise the independence of our foreign policy," he said. "It is shocking that the Government have yet again let this through and it totally destroys their claim that their so-called red line on foreign policy is effective."+
Full article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/20/neu120.xml 19 July 2007
Telegraph EU referendum drive targets Gordon BrownBy Bruno Waterfield in
Brussels and George Jones
Sign our petition for a referendum on the EU Reform Treaty
A cross-party campaign to be launched in September will personally target Gordon Brown for refusing voters a referendum on the new European Union treaty. As the party conference season gets under way, the "I Want A Referendum" campaign will be launched with an "eye-catching stunt" and advertising in newspapers and cinemas. A Daily Telegraph campaign for a referendum on the treaty had attracted 12,500 signatures by yesterday, reflecting growing demand for the voters, not Parliament, to be given the final say. The treaty revives elements of the EU constitution, rejected by France and the Netherlands in 2005. The petition, launched online and in a coupon in this newspaper a week ago, demands that the Government stands by its manifesto commitment to hold a national referendum on the EU reform treaty.+ Full article
27 June 2007 Melanie Phillips
Daily Mail, 25 June 2007 Well, what an amazing surprise. Tony Blair is reported to have protected all his ‘red lines’ at the Brussels summit. Gordon Brown, who previously promised that he would call a referendum if Britain’s interests were threatened by the new constitutional treaty, now says we don’t need a referendum after all because of Mr Blair’s negotiating genius. So apparently we can all relax. St Tony has strangled the EU dragon with his bare hands before striding out of Downing Street into the sunset. The threat to our power of self-government has been seen off. Britain has been saved. Oh please. Pull the other one, it’s got euro-bells on it. The plain fact is that, true to type, the EU set out to smuggle in a constitution by stealth — and it is now brazenly doing precisely that. Even by its own ruthless standards, the scale of the intended deceit and the railroading of its own procedures to ensure that it gets away with it are truly breathtaking.
What actually happened in last Saturday’s pre-dawn diplomatic brawl in Brussels was that Mr Blair’s red lines turned into the colour of fudge and then faded from sight altogether. The supposed safeguards he secured on the core issues of foreign policy, the Charter of Fundamental Rights, economic policy and criminal justice are simply not worth the paper they are written on. For the new treaty doesn’t just extend the EU’s powers. It turns it into a constitutional freak, a bureaucratic Frankenstein’s monster without a shred of democratic legitimacy, which will destroy what remains of our powers of self-government and make Mr Blair’s apparent ‘opt-outs’ absurdly irrelevant. For example, the EU is now to have its own foreign minister. The fact that this panjandrum will be called the EU’s ‘high representative’, which sounds like something straight out of Gilbert and Sullivan, does not detract from his power — which is to head a diplomatic service with ambassadors worldwide in pursuit of an EU foreign policy. What’s more, member states will be forced to support that policy ‘actively and unreservedly’– and will be barred from launching military strikes or declaring war that might be thought to damage the EU’s standing. In other words, we would be forbidden from defending our own interests and would be forced instead to do whatever the EU collectively decides.+
Full article 27 June 2007 Telegraph
Brown defiant at Irish EU announcementBy Toby Helm and Bruno Waterfield Last Updated: 2:05am BST 27/06/2007
Gordon Brown was under pressure to perform a U-turn over Europe and grant a referendum on the proposed EU treaty last night, after Ireland said it would call a national vote.
The move by Dublin - which said 90 per cent of the rejected EU constitution had been revived in the treaty - raised questions about whether Mr Brown can resist Tory calls to put it to the British people. Speaking on BBC1's Politics Show yesterday, the new Labour leader said Tony Blair had prevented substantial loss of sovereignty and therefore a vote of the British people would not be needed. "On that basis, like every other treaty that has been negotiated - Nice, Amsterdam, Maastricht - while many other people will call for a referendum, it seems to me that we have met our negotiating position," he said. "People, when they look at the small print, will see that we did what we set out to do, and that was to make sure that in these areas we were properly protected as a country to make our own decisions when we want to do so."
