So do they really take us for total fools, with all their faux huffing and puffing over the EU foreign service? Surely it can’t be the case that they actually believe the nonsense they have been telling us about ‘repatriating’ British powers from the grasp of the EU? What’s more alarming in a politician– shameless dishonesty or rank stupidity? Fancy! The Times (£) reports that Foreign Secretary William Hague has ordered British ambassadors around the world to fight off what he believes are attempts by the EU foreign service to usurp their positions: David Lidington, the Europe Minister, made no secret of Mr Hague’s suspicion of the ambitions of Lady Ashton’s External Action Service (EAS) in a briefing in Brussels yesterday. ‘We see some evidence of EU delegations in particular parts of the world where they try to push for an enhanced leadership role,’ Mr Lidington said. ‘William has sent out instructions to all our posts around the world to be vigilant about any risk of competence creep. It is things like an EU delegation assuming and asserting that it has the right to speak on behalf of member states. ‘There is a pressure from some parts of the EU machine to push competence and we are very keen to make sure it is pushed back and clear lines are drawn.’ ‘Competence creep’? Seeing ‘some evidence’ of EU delegations pushing for ‘an enhanced leadership role’? ‘Vigilance’ to make sure this is ‘pushed back’? What’s with the surprise all of a sudden? The thermonuclear row over the Lisbon Treaty, which enshrined the EU constitution and thus effectively created the EU Superstate of Bureaucratiya, was all about the fact that henceforth the EU would indeed speak on behalf of member states through its foreign service – indeed, that it would usurp virtually every self-governing function of Britain and other EU member states. The whole point about the Lisbon Treaty was that it would finally destroy Britain as an independently governed country. That was why, when they were in opposition, the Cameroons promised a referendum on that treaty, only to fall strangely silent once it was signed. It is now clear to all that, having issued apocalyptic warnings that the EU would destroy what remained of British sovereignty, the Cameroons have absolutely no intention of restoring that sovereignty – because that inescapably means leaving the EU (unless it collapses under the weight of its own contradictions). Which they will not countenance. As a result, disillusioned voters can all see that on the EU (as on the unrelated but similarly neuralgic issue of the destruction of English justice and democracy by human rights law) the Cameroons are all mouth and no trousers. So do they really take us for total fools, with all their faux huffing and puffing over the EU foreign service? Surely it can’t be the case that they actually believe the nonsense they have been telling us about ‘repatriating’ British powers from the grasp of the EU? What’s more alarming in a politician– shameless dishonesty or rank stupidity? 
Creeping competencies,
or incompetent creeps?
Tuesday, 24 May 2011
Apparently the British government is shocked –shocked! – that the European Union’s foreign service is attempting to usurp the role and authority of British diplomats.
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