Once again we see misinformation and downright lies being used to advance the cause of UK membership of the EU.

Firstly, one of the presenters of the BBC's 'Today' programmme asserted that the reason why 58 people died on the Dover bound lorry was that "the UK had not signed up to the Schengen Agreement". This is an outrageous claim and completely flies in the face of the facts.

Irrespective of the UK being a member of Schengen, the Belgium police released the refugees without escorting them back to whence they came. The refugees could have then, BECAUSE Belgium, France, Germany etc. are signatories to the Schengen Agreement, roamed freely without any form of checks at each successive Schengen border. If they had chosen to remain within a Schengen country, they would however had run the risk of spot ID checks as this is the method by which Schengen signatories control illegal immigrants.

As the UK does not have a concept of spot checks for ID like the Schengen countries, clearly irrespective of the motive for coming to the UK, they would only run the one-off risk of a spot check at Dover, rather than a continuing threat of detection. In all likelihood therefore, they would escape detection for a greater period of time by coming to the UK, than if they remained on the Continent.

All of this does not change the reason that the poor souls died. Their death was purely due to the unbearable temperatures and confined space combining together to determine their dreadful fate. If they had chosen to go to France or Spain or anywhere else within the Schengen agreement by the same or similar vehicle, their fate would have been undoubtedly the same. Indeed the very fact that we have border controls at all, probably saved the lives of 2 of the 60, a fact not acknowledged by the presenter on 'Today'.

For a BBC commentator to either incompetently or maliciously allege that the refugees' death was due to the UK not being a signatory to Schengen, is a travesty - not only of truth, but of their memory, and determination to find a better life. It deserves nothing less than a full apology from the BBC, both for inaccuracy and insensitivity.

Secondly, in Chris Patten's interview for the 'On The Record' programme, he is quoted as saying: "I think sooner or later those of us who believe passionately in Britain's role in Europe are going to have to confront the arguments, confront the hostility and take it on as vigorously as possible".

Is he including himself amongst these true believers? If so, can this be the same Chris Patten who recently allowed it to be widely publicised that he is bored to death by his job as a European Commissioner and that he is 'counting the hours' until his period of office is over. Obviously, he is really passionate about 'Europe'!

Judging by recent refusals to take part in both a 'Today' programme discussion with Lord Lamont of Lerwick and a Sky News panel discussion with Lord Stoddart of Swindon, his fellow passionates Messrs Heseltine, Brittan and Clarke et al are as yet unwilling to take up the challenge. Do they lack the courage of their presumed convictions? Or are they simply following Mr Blair's tactics of trying to stifle open debate by refusing to take part in any such discussion?

27/06/2000

In the Government's half-yearly report on developments in the EU we are told that in the last 6 months, 22 areas of Government policy have been transferred, either wholly or partly, to Brussels, 62 judgements of the European Court of Justice have determined or altered British law and that of the 15 treaties which have been entered into on behalf of this country, none have been ratified by Parliament.

If that is not enough, the House of Lords concluded this week that the EU can impose VAT on toll bridge crossings and the EU confirmed plans to establish its own police force to enforce EU law.

Oblivious to all this, Robin Cook said yesterday that the British Government was always "being the back-seat driver complaining about the direction in which those in charge [of the EU Council of Ministers] were going, but never determining it."

Does that now mean that this Labour Government will acquiesce to this total emasculation of Parliament and be a tame passenger on the journey toward a single state of Europe? Or does it mean that Robin Cook on behalf of this Government will now extend his damascene conversion to the euro and lead the europhilic call for Britain to become a mere province within a single state of the EU?

The EU's dupes within the business community continue to make fools of themselves. At one time inept British managements used trade union activity as the excuse for the poor performance of their companies. Following the emasculation of the union movement by Margaret Thatcher they know that this particular lie will no longer work, so they have seized upon the weakness of the euro (or the strength of the pound as they prefer to call it) as a whipping boy for their own failures. Ignoring the fact that German businesses never seemed to suffer from the mighty mark, and that US companies can handle the dominance of the dollar, these incompetents whine continually about the pound-euro exchange rate, while continuing to run their organisations in the same hopeless manner they have always employed. We would indeed be fools to throw away our freedoms in order to meet the complaints emanating from these perpetual losers. There are many British companies who are succeeding in the real world and who know that to attempt to fix the markets is a policy doomed to failure.

18/06/2000

As usual we have been treated this week to more idiocy from those who are determined to submerge this country in a federal superstate.

The first of the usual suspects is Chris Patten. Jonathan Collett reports the following:

Chris Patten has urged the European Commission to seize back control of foreign policy he claims it has lost to member governments. The former Hong Kong Governor and Tory minister, now European External Affairs Commissioner, has produced a report that highlights the divided house that the European Union has become in foreign policy-making.

It reflects a sense of dismay at the EC that national governments involve themselves too much in the day-to-day running of the union - a job the EU treaty assigns to the 20-member European Commission. The paper was to be discussed at the EC's weekly meeting but a debate was put off because of a heavy agenda.

The document was not made public. However, officials said, it listed measures to enable the EU head office to assert itself more and reclaim the role as engine of European integration. One official said Patten complained that the EU governments effectively sideline the European Commission in foreign policy issues. "Patten tells his colleagues that foreign policy is a key priority for the Commission," said the official. "We are talking about modern, integrated foreign policy that includes areas such as, yes, security and defence but also trade, environment, financial assistance, economic rebuilding." While EU governments take on a bigger role in European defence, they fully exclude the Commission though the EU treaty says the latter must be "fully associated" in such an enterprise, said the EU official.

So once again Patten, a man who was rejected by the voters at the 1992 General Election, and who has not stood for any elected position since, wants more power given to him and his fellow commissioners. He is the archetype of the modern Europhile; first appointed to the Governorship of Hong Kong, then appointed to the European Commission; they desire to rule without accountability and that is what the European Union is designed to provide. As the superstate develops so we will see more of politicians, such as Patten and Kinnock, who failed in domestic politics, acquiring power without the need to consider the wishes of the citizens of the countries they presume to control.

Proponents of UK membership of the European Union frequently present illogical arguments in support of their position, none more so than Leon Brittan in a recent letter to The Times when he maintains that, as the EU is a major trading partner of Britain we must sacrifice our political independence in order to 'influence the rules'. The UK also trades mightily with the USA and hopes in future to do the same with China but does anyone in their right mind consider that we should therefore accept the Stars and Stripes as our flag, or that we should be embracing Marxism in order to have a say in the rules whereby the Chinese run their vast market. The changes in world trade patterns, particularly as a result of the Internet, imply that our largest markets will soon be outside Europe so perhaps Lord Brittan sees us switching political membership of supranational blocks in order to influence rules as it suits us.

As far as the OECD report that the British and Euroland economies are moving together is concerned one can only suppose that if they were presented with a snapshot of two children whose swings were level with each other, they would conclude that convergence had been achieved, regardless of the fact that, within an instant, divergence would take place, and increase thereafter. The fundamental differences between the UK economy and that of euroland ensure that any permanent stable relationship would require many years and unacceptable financial sacrifice on the part of the British people. The position at one fleeting moment must not be used as justification to throw away our national currency, and national independence.

We can rely upon the Europhiles to continue to produce these idiotic arguments for, as we are well aware, they all live on the other side of the looking glass!

10/06/2000

These days seem more and more like those of September 1938 when Halifax, Hore and Henderson were aiding Chamberlain in the final act of appeasement as Czechoslovakia was betrayed by its allies at Munich. Now however it is not the freedoms of the Czech people which are being given away, but our own, and this time we have no Churchill under whose leadership we will be able to redeem and save ourselves. The lament of John of Gaunt in Richard II has rarely been more apt than now "With inky blots, and rotten parchment bonds: That England, that was wont to conquer others, Hath made a shameful conquest of itself". We have no ambitions for conquest now but the European treaties which our shameful political class have signed, and are determined to sign, will destroy our nation more surely than did the Wars of the Roses.

Melanie Phillips, writing in the Sunday Times, in a devastating analysis of recent EU directives, points out that, for example, a hospice will no longer be able to refuse to employ a doctor who believes in euthanasia or that a Christian school will not be able to reject an atheist teacher. Indeed she sees the creation of no less than Orwell's 'thought-crime' and concludes that the real issue is the EU's threat to the power of nations to govern themselves, in a cultural climate that is fast eroding freedom of thought itself.

Perhaps even more alarming is a letter to the Times from Bernard Connolly, author of The Rotten Heart of Europe which deserves to be quoted in full:

Sir, You rightly argue that the proposed charter of fundamental rights of the European Union would weaken Europe-wide protection of human rights. But it would also, as stressed in recent House of Lords hearings, make the European Court of Justice the ultimate arbiter of political freedoms in our own country.

The evidence suggests that the EU court system interprets such freedoms in a way totally incompatible with either the common law or the existing European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). Thus a recent ruling of the Court of First Instance of the European Communities states that the right to free speech can be restricted by reference to "aims of general interest pursued by the Communities". The ruling extends this doctrine to all other freedoms, and to the right to property in particular. In other words, any policy adopted by the EU can justify restrictions on the exercise of free speech, of property rights and the right to join or vote for a political party of one's choice.

No legal system in any European country - with the exception of Serbia - so blatantly attacks both the principles of English common law and the fundamental purpose of the ECHR. Moreover, by ruling that the EU can legislate to restrict fundamental freedoms at all, the ruling massively extends the scope of the EU treaties, effectively according the EU the status of a state.

