EU Referendum

Showing posts with label constitution. Show all posts

Heffer really hasn't got it. Under the headline, "David Cameron must learn the dangers of tinkering with the constitution", we are told "Labour has not just hobbled the Union, but wrecked our whole system of government."

In the yards of EVM that follows, not one mention of the EU. Yet the consolidated treaties are part of our constitution, and our supreme government is in Brussels. How can you write about reforming our constitution without mentioning the elephant?

COMMENT THREAD

Frank+Field+copy[i-Frank+Field+copy]Standpoint, the new rightish-wing magazine, of whose launch I wrote a little while ago, has its second issue out and full of interesting stuff it is, too. The article most relevant to this blog, much as I would like to discuss Julie Burchill's imprecations against women journalists who become misery tourists when they get to the sea, sand and tall Muslim men, is Frank Field's column.

We can but applaud his first statement though I rather suspect that a number of eurosceptics have a weird hankering for the full disastrous system that Attlee's government built.

There is a palpable sense that British politics is at the end of an era which began with Attlee’s victory in 1945. The post-war consensus was only partially dismantled by Mrs Thatcher. New Labour, by embracing the market, tested to destruction the old Labour shibboleth that high public expenditure was the gateway to greater equality.

The Attlee revolution entailed not simply nationalising the commanding heights of the economy but, much more sinisterly, the Government brought most of civil society – apart from the trade unions - under the whip of central government control. Thatcher’s revolution denationalised the industrial sector, blew up the City’s restrictive practices and handed power back to individual trade unionists. What the Thatcherites left untouched was central government’s iron fist, which still controls how most of the 42 per cent of national income is spent.

This reminds me of a conversation I had with some unfortunate member of the Conservative Party in which he yet again bemoaned the fact that Frank Field would not cross the floor and join the Conservative Party. "Maybe that's because he does not believe in socialism," - I said perhaps more tartly than was necessary.

Mr Field himself is rarely lost for tart words himself. Who among us would not smile at the second sentence in this paragraph?

One effective way for Gordon Brown to revive his government would be to establish pilots so that these six proposals become stepping stones to his 2010 manifesto. Alternatively, David Cameron might nail his colours to the mast, rather than the fence.

Mr Field then proceeds to make six proposals himself. Some of them we can agree with, others seem more dubious. Most certainly greater control of the education system by parents is an excellent idea.

However, it is the last one that makes one stop in one's tracks:

Sixth, initiating a democratic blood transfusion. Democracy is at the heart of British society, but it is in urgent need of medical attention. Only 22 per cent of the electorate elected the current Government. Power needs to be moved back from the parties to the voters by instigating open primary elections in safe seats. Similarly, given the failure of the police to respond to public concerns, chief superintendents, who decide day to day policing strategy, should become electable. While such a strategy will not make good the obvious shortfall we have in policing manpower, it would ensure that existing resources were deployed most effectively. The local electorate would set the targets by which the chief superintendents would be judged.

Indeed. But why stop at the police? Why not have local councils raise their own income through whatever means they see fit and stand in elections on that?

Above all, why not look at the two Houses of Parliament? How about a democratic blood transfusion there? Here is a really interesting idea, Mr Field: how about restoring legislative powers to our own Parliament? Moving on from there, how about MPs abandoning those powers they have arrogated themselves over local government, organizations that should be allowed to run themselves and individuals? You never know, people might start turning out for elections and, even, start acquiring some minimal respect for politicians.

Gordon+Brown[i-Gordon+Brown]Time for another little constitutional discussion, methinks. I yield to no-one in my dislike, distrust and contempt for Gordon Brown, our Prime Minister and erstwhile Chancellor of the Exchequer. Indeed, I have always maintained - and there are witnesses to this - that he was a failure as a Chancellor, a complete loser and, most importantly, not a eurosceptic or even someone who was genuinely interested in keeping this country out of further EU entanglement, such as the euro.

I recall numerous heated and, as ever, rather ill-phrased discussions on the forum with readers who maintained that I was wrong and shall see the error of my ways as soon as Gordon becomes PM. I have heard no acknowledgements that these people were wrong but let that pass.

Now we have rumours that he is plotting to take us into the euro, presumably without any intention of holding that promised referendum. He may find that a good deal more difficult than he imagines, if the rumour is true, which it may not be.

He is certainly a man who has little understanding of economic forces or political integrity. But is he unelected? Well, actually, no.

As any schoolchild used to know, we do not have a presidential system and we do not elect prime ministers directly. There are many problems with the system we have in which the legislative and the executive are elected simultaneously because that prevents a genuine separation of powers that, in turn, means there are no real checks and balances. However, that is the system we have.

This means that we actually elect a party to form the government and it is up to that party to decide who should be the leader. Gordon Brown is no more unelected than Churchill was in 1940, Eden in 1955, Macmillan in 1957, Douglas-Home in 1963, Callaghan in 1975 1976 or Major in 1991 1990. Of these only Eden went to the country almost immediately and strengthened the mandate. The others continued in their position without an election for as long as possible. (Clearly, Churchill was an exception in that there could be no election in war time, though the Americans managed one in 1944.)

