Apologies - You got missed out! Christina
Caroline Jackson has suffered from a lack of credibility ever since her husband, then an MP, defected to Labour.
However, and despite the protestations of the europhiles, every opinion poll, including those undertaken by the EU itself, shows a profound distrust amongst the British people for the EU amounting in many cases to outright dislike.
Conservative voters are completely in line with this view.
It was crazy of the party to have allowed all those eurofanatical MEPs 'safe passage' back to their well-paid posts in Brussels. It has bred cynicism amongst those who would otherwise have been keen supporters
Mrs Jackson is going but the poison she spreads around the party lingers on. How long before she joins her husband in the Labour Party?
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CONSERVATIVEHOME Blog 18.2.08 Euroscepticism is "a very nasty patch of poisonous fungus" on David Cameron's blue-green tree
That's the view of Caroline Jackson in today's Financial Times:
"Opinion polls show that the Conservative party has a strong chance of winning the next UK election. On all main domestic issues, David Cameron, the party leader, has persuaded it to adopt policies that appeal to a wider constituency. At home, it is no longer seen, in the immortal words of a former party chairman, as "the nasty party". But the change is not complete. In the shade of the blue- green tree (the party's emblem), a very nasty patch of poisonous fungus lingers on: it is Europe - and Mr Cameron now needs to address it because it could threaten the future success of his project. On Europe, the party has received no encouragement to move on from the negative mood of the Thatcher era. While calls for Britain to leave the European Union altogether are still confined to an eccentric minority of Tory peers, MPs and MEPs, most exhibit a mood of exasperation and hostility towards the EU. Party activists tend to be EU-allergic."
Mrs Jackson's piece follows an article she wrote at the start of this month for The Guardian's Comment is Free website in which she attacked anti-European dogmatists in the Conservative party for embarrassing David Cameron. She calls for David Cameron to take action against Dan Hannan for his well-publicised criticisms of European parliamentary procedeures. Many will think that her attacks on mainstream Conservative opinion are more worthy of discipline.
Mrs Jackson is a principled Europhile and is retiring at the next European elections. Most members will be glad to see her go but many of the party's other MEPs hold similar views to her. One- third to one-half of the current group of MEPs want to remain within the EPP. Perhaps only a quarter or third of our Brussels delegation actively support building an opposition within the Parliament to the EU's grand ambitions.
The scandal is not Mrs Jackson's views - disappointing as they are. The scandal is the fact that ordinary members have been excluded from the process that has put all sitting Tory MEPs back at the top of the lists which determine prospects of re-election. David Cameron wanted to avoid the short-term pain of Eurosceptic members deselecting sitting Europhile MEPs. The long-term result, however, is the perpetuation of a bloc of MEPs who hold Mrs Jackson's worldview.
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SOME EXTRACTS FROM READERS' COMMENTS ----
===If Mrs Jackson wants the Conservative Party to win the next election she should do us the favour of keeping her views to herself. She would do well to recognise that she and the minority of MEP's in the Conservative party are just that, a minority who are out of tune with the country as a whole. Those of us working at the grass roots level know which way the wind is blowing and what the voters feel on Europe. For the avoidance of doubt, they are sick fed up to the back teeth of being dictated to by European Union, and given the choice would probably vote to leave.
===Fascinating how these Europhils resort immediately to the most vitriolic name calling. We're fungus, apparently. Well at least we have arguments above and beyond mere name calling. Not bad for a mushroom. And as for "poison" - that's clearly clearly Caroline Jackson's department.
===For this MEP to equate decent Euroscepticism - which in essence is a strong Conservative distaste for big un-accountable Government
(whether it be the from Gordon Brown, or Brussels - with 'nastiness' from Tory activists is very disappointing. Why is it that some Europhiles can never make the argument for what they believe in and instead resort to abuse?
==="a very nasty patch of poisonous fungus...called Europe". Yup, she's got that right. Thanks to the likes of Dr Jackson people such as me, while staying uber-loyal to the Conservative Party domestically, take a slightly different view Europically.
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