In addition, the ruling declares specifically that damaging the image or reputation of the community institutions - by telling the truth about their failings - provides sufficient justification for those institutions to restrict the exercise of free speech and the right to property. This aspect of the ruling will, if the charter is imposed on Britain, overturn the Common Law principle affirmed in 1993 by the House of Lords in Derbyshire County Council v Times Newspapers that 'It is of the highest public importance that a democratically elected governmental body, or indeed any governmental body, should be open to uninhibited public criticism'.

The implication is clear: to entrust the interpretation of political freedoms to a political body, the European Court of Justice, which has the creation of a European superstate as its overriding objective, would be to undermine the freedoms until now guaranteed in Britain by the Common Law".

In their last conversation, as the war clouds grew over Europe, Sherlock Holmes said to Watson "There's an east wind coming, such as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast. But it's God's own wind none the less, and a cleaner, better, stronger land will lie in the sunshine when the storm has cleared." We now face another wind from the east but this time, unless we fight back, and soon, it will destroy everything worthwhile about this nation, ending centuries of independence and democracy. Connolly and others are warning of the peril in which we stand - it is up to the people to heed those warnings!

07/06/2000

Once again we see proof that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. In what not doubt gullible people who believe themselves to be liberals see as a good idea the draft of the European bill of rights has come to the attention of the media. Once again the bureaucratic mindset of the those who direct the affairs of the European Union has produced a document which, if implemented, would undermine, not enhance, the freedoms of the peoples of Europe. Every time this sort of charter is imposed it transfers power from the people, exercised by their elected representatives, to judges and lawyers who make a fine living arguing over the legalistic language while natural law and justice is forgotten.

One particularly horrendous provision is that the burden of proof should be transferred from the complainant to the defendant in certain civil cases so that a totally innocent employer would be forced to prove his or her innocence if accused of discrimination. Anyone who would treat an individual unfairly because of their race, gender or whatever is beneath contempt but this proposal is a negation of one of the principles of the English Common Law, that one is presumed innocent and has to be proved guilty. Of course this principle will be completely destroyed if Corpus Juris is implemented so we should not be surprised that the EU seeks to undermine it now.

Such a change is the first step on a slippery slope that leads from the defendant being presumed guilty to the position where the accusation is enough, no defence being allowed. This was the basis for the Great Terror in France, when to be anonymously accused to the Committee of Public Safety meant the guillotine, and has been amply demonstrated by Stalin's Red terror, the Brown version unleashed by Hitler and those practised by Mao, Pol Pot and many other murderous dictators.

A new book Democracy in Europe points to the fact that the European Union is being built upon the lines of the French state, to the detriment of democracy. The Constitution of the Fifth Republic gives a decisive advantage to the executive over the legislature. Policy is shaped by interests that are well placed to influence the former, and formal checks and balances and publicity play little part. Power to the elite is the name of the game which is why it so appeals to politicians who seek to escape accountability to those they presume to rule.

Perhaps no greater exponent of this elitist game exists in the UK than Lord (Roy) Jenkins. This man, exuding self satisfaction and claret from every pore, is the model for all those who wish to be in politics because they believe they know best, and that the common herd must conform to their wishes, not that they should seek to serve the interests of the electorate. How such a person ever represented the old Labour party is a mystery and it is no surprise that the people's party became too distasteful to him so that he helped create the Social Democrat Party, another great success story! Yesterday he informed the annual conference of the European Movement that Tony Blair must argue for Britain's membership of the euro in order that a referendum on the issue can be won by the Europhiles. If the British people are so misguided as to listen to this man they will deserve to live in a state run, like France, where a few dispose and the majority have no choice but to accept. The arrogance of this sort of elitist is only exceeded by their stupidity.

It is noticeable that several of the major broadsheets are at last waking up to the fact that the EU is establishing a federal superstate by stealth (in the UK at least - everyone else knows that has always been the aim). To illustrate the supreme duplicity of our political class one can hardly do better than repeat the statement made in June 1947 by the 'Design for Freedom' committee, chaired by Peter Thorneycroft MP:

"It is as well to state this at the outset - no government dependent on a democratic vote could possibly agree in advance to the sacrifices which any adequate plan for European Union must involve. The people must be led slowly and unconsciously into the abandonment of their traditional economic defences, not asked, in advance of having received any of the benefits which will accrue to them from the plan, to make changes of which they may not at first recognize the advantage to themselves as well as to the rest of the world. No satisfactory economic plan for Europe can be devised without sacrifice of sovereignty by the nations concerned."

Is it any wonder that people regard politicians as untrustworthy?

04/06/2000

The latest news is not good for those who worship the European Union.

In Germany the leaders of the regional governments have threatened to refuse to ratify the next European Treaty if their demands for a retention of their powers are not met. Henning Scherf, the socialist Mayor of Bremen says "All 16 of us have sworn to do everything in our power to prevent Germany's federal structure from being dissolved by EU centralisation" while Edmund Stoiber, Bavarian state premier added "the Commission itself ought to have the greatest interest in the separation of powers otherwise the people will not accept the Commission's decisions". Individual states in Germany must approve all major treaties, laws and changes to the Constitution so there is no way the treaty could be signed without their approval, but whether they will have the resolution to defy the Europhiles remains to be seen.

The Scottish whisky distilleries are under threat from another of the EU's "one size fits all" directives, The European Water Framework Directive, which will seek to impose licensing and fees upon them for the use they make of water, hardly a commodity in short supply north of the border. In order to legislate for factories in central Europe the EU once again treats the entire continent as if there were no regional variations. Perhaps the Scottish Nationalists, who cling to the absurd fiction of an independent Scotland within Europe might like to explain this one!

Reports from Ireland own central bank reveal an economy at full stretch, with "excessive" house price increases and an "unprecedented" growth in private sector credit. The governor of the central bank says "We are probably more exposed than most (to the Euro's weakness) because of our relationship with Britain and the US". Of course, this is no more than Eurorealists warned would happen and Ireland's fate, when boom turns to bust, should be a warning to those who would push the UK into EMU.

A new book The Degeneration of EMU by an Oxford historian and a Boston economist, examines the results of applying generational accounting to the European project. In order that the as yet unborn pay roughly the same in tax as do we all members of euroland will have to choose between increases in taxes unprecedented in peacetime or truly dramatic government spending cuts. The problems are so great that the authors foresee the total break-up of euroland within the next decade, the fate which has overtaken so many nations which sought to create a monetary union with others, without there being any fiscal basis for such. Indeed they predict that one or more countries may bolt for the exit before the British people are called upon to vote on the matter in a referendum. We can but hope!

Richard Perle, senior security adviser to George W Bush, and remembered as "The Prince of Darkness" from the Reagan era, has warned that the British government's support for an independent European Army and its defence pact with France threatens the UK's special relationship with the USA as the latter recognizes that France is hostile to the "Anglo-Saxons". Knowing how difficult it was for Churchill to coax the Americans into becoming involved with European affairs, even when we stood on the brink of disaster, it will be foolish indeed if we allow the Europhiles to destroy the links we have with the only world superpower, merely that they may be members of their cosy little club.

It appears that a trio of Cabinet ministers have formed an alliance to oppose Gordon Brown's position on the euro. While one might seek advice from Robin Cook on marital fidelity, from Peter Mandelson on working class culture and from Stephen Byers on the competent handling of matters such as BMW and Rover it would be unwise to rely upon their advice on the matter of the European Union. They are all fully paid up members of the pro EU political class and can be relied upon to put their self interest ahead of the interests of the British people.

The supermarket chains Sainsbury and Somerfield have decided to pre-empt the decision of the British people and to convert their shopping trolleys to accept euros as well as pounds. Michael Leach, general manager of the company involved, is quoted as saying "I think the euro will come into Britain whatever anybody says. These trolleys will last five or six years. I reckon the euro will be with us within that time span and it could be even sooner", while Tony Barber, general manager of the trolley maintenance company said "It is sound economics. This means that when the euro is introduced they don't have to change the mechanisms all over again". One does not know whether to amazed by the ignorance of these people or to be angered by their arrogance - probably both. They all talk as if the UK joining the euro was inevitable when anyone who knows anything of history is aware that only death is inevitable. Do they not remember that in the 1930s Fascism was regarded as the wave of the future, that in 1940 Britain's defeat was said to be certain and that until it collapsed the victory of Communism was declared to be inevitable. It is to be hoped that when, God willing, it becomes clear that we shall never join the euro, those who wasted resources in this way pay the price of their stupidity.

The European Central Bank has attacked Romano Prodi for his comments that a country could join the euro and then leave later, suggesting that perhaps he has placed his fortune in dollars. As noted elsewhere in this website Prodi is perhaps too honest to be the President of the European Commission as he previously suggested that Italy might be forced to abandon the single currency. The truth is he recognizes a dud economic policy when he sees one but is committed to it for political reasons.

The Home Office has admitted that a proposed EU directive could prevent the British government implementing its policy towards asylum seekers. Although this might be a good thing it is amusing to see the pro European Blairites falling foul of their beloved European Union.

The Brussels Broadcasting Corporation has axed an expose of waste in the European Union called The Enemy Within which was to have been part of a series names Desperately Seeking EUtopia. It was suspended by BBC2 after 12 of its 20 episodes were dropped, although it may show them later on BBC Knowledge, a digital channel with a small audience. The organisation that was a byword for truth during the dark days of the war is now no more than a lapdog of Brussels, determined to conceal the facts from the British people.

29/05/2000

The week began with Peter Mandelson, a leading light of the European Movement, declaring, surprise, surprise, that the UK must join the Euro, and ended with Italy's well known comedian Romano Prodi declaring that of course nations can join, and then leave, the single currency, despite the fact that the rules of the organisation he supposedly heads deny any such right, quite apart from the practical problems of such a course of action. Does one believe that the UK, for example, would get back its gold reserves from Frankfurt, short of using the SAS to do so?