In a dim sort of way Brown understands this as he spoke of the mandate he had last autumn. Rather stupidly (and I suspect that the man is not very bright) he did not follow it through and point out that he had a mandate to carry on being a prime minister and did not need to go to the country as we, on this blog, knew he would not. Instead, he prevaricated wanting to harm the opposition more than strengthen his own position and failed in both.

We have always maintained that whether one liked Tony Blair or not, whether one agreed with his actions or not, he, being the elected prime minister or, in other words, the chosen leader of the party elected to form the government of the country, had every right to do certain things. It is he who was constitutionally empowered to take this country to war not the people who bothered to turn up for whatever reason for a demo on a fine Saturday afternoon.

In the same way, whatever one may think of Gordon Brown, one has to admit that he is the rightfully elected prime minister of this country. The problem is that the mandate that gives him that right also includes a certain assurance that there would be a referendum on the Constitutional Reform Lisbon Treaty.

PS It was pointed out to me after the original posting that I made a mistake over two dates. Mea culpa. I have now corrected the mistakes, resisting the temptation of a stealth edit.

House_of_Commons01[i-House_of_Commons01]In December last year I wrote an open letter to the Members of the House of Commons as there was news that they were whining about how little they were paid (that's over £60,000 plus very generous expenses, not to mention the possibility of putting members of their own family on the salary list).

Another year, another pay demand by our MPs. The story and the accompanying storm broke yesterday when we found out that our so-called legislators (I'll come to that in a minute) are demanding a ten per cent pay rise, well above inflation level. I don't suppose that means a commensurate ten per cent cut in the average allowance of £134,000. No, I thought not.

After all, as the Mail on Sunday put it:

One reason for the big claim is that many Labour MPs fear they will lose their seats at the next Election - and want to boost their Commons pension rights before it is too late.

Terrific. All at our expense, too, gentle reader.

Today there are lots of stories such as this one about Gordon Brown opposing the proposals and calling MPs selfish. Most of us can think of other, less pleasant descriptions but that will do to start with.

There is a good deal of predictable whining about the police not getting the pay rise they want. As it happens, that argument leaves me cold. As the think-tank Reform explained:

Discussion over this year's police pay settlement should take into account the fact that, over the last twelve years, police pay has risen at twice the rate of inflation and by more than the average of the public sector and the private sector pay increases.

One cannot possibly argue that productivity has gone up with the same fantastic leap. Indeed, that is true about the public sector in general - money has been poured in, salaries have gone up, productivity stayed the same.

Back to MPs, however.

Inevitably, the blogosphere is also buzzing. Iain Dale, has come out on the MPs' side, as he usually does, arguing that

Surely we should pay our MPs at a level where few would actually be put off standing for Parliament. I'd like Parliament to be representative of a number of professions, but few people from those professions would think about standing for Parliament because they would have to take a pay drop. Relatively junior managers in industry or the public sector now command salaries in excess of what MPs earn. What message does it send out that we are happy to pay MPs the same as the Deputy Public Affairs Manager of an NHS Trust?

On the whole, few of those who commented on the blog agreed with Iain (Peter Luff MP being one of those who did in a particularly whinging comment), pointing out that junior managers in the private sector do not earn that much, cannot command those expenses and cannot employ members of their family. If the Deputy Public Affairs Manager of an NHS Trust is on the same salary (plus expenses?) then he/she is seriously overpaid.

Tim Worstall, on the other hand, is demanding that MPs' salaries should be cut or reduced to zero on the grounds of supply and demand. There are very many people who want to be MPs and there will be even if they do not get the salaries they do.

I am not sure I accept Tim's argument entirely, though it makes more sense than Iain's about paying MPs as much as they could get in the private sector. Let's face it, most of them are MPs because they could not get much more than their train fares in the private sector. We are not talking potential captains of industry, hard-working GPs or anything of the kind. We are talking about people who have gone from one political position to another with an odd interlude of outside employment where they displayed no ability whatsoever.

There are many reasons why people who can do other things would not want to be MPs and they do not have much to do with the money. Maybe the company one has to keep.

Besides, why would we want to skim talented people off the wealth-creating private sector and send them into the parasitical public one?

It is curious that those parallels with the private sector concentrate, however erroneously, only on the pay, never on productivity or other problems like going out of business because of high taxes and an impossible regulatory structure.

What would a firm in the private sector do if it found that seventy to eighty per cent of its work has gone somewhere else? It would institute major cutbacks and many people would be laid off. Yet with that proportion of our legislation coming from Brussels and MPs not being able to reject it and not even reading it most of the time, we have no cutbacks; nobody is laid off; and a ten percent salary rise is demanded. I bet when that is debated, we shall have the House full to the rafters, unlike the time there is a debate on, say, the fishing industry and its destruction.

