...And so it creeps, bit by bit - "salami" government by Brussels!
Daily Mail Sat 26th December.
Horrible to watch - and to think that nobody seems either capable or wanting to stop it!
Well, some of us do want to stop it!
The policy of whether to let MEPs sit in the House of Commons falls to Commons speaker John Bercow
Europe is making moves to give British MEPs the 'right' to sit in the House of Commons at certain times in the year.
The proposal is only at a nascent stage - that of a particularly nasty moth emerging from its pupa - but it represents a threat to the electoral purity of our sovereign parliament.
The policy at present falls into the lap of Commons Speaker John Bercow. He seems less than urgently gripped by the danger, something his rival Nigel Farage of Ukip is quick to decry.
The Europeans' idea is, on the face of it, not unreasonable. They reckon that MEPs probably know more than most of us about European legislation (fair comment) and think they should therefore help the Commons scrutinise laws emerging from Brussels.
This could be done by them helping the Commons select committee on European scrutiny.
Here one hits an awkward principle. Should Commons parliamentary scrutiny not be the preserve of elected parliamentarians? Once you start to unpick that, the whole notion of parliamentary sovereignty could disintegrate.
This cunning plan, as Baldrick might put it, was on the agenda at a Swedish gathering of speakers of Europe's various national assemblies.
It went further than what I have just outlined. It proposed, furthermore, that MEPs should have 'the right to be invited once a year to speak in plenary sittings of national parliaments'.
In plain English, this means giving MEPs the right to sit on the green leather benches of the Commons Chamber.
The proposal-was issued under the name of the president of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, and was discussed in Stockholm at an EU Speakers' Conference on Friday, December 11, and Saturday, December 12.
Speaker Bercow did not attend the meeting because it 'clashed with parliamentary business' (actually, the Commons did not sit on either of those days). Instead, he sent along the Deputy Speaker, Sir Alan Haselhurst.
Sir Alan confirms that the proposal was on the agenda. He says he did his best to play a dead bat. But the matter is unlikely to rest there. It will be discussed next in Madrid at a conference in early May, quite possibly clashing with our general election.
Ukip, whose Mr Farage hopes to beat Mr Bercow in Buckingham at that election, employs heavy irony in praising 'the robust defence of our parliamentary sovereignty by the Speaker's office'.
Mr Farage adds: 'It had ruddy better not fly, this proposal. Ukip will shoot it down if it does. Those whose job it is to guard our rights in Westminster seem to be sleepwalking into oblivion.'
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