Far more sensible than the offerings from either of the aforementioned clowns was an article by Roger Bootle in the Times, in which he subjected Peter Mandelson's remarks to close analysis and exposed them as the nonsense they undoubtedly are. The main points he makes are:

• permanent fixity at a grossly inappropriate rate would be worse than almost any amount of instability

• constitutional issues are of far greater importance than concerns about the comparative advantage of manufacturing

• we are bound to be subject to substantial swings of the exchange rate and it is merely a question of which currency we swing against the most. In recent years sterling has been stable against the dollar but, had we joined the other lemmings last year, we would have lost 20% of value against the dollar

• people who claim that inside the euro we would enjoy a stable exchange rate are ignoring the dollar and the fact that we would almost certainly suffer greater fluctuations against the latter if we were inside the single currency

• although approximately 50% of visible trade is with euroland some 65% of our income form services and 60% of our investment income comes from outside the EU

• whereas our overall trade outside the EU is greater than within it this is not true for France, Italy and Germany so currency stability between the members of euroland matters far more to them than it does to us

• inward investment to the UK is 60% from outside the EU and our investment abroad is 70% outside the EU so it is the dollar rate which matters to us

However, of even greater moment than the points detailed above is the projection Bootle makes for the future. He points out that possibly the main reason why a great deal of our current account business is with the EU is the effect of geographical proximity, a factor that the shrinking world, and the nature of goods is gradually reducing to a minimal consideration. Even manufactured goods have to increasingly embody intangible components such as innovative design if they are to sell and all those things becoming available over the web such as software, films, music and education will have no transport costs. Given that the fastest economic growth is now to be found in Asia and Latin America it is likely that the share of the EU in Britain's overall trade is set to fall, even perhaps to plummet.

Rather like the Generals in the First World War who tried to fight with the methods of the 19th Century our political leaders are trying to shape our future based on a world that has passed them by. The geographical location of our trading partners will matter less and less in the next century and, as Bootle concludes, currency stability against the countries of euroland will be a paltry prize to have won if it implies greater instability against the rest of the world, where lies our future.

Of course our politicians will never be convinced by these arguments as they do not look upon the issue as an economic one but as a means of tying the UK into a federal state which they, and their fellow politicians from across the Channel, will run without the need to be accountable to the people. It is their own self interest which drives them , not the crocodile tears they shed for the interests of a minority of manufacturing companies.

27/05/2000

An excellent letter in today's Times makes such an unanswerable case for retaining the pound that it is well worth quoting here. The points made by the writer are:

• Barely 30 per cent of our GDP is exported. Of that, only 41 per cent goes to euroland afeter removal of "the Rotterdam effect" - goods shipped to Rotterdam for forwarding elsewhere in the world.

• Less than 3 per cent of all businesses in the UK have any dealings whatsoever with euroland, either importing or exporting.

• Most of out foreign trade is denominated in dollars, and most of our principal trading partners are in the Anglo-Saxon world - not Europe.

• The US and UK economies have broadly marched in step for years. They are based on a common commercial culture.

• We import far more from euroland than we export, and all those imports are now much cheaper as a result of the euro's weakness.

• The pound, like the dollar, is a petro-currency. The recent fall of the pound against the dollar has put up petrol prices at the pumps - but much less than if we had been converting to euros.

• Fuel prices in euroland have escalated catastrophically in recent months as the euro has slumped 20 per cent against the dollar. The higher costs of fuel and other imports particularly raw materials - are now seriously damaging euroland businesses, and they can do absolutely nothing about it.

What can one say but Exactly! The British people must ignore the siren voices of the political class and their cronies in the media who understand nothing of business and can only see the advantages to themselves from going ever deeper into the morass created by the corrupt club of the EU, caring nothing for the destructive effects on the British nation and her people.

Once again, in sharp contrast to the British political class, a senior EU figure has made clear the truth about the whole project. Joschka Fischer, Germany's foreign minister, has called for a European federal superstate, with its own elected president and written constitution. He proposes a European government with "far-reaching executive powers" and says "If we are to meet this historic challenge, we must put into place the last brick in the building of European integration, namely political integration". He further claimed that the introduction of the Euro would force the pace towards integration in defence and security.

It is not a surprise that a senior continental politician should make statements of this sort as it is no more than a restatement of the goal which the architects of the EU intended. What is so disgusting is that British politicians should continue to lie about this aim and to pretend that the EU is no more than some sort of trading area. A Downing Street spokesman's response to Herr Fischer was to say that he was expressing "a minority view within Europe and it underlines the importance of Britain remaining engaged"!

To say that this was turning the truth on its head would be an understatement. Herr Fischer is speaking for the entire European political class and it underlines the importance of Britain withdrawing from the EU immediately. If the peoples of Europe wish to become part of some pan-European federal state then that is their choice and they should be allowed to do so. What is certain however is that the British people have no such wish and that the only way to avoid such a fate is to leave the organisation forthwith.

Francis Maude, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, says that "Herr Fischer has spectacularly blown the lid off Europe's superstate agenda" but in this he is being disingenuous, as any politically aware person has known for decades that the United States of Europe was always the aim. That the Tories are now turning away from this idea is welcome but they must bear the lion's share of the blame for involving the UK in the whole misbegotten project and they have a long way to go to redeem themselves.

The British people cannot now say that they have not been warned in the most unambiguous way about the federalist intentions of the EU and should draw the inevitable conclusion before it is too late.

After his victory over the party machines and spin doctors, in which Ken Livingstone received the support of many who oppose the political class, he immediately proved that those who decry his views as maverick, rather than as part of a coherent philosophy, were right.

Almost his first pronouncements were on the subject of the UK and the Euro and he chose to stand four square with the worst of the federalists, such as Clarke and Heseltine, in calling for this nation to sign away its freedom and join without delay. Although one expects him to offer his views on many matters which are totally outside his remit as London Mayor it is particularly offensive that he should have chosen this subject upon which to begin.

Of course these views illustrate that he cannot be considered a man of the left. Almost every principled figure on the true left such as Tony Benn, Dennis Skinner, Arthur Scargill, Lord Shore and Lord Stoddart are against the capitalist club of the EU and are seeking to fight the surrender of our democracy to the dictators of Brussels. Livingstone places himself with Heathite Tories and gullible Lib-Dems who follow the vision of a Britain submerged in a federal superstate, and one where the working class would be at the mercy of the corporate state.

There are other 'useful idiots' who purport to believe in left wing views, but offer support to the EU, not least John Monks, Secretary General of the TUC, who wants the government to use its windfall from the mobile phone auction to prop up the Euro!

Livingstone will find that his love of the EU is a cause that the majority of true socialists and trade unionists will reject so perhaps we may yet see him change his position in an effort to retain support in the future. However it would hardly be a convincing conversion after the enthusiasm which he showed this week for the monster of Brussels.

This week has illustrated the farcical nature of the arguments about exchange rates. At the same time as some headlines still talk of 'the strength of the pound' (where they should be referring to the 'weakness of the euro'), others speak of 'the pound tumbling against the dollar' or of 'a slump in the value of the pound'.

While we in the anti EU movement have enjoyed the discomfiture of the Europhiles as the value of their beloved currency sinks this is really not the point, as the crux of the issue is politics, not economics.

The Europhiles, like Heseltine, tell us that the weakness of the Euro is a reason to join but, of course, had it soared in value, instead of sinking like a stone, they would have told us that that was a reason to join. Conversely we in the anti EU movement will not suddenly decide that we should join EMU if the euro should recover in value for, like the Europhiles, we recognize it for what it is.

The reality is that the euro is one of the building blocks with which the EU intends to create the federal state which will take the place of the independent nations of Europe. It takes its place alongside a single tax regime, a single legal area, a single agricultural system, a single fishery, a single police force, a single market and a single army to form a single government. We shall always resist the Euro, while the Europhiles will always promote it, regardless of its level against other currencies, for we all know it is an essential part of the scheme to give the European political elite supreme power within the EU.

07/05/2000

The announcement that Michael Heseltine will be leaving the Commons at the next election has occasioned an outpouring of praise from his contemporaries, even to the extent of a Labour Home Secretary, Jack Straw, writing a laudatory letter to the Times. However, for those who believe in the sort of accountable democracy which we have evolved in this country over many generations Mr Heseltine is not a figure to evoke much admiration. In common with his allies Sir Edward Heath, Lord Howe and Kenneth Clarke he has constantly advanced the cause of European integration and of the absorption of the UK within the resulting federal superstate.

The reason for this is not hard to find as it results from the patronising and condescending attitude taken by many members of the political elite towards the ordinary citizen. They do not see government in terms of the common will of the people but as a managerial exercise. In their arrogance they believe that only they know best and that it is the duty of the elite to which they belong to administer the state in the way they see fit. The centralised, corporate, bureaucratic state being created by Brussels is the ideal vehicle to ensure that those who run Europe will not be troubled by a little thing like the need to consult the electorate as to the way forward. This attitude is prevalent in many mainland European countries, particularly France and Germany and will of course be the paradigm within which the United States of Europe will operate.

It is ironic that this belief in their managerial abilities is not borne out by the facts as so many of the economic problems of the UK stem not from recalcitrant unions but poor managers, at a corporate and political level. They would do far better to trust to the parliamentary system which has served this country so well in the past.

The reason as to why political opponents such as Jack Straw are fulsome in their praise, and why Heseltine himself felt able to join Tony Blair on a 'Britain in Europe' platform is that so many members of the political elite have more in common with each other than they do with those they claim to represent. It is indeed fortunate for the British people that Heseltine never made it to No 10 or by now we would be locked into the Euro and on the verge of losing our independence. No doubt his abilities will be better employed running his publishing firm.