A year ago I wrote:

What is it you do, ladies and gentlemen that would justify yet another pay rise? Do you legislate? Well, not in the eighty percent of the legislation that comes, one way or another from the European Union and is passed on the nod because you do not have the right to reject or amend it. Let's face it, you do not even bother to read most of it. There is a lot of material there, I agree, but it is you and your equally greedy predecessors, who made sure of this state of affairs.

Let us not forget, ladies and gentlemen, Members of the House of Commons, that a good deal of that legislation does not even pass through Parliament. It arrives in the shape of EU Regulations, which are directly applicable and are put into place by Statutory Instruments, which you know nothing about, or regulations created by quangos such as the Food Standards Agency.

What of the remaining twenty per cent of the legislation? Do you live up to the expectations of the people, whom you are supposed to represent? Do you read the legislative proposals or Green Papers or Bills? Do you realize how badly drafted many of the last are? It would appear not, as those badly drafted Bills wing their way through the House of Commons and it is only when the (unpaid) Members of the House of Lords start scrutinizing them, line by line, clause by clause (something you ought to do, ladies and gentlemen, Members of the House of Commons) that the full shoddiness or horror becomes clear.

It is not unknown for the Government to have to rush scores, even hundreds of amendments at a late stage, say Report, in the House of Lords, having not realized before what a mess the particular piece of legislation was. It is many years since the House of Commons has made any effort to scrutinize legislation with any attention. GPs who carried out their duties the way you do, ladies and gentlemen, would be struck of the Register of Medical Practitioners.

And a good deal more. I stand by every word of it. Cut their salaries in accordance with the work they have voluntarily abandoned.

hogarth39[i-hogarth39]Actually, as this is Philip Johnston we are talking about, we have to admit that he gets there ahead of the pack. In fact, if anyone were to ask me for the names of a few really good journalist in Britain, I would probably put Mr Johnston top of the list (on the assumption that our own Christopher Booker is above and beyond competition).

Today's article in the Daily Telegraph is entitled "Why I am prepared to break the law" does not give any very sensible instructions on how to overcome two particular heinous pieces of legislation, one already effectively in place, the other due fairly soon but still in the planning stages.

The first is the compulsory ID card that has been long in hatching, is already promising to be twice as costly for every individual as it was originally mooted and is likely to be the biggest cock-up in history of many cock-ups.

The second one is the question of political party funding. On this subject Mr Johnston is eloquent. Analyzing what we already pay to political parties under the heading of "legitimate political activity" he gives a quick overview of the recent report by Sir Hayden Phillips and the all-party discussions that have broken down with mutual recriminations of cheating.

It is typical that these negotiations should founder on the rocks of self-interest, rather than because one or other party was unhappy at the prospect of state funding.

The arrogant assumption that the taxpayer should be fleeced further because the parties spend too much and are having trouble raising enough cash is breathtaking.

Furthermore, the notion that state support underpins political integrity is simply not sustained by the evidence.

If anything, public funding of political parties leads to greater venality, not less, as is evident from countries like Italy or France where campaigning is far more dependent on the taxpayer.

In any case, why should public funds reinforce the political hegemony of a few extant political parties? Who says Labour or the Conservatives have a right to exist that requires support from the taxpayer?

Hmm, I thought, this sounds familiar, particularly that last bit. Could I have been thinking of these words?

As it happens, there already is money from the taxpayer going into political parties. In the first place, somebody has to pay for the free postage and broadcasting slots. It is not unreasonable to ask the electorate to help fund the smooth functioning of free and fair elections, which is what these contribution amounts to.

It is quite another matter to make the electorate pay through taxes for the activities of individual political parties. Parties already receive £2 million in Policy Development Grants and, in all fairness, this, too, should be cancelled.

Sir Hayden comes up with a complicated formula of how parties should receive state funding according to the number of votes cast for them in elections, that being the surest way of showing how much support they can garner. As it happens, he is wrong. Support for parties is shown in votes, in membership, in voluntary activity and in the money they can raise. If they cannot get any of that, they had better start thinking of doing something else with their time.

What this report will achieve, if put into legislation, is a freeze on any political change or development, the very opposite of what it intends. A stronger democracy does not need "sustainable" funding of political parties but a true marketplace for them. Let the people decide and not through tax money being parcelled out by the Treasury.

Yes, I rather think I must have been. These words went up on EUReferendum on March 15, the Ides of March. But they get there in the end.

Jack+Straw[i-Jack+Straw]If our readers think back to the first careless rapture of the Brown government (and how long ago that seems now) they will recall that the new Prime Minister in his efforts to distance himself from the previous one, in whose government he had been Chancellor of the Exchequer for ten years, they will recall that there was much talk of a constitutional change, nay, reform.

Well, the first stage of this “reform” is being unrolled, accompanied, I am glad to say with absolutely no fanfare from the media. Could it be that the hacks have finally learnt what these various initiatives are worth?

On Thursday, Jack Straw, Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor (there’s a Pooh-Bah-like title) stood up and made a statement to the House of Commons about “Governance of Britain” and how the new reforms will affect war powers, treaties, judicial appointments and protests. Well, actually, the statement was about the consultation documents that are being issued on those subjects and how the new reforms should affect them.

