Europe: The proposal

Earlier in this post I gave some options that David Cameron can use for his European policy.

I've now got my proposal.

Firstly David Cameron should be up front and say that he didn't want to be in this position. He had said that Lisbon was a step too far, and it is. He now has to push for Britain's rights to have the relationship we want with Europe. With that in mind he will have one or two referenda.

The first referendum will have a question such as "Britain should have its own rights over Fishing Quotas, Immigration, Taxation and Employment rights. Agree?". The exact list should be set out at the time, but be at a level where we are happy. I can now hear the laughter - how naive, Europe will never agree to such repatriation of powers (even though the original Constitution was supposed to bring some powers back to nation states - look how that turned out!).

That's the reason for the second referendum. In case the EU turns away and chooses not to listen to the UK's point of view, the second referendum is asked. "Britain should have an Economic relationship with the EU, and have associate membership". This is the nuclear option.

Both referenda will be set out at the start. It is blackmail, but the EU does not listen to its people and Governments collude to deny the electorate their say - so needs must.

It will then be a matter of how much the EU wants the UK as a member. If they do want us, then we will continue to contribute to the coffers but we want some powers back. If they don't then fair enough we will go our own way.

I think it is time to play hard ball with the EU political elite.

Squiffy.

The Brown jinx hits again

Whenever the PM wishes someone well before an endeavour or publicly supports someone, you know it's curtains. Last night he publicly back his old friend and foe, Tony Blair, as new President of the Council of Ministers. This morning we hear that EU leaders have cooled on the idea.

 

He's done it again! Maybe that was the plan…

 

Squiffy.

 

David vs William: Part two

An infrequent series of interviews seem to be occurring on the Today programme where at 8.10 a.m. both David Miliband and William Hague are interviewed together. It's always entertaining.

 

In this morning's exchanges, William had the killer point in the earlier part of the interview and David in the latter.

 

Firstly, William Hague pointed out that the Labour Government claimed that the treaty was not a constitution and was just a tidying up exercise and so the referendum was not needed. But Hague then pointed out how David Miliband is stating that we need a strong new EU President who can stop the traffic to push forward EU views to the rest of the world. Surely that role is quite a constitutional change from the rotating presidency with limited powers now. David Miliband had no real comeback on this hierocracy.

 

Then in a discussion about the polish head of the Conservative grouping in the EU, Michael Kaminsky, David Miliband read out an interview in which Kaminsky said that the death of 300 Jews  was not of a scale as the Holocaust and should not be apologized for. William Hague had no come back for that.

 

1 all, I would say.

 

P.S. When I think about the EU and how the electorate (of the whole EU) are being treated, I get angry. Very angry. In fact I've nearly had enough. I am now close to changing my position on the EU and thinking that we should go for associate membership, like Norway. I'm not there yet, but it's getting closer.

 

Squiffy.

 

Iceland closes down McDonalds

No this has nothing to do with Kerry Catona's advertising prowess, making the burger giant fold!

 

This morning it is reported that the recession is so bad in Iceland that the three McDonalds restaurants (can I call them that) will be shut. Apparently the Icelandic Krona is so weak that it is now too expensive to buy a Big Mac. Wow, it must be really bad, or possibly a blessing is disguise.

 

Maybe they will be able to get their fix by digging up the semi-putrified fillet-o-fish buried last summer and eating those!

 

Squiffy.

 

The failure of Labour's schemes

George Osborne today made a significant speech about Labour's failures in tackling the recession and what the Tories would do about it. It was an impressive speech, but what struck me was the scale of the failure of the Governments plans. If George Osborne is correct then these are the figures.

- The Capital for Enterprise fund has helped just 5 companies.

- The Mortgage Rescue Scheme has helped 15 families.

- The Trade Credit Insurance Scheme has helped 58 businesses with £13 million, it was designed to supply £5 billion!

- The Guarantee for Asset Backed Securities has not provided any guarantees yet.

- The £2.3 billion Automotive Assistance Programme has not provided funds to anyone yet.

We know that the car scrappage scheme has worked, but it looks like nothing else has. Including the VAT cut.

What a waste of time. Gordon Brown says the Tories would do nothing to help, well he should look to himself because that is what his government has achieved. I think the £50 billion loan guarantee would have been better than all these schemes!

Squiffy.

The Frenchman wins round one

There are two French vs Finnish motor sport contests this weekend. The first is for the Presidency of FIA, the governing body. Unfortunately Jean Todt has beaten Ari Vatanen to it. I say unfortunately, because Max Mosley has been a big supporter of the ex-Ferrari team boss and he hopes that it is more of the same.