01/05/2000

Those of us in the Eurorealist movement who stated from the outset that EMU was a political, not an economic issue, and that the attempt to impose a 'once size fits all' policy on the disparate economies of the EU would lead to disaster, need now only sit back and watch as all our predictions come true and the political class run around like headless chickens, still trying to claim that two and two is five. Last Wednesday, as the Euro headed over the cliff towards the 'two euro pound' Gerhard Schroder, the Chancellor, praised the currency saying "it is a sparkling success over which I have no worries". With an optimistic viewpoint like that one can only assume he thinks Germany won both world wars as well. Other Germans, not of the political elite, have a better grasp of reality. Professor Donges is quoted in earlier articles on this page (see below) and Haus-Olaf Henkel, head of the BDL, the German industry federation says: "A weak Euro is sweet poison. The consequences are that companies benefit from an export-led boom for which they have to do very little by way of improving their competitiveness and reducing costs. International investors have lost faith in the ability of the Germans, French and Italians to tackle their fundamental problems". This latter point is emphasised by Mike Gallagher, research head of Ideaglobal.com, the financial-research company, who cites the losses of Japanese investors. "They are getting their fingers burnt again", he says. Of course, that's what happens when you believe a bunch of self interested politicians!

The different requirements of the individual economies are widening the cracks in euroland. While Jean-Pierre Chevenement, France's interior minister, says that the ECB is wrong to raise rates while inflation in France is only 1.5%, Niall O'Sullivan of the Bank of Ireland, whose country is suffering a 5% rate, and growing, says There was always a risk of going into the euro. Irish sterling and dollar trade comprises a substantial part of our imports and foreign exposure was always going to be a problem". By joining the Euro, Ireland gave up the right to influence its own economic affairs, a fact recognized by Colin Hunt of Goodbody Stockbrokers, who says "There is little point in us saying we should not have gone in as there is no exit mechanism. We must deal with the consequences of having an inappropriate monetary policy".

Exactly! The Irish have jumped over the cliff and now realise that they are going to hit the rocks. The only way of 'dealing' with the problem will be to stand and watch while they suffer boom, bust and then large scale unemployment. We did warn them.

To complete the worst week for the Euro so far the future of Jean-Claude Trichet, the governor of the Bank of France, due to take over as ECB president in two years time, is in doubt because he is under investigation for his role in the Credit Lyonnais scandal of the early 1990s.

Given the parlous state of affairs in Euroland the British people should be grateful that we have not yet taken the insane step of joining them. At the current rate the whole mess will have collapsed before our political class can deceive enough people into voting 'Yes'. The hope must be that the collapse of EMU will also herald the break-up of the European Union, thus saving us from this misbegotten creation of the political elite.

30/04/2000

In the decades following World War II the Germans worked hard to rebuild their country, their most visible source of pride being the strength of their currency. However some fifteen months ago their political class decided to abandon the mighty mark and to tie their destiny to the single European currency. This week we saw the incredibly shrinking Euro lose value not just against the pound, the dollar and the yen but also against the Cuban peso and the North Korean won!

The Germans have sacrificed the most potent symbol of their economic strength in order to satisfy the desire of their so-called leaders to be members of the European political elite. It brings to mind the cutting comment by Oscar Wilde on the death of Little Nell "you would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh".

Tonight, as the Euro loses another three percent against the pound, and the British government gains twenty two and a half billion pounds in the mobile phone auction, federalists show how little they understand economic reality, and how much they would throw away in defence of their beloved European Union. Interviewees on the Channel 4 news actually advocated spending the windfall on propping up the Euro. For these 'useful idiots' it is not enough that they constantly talk about the strength of the pound, when the truth is it is the chronic weakness of the Euro which is the cause of all the trouble, but they would have us waste our money bailing out the European political class who ignored all the warnings and went ahead with this ridiculous project in the teeth of economic reality. What would these federalists not sacrifice in order to create the federal superstate?

27/04/2000

Jurgen Donges, appointed last month as head of the 'Five Wise men' advising Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, has said that politicians misled the public about the single currency and that now the German people have lost confidence in the Euro. His statement is backed by an opinion poll taken last week which shows 57 per cent of Germans now reject the single currency.

Professor Donges said "Global investors are staying away because they don't believe the Europeans have the will to tackle badly-needed reforms. The Euro has lost its good reputation". Of course one must take issue with the last part of that statement. The Euro never did have a good reputation, except in the rose coloured dreams of the federalists - in reality it has been a failure from day one.

One Frankfurt Stock Exchange dealer commented that "the Euro is melting away like a camembert cheese" as it sunk to a record low of 93.59 US cents, a decline of 21% since its launch 15 months ago.

Professor Donges reinforced his gloomy prognostications by saying "For the British Eurosceptics, this is grist to the mill. The weak Euro is a message to each country that they must make fundamental changes if Europe is to benefit from the so-called New Economy. In France and Italy, reform is hardly discussed. I have the impression that in Italy things have actually gone backwards since they qualified for the Euro. In normal circumstances in Germany we should have stability and growth along with a balanced budget. Yet ever since reunification, we have bigger and bigger budget deficits. I ask myself what would ever happen if we had a recession".

Of course we all know that if all the economists in the world were laid end to end they would never reach a conclusion and that they are about as politically aware as most businessmen, who cannot see beyond the end of their noses, preferring to believe that short term profits are the only thing that matters. However intelligent men such as Professor Donges should have realised that we in the anti EU movement spoke no more than the truth when we said that the Euro was a political, not an economic project. The European political class want to create a federal superstate which they will dominate and which will give them the opportunity to detach themselves from democratic accountability and rule as an immovable elite, as did the old aristocracy before the French revolution or as Orwell's Inner Party does in 1984. They created the single currency as a tool to this end and not as a sensible economic device. The German people can complain as much as they like but their politicians will not turn back. This should be a warning to the British to reject the whole sorry mess - Euro, EMU and EU!

25/04/2000

Once again we hear the same old song from the siren voices who will never give up trying to entangle this country with the single currency and the federal superstate. John Cushnaghan, managing director of Nissan Motor Manufacturing (UK) Ltd said, in a speech to the International Automotive Conference in Sunderland, "The greatest threat lies with the strength of sterling and the idea that we can ignore the EU. We need to move closer, and not, as some would have it, move away. EU monetary union has happened and it's not going to go away"

Mr Cushnaghan's comments show a naivete that beggars belief:

1. It is not the strength of sterling that is the problem but the chronic weakness of the Euro, a failure and a joke. Sterling has remained constant against the yen and the dollar while the Euro has declined against all three

2. If we were to be so mad as to join the single currency we should not be permitted to go in at a rate of our choosing but would be making the current unfavourable exchange rate a permanent feature

3. History shows that currency unions rarely endure. It is in fact very likely that EU monetary union will go away, but not before it has inflicted untold damage on the economies of the participating countries.

4. Given that we make enormous losses in our trade with the EU and large profits on our trade with the rest of the world we should do far better if we did ignore the EU

5. Business for Sterling points out that Britain is getting more inward investment that Germany and France together and that last week Honda announced a big expansion in the UK, recruiting 1,00 workers for its second plant and bringing its total investment to £1.2 billion.

6. Michael Portillo also reminded Mr Cushnaghan that unemployment was significantly higher in euroland than in Britain and stated "There is no case for the UK to give up the pound".

Even more predictable was the outburst from Peter Mandelson who, while addressing businessmen in London, claimed that euroland was heading for a boom and that Britain belonged at the heart of Europe. He said "Whether we like it or not, our future is in Europe. Only at its heart can we fulfil our potential".

As far as the talk of being at the heart of Europe is concerned perhaps someone should do for Mandelson what Enoch Powell dryly suggested should be done for John Major - Show him a map! The general tone of the speech by this leading light of the European Movement reveals that he has learnt nothing from the experiences of the past few years. As euroland and its misbegotten currency sinks further into an economic mire, while at the same time the 'Anglo-Saxon' economies continue to power ahead, Mandelson refuses to face the facts, preferring instead to believe in the myths that the Europhiles substitute for reality. Of course, as a leading member of the political class, he is one of the few who stands to benefit from UK membership of the EU but, for the rest of us, our hopes for the future demands that we ignore his blandishments and turn our backs on the declining backwater of euroland and return to our true destiny as a global trading nation. Whether Mandelson likes it our not, our future is across the oceans, not the Channel.

20/04/2000

Simon Heffer of the Daily Mail hit back this week at the those who claimed he was biased and unfair in his criticims of the European Union. His comments are worthy of repeating in full:

'Bias' means unfairness. I wish to be fair about the EU. It is run by unelected and largely unaccountable failed politicians, and it has a recent history of gross corruption. It hates the idea of national identity and wishes to create a federal superstate. It is incapable of admitting its own ghastly mistakes, whether it is uselessness in international conflicts, such as the Gulf or Kosovo, or its abortion of a single currency. It wastes money on an epic scale, resulting in higher-than-necessary taxes and prices for consumers. It practises a centralisation that entirely discounts local feelings and customs - such as with metrication. If any of the above is unfair, not doubt the Commission's overpaid and anti-British lackeys will quickly tell me."

Well - you can't say fairer than that! A fine summary of the monster of Brussels.

19/04/2000

The Times business commentator made a good point this week when considering the Government's plans for encouraging businesses to throw away good money preparing for an event which, we fervently hope, will never happen:

The Government's "Prepare and Decide" plan looks increasingly like a total waste of money. The millions that were spent on fending off the millennium bug at least resulted in an upgrading of most systems, and the bug might have bitten. But Britain joining the euro seems too remote a possibility to merit a cent of public expenditure. A year ago DHL's survey of exporters found 71 per cent in favour of UK membership of the single currency. Now the figure is down to 45 per cent. As for non-exporters...