However, the Conservatives seized on the decision by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to call a vote as evidence that sovereignty had been transferred. A spokesman for the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs said that although some constitutional elements had gone, "90 per cent of what was in the previous treaty is still there, so Ireland is happy". Ireland's constitutional arrangements make it difficult not to call a referendum on a proposed treaty. In 2001, Irish voters threw the EU into turmoil when they rejected the Nice Treaty. Dublin then called a second poll the following year, in which the vote was reversed. Denmark has also been considering whether it has to hold a referendum on the latest proposals from Brussels. Last night William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, said: "As each day goes by, more and more of the Government's case on the EU treaty falls to pieces. "It is now getting clearer and clearer that this is basically the constitution by another name. Large amounts of power have been transferred to Brussels and the Government has failed to safeguard Britain's interests. "People in Britain will want to know, when Irish voters will decide for themselves on this crucial treaty, why Gordon Brown thinks British people do not have the right to have their say, even though he promised they would." The Tories said that the small print of a deal struck in the early hours of Saturday in Brussels would make it far easier for European leaders to abolish national vetoes in future and consolidate ever more power in Brussels. Under the deal, they said EU leaders would be able to slip through major changes -including the end of vetoes -by resorting to a "less visible" procedure for creating new EU powers called the "simplified revision procedure".+ Full article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/25/neu125.xml 21 June 2007 UKIP release
Brussels bulldozes peaceful protest Four MEPs were threatened with arrest today after Belgian police objected to a peaceful protest outside the European Union summit.
Divisional Commander Pierre Vandernissen said he was "acting on instructions from a higher authority" when he confiscated an inflatable bulldozer and threatened to arrest MEPs Nigel Farage, John Whittaker, Derek Clark and Gerard Batten. When questioned why he was doing it, he answered "because I have the power" and refused to say whether or
not it was politically motivated. "I don't have to answer you" he said.
Part of the discussions over the new EU Treaty is the plan to decide Justice and Home Affairs by Qualified Majority Voting and remove the veto which Britain currently has.
The inflatable bulldozer was part of an 11,000 euro display by the Independence and Democracy group attacking EU politicians for their secrecy over the treaty. On it was written, 'Clearing the way for the EU constitution' and 'don't let them bulldoze the treaty through'.
Within 20 minutes of the bulldozer being inflated, just yards from the entrance to the European Council on the 'Zone of Free Expression', 35 policemen had arrived, switched the generator off and parked their police vans to obscure the view of the world's TV cameras which had been trained on the spot. The inflatable was confiscated and will not be returned until the end of the summit, if then.
The police commander told Mr Farage that "you will go to a cell for 12 hours and then we will sort it out." He later threatened to arrest everyone in the area, including civil servants and members of the press.
UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage slammed the moves by police as "storm trooper tactics."
"I have seen the future of Europe, and I don't
like it." said Mr Farage. "It was an outrageous response to
what was intended to be a humorous counterpoint to the debate over the
future of the continent".+
Full release
24 June 2007
Telegraph
Our new Prime Minister must call a referendumLast Updated: 12:01am BST 24/06/2007 The EU Constitution is dead. Long live the EU Constitution... That has been the attitude of EU officials to changing the basis of the relationship between individual states and the EU's central bureaucracy. The officials have never made any secret of their refusal to take "No" for an answer when it comes to the question of whether the powers of the EU should be extended and enhanced. They have admitted that if their plans for greater control were rejected by individual nations, it would not make any difference: as Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel said, they would achieve their goal with or without the consent of the people of Europe by changing the wording but not the substance of the constitution they wanted.
And that is what was agreed at the European summit in Brussels yesterday. Behind Tony Blair's insistence that he has retained his "red lines", the reality is that the EU juggernaut has ploughed onwards in exactly the way that the Eurocrats planned. The new constitution, now termed only a "treaty" in order to make it seem less threatening, grants almost exactly the same additional powers to the central EU bureaucracy as were stipulated in the "old" constitution. Out goes the possibility of an individual member vetoing legislation it does not like in more than 40 areas, from asylum and immigration law to economics, welfare and health policies. In come greater powers for the European President and the European Court, and a new post of European foreign minister, though by a different name. To the people of Britain, it is not just the new powers that are disturbing but the way in which they have been arrogated by the Eurocrats. The whole process has been characterised by an utter contempt for notions of democracy. Most national electorates have not been consulted; those that have been consulted and have responded in the "wrong" way have had their voices dismissed as "irrelevant". If anyone needed proof that Europe's bureaucrats regard their mandate to rule as based on something other than the consent of the ruled, this is it.+ 22 June 2007 Telegraph Road charging 'sneaked through Parliament'By David Millward, Transport Correspondent Last Updated: 2:38am BST 22/06/2007
Britain has secretly signed up to a pan-European road pricing scheme, it became clear last night. Legislation that would allow Brussels to dictate what technology was used in any charging scheme was taken through the Commons without debate. It was contained in a Statutory Instrument, normally a routine measure that passes through Parliament on the nod. But in this case it has made a European directive legally binding in Britain and as a result has set limits to the technology that can be used in any charging scheme. The AA said London's congestion charging scheme could fall foul of this directive unless Ken Livingstone, the capital's mayor, convinced ministers that it was harmonised with other systems in Britain - and ultimately Europe. Underpinning the directive is the European Union's desire that equipment used in any road pricing system would be useable in all 27 member states. Known as the Road Tolling Interoperability of Road User Charging and Road Tolling Systems, it sets out three acceptable technologies.+
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