A fascinating speech it was, too. One cannot help wondering whether Jack Straw, who is not, by any means, stupid, knows what a lot of tosh he was talking. The three consultation papers, he explains are part of the Prime Minister’s vision of a “renewed relationship between Government and citizens” as set out by him back in July when he identified twelve areas in which the executive and the Prime Minister “should surrender or limit their powers”.

Apparently these are areas in which “exclusive exercise” by the Government “should have no place in a modern democracy”. One could argue that it is only in modern democracy as opposed to constitutional liberalism that the Executive actually managed to grab quite as much power as it has; one could also argue that much of this “grabbed” power can be abandoned or restored to the people and to Parliament (should the Commons part of it actually want any power, of which there is no sign) without any great announcements of constitutional reform.

First off, we have war powers.

On 15 May the government supported a motion in this House which declared that it was “inconceivable” that the precedents set in 2002 and 2003, when the Government sought the approval of the House for military action in Iraq, would not be followed in the future. The same motion called on the Government “to come forward with detailed proposals” on how this convention should be entrenched. Today’s consultation paper therefore explores a range of options, each aimed at formalising Parliament’s role. It suggests that this might be through a convention, through legislation, or by a combination of both.

When one looks through the relevant sections in the consultation paper, “The Governance of Britain – War powers and treaties: limiting Executive powers”, one finds various arguments about the difficulties that voting on war in Parliament would create.

The arguments are not stupid, as it happens. The question of our troops’ safety must be paramount and if a debate in Parliament jeopardizes that, careful thought must be given; then there is the issue of our commitment to our allies; the need to move fast in certain circumstances – most military engagements do not have the long run-up the Iraqi war did; the conundrum of when the engagement should be debated – a long way ahead, immediately prior to engagement or ex post facto after the troops have moved in; and so on.

In fact, the result is likely to be some form of codification of the government asking Parliament to debate war powers as and when it sees necessary, which is more or less the situation at present. Agree with it or not, there is no need for a huge fuss about constitutional reform.

In any case, that is not what MPs want. What they would really like is legislation that would retroactively abolish the debate and the vote. That way they can vote for a war when it is popular and shriek with horror that they had not been consulted when it becomes unpopular.

Moving right along with the Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor (could that be SSJLC?) we come to the question of treaties. Both the statement and the consultation paper goes to some trouble to explain the Ponsonby Rule:

According to this and with certain exceptions, the Government must lay a treaty as a Command Paper before Parliament for a minimum of 21 sitting days prior to ratification. It is then for Parliament to determine which treaties it wishes to debate. The Government believes that there may be value in putting this convention on a statutory footing, to establish Parliament’s right to decide and show that the actions of the Government are subject to the will of the people’s
representatives.

Several points need to be made here and, for some reason, Mr Straw forgot to make them. Likewise, his officials forgot to put them into the consultation paper.

Firstly, let’s face it, there is no value whatsoever in wasting time going through a lengthy legislative process, if that is what will come out of this exercise, in order to put a well-understood convention on a statutory footing. It isn’t as if the Ponsonby Rule failed in what it can achieve.

The problem is with that “can”. Mr Straw seems to have forgotten that trade treaties, for instance, do not come under the Rule because they are negotiated and signed on our behalf by the European Union. Parliament can then debate all it likes but it cannot deny ratification.

The other problem not mentioned particularly is that of the various treaties that are become amendments to the European Communities Act. Is it actually possible for Parliament to decide not to ratify, say the Constitutional Reform Lisbon Treaty, thus obviating the necessity to introduce the next amendment to the Act?

Finally, there is no mention that the forthcoming Constitutional Reform Lisbon Treaty allows for a Chief Panjandrum on the Common Foreign Policy (no longer called a Foreign Minister). While we are assured that foreign policy will remain in the domain of individual states, the High Representative will state the common position, where there is one and negotiate on its basis.

Coupled with the fact that the European Union will acquire a legal personality, that is, it will be in a position to negotiate and sign treaties beyond the trade ones (which are nominally signed by all the member states) the question of what will come under the Ponsonby Rule even if it is put on statutory footing will be considerably more moot than Mr Straw seems to believe.

I bet our readers cannot wait for the next few instalments of the constitutional reform as propounded by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who seems not be able to understand what it is he has agreed to in Lisbon not so long ago and what the implications are for the country.

COMMENT THREAD

Referendum2[i-Referendum2]It is a measure of the establishment’s and assorted europhiles’ desperate shortage of arguments that they have resorted to accusing those of us who are calling for a referendum of undermining British democracy and parliamentary representative government.

In fact, even people who assert that they are on “our side” produce mimsy statements about a “referendum not being British”. Well, nothing is British until it is done in Britain and is part of the British system. The right to vote by everyone over the age of 18 regardless of whether they contributed anything to society or not would not have been considered British until very recently. Yet, somehow, it has become just that.

We have now had a sufficient number of referendums to consider that it is, in exceptional circumstances, part of the British political structure.

