EU politics: Cameron – a "little European"
Monday 10 June 2013
 The prime minister is arguing that the national interest requires the UK to be represented at the highest level in a multiplicity of international organisations, i.e., at the "top table". And to that effect he asserts that part of his international ambitions for the UK "is our place at the top table. At the UN. The Commonwealth. NATO. The WTO. The G8. The G20 and yes - the EU". Now, from that, there can be only one of two conclusions. Either the prime minister is colossally ignorant of the way the world works, or – a more cynical interpretation – he believes that we are totally ignorant and he can hoodwink us with deliberate untruths - aka lies. For the prime minister to assert that the UK can be at the "top table" of both the EU and the WTO, for instance, is to say that one or other of those conclusions must be the case. For even the meanest of us knows that, within the EU, trade policy is an exclusive competence of the commission. When it comes to dealing with the WTO, the framework for negotiations is decided at EU level by consensus, and we are then represented at the WTO "top table" by the European Commission. It is thus the case that membership of the EU gives us access to the "top tables" of EU institutions, but the very fact of our membership excludes us from the WTO top table. We can sit at one, or the other, but not both. Furthermore, this is repeated across the board. When it comes to the UN – and its many subsidiary bodies – even where the EU is not directly represented as of right (and in an increasing number of cases it is), we agree to be bound by a pre-agreed "common position" and do not represent our own national interests. But increasingly, we are not even represented on international bodies. For instance, as we pointed out earlier, when it comes to the World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations, we have no direct membership and our interests are represented exclusively by the European Commission. Similarly, on the vital North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission, which jointly manages the fisheries in the region, the UK interest is represented by the European Commission, and we are not even parties to the enabling treaty, the EU having taken over our seat. Thus, Mr Cameron simply should be asserting that we can hold "top table" positions in a range of international organisations – in many instances, it is a question of "either or". If he is doing so out of ignorance, then it is a terrifying prospect to have a prime minister who does not know such things. If he is seeking to hoodwink us, that is deeply insulting. But that makes him either a fool or a liar, and I don't know which is more objectionable. Of course, a case could be made that, by assuming the "top table" position in the EU is worth the sacrifice of reduced direct representation in other organisations, such as the WTO. This is not one with which I would agree, but the case can be made. But Mr Cameron is not making that case. He is advancing an argument which is deeply flawed and, if advanced knowingly, would be fundamentally dishonest. Upon this, though, Mr Cameron builds his case further, stating: My argument – and the argument of this government – is that to succeed, it's no use just hiding away from the world; we've got to roll our sleeves up and compete in it. And it's no use just giving in to the world – we've got to be unashamedly bold and hard-headed about pursuing our national interests.With that, he rejects the "Little Englander" approach, arguing that he is "ambitious about pursuing our national interest and standing up for our values". But, in seeking the claustrophobic embrace of the EU, he is in fact demonstrating that he is something far worse – a narrow "little European". COMMENT THREAD Richard North 10/06/2013 |
Immigration: Swiss vote for tougher rules
Monday 10 June 2013
 This we flagged up on 1 June and the results are now being widely reported, in the German mediaand elsewhere - everywhere except the British press. As it stands, the Swiss people have approved a toughening up of the law, with 78.4 percent of those who voted accepting the proposition. This a regarded as a "sharp defeat" for NGOs and political left who have said it the new rules are too restrictive, and have been campaigning hard against "exclusion and xenophobia". Despite that, the changes are fairly modest. As well as stripping benefit rights from asylum-seekers convicted of criminal behaviour, they remove from the grounds on which asylum can be claimed, refusal of military service. Asylum seekers will also have to present themselves at the Swiss border instead of, as at present, being able to request asylum from Swiss embassies in other countries. There is also provision for national centres for processing asylum-seekers, as well as for sites housing those considered to be troublemakers. Asylum-seeking has been on the increase since 1999, since the Kosovo war, but as numbers have increased, the majority of applicants are coming from from Eritrea, Nigeria, Tunisia, Serbia and Afghanistan. More than 28,000 applications were recorded last year, a record since 2002, and the total awaiting processing stands at about 48,000. However, it has to be said that the issue has not sparked a string debate and the turnout is recorded at a mere 38.9 percent, giving a mandate for the proposition of only about 30 percent. One assumes that the non-voters were content to see the widely expected positive result to prevail. The most recent poll in late May showed 57 percent in favour of tougher asylum rules. Given the concern expressed about immigration throughout Europe, though, the Swiss result is a startling demonstration of people power, and contrasts sharply with the apparent inability of EU member state governments to determine their own immigration policies. One might have thought, therefore, that the British – supposedly eurosceptic – media might want to highlight an example if what happens when people are free to make their own rules. But, in this case, even the BBC – which did recently highlight tightened controls on EU migrants to Switzerland – has been silent. In fact, the BBC and others are devoting their resources to retailing complaints about "new visa rules" which, says the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Migration in a new report, are "tearing British families apart". The Labour MP Virendra Sharma, who was born in India, said: "The Government has set the bar for family migration too high, in pursuit of lower net migration levels. These new rules are keeping hard-working, ordinary families apart. I, and others like me, would not have been able to come to the UK to join my family if these rules had been in place then. Today we are calling on the Government to think again". This is the MP for Southall, where immigrant camps are being set up in abject squalor, and Mr Sharma thinks that rules that would have kept him and many like him out of the country are a bad thing? Nevertheless, the report's findings were also welcomed by the Migrants' Rights Network, giving Ruth Grove-White, its policy director, a platform to emote about foreigners being excluded from the UK. But of settled people's rights, on the basis of the Swiss model, comment there is none. COMMENT THREAD Richard North 10/06/2013 |