The very name of the plan shows an arrogant assumption that the decision would be to join. At the very least one would have thought that they might have titled it "Decide and Prepare"! They perhaps should also be asking business to spend money in anticipation of an invasion from Mars, an event about as likely as the UK joining EMU, unless of course the latter is achieved without the consent of the British people.

08/04/2000

Once again the satirical magazine Private Eye shows that it has the courage to print the truths which the major newspapers fail to report, either through incompetence, or because of a deliberate desire to suppress the facts about the European Union.

It is worth quoting the Eye's piece in full:

As EU leaders planned their techno revolution in Lisbon with great fanfare, elsewhere the European Parliament's constitutional affairs committee was discussing the treaty of Paris that will embrace the newly enlarged EU of Eastern European members.

Amazingly, a majority of MEPs, including those in the UK, voted in favour of a document which envisages one state with majority decision making in all areas and control over law and commerce. The MEPs also agreed to give more power to the president of the recently disgraced commission.

The Earl of Stockton was one of the few UK MEPs who abstained from voting on proposals which will also abolish the British legal rights of habeas corpus and trial by jury in favour of one supreme European public prosecutor.

Smaller countries like Luxembourg, Greece and Portugal were also wary of the plan to substitute unanimous decisions with majority ones. But only a group of French MEPs of the Europe of Nations party, led by Georges Berthu, openly voiced alarm at this "superficially democratised superstate" with "coercive" powers. Mr Berthu described British MEPs as "pro-federalist".

Although the proposal will affect the future of all EU taxpayers, the MEPs' debate remained unreported by most Brussels based hacks. Oddly, at the same time Tony Blair's mouthpiece Alastair Campbell was rebuking the BBC for "dumbing down" its coverage of the Lisbon summit, referring to everyone's "exasperation at how difficult it is to get serious coverage for serious issues". Doubtless when the Rev Blair signs this constitutional document he will tell us of the very serious issues it covers.

Let us hope that when the mass of the British people wake up to the betrayal of their fundamental rights and freedoms taking place every day in Strasbourg they will recognize those MEPs and media hacks who have conspired to give away their birthright for what they are, while perhaps they may recognize that Private Eye has done all it can to protect our democracy.

07/04/2000

In a perceptive article today Times journalist Michael Gove points out the prejudice that BBC reporters show in their reports on the European Union:

He notes that on March 15th The Nine O'Clock News ran a report by Peter Morgan on the Irish economy which praised the euro without regard for the realities. It highlighted the cheapness of Irish petrol relative to the UK without mentioning that our petrol is more expensive because of higher taxes, while it failed to point out that Ireland's petrol is nevertheless dearer than it needs to be because oil is priced in dollars and the euro's depreciation, relative to the dollar has increased the price of petrol throughout Euroland.

The BBC's foreign editor, John Simpson, claimed it as an "objective fact" that Ireland benefits from the Euro and he "has yet to come across an economist or political observer who disagrees". As Gove wryly remarks, maybe he should get out more. Jim Power, the Bank of Ireland's Chief Economist, has said that the eurozone's interest rate is "totally inappropriate" for Ireland, which has an asset boom and the highest inflation in the EU.

On February 10th Stephen Evan's report on Today uncritically and unattributably asserted that Britain's position outside EMU threatened inward investment. Mr Evans claimed that Sony has issued such a warning. Not only did Sony deny the report, the BBC has itself declined to report that Britain, outside the euro, last year attracted twice as much inward investment as France and three times as much as Germany.

Gove's final assessment is worth repeating: "There is something deeply unsatisfying about a supposedly independent broadcaster presenting a one-sided account of an issue, congenial to the Government but contrary to majority opinion. Never has so much bias been shown by so many correspondents on an issue backed by so few"

The BBC has long been known to Eurorealists as the Brussels Broadcasting Corporation and it is sad to see how an organisation that once spoke for the nation in World War II has now sunk so low that one could almost believe, given the chance, it would probably employ William Joyce as its European Union correspondent.

28/03/2000

The furore over Rover is giving rise to another big lie that the problem is due to the UK not signing up for the single currency. This assertion bears no relation to the facts about currency fluctuations.

The pound is not unique among the major world currencies in being strong against the chronically weak euro but its value against the dollar and the yen tells a different story. Most of our overseas trade is transacted in US dollars and the pound has actually fallen against the dollar in the last twelve months from 1.67 to 1.57, while both have fallen against the yen.

The problem is not the strength of the pound but the growing failure of the euro. It is proving a disaster for those who foolishly allowed their wealth, assets, income and buying power to depend upon this misbegotten child of idiot politicians who are now embarrassed by its existence but who are too committed politically to admit that they have made a ruinous mistake.

If the UK had allowed the pound to sink in the currency markets as the euro has done we would be accused by our 'partners' of an anti competitive devaluation. However different rules apply to the hypocritical politicians of mainland Europe!

If a known opponent of the EU stated that the single currency faced an "almost lethal threat" to its existence and that the EU itself was likely to "renounce not only an important role on the world stage, but also its own future" then no doubt the media would denounce the remarks as biased and scare mongering.

However these comments come from Professor Otmar Issing, the chief economist of the European Central Bank and a leading member of the ECB's executive board. To quote him in full "The risk of failure can be summed up in a few words. An EU which enchains its huge innovative potential through all sorts of regulations, suppresses economic incentives through high taxes, seeks to protect its prosperity from the outside behind all sorts of barriers and strives to redistribute wealth internally, based on an ideology of equality portrayed as justice, renounce not only an important role on the world stage, but also its own future". He goes on to say that "Rigid labour markets and misguided incentives provided by the social security and welfare systems are the prime cause of alarmingly high unemployment in the euro zone.

Need one comment - they condemn themselves out of their own mouths. One thing is certain, his warnings will fall on deaf ears and the EU juggernaut will continue on its one way journey to disaster. Time for the UK to get off!

The sorry story of the Rover car company reveals many things about the state of Britain today and is a tale of deceivers, selfish fools and those who consciously, or unconsciously are betraying the interests of their own nation

It is obvious that the BMW company has deceived both the British government and the Rover workforce in their actions over the future of Rover. However it should not be unexpected, given that it is in the interests of Germany that the UK should be deindustrialised. Anything which undermines our ability both to compete with them economically will naturally be to the advantage of Germany and we are several types of fool to allow it.

Many of the British people have been selfish fools over the years in their decisions to buy foreign made goods in preference to those made in the UK. How many of those who have made fortunes here nevertheless choose to drive swanky foreign cars and to always buy goods made by our competitors, not caring if their fellow citizens prosper, provided that they are OK. On a larger scale we see companies which owe their existence to the UK choosing to make major purchases in foreign shipyards etc. and to hell with their own compatriots. This sort of self destructive behaviour is as responsible for the loss of jobs here as is the duplicity of BMW.

By far the worse are those who betray their own nation by using events such as the debacle at Rover to advance their support of the UK joining the single currency asserting, against all the evidence, that it is our refusal to jump over the cliff with the other EU lemmings that is responsible for the demise of Rover.

The following article was circulated via media sources today:

Britain's membership of the European Union could be costing every household in the U.K. as much as 1,000 pounds ($1,600) a year, a study claimed today. The Institute of Directors said the net cost of belonging to the 15-nation bloc is currently 15 billion pounds, and could be as high as 25 billion pounds. The cost would rise further if Britain joins the EU's single currency in coming years.

The report will give fresh ammunition to lawmakers and business groups fighting to keep Britain out of the single currency and spark a fresh row over its membership in the EU. The government favours joining the euro in principle, providing the economic conditions are right shortly after the next general election, which could be held as early as spring 2001.

However, opinion polls suggest that more than two thirds of Britons want to keep the pound, and the government is concerned that opposition to the euro is leading to hostility to the EU. A recent poll for the British Broadcasting Corp. showed 34 percent of Britons wanted to pull out of the EU altogether.

To counter rising public scepticism, the government last month warned that more than 3 million jobs were at risk if Britain left the union. The IOD stopped short of advocating withdrawal from the EU, saying Britain should continue to fight for reform from the inside. "The EU needs to work better for the U.K. and to work better for the 17 million unemployed across the EU,'' said Graeme Leach, the chief economist at the institute and author of the report.

"But reform is required, and if that reform is not forthcoming, then it may well come to the point when the U.K. should consider renegotiating its commitment to all aspects of the EU treaties.''

Benefits

In an interview in the Financial Times newspaper, U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair said he hopes the summit will help to convince Britons that Europe is "moving in the right direction.'' "The biggest danger will be if we fail to send a clear, positive and strong enough signal, but I think there is a growing consensus behind the concept of economic reform as necessary for the future,'' the paper quoted Blair as saying. "We know our economies and our workforces have got to become more adaptable, more innovative and more dynamic.''

The IOD are basically Euro sceptic although they have yet to draw the logical conclusion about the EU and still persist in the naive belief that we can, as the Conservatives say, be "In Europe, but not run by Europe". They refuse to recognize that, in the long term, we cannot stay in the organisation without becoming members of the single currency, but reports such as today's show that they are gradually learning.

It is doubtful that the same thing could be said about Mr Blair. When will he wake up to the fact that not only will the EU not reform, it does not want to reform. The political elite are quite happy with their cosy little arrangements and they are not going to let Mr Blair convince them to undertake a modernisation they do not desire. They will listen politely and then ignore him, much as the Welsh, Scots, Irish and Londoners appear to do. If Mr Blair stepped out from behind his spin doctors occasionally he would find that there is a whole world out there who do not subscribe to the views of New Labour.