Nor does the holding of a referendum on an important constitutional matter in any way weaken or undermine the role of Parliament. (Considering that this role has been well-nigh destroyed by successive governments and by the European project, it seems rather odd that the very people, who have either contributed to that destruction or still support it, should be rolling their eyes in horror at the thought of a spot of direct democracy.)

The argument that a referendum undermines parliamentary democracy or the power of parliament assumes that this power is unlimited; that Parliament or, at least, the House of Commons is sovereign. Not so but far from it.

Parliament is not sovereign either in the sense that a country has sovereignty or in the sense of being able to pass any legislation or impose any decision on the people it likes, even if the dominant part of it has been elected. A situation in which Parliament can behave with impunity and claim sovereign powers is not a democracy but elected dictatorship.

In other words, there are limits to what Parliament, as the legislature, should be able to do within a constitutional democracy and it has long ago stepped beyond those limits. There has to be a way of bringing it back within the framework of democracy and constitutional rule.

Here we come to another problem. Britain does not have true separation of powers in the way the American Constitution laid it down for the United States (and even there the Supreme Court, that is the judiciary, has been extending its powers beyond its remit, thus upsetting the balance between the three branches of government).

The British system, as it has developed, has, theoretically, subjected the executive to the legislative branch but, in actual fact, has made the executive all-powerful because it is the dominating part of the legislative while the judiciary’s role remains interpretation of legislation as it is passed by Parliament that is effectively controlled by the government. Does that make sense? I do hope so because it is important that I should get this right.

A government with a good working majority in the House of Commons can behave with perfect impunity and the notion that it will be punished by the electorate is laughable for a number of reasons, not least because it depends on the existence of an effective opposition.

There are no constraints on the government of the day except for what comes from the European Union, which does not, on the whole, bother our politicians over-much. The only, very mild, restraint at present is the House of Lords and the government, aided by its flunkeys on all sides in the Commons, is working very hard to destroy even that.

So, it seems clear that, until such time as, rid of the European Union, we can implement a new Bill of Rights that will actually be kept by the politicians and not abolished item by item, possibly a clearly defined Constitution and a consequent Constitutional Court that will prevent MPs from destroying it, there can be only one controlling mechanism; only one way to ensure that there are some controls on the elected dictatorship we have now, and that is through referendums on important constitutional issues.

Given that it was a referendum that created the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Greater London Authority and it was a referendum that prevented the creation of an elected assembly in the North-East, I cannot quite understand why people keep muttering about referendums undermining democracy or being un-British. They are not a particularly good way of controlling the executive. As we know too much depends on how the question is phrased and who is allowed to campaign. The government still holds the reins. But they are the only method we have at present to ensure that constitutional democracy does really function.

COMMENT THREAD

Brown_cabinet[i-Brown_cabinet]
In one episode of the superlative series "Yes, Prime Minister", Sir Humphrey explains to Jim Hacker the niceties of courteous insult and disagreement. Thus "with respect" is weaker than "with respect Prime Minister" or "with great respect Prime Minister". Later on in the story, Sir Humphrey takes a deep breath and starts saying, "with the greatest respect in the world, Prime Minister". Hacker interrupts him: "Don't Humphrey. You'll regret it."

Though not in Sir Humphrey’s position I, nevertheless, feel inclined to use that phrase with gritted teeth as I read about the new Prime Minister's daily antics, so reminiscent of Blair's in 1997.

Blair, let us recall, was also hyperactive in those weeks immediately after the election and also spent some time "wrapping himself in the flag" just as Brown keeps talking about Britishness and British values. None of this means anything.

So, let us begin.

Yes_minister[i-Yes_minister]With the greatest respect, Prime Minister, it is a little pointless to keep talking about all the changes that are about to start and new beginnings when all you are doing is taking over half-way through the third term of an existing ministry.

While it made sense for your predecessor, Tony Blair, in 1997 and for Margaret Thatcher in 1979 to speak of great changes, it makes no sense for somebody who was effectively appointed by his party to be the Prime Minister, regardless of how many new appointments he might make in his Cabinet or how many new highly paid new ministerial jobs he might create. It is still the same government with the same mandate.

Nor does it matter how many times the Cabinet has been summoned in the first two days for no very good reason or the fact that meetings will now be moved from Thursday to Tuesday. Very few people know or care when the Cabinet meets.

Nor will anyone, apart from a few journalists in the MSM be terribly impressed by the "new" Cabinet. The Cabinet of All the Talents has boiled down to several ministers who have already displayed their incompetence, such as Jack Straw, Yvette Cooper (who will only attend some Cabinet meetings), Ruth Kelly and others and a large number of inexperienced politicians who are unlikely to stand up to the Prime Minister.

With the greatest respect in the world, Prime Minister, your Cabinet is going to be even more of a one man show than your predecessor's was. There will be nobody like you to stand up to you. Of course, Prime Minister, one cannot altogether rely on friends, such as Alistair Darling, to remain quiescent as Chancellor of the Exchequer but that, presumably, is precisely what you are relying on.