EU politics: the Single European Sky fails to deliver
Monday 10 June 2013
 Achieving performance targets to increase European airspace capacity and cut costs go to the heart of the Single European Sky (SES), says the Commission. They are vital for its entire success, and the success of the performance scheme will depend on the level of ambition of EU-wide targets for the second reference period which will run from 2015 until 2019. Overall, the Commission has a point. The inefficiencies caused by Europe's fragmented airspace bring extra costs of close to €5 billion each year. They adds 25 miles to the distance of an average flight, forcing aircraft to burn more fuel. And be comparison, the United States controls the same amount of airspace, with more traffic, at almost half the cost. But, while this is the very sort of thing that Mr Cameron might laud as a perfect example of why we need this wondrous construct called the European Union, French unions are very far from impressed. Having leaned of the new performance targets, they have decided to stage a three-day strike for this week. The union action will coincide with the next phase of the European Commission plans, scheduled for Tuesday, when the Single European Sky (SES) II+ package of measures is announced. The European Transport Workers' Federation (ETF) had already announced that that air traffic management employees will mobilise for a European Action Day on 12 June to demand the establishment of a fair, cooperative and social SES and to "stop a never-ending process of liberalisation, deregulation and cost-cutting in the ATM industry". And there we have the dagger poised at the heart of the European experiment. In October last yearvice-president Siim Kallas, European Commissioner for transport was complaining that, after ten years, the SES was still "not delivering". The core problems, he said, remained the same: too little capacity generating the potential for a negative impact on safety at too high a price. "There are some signs of change", he added, "but overall progress is too slow and too limited. We need to think of other solutions and apply them quickly. There is too much national fragmentation. Promised improvements have not materialised". Yet, whenever it comes to delivering on its plans, the EU always fails. It is great at bullying Britain, and forcing member states to comply with whatever comes out of Brussels, but whenever the shoe is on the other foot, and Brussels has to deliver, nothing serious ever gets done. But then, trying to get the liberal "free-market" British to cosy up with the dirigiste French and the rule-bound Germans, together with the anarchic Belgians, all with the corrupt Greeks, the Italian jokers and the rest, always was a crazy idea. At least though, there is some small comfort for any eurosceptics trying to fly to or over France in the next few days. They can blame the delays and disruption on the EU and ruminate that this is how it is always going to be when the EU tries to run the show. COMMENT THREAD Richard North 10/06/2013 |
Climate change: the trougher trapped?
Sunday 9 June 2013
 Tim Yeo, a man already under fire, told undercover reporters — posing as representatives of a firm offering to hire him — that he was close to "really all the key players in the UK in government" and could introduce them to "almost everyone you needed to get hold of in this country". Smashing through the paywall, the Daily Mail gives in-depth treatment to the story, while the BBCalso airs some of the incriminating video – and what a truly repulsive individual Yeo shows himself to be. He was filmed revealing how he had advised John Smith, managing director of GB Railfreight, before the executive gave evidence to the committee last month. Yeo is a paid director and shareholder of Eurotunnel — the firm's parent company. Yeo publicly excused himself from asking questions because of the conflict of interest. However, he did not tell his fellow MPs that he had coached the executive. "I was able to tell him in advance what he should say", Yeo confided to the reporters. The former environment minister has earned about £530,000 from private firms since taking over the committee in 2010, and has shares and options worth about £585,000 in "low-carbon" companies that have employed him. Yeo, while denying allegations (all of the) has referred himself to the Parliamentary standards commissioner, and an investigation will follow. One hopes then that some light will be shed on the murky world of parliamentary select committees, where it is all to easy (and common) to rig the evidence to achieve a desired result. Apart from anything else, MPs really need to take a hard look at select committee chairmen - who get paid an extra £20,000 a year for their efforts – and whether they should be permitted to take fees from external interests where there is clearly potential for conflict of interest. At the very least, Yeo demonstrates quite how easy it is to circumvent the spirit of the rules. He toldSunday Tines journalists that he could not speak out for clients publicly in the Commons because "people will say he's saying this because of his commercial interest". But he assured them: "What I say to people in private is another matter altogether". The journalists had approached Yeo posing as representatives of a solar energy company offering to hire him as a paid advocate to push for new laws to boost its business for a fee of £7,000 a day. He told them he could commit to at least one day a month, despite the fact that he already held four private jobs and was in negotiations to take a further two. Setting out what he could offer, the MP said: "If you want to meet the right people, I can facilitate all those introductions and I can use the knowledge I get from what is quite an active network of connections". Asked if that extended to government figures, Yeo replied: "Yes". The House of Commons code of conduct forbids members from acting as paid advocates, including by lobbying ministers. Those who know how politics works are conscious that access to people in power is half the battle. It is for access to the private (some might say secret) network of influence for which commercial companies are prepared to pay real money. And it is that in which Yeo is trading, to his own considerable profit. Arguably, the whole select committee system needs to be cleaned out – including removing ex-ministers from chairmanships – their own roles often being to block investigations into matters for which they have been previously held responsibility. If parliament is to carry out even a halfway effective scrutiny role, the select committees themselves must be above reproach, and they must be accessible to all when it comes to presenting evidence and having it heard. As long as there a people such as "trougher" Yeo around, that clearly is not the case. COMMENT THREAD Richard North 09/06/2013 |
Monday, 10 June 2013
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