We often hear of local authorities seeking what they describe as 'EU funding' to support a project in their area. Indeed this is the issue upon which the furore in the Welsh Assembly is based. The matter is however based upon false premises as the EU has no money beyond that which it has already taken from those nations, such as the UK, which are contributors to its central funds. The reality is that for every one of our own pennies the EU graciously allows the UK it is retaining two or three times as much. We receive nothing from the EU except the return of a portion of our own money.

The amounts we pay into central EU coffers amount to approximately 20 million pounds per day.

To put this into perspective:

• the amount needed to save the Royal yacht - two days

• The amount the Government is loaning British Aerospace thirty days

• The amount the British people have contributed through their generosity to the poor people of Mozambique - less than one day

• a new hospital - ten days

Remember this figures next time someone tells you that the EU helps deprived areas. The money we waste on belonging to this vile organisation is spent as fees to the club of which our political class are determined to be paid up members, for their own selfish benefit. If we were free of the EU we could be spending eight billion pounds a year on the projects we supported, not on corrupt bureaucrats and their luxury lifestyles and buildings.

14/03/2000

A domain name http://www.cibhq.co.uk has now been registered for this website and the office email address for CIB can now be reached be using info@cibhq.co.uk. These changes will make our addresses more easily accessible.

12/03/2000

Reports in this week's press show that Euro madness is alive and well:

Charles Kennedy, the Liberal Democrat leader, is intending to make overtures to the trade union movement, seeking to make common cause with the TUC to support early entry into the Euro. Of course there are Blairites in the trade union movement like John Monks, Sir Ken Jackson and John Edmonds who cannot wait to sign away all power to Brussels but they do not represent ordinary trade unionists, a majority of whom consistently tell pollsters that they oppose a single currency. As one who has been a trade unionist for thirty seven years I know that the love affair the pseudo Conservatives of New Labour are conducting with their fellow European elites is regarded by workers as a betrayal of their interests. Kennedy may attract the corporatist element among the union leadership but he has nothing to say to the real backbone of the movement.

The petty dictators of Whitehall are continuing their campaign to impose metric measurements on the UK, against the wishes of the people but in accordance with their orders from Brussels. Many businessmen are being persecuted because they wish to continue to use Imperial measurements, something that is legal everywhere within the EU, except in the UK!. How much more will the people of this country take before they rebel against those who seek to destroy everything that makes the UK a nation? Will it take foreign police on our streets and our Armed Forces being used against British interests as part of a European Army or will even that not be enough? We are losing our accountable system of government, the Common Law, our imperial measurements and, if the Europhiles have their way, control over of our currency and finances. In time we shall be forced to drive on the right-hand side of the road, then later no doubt the use of English will come under attack. If they can see us now those who fought and died to preserve the British way of life in two World Wars must wonder why they bothered. We could have had a better deal if we had just surrendered to Imperial Germany in 1914 than having to endure the destruction of our nation by the fifth column of our own political establishment.

This week Sir Brian Unwin, the newly retired chairman of the European Investment Bank, added his voice to the chorus of those seeking to surrender our control of our own currency, warning that "It will be dangerous to be outside". This is the old argument, trotted out by the Europhiles time after time, that does not bear a moment's consideration. Are Switzerland, Norway, the USA, Japan, China et al in danger because they do not become part of Euroland? Of course not, but these blinkered members of the elite cannot see beyond their desire to join the local club and chose to ignore the real world beyond the borders of Europe in their lust for acceptance by the corrupt political establishment which is leading the continent to destruction. Sir Brian is quoted as being proud of his part in helping Mrs Thatcher win the famous British budget rebate at the Fontainbleu summit. He conveniently ignores that the price for this was the signing of the Single European Act, the greatest surrender of our sovereignty yet seen. That particular deal truly did sell our heritage for 'a mess of pottage' so let us not regard its authors as heroes for so doing! He concludes "Europe wants Britain to be there". Of course they do - it is the best chance they have had for centuries to destroy this nation and ensure that never again can we oppose attempts by others to achieve hegemony within Europe. As an impoverished series of provinces within the European superstate we should be unable to stand against the ambitions of any seeking such domination. The British people should ignore those such as Sir Brian and follow their instincts to reject everything to do with the EU, the most massive confidence trick in history.

04/03/2000

Reports in this week's press reveal that French entrepreneurs are fleeing euroland for the UK. Le Figaro trumpeted the business friendly merits of Britain, noting that 150,000 French businessmen had moved across the Channel since 1995. The French government is attempting to counter the exodus by imposing legally questionable taxes on those taking their firms outside France, but is having little success.

The question those such as 'Britain in Europe' should have to answer is this: If Euroland is so wonderful, and British business so 'isolated' why are French entrepreneurs voting with their feet? Answer came there none!

27/02/2000

This week we have further evidence that the insane worship of the EU infects politicians of all the major political parties, from those who live on the wilder shores of Europhilia to those who purport to have awakened to the perilous position in which this country is now placed.

First, a letter appeared in the Times from all the usual suspects, including Clarke, Heseltine and Patten. Here we saw representatives of the self interested political class using mendacious arguments to defend their right to a place on the European gravy train and the chance to exercise power without responsibility, the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages. Their claims regarding the impact of withdrawal from the EU on the UK economy have already been denounced by the director of the relevant think tank (see article below), while the statement about loss of influence is laughable. As Lord Stoddart reports in his article elsewhere on this website:"It was Wim Duisenberg himself who put the argument about loss of influence to rest once and for all at a recent Group of Seven meeting in Washington. He made the governors of the central banks of Germany, France and Italy leave the room when the meeting turned to discussion of exchange rates. The reason? Their national currencies have been abolished and they no longer have the power to set interest rates. They were forced to twiddle their thumbs in a waiting room. I don't think they were able to exert much influence from there! Needless to say, Eddie George took a full part in the meeting."

These political dinosaurs concluded by stating "In today's rapidly changing world, global markets dominate our working lives. Britain cannot afford to be isolated. A successful future depends on a skilful pursuit of the British national interest within an internationalist, free market, free trade, European policy." These statements encapsulate the foolishness of their position. Of course we live in a global marketplace but to leave the fifteen state EU and rejoin the 200 other nations in the world is not isolation but the reverse. The contention that the EU is internationalist and free trading flies in the face of the protectionist, sclerotic reality, showing that there are none so blind as those who will not see.

We may expect these unreconstructed Heathites to continue to pursue the Europhiles' agenda of ending Britain's existence as an independent nation but we might have hoped for better from the current Conservative leadership. However William Hague is reported as stating to a group of financiers in London: "The Conservative Party took us into Europe and the Conservative Party will keep us in Europe.". He also described those wanting to leave the EU as "an extremist minority". Today Michael Portillo stated that the Conservative position on not joining the Euro only pertained to the period of the next parliament, not necessarily beyond that time.

Are we never to find significant politicians beyond the principled minority such as sustain CIB and like minded organisations, and those such as Tony Benn, who will turn their back on the madness of the last thirty years and recognize that UK membership of the EU is a disaster for this country? It is essential that it is not only those who have lost office, or are unlikely ever to gain it, who speak for Britain, but that those who may at some time take over the great offices of state are prepared to put country before party and principle before self interest.

One former politician who has spoken out is Bernard Weatherill, previously Speaker of the Commons. He has revealed his outrage at the loss of British sovereignty to Europe and warned of "seeds of dissension in days to come" on a scale comparable with the break-up of Yugoslavia. He does not relish the prospect of future Speakers of the House of Commons being "about as relevant as the former chairman of the Greater London Council.". One point he makes has long needed saying "Our freedoms were signed away by Mrs Thatcher in the Single European Act, which allowed for qualified majority voting". He recognizes that Mrs Thatcher has since realised what she had done but her later conversion cannot undo the damage.

Tony Blair revealed in his speech in Ghent that he is suffering from delusions of grandeur concerning Britain's place in the EU, speaking of our need to "assume our destiny as a leading partner in Europe", no doubt seeing himself as the President of Europe!

We have been down this path before - in an article in this week's Times, Sir Trevor Lloyd-Hughes, press secretary to Harold Wilson, related how Wilson confided to him "Trevor, my real, deepest ambition is to become the master of Europe's destiny". Thirty years on Lloyd-Hughes comments "Blair's hunger for power may drag Britain into a federal Europe by stealth"

Surely never can this country have had as many politicians working against the interests of its people as we are suffering today. If they succeed they will deserve to be remembered with the same degree of opprobrium with which the Americans remember Benedict Arnold.

27/02/2000

We always knew that 'Britain in Europe' was careless with the truth but now they have been fully exposed for their cynical distortion of facts.

Martin Weale, the director of the National Institute for Economic and Social Research, has reacted to BIE claiming that a report produced by his organisation stated British withdrawal from the European Union would place eight million jobs in jeopardy.

To quote the words attributed to Mr Weale by the national media:

"It's pure Goebbels. In many years of academic research I cannot recall such a wilful distortion of the facts. Even if there were to be initial job losses, higher unemployment would put downward pressure on wages and prices so that those losing their jobs could price themselves back into work. Britain in Europe's claims are absurd. Nobody could plausibly believe the figures. As the experience of the 1960s indicates, there is no reason why being outside the EU should necessarily involve mass unemployment, although living standards would probably be slightly lower"

Pro EU campaigners, realising that being caught distorting the truth in this manner is not helpful to their cause, have blamed the director of BIE, Simon Buckby, a Labour Party apparatchik with close links to Downing Street.