The ministers from outside will not amount to much, even if Shirley Williams (now Baroness Williams) does come into the big tent. To say that she is past her sell-by date as a politician is to make a statement that is about thirty years out of date.

Then there are Lord Malloch Brown, the man who ran interference for SecGen Kofi Annan in the oil-for-food scandal and is now the Vice-President of the Soros Fund, Sir Digby Jones, soon to be Lord Jones one assumes and, possibly the only imaginative appointment, Sir Alan West, former First Sea Lord who becomes junior minister in charge of security matters and Sir Ara Darzi, a surgeon who will take on the rather nebulous task of "improving patient care and building partnerships with staff".

All very jolly, of course, though hardly revolutionary, Prime Minister or even a series of particularly bold decisions. Outside "experts" are always being brought into governments by politicians with variable success. Frankly, Prime Minister, with respect, you would have been better off to use these people as advisers if you wanted them to help you, that is, rather than to silence them.

As it is, they will be in the invidious position of being inside that big tent but at your mercy as none of them will have any standing or support in Parliament, let alone the party.

What of the supposed constitutional revolution that so excited journalists yesterday?

After carrying out the most sweeping Cabinet reshuffle of modern times, the Prime Minister will promise that in future ministers will have to seek parliamentary approval before a major commitment of troops overseas, subject to operational needs and secrecy.

There will be "confirmation hearings" for major public appointments, curbs on political advisers and an independent figure to investigate breaches of the code of conduct for ministers. Mr Brown demonstrated that he wants to set a cracking pace - after months of limbo during Tony Blair's farewell - by summoning the new Cabinet for its second meeting within 24 hours.

With the greatest respect in the world, Prime Minister (and ladies and gentlemen of the media) these are merely administrative adjustments. As it happens your predecessor (remember his name?) did seek and get parliamentary approval before he sent the troops to Iraq. That approval weakened because things did not go quite as smoothly as expected after the first burst of enthusiasm and because some of the arguments he had used to persuade you and your colleagues turned out to be spurious.

That, Prime Minister, is because he did not dare to talk of British interests. Will you when the time comes?

A real constitutional revolution that will revive faith in politicians (well, actually, Prime Minister there never was all that much faith in them and why should there be?) would be the return of legislative powers to Parliament. Now that would be a bold decision. Will you do it, Prime Minister?

Will you, at the very least, not show yourself to be your predecessor’s poodle (though, with respect, real poodles have far more personality than the average politician) by agreeing to turn the mandate he signed in Brussels into a new constitutional treaty without as much as a squeak in protest?

A bold decision to fight for Britain's interests and for a complete change in the European structure, threatening withdrawal from the outdated, undemocratic, authoritarian even by its own standards and economically backward European Union would be a real constitutional change. Of course, you would need the people's approval and that, really, would be a very bold decision. With the greatest respect in the world.

COMMENT THREAD

Who knows? Who even cares at this stage? But, according to Der Spiegel "President Lech Kaczynski indicated that he is not interested in standing in the way of a solution". Whether that means that the Poles have shown a certain reluctance to die for the "square root" method of calculating voting rights on the Council is unclear. President Sarkozy is claiming credit for changint the Polish President's views but even he is not entirely certain as to what this might entail.

Then again, as we have pointed out before, the decision to call an IGC, which is necessary to decide on a new treaty, and the topics for it, will be decided by a simple majority. The vaunted Polish veto is of little significance at this stage.

Still it is good to know that the new French President shows entirely Gallic logic in his attitudes:

Sarkozy himself had made clear what the tenor of his visit was going to be. "Poland cannot block the European Union," Sarkozy told the Polish daily Gazeta Wyborcza in an interview printed to coincide with his first trip to Poland as French president. "If every one of us shows total intransigence ... the question arises: What are we doing together?"

What indeed?

COMMENT THREAD

Baroness+Scotland[i-Baroness+Scotland]Are our rulers fools or knaves? What about the media or the rest of the political establishment? It is truly hard to tell which they are. Do they really believe what they say, in which case they are seriously stupid and ignorant or do they simply say these things, without caring about the reality behind them, in which case they are definitely knaves?

Let us have a look at the Starred Question asked by Lord Pearson of Rannoch yesterday. As readers of this blog are aware, his lordship has been pursuing the simple matter of Article 308 of the Consolidated Treaties, which gives all sorts of rights to the Council to legislate, provided it relates to the Common Market, but which is used increasingly to introduce other legislation.

In particular, Article 308 has been used to propose the establishment of a Programme “Prevention, Preparedness and Consequence Management of Terrorism” and Lord Pearson asked his question about that:

What is the justification for using Article 308 of the treaty establishing the European Communities as the legal base for the EuropeanUnion’s programme “Prevention, Preparedness and Consequence Management of Terrorism” when that article permits the European Union to act only “in the course of the operation of the common market”.

Explaining the “Legal Basis and Rationale of the Policy Instrument”, Article 4.1 says:

4.1. Legal basis

In the absence of a specific provision, Article 308 of the Treaty establishing the European Community is the appropriate legal basis not only for civil protection, but also for related measures on prevention, preparedness and consequence management.

