I’ve never understood why freeborn Englishmen and women could ever be so insecure as to think they need to hand over their rights to foreigners in Brussels order to succeed in the world.
And if you say that as someone of a certain age, I might be responsible for this because of the referendum of 1975, I can assure you I was living in New York at the time and didn’t appear on the electoral register in England. (Gordon Macavity Brown couldn’t have put it better)
But in a way, people can be forgiven for having voted Yes to the Common Market, as it was known then. All the mainstream politicians, led by egregious liar Edward Heath of the Conservative Party (think secret protocol to handover our fishing rights as a common European resource by 2000, which he negotiated in Brussels in 1971) who assured all and sundry that it was just a market, that there was no intention of conceding any political sovereignty. Since then, we have moved on to the European Economic Community (EEC) to the current European Union. It is clear now that the movers and shakers behind the E.U. want a federal state, but it is their underhand, deceitful approach which makes this project such a threat to our values, and which means it lacks any political legitimacy.
Unlike the American revolutionaries who set up the Republic, and set out from day one to write a constitution that would preserve liberty. They had protracted conferences. Many learned papers were written. In the end, a constitution which has stood the test of time emerged. The member states agreed and signed up. Look at how different the European approach has been. Those wanting a united Europe, like the wretched Heath, couldn’t bring themselves to admit they wanted this. They tried to inveigle us by stealth into the clutches of Europe, writing bits more of a constitution along the way. Hoping that by the time we woke up, it would be too late to leave. What an absurd approach. What an insult to the intelligence of the electorate in Britain.
There are lots of things for which you can despise the Liberal Democrats. Their hand-wringing approach to politics, always feeling your pain, being all things to all men, is nauseating enough. The fact that the Libs have no principles to defend at all, just not being the other parties is their call to arms. It is their utter cowardice over the E.U. that is their most contemptible policy. They do truly think we can’t govern ourselves. I heard Nick Clegg the other day saying with a straight face that we need to subsume ourselves to Europe in the name of crime and defence. No one country can fight crime alone, and has to give up its governance to Europe to do this. The same goes for defence. We need a European Defence in this troubled world. Has the man never heard of NATO? Has he never heard of Interpol? (More to the point, why didn’t the interviewer know this)?
And then there is the crowd which says we can’t hack it in the real world because we need access to the E.U. markets. Have they never heard of the World Trade Organisation? We don’t need to be in the E.U to trade with Europe. As Germany’s biggest trading partner in Europe, there is no way that Britain would be allowed to become cut off. Where would they sell their BMWs and Mercedes?
We don’t need to be in Europe to sell our goods. As the world’s 4th largest economy (sorry Gordon Brown has just knocked us down to 5th) we carry a huge amount of clout around the world. As one member of the 27 member states of Europe, nobody is listening to us.
As for the Tories, they say they want to bring back some powers to Britain. That’s good but not good enough by a mile. The Labour Party (Medic!) is dead in the water and not even worth considering in the European election. Even Gordon Brown’s mother probably has contempt for the party and won’t be voting. The British National Party wants to pull out of the E.U., but it is also an extreme socialist party, seeking protectionism, higher taxes, and more nationalisation. As Lord Tebbitt described the BNP – it is no more than “Old Labour with Racism”. The Greens are just silly. If anyone listened to them, we might as well go back to living in caves.
Which leaves the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP). UKIP unequivocally wants us out of the E.U. It is a libertarian conservative party seeking smaller taxes and less government. It has the confidence in us Brits to think that we don’t need to water down our ancient freedoms to succeed in the world. Vote UKIP on June 4.
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