Of course, we in the anti EU movement do not accept Mr Weale's somewhat dubious contention that slightly lower living standards would result from withdrawal, believing in fact that the opposite would be true. Leaving that aside the main lesson to be learnt from this debacle is that the self interested politicians behind Britain in Europe will stop at nothing to defend their tickets on the EU gravy train, even if it means acting, in Mr Weale's words, in a manner to be expected of Josef Goebbels.

Those interested in the real debate about British membership of the EU should ignore pronouncements from Britain in Europe, the veracity of which have been shown to be poisoned at source.

20/02/2000

One of the justifications for European integration used by federalists is that there are some matters, particularly environmental ones, which cannot be dealt with by one nation alone. Of course this is true but there is no reason why nations cannot negotiate agreements on these things without the need to subsume their governments within one federal state. After all, unless the whole world joins the EU, there would have to be cross governmental agreements anyway. The test ban treaty is an example of where sovereign governments reached agreements on a matter they could not have dealt with in isolation, but without anyone 'sharing their sovereignty'.

Today news comes of the decision by the British government to surrender our right of veto over transport policies devised in Brussels. This means that large juggernauts will then have the right to free passage across the UK, exposing small villages to 60 tonne lorries; that the UK government would be powerless to stop the EU blocking proposals for weekend traffic bans in large cities; and that the EU could impose limits on subsidies for the London underground.

Among those protesting about this surrender are the pressure groups Transport 2000 and Friends of the Earth. The latter makes the very perceptive point that "This will be a way for British politicians to abdicate responsibility. Dropping the veto means they can blame other people". They at least recognize that the aim of the political class is to achieve the prerogative of the prostitute throughout the ages- Power without responsibility - indeed this is why so many politicians are enthusiastic about the idea of the EU!

Those who care about the environment should open their eyes the EU will not help their cause, but is much more likely to provide the means for big business to ride roughshod over such concerns. We now face the prospect that if 90% of the British people, plus a majority of the MPs at Westminster opposed 60 tonne lorries they could not be stopped if Brussels supported them. That is the reality brought about by our membership of this dreadful organisation.

In a very perceptive article in yesterday's Times the City Editor highlights the need to continually nail the lie that foreign investors in Britain are clamouring for us to take a firm. early decision to join the single currency. The points he makes are well worth remembering next time Europhiles trot out this tired old canard:

• Time and again this assertion turns out to be untrue. Any real cases tend to be Japanese investors who need some relief from problems back home and they are really complaining about the high level of the pound

• The myth was propagated that, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the head of Sony is supposed to have begged Tony Blair to go for it. Sony then explained that it said nothing of the sort, but did voice its worries about the exchange rate

• The level of the exchange rate is not relevant to the argument. Wim Duisenberg, President of the European Central Bank, reminded all those who prefer to ignore facts, that a currency has to be stable against the euro for two years before entry and that entry cannot be used as a pretext for devaluation

• The entry rules cannot be bent and, even if they could, the rest of Euroland would be mad to allow it. In reality early Euro entry, far from easing the pressure of a strong pound would set it in stone, without any hope of relief at any time

• If sterling now, or at any time when the UK economy is at a more vigorous stage of growth than France and Germany, then interest rates would halve, inflation would take off and exporters would be in a great deal of trouble

• Foreign investors understand clearly that the point of retaining one's own currency is that overvaluation can be unwound as different countries change places on the economic cycle.

• The first year of the Euro was a buoyant year for inward investment into the UK, partly because foreign groups were anxious to increase their presence in the City of London

• A T Kearney, the consultancy, has just produced a survey of foreign companies' investment intentions which suggest that, in the last six months, the UK has risen from third to second in the list of countries in which they wish to invest (the USA being number one).

• Even more decisively, the UK has become the favourite European destination for investment from Euroland itself!.

Those of us not in thrall to the European dream (or rather nightmare) must continue to nail this, and other big lies, every time our opponents voice them. Let us prove Goebbels wrong and show that the truth can triumph over falsehood, however often the latter is repeated.

12/02/2000

The British Chambers of Commerce is currently polling all of its 126,000 members on whether the UK should join the Euro, the closing date being 29th February.

All Eurorealists should ensure that business acquaintances are aware of the case against the Euro. The contact details for the BCC are:

Manning House, 22 Carlisle Place, London, SW1P 1JA

Telephone - 0207 565 2000

Fax - 0207 565 2049

Email - info@britishchambers.org.uk

Website - britishchambers.org.uk

07/02/2000

Once again a grandee of the European Union speaks plainly about the federalist aims of the organisation, giving the lie to those in the UK who continue to insist that black is white, in the face of all the evidence.

Gunther Burghardt, the EU ambassador to Washington (and what, may one ask is a customs union doing with ambassadors?) in an interview with The Washington Post, said of Europe's progress in constitutional reform, "We are somewhere between the articles of confederation of 1781 and the final constitution of Philadelphia in 1787"

How many more warnings do those of the Europhiles in Britain who do not want a federal superstate require before they wake up! There are none so blind as those who will not see.

06/02/2000

One can feel little sympathy for the motor car manufacturing industry as it bleats plaintively about a new European Commission directive on recycling which they claim will bankrupt them.

The majority of these companies have long been enthusiastic campaigners for closer European integration, putting short term profits ahead of any considerations of democracy, or even the long term economic implications. They take it in turn to practice naked political blackmail, issuing statements to the effect that they will pull out of the UK if we refuse to abolish the pound and join the rest of the lemmings in the Euro. Time and again these threats are shown to be hollow, the very real reasons for staying in the UK being overwhelming.

Perhaps these idiots will now grasp some fundamental facts about the EU: it is patently an anti-business organisation and it does not offer 'a la carte' membership. If they want the EU package they will get the lot, not just the bits they like.

All this shows the foolishness of giving any credence to the statements of most businessmen about fundamentally political matters. They have tunnel vision and one bottom line, short term profit, and are incapable of seeing the bigger picture.

06/02/2000

The last week has seen the swearing in of the new Austrian government and the repercussions of that act throughout the world. As Austria is a member of the EU the issue concerns all those who are involved in the struggle against Brussels. There are a number of points which must be made:

1. Members of democratic organisations such as CIB, whose supporters are motivated by a desire to protect democracy, unreservedly condemn anyone who offers apologies or excuses for the murderers of the fascist and Nazi regimes, who herded countless innocent men, women and children into gas ovens, who committed numerous war crimes during WWII and whose philosophies were the antithesis of everything for which we stand.

2. Although extreme right parties claim to share the revulsion we feel at the construction of the European federal superstate that fact in no way implies that there is a shared view of morality or politics. These assertions by such parties are anyway dubious given that two of the earliest supporters of the concept of a united Europe were Oswald Mosely and Josef Goebbels.

3. Opposition to the EU is not, as those such as Kenneth Clarke and Tony Blair claim, the mark of the right, or an indication of being anti-European, but is precisely what it says- a desire to prevent an undemocratic, bureaucratic monster from destroying European democracy.

4. While there will undoubtedly be those in Austria who do share Herr Haider's sympathies the majority of his supporters are protesting about the way in which the political establishment has used cosy deals to sew up the administration of the nation, institutionalising corruption and excluding those who do not belong to their group. We have for long warned that it is this sort of elective dictatorship which the EU will create and which will inevitably generate extremist reactions.

There is a definite move by the Europhiles to attempt to equate our position with that of the far right - a calumny which is rendered ridiculous by the fact that UK withdrawal from the EU is supported by, among others, Tony Benn, Lord Shore and Lord Stoddart, all stalwarts of the Labour movement. By all means take action against fascists but if the EU extends this principle in order to attack governments because they oppose the EU then what would have happened if the Labour Party (including Tony Blair MP) had won the general election in 1983, or if an anti EU Conservative party should win power in the next ten years?

05/02/2000

CIB members will be pleased to know that we have three excellent speakers for the AGM to be held on 1st April in Birmingham: Frederick Forsythe, Richard Shepherd MP and Lord (Peter) Shore. It should be an inspirational meeting.

30/01/2000

Ft.com is inviting participants for an on-line discussion being led by Lionel Barber, news editor of the Financial Times:

Europe needs a US-style constitution

European Union is one of the most successful political and economic experiments in history. The single market, successive enlargements, and monetary union are the most visible achievements.

But the Union suffers from a lack of accountability and political legitimacy. It was built by elites; now is the time to make it truly democratic. It must modernise its institutions and make its decision-making more open.

The starting-point should be a serious constitutional debate as happened in the US after the War of Independence. We need a new Philadelphia which will formalise power-sharing between the nation states of Europe. And if that means a federal Europe, so be it.

Visit http://www.ft.com/davos/discuss/ to put your views across

Perhaps CIB members would like to contribute! Shown below is my contribution:

Your basic premise that the European Union is a success is false. It may very well be so from the viewpoint of the European political class, given that the organisation is allowing them to escape from the need to be accountable to their electorates. It is also a success for bureaucrats, as they are now exercising unparalleled power, without the need to take the views of elected politicians into account. However, for the ordinary European, they are seeing economic stagnation, massive unemployment and, above all, the destruction of any semblance of true democracy. The British in particular have suffered at every turn, the fishing industry laid waste, the countryside distorted, manufacturing industry decimated, and our historic markets and allies spurned in favour of the inward looking, protectionist, sclerotic disaster centred on Brussels.

The EU is the greatest confidence trick in history, reversing all the gains made by ordinary people over centuries and giving power to an immovable and corrupt elite. It is (for now at least) a more benign version of Orwell's Inner Party, which seeks to establish the corrupt practices of Italy and France as the norm, already having succeeded in destroying morality in German politics, as can be seen by the Mitterrand-Kohl Axis.