Actually, as we have already pointed out (and Lord Pearson points out tirelessly), it does nothing of the kind. Allow me to remind our readers what it does say:

If action by the Community should prove necessary to attain, in the course of the operation of the common market, one of the objectives of the Community, and this Treaty has not provided the necessary powers, the Council shall, acting unanimously on a proposal from the Commission and after consulting the European Parliament, take the appropriate measures.

Clear enough, one would have thought, yet apparently not so as far as our own politicians are concerned.

In response to Lord Pearson’s question, Baroness Scotland of Asthall replied on behalf of the government:

My Lords, Article 308 does not require that every proposal using it as its legal base should relate in a narrow and restrictive sense to the operation of the Common Market. There is limited Community competence in relation to civil protection and the protection of critical infrastructure from security-related risks and damage to these interests could have an impact on economic activity and the operation of the Common Market.

That is known as stretching the truth, m’lud. After all, anything can be said to have an impact on economic activity but the common market is only one of the objectives of the Community, the one Article 308 applies to.

It is worth reading the full debate, particularly the speed with which supporters of this completely illegal activity (even by Community standards) resort to idiotic waffle about the benefits (unmeasured) that membership of the European Union allegedly brings to this country and the complete refusal to acknowledge the process whereby the last vestiges of this country’s sovereignty are disappearing.

When asked directly about that by Baroness Knight of Collingtree and Lord Vinson, all Baroness Scotlad could do is bleat:

My Lords, if there were to be an erosion of sovereignty, we would of course take it seriously. However, because the globe has changed, we have had to pool our efforts in order to face up to some global challenges. Europe together has made a much better fist of it that each of us would have done on our own.

So, I return to my question: are they fools or knaves?

lord_harris[i-lord_harris]I have just returned from the Memorial to Ralph Harris, aka Lord Harris of High Cross. I wrote an obituary of the great man at the time of his death, so I need not do so again, except to say that neither I nor anyone else who knew him has really come to terms with the fact that the world no longer has him in it.

It was, as readers can imagine, a gathering of the clans with many friends and acquaintances, all good allies in the fight.

Twelve people from different backgrounds and different countries gave brief talks about Ralph and their memories of him. In the middle about ten minutes of a Liberty Fund film, “Conversation with Harris and Seldon”, was shown. As the meeting was dedicated to Ralph Harris, it was almost entirely his words that we could hear.

The DVD of that discussion is available from the Institute of Economic Affairs and the text has been published together with comments by other eminent economists and writers.

What struck me was Ralph waving about his “bible”, Hayek’s “Constitution of Liberty” and quoting from its last chapter, “Why I am not a conservative?”. That was the book, incidentally, Margaret Thatcher is supposed to have pulled out of her bag when, as a newly elected leader of the Conservative Party, she met her policy wonks at Central Office. Dissatisfied with their waffling, she reached into her bag, took out the book and slammed it on the table with the words: “This is what we believe in”. I am surprised nobody asked her what she meant by “we”.

Hayek[i-Hayek]Anyway, Hayek’s words explain perfectly why a free society is preferable to the alternative and why looking for utopian solutions with super-intelligent and super-moral philosopher-kings is not the answer.

The main merit of the individualism which Adam Smith and his contemporaries advocated is that it is a system under which bad men can do least harm. It is a social system which does not depend for its functioning on our finding good men for running it, or all men becoming better than they are, but which makes use of men in all their given variety and complexities, sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes intelligent, more often stupid.

There you have the answer to all that wailing and gnashing of teeth. No, politicians are no better than we are; they were never better; and they never will be better. They reflect society as it is. Therefore, we must have a political system in which they can do as little harm as possible. All else is a mirage.

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Edmund+Burke[i-Edmund+Burke]Who could deny that Edmund Burke was a politician of integrity and principle? Well, actually, quite a lot of people do, his personality being capable of exciting screams of frustration 210 years after his death.

Nevertheless, his words, quoted in the posting seem a good discussion point when trying to resolve that vexing question: what is a politician of principle and do we really want them?

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Time for a rant, methinks, and a move away from toys of both real and alternative kinds. Only temporarily, of course, as this blog cannot stay away from toys for very long.

As this is a very pugnacious blog with rottweiler-like readers, it is time to ask ourselves, what it is we are fighting for? Not against, but for. (All flip and silly comments along the lines of "well I know what I am fighting for and I do not need to define it" will be ignored as unworthy of interest.)

So, let the debate begin. Here is the opening (prolonged) salvo.

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POL+-+Merkel+079[i-POL+-+Merkel+079]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.

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Herzog[i-Herzog]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.

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Barroso+002[i-Barroso+002]Not us, guv... the words come from our old friend, el presidente José Manuel Barroso. He has told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper that the abortive EU constitution does not have any chance of coming into effect – a more or less direct attack on the obsessive navel-gazing of the colleagues.

