Oct 19 2007
Brown betrays Britain
In the end the British Prime Minister not only gave in over the large surrender of power to Brussels, but spent time trying to persuade the Italians to give in as well so the Treaty could be signed.
We now know all those Eurosceptic noises and briefings whilst Blair was still PM did not mean a thing. No wonder the Murdoch press is livid with Brown - he soon forgot his Eurosceptic clothes when invited to join the synchronised swimming in the Lisbon pool.
The PM’s calculation is he can make out that this is all very boring and technical, grinding people down in the detail of the legislation in Parliament, whislt telling electors that he wants to get on with the "real agenda" and the "vision", whatever they may be.
The surrender of so many vetoes means many more things where we will have to do what Brussels wants. More and more the UK Parliament becomse a rubber stamp to push through the consequences of Directives we never wanted and may even have voted against.
Norman Tebbitt, Bill Cash, Ruth Lea and I shared a platform yesterday to urge a referendum on the government. They have broken their promise badly. This will do lasting damage to the PM, undermining his stated wish to restore faith in politics and to listen to what the public wants. It will also do more lasting damage to Lib Dems, unless they wake up to the public demand for a referendum and use their votes with the Conservatives and Labour rebels in the Commons to try to secure one. It will be the first test of Mr Clegg.
John Redwood has been the Member of Parliament for Wokingham since 1987. First attending Kent College, Canterbury, he graduated from Magdalen College...
Now that we have moved one step closer to a Soviet style superstate, do you think MPs will be given a free vote on the EU treaty(sic)?
In keeping with recent events and statements relating to the cancelled election that Mr Brown believes he would have won, will Mr Brown not call a referendum because he believes he would win that too?
Reply: no chance of free votes. Doubtless in Mr Brown’s parallel universe he thinks he could win a referendum!
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Unfortunately they do have a point when they say that the Thatcher and Major didn’t offer us referendums.
The question of whether this particular treaty hands over a lot or a little of our sovereignty is something of a moot point. The fact is that it’s yet another step in the inexorable insidious creep of the EU. We have to have a referendum sometime so it may as well be now.
Brown should stand by his manifesto pledge, and his pledge to the British people on becoming leader to ‘listen to the people’.
Reply: Thatcher only gave away 14 vetoes - compared to Labour’s 150. Major did not offer a referendum on Maastricht because we had a clear and effective opt out from the main point, the single currency. I resigned from his governemnt partly to make the case that we should never enter the Euro - i.e. make permanent our use of the opt out. There is no such effective device against the EU’s power grab under this latest Treaty. More importantly, the Tories did not offer a refernedum on a Treaty before an election - in order to neutralise the issue - and then rescind the offer once they had won!
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Brown has probably calculated that it’s now very unlikely that he’ll win the next general election. His strategy therefore is to suck up to all the other European leaders in the hope that they’ll offer him a nice job following his eventual dismissal by both the British electorate & his own party.
He must know that he’s disgraced himself on this side of The English Channel, but fortunately for him there are always lots of juicy sinecures to be had on the other side.
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Commissar Brown has confirmed (if any confirmation were necessary) that he is a mendacious leader whose words have no credibility other than to confirm that he believes the British people are a bunch of fools. He is not interested in restoring faith in politics or in listening to any other opinion than his own. We were warned by various former Labour cabinet ministers of his methods before he became Prime Minister. He is not worthy of any form of political office and must be opposed with the utmost rigour.
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