There is not, and never will be, a 'European' identity, in the same way that a Frenchman, German or Briton has a national identity. This means that any body such as the European Parliament will inevitably vote along national lines. The constituencies of the MEPs are so large as to render it impossible for anybody to represent those within them, while the workings of the EU ensure that the EP is nothing more than a talking shop, ignored by the bureaucrats and providing a smokescreen of democracy, behind which the European political class appoints its own members to rule Europe.

There is no possibility that any changes to the organisation will restore democracy. For the British, and indeed for all the nations involved, the only way to prevent themselves being absorbed by a bureaucratic dictatorship is to withdraw from the EU altogether.

The comparison with the USA is false. America was created by a culturally homogenous population, speaking the same language, not by a collection of ancient nation states, possessing long, and often antagonistic histories. Even so the US civil war cost more American dead that all her other wars combined and resentment of the federal government is alive and well in many of the states today.

No European constitution imaginable will ever reconcile the contradictions inherent in a federal Europe. In the long term the EU will, as has every forced federation, break up. If the UK leaves now we can negotiate a tolerable and amicable divorce. If we wait then the end will be sure but may also be bloody. The people will not allow all their freedoms to be sacrificed without eventually fighting back and the fault will lie with all those 'useful idiots' who chose to pursue a chimera, ignoring reality until it was too late.

30/01/2000

Some claim that, as the European treaties contain no provision for a nation to withdraw it is therefore impossible for the UK to leave the EU. The lie has been given to this myth by an exchange in the House of Lords on 11th January 2000 between Lord Pearson, a leading member of CIB, and Baroness Scotland representing the government:

Lord Pearson of Ranoch asked Her Majesty's Government:

Why, given that the treaties governing NATO and the World Trade Organisation specifically provide for the free and unilateral withdrawal of member states from those organisations, no such provision exists in the treaties governing membership of the European Union.

Baroness Scotland of Asthal: We see no need for the Treaties governing membership of the Union to include a specific provision on unilateral withdrawal. It remains open to Parliament to repeal the European Communities Act 1972, the logical consequence of which would be to withdraw from the EU. The terms of such a withdrawal would be for the Government to negotiate with the other member states

As can be seen from the above, all it takes is the will to do it!

29/01/2000

Those businessmen whose only priority is profit, and who are incapable of looking beyond the end of their noses, are convinced that UK entry to full monetary union will see a devaluation of sterling against the Euro and they care nothing for the lose of financial control that such an act would involve. Unfortunately for them Wim Duisenberg has just confirmed that the Maastricht rules demand that before a currency joins it must have been stable against the Euro for two years. If we were to join soon after the next election the current 3.2 rate against the mark would then be locked in forever, thus ensuring the final devastation of our manufacturing industry and the economic destruction of those poor fools who are so keen to join the rest of the EU in jumping off the cliff.

The President of the European Central Bank has therefore stated what the Europhiles in Britain refuse to admit - if the UK joins it will be at as lunatic a rate as we joined ERM and everyone knows what happened then. Just remember that there is no escape clause to EMU so there would be no repeat of White Wednesday, but a permanent and devastating economic cataclysm.

29/01/2000

A number of stories this week illustrate the peril which threatens our democracy. As Christopher Hitchens reports from the presidential primaries, the average American is less and less inclined to take any part in federal politics, even to the extent of voting. Hitchens put this down to the fact that the ordinary voter recognizes that politics at the federal level has become an incestuous contest within an elite establishment, whose differences are cosmetic, compared with their common desire to ensure that power remains with them, regardless of which personality happens to present the outward face. Of course this sort of cosy arrangement is precisely the aim of the European political elite, who wish to create a federal superstate which they will govern without the need to concern themselves with the desires of the electorate.

Nothing could show the truth of this cross national conspiracy better than the revelation that Mitterrand supplied French government funds to help keep his fellow Europhile, Kohl, in power. The level of corruption that is now being exposed within Germany makes clear that the attitudes that have for long infected every level in France and Italy are spreading throughout the EU.

The children of Craxi, the disgraced Italian Prime Minister, also announced this week that the use of slush funds by those such as their father, Kohl and Mitterrand, were justified by the need to realise the 'European' dream. Of course this 'the ends justifies the means' argument has been used throughout history to excuse every malign act by dictators, from Caesar's massacres in Gaul, through the repression practised by the medieval Church, to the slaughters of the 20th Century. A nation which produced Machiavelli and the Mafia is not merely unable to end corruption but is constitutionally incapable of understanding the 'Ango-Saxon' objection to such things. Andreotti, another discredited Italian prime Minister, has defended slush funds as merely a 'venial' sin while Romano Prodi, Mr Blair's choice for president of the European Commission, is still being investigated by those who expect to prove his involvement in shady dealings.

As the Times says, yesterday's men are driving the European project forward from their political, or mortal, graves, and yet the project itself is outdated and irrelevant to the modern world, where the Cold War is long gone and the Internet is remoulding economic realities. In the same paper David Selbourne's article sums up the truth for the British: "We do not understand Europe. We are not 'at its heart' and we never will be. In grappling with our crisis of identity we are losing sight of our own civic and other virtues, while compromising our institutions with half-baked reforms."

29/01/2000

At the same time as we are assured that Denmark and Greece wish to join the Garedene swine in their rush over the cliff of monetary union (although one wonders if that is the wish of their political class, not the people) further evidence emerges of the depths to which the European Commission sank under Santer, and the extent to which it still resembles a cesspool of corruption and incompetence. The breath of Kinnock's proposed reforms serve to underline just how much is wrong with the EC as none of his changes would be necessary were it not for the fact that, as the Times says in a recent leader, malpractice, disorganisation and outright fraud are built into the system. The sincerity of the Commission's desire to change things can be seen from the fact that, while Paul Van Buitenen was being named "European of the Year" for exposing corruption, Kinnock continues to condemn his whistle-blowing. If the attempts at reform were serious then the EC would reinstate Mr Van Buitenen in his old job, or even better, make him President. The reality is that nothing effective will be done for, as they say, you don't ask the pigs to clean out the sty.

A perceptive article by Aidan Rankin in the Times highlights the way in which our democracy is being undermined by the party political system. Every day we see the politicians paying homage to party machines, rather than to their constituents, and, as Rankin says "power is slipping from MPs to unelected quangos or pan-European leviathans, with Parliament treated as a rubber stamp." The greatest Englishmen of the twentieth century, Winston Churchill, never forgot the duty he owed to Parliament, and thereby to the electorate, but his pygmy successors respect only the party whips and the party grandees. Rankin concludes with a paragraph which sums up the position and makes clear why our political class does not care about the transfer of power from Westminster to Brussels: "Political parties are not corporations and being an MP is not just another executive career. MPs are not responsible to party or government, but constituents. These are the founding principles of our parliamentary system. If we let our representatives forget them, the result will not be "reform", but a surrender to the dictatorship of blandness". Amen to that - we face rule by party apparatchiks and spivs, not representatives of the people's will.

Among all the scare stories put out by the likes of 'Britain in Europe' about vain threats from Japanese car makers to move from the UK because we have not joined the Euro (generally denied the day after being publicised) it was a breath of fresh air to read of how BASF from Ludwigshafen chose London as its HQ and Commerzbank chose London Docklands as the head office of its electronic bank. The lobby group 'London First' reports that last year it helped 22 European firms move to London and says that "interest is widespread, from Berlin to Cologne and across the board of industry". These companies know that the UK is outside the Euro, and given the current opinion polls, likely to remain so for years, or forever, nevertheless they chose to move to London. Does this not give the lie to those who claim that we will lose out unless we join?

One honest politician spoke up this week. Roger Helmer, Conservative MEP for the East Midlands, has called for Britain to leave the EU. One swallow does not make a summer but, where one has the courage to lead, others will follow. Watch this space.

23/01/2000

The advent of a new year has made no difference to the litany of disaster that is the European Union. Just a few of the highlights:

• Portugal, which assumed the EU presidency on January 1st, is to override the UK's opposition to the art levy, to attempt to pressurise the British government into surrendering over the withholding tax and to push for the extension of QMV and the ending of the national veto

• MEPs have threatened to block all future financial services deregulation within the EU unless Britain drops its opposition to the withholding tax

• As predicted earlier in these pages the European Commission has ruled out imposing an injunction on France for its failure to lift the beef ban

• The corruption scandal in Germany has expanded to encompass not only Kohl, but also the current CDU leader Wolfgang Schauble

• Sir Leon Brittan, that paragon of political achievers, has written a new book in which he claims that rather than cling to an outdated notion of sovereignty Conservatives should realise that sovereignity can be increased by pooling it and that to stand aloof in the name of independence was foolish. This hardly needs a comment, illustrating as it does the attitude of mind that typifies those who followed Heath.

• The Times leader yesterday (headed Europe's Rotten Heart) pointed out that the two men most responsible for the drive to European integration, Kohl and Mitterrand, stand revealed as men who placed the pursuit and retention of power above probity and the law.

• Italian lawyers are pressing for a court ruling on the corruption enquiry involving Romano Prodi

• The European Commission is taking two other EU institutions, the European Central Bank and the European Investment Bank, to court over their refusal to recognize the European Anti-Fraud Office. One hardly knows whether to laugh or cry!

• That political giant, Neil Kinnock, says that the reforms (oh yes?) that he is making to the European Commission will rob Britain's Eurosceptics of their favorite orge". It is obviously beyond the Welsh windbag that objections to UK membership of the EU go far beyond corruption in the Commission. Even if it worked perfectly, and was staffed by nuns, the principles of national independence and democracy demand our withdrawal.

• Robin Cook is said to be leading a group within the Cabinet seekin