All that can be salvaged from it are "its values, principles and substance", says the commission president. He believes that the German presidency could take "important steps" quickly to improve the union's ability to make decisions but when it comes to the Angela Merkel's much touted ambition to resurrect the constitution, Barroso is blunt.

I give you an honest answer, he says. The EU constitution in its current form will not come into effect. "We should not fool ourselves. It's important now to maintain its values, its principles and its substance. Above all, we have to improve the decision-making mechanism, and we need to do that as quickly as possible."

This will not, of course, stop media speculation about Merkel’s intentions. If a little thing like the German constitutional court can’t do that, then the words of the commission president are hardly likely to do it.

The fact remains, though, that it has become a recent tradition for incoming presidencies to "talk up" the constitution, only to slide out six months later with the Community no further forward.

link[i-link]Thus did we have the Austrian presidency in 2005, with chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel spelling out Austria's ambition to "breath back some life" into the constitution. Remember his "Sound of Europe"? And before that, Schuessel was saying: "We have promised ourselves that we will restart the negotiations on the constitution," only to pass on the baton to the UK and thence to Finland.

For once, therefore, this blog and the commission president are at one. Much as we would like it to be otherwise – with the opportunity for a referendum that it affords - there is going to be no EU constitution. Take it from the horse's mouth."

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Gaza%20crowd[i-Gaza%20crowd]Sometimes it is difficult to tell whether it is real, or just a false perception, reflecting your own prejudices and sensibilities. But the recent theme of this blog that the European Union is a failed, decaying political construct does seem to have some substance.

Read for instance, this extract from a recent Reuters report concerning developments in Gaza:

Gunmen fired two mortar bombs at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's office in Gaza on Sunday, wounding at least five members of his personal guard as tensions with the ruling Hamas movement threatened to boil over.

Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar, a senior Hamas leader, accused Abbas's forces of attempting a "military coup" in Gaza after they overran two ministries under the control of the Islamists.

Zahar demanded the security men leave the ministries or else be arrested, a move that could provoke further violence. "What is happening is a real military coup, assassinations, attempted assassinations, the occupation of headquarters and ministries," Zahar told a news conference.

Now read an extract from this report from EU Observer, headed: "Chirac suggests bell to cut off 'endless' summit talks". It begins:

EC%20meeting[i-EC%20meeting]Boredom with seemingly endless EU summit discussions ran high on Friday, with French president Jacques Chirac suggesting to Germany's chancellor Angela Merkel that she use a "bell" to limit leaders' speaking time during her upcoming EU presidency.

Several EU leaders on Friday complained about the gruelling so-called tours de table which sees every member of the 25 - and soon 27 member - union have a say on the final wording of the summit conclusions.

A bullish president Chirac told journalists after the meeting that he had given chancellor Merkel, who will from January chair the EU for six months, small "advice" to "limit the speaking time of everyone to three minutes." "It is impossible for the council [EU leaders' meetings] that we speak endlessly while always saying the same," he said.

Blair%20helio[i-Blair%20helio]In my view, there are just too many threads coming together for this blog's thesis to be ignored. When, with so much going on in the world, leaders of the EU member states find their own creation "boring", we know it can only be a matter of time before the construct crashes and burns.

For sure, the EU is a huge apparatus, staffed by thousands of rent-seekers and supported by a massive salariat which depends for its position and influence on EU action. But readers may recall that in September we wrote a piece about how even the bureaucrats were complaining about the bureaucracy. Now their bosses are also complaining.

Looking at the "action man" picture above, showing Blair leaving Baghdad yesterday for Basra, to address "his" troops, you can quite see why he wanted to get away. Let's face it, being boss of your own country is so much more fun.

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Zap%20Junck[i-Zap%20Junck]Something we didn't pick up from the general media is a report on an English language Spanish site which headlines a piece: "EU summit on the European Constitution set for Madrid in January".

We are told that, at the "European Summit" (i.e., Council) on Friday, Spain and Luxembourg announced a joint initiative to try to recover the idea of a European Constitution. The prime ministers announced a new EU summit between the 18 countries which have already ratified the document, to be held in Madrid on 26 January.

These were Spanish prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and the failure of Luxembourg, Jean-Claude Juncker, the man whose one aim in life is to see his bébé come out of intensive care.

How instructive it is, though, that Blair, immediately following the European Council, jetted off to Egypt – with a brief stop-over in Turkey - in a bid to resolve the growing Mid-East crisis. He went not as a plenipotentiary of the EU, nor as one of an EU "troika" or whatever other grouping they tend to go for. He went as Tony Blair, prime minister of the United Kingdom.

erdogan-blair_b[i-erdogan-blair_b]Furthermore, how interesting it is was, while in Turkey, Blair met his counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan and talked not of Turkey's (failing) bid to enter the EU but of how to revive peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians (not that that is possible if the latter are determined to rip themselves apart in a civil war).

Thus do the "little Europeans" condemn themselves. With their obsessive navel-gazing, they are not only boring us all to death but highlighting the pathetic vacuity of their agenda and their irrelevance as world players.

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