 

I wanted there to be a big change. Some more consistent rulings, a push for reduced carbon emissions throughout motor sport, less intrigue and less politics overall. Todt is made in the Mosley mould, so get ready for more stories of motor sportshooting itself in the foot.

 

The second contest is for the World Rally Championship, between the Finn Mikko Hirvonen and Frenchman Sebastien Loeb in Wales. Loeb has won the championship for the last five years and I think it would be good for the sport if another were to win it this time around.

 

Squiffy.

 

Question Time : The verdict

I quite enjoyed the car crash telly of last night. I didn't know whether all the questions would be BNP based or follow the normal pattern of current affairs. In the end they plumped for the former, which worked but I think that if they were to repeat the exercise they would be advised to do a normal format.

 

Most people were worried that Nick Griffin would be articulate enough to strike a chord with the working class who feel hard done by. In the end I don't think that happened, he was simply not good enough. He came across as more evasive than most politicians and tried not to explain why he had been a holocaust denier. I don't think, and I sincerely hope, that he didn't do the BNP any favours. Most of what he said seemed to deny reality in a way Gordon Brown could only dream of. His insistence on the "indigenous English" coming from the ice age 17000 years ago, floating down on an ice sheet I suspect, is just laughable. Doesn't he know that even the word English comes from the Angles (invaders from Germany), what an eejit.

 

I thought Jack Straw was awful tonight, he's usually much better than that. Baroness Warsi argued a good case and Bonnie Greer had a good one liner ("I've brought  some good history books for you, you should read them"). David Dimbleby was excellent though and asked some probing follow up questions, he's  hopefully put to one side his woeful presentation the US Presidential Election last year.

 

Great TV.

 

Squiffy.

 

"Best placed to weather this recession". Humbug.

At the beginning of this recession the Prime Minister and ministers were often telling us that Great Britain was best placed to weather this recession. Well today's GDP's figures shows how wrong they were. Whilst France and Germany pulled themselves out of it, we're still stuck in negative territory.

 

We were the first into this recession and now it looks like we'll be the last out of it. This one tops the 80s and 90s recessions with six quarters of negative growth, worst since 1955.

 

So stick that up your quantitive easing.

 

Squiffy.

 

No to all women shortlists

David Cameron is mistaken in considering all women shortlists for Tory MPs. If he genuinely believes it then he is simply wrong. His argument that parliament is not working well because it is unrepresentative is wrong. It's not working well because the executive is too strong.

 

We now have more women than ever in parliament, is our politics better than ever? No, it's in the gutter. Have female ministers proved to be more able than their male counterparts? No. Am I blaming women for any of this? No. The number of women in parliament is irrelevant to this argument. If we had better MPs maybe we would be in a better position, and by better I mean more able to think for themselves and formulate an intelligent argument whilst supporting their constituents. So they should get to be an MP on merit, i.e. not by being on some favoured list or minority only list.

 

It is completely un-Tory. Which makes me think that DC is up to something? Is he wanting a clause 4 moment? If he is, he's chosen the wrong argument because he will lose.

 

If all jobs were chosen on merit, we'd be in a better country.

 

Squiffy.

 

It's October FFS

Just watching TV, and there's already been three Christmas adverts on. God help us.

Squiffy.

Congratulations Jenson

This is a slightly tardy message of Congratulations to Jenson Button on his first World Championship. It's slightly late because I'm recovering from a hangover, brought on by the champagne we drank last night toasting the 2009 champ!

 

We'd planned for some friends to come round to watch the Brazilian Grand Prix in the hope that Jenson would secure the title. On Saturday night, though, it looked like we were being premature. As he placed his car on the 14th spot to set off, I didn't think he could win it there and then. Just get around the Senna S and hope for the best!

 

Instead, in a fantastic race, Jenson pulled off 4 great overtaking manoevres to make a drive worthy of a champion. In a neat symmetry, both Lewis Hamilton and Nigel Mansell won the world championship coming home in 5th place.

 

As an aside, I was impressed by Kobayashi. Many Japanese drivers seem to be in F1 due to their relationships with Honda and Toyota and not purely on merit. Kobayashi's first race was very good. He was aggressive and fast, and didn't make any significant errors. He deserves to be in F1 next year.

 

At the beginning of the year I predicted that Robert Kubica would take the championship. How wrong was that? Big time - but I'm glad I was and now I'll take my hat off to Jenson Button. Deserved World Champion 2009.

 

Squiffy.

 

The fire sale has started

The news that the Government is now looking to sell off assets to fund its huge amount of debt is to be partly welcomed. I welcome it because many of the proposed assets should not have been in Government hands in the first place - can anyone think why the Government should own a betting company?

 

I add caution though. The sale will occur near the bottom of the market for many of these assets, they should have been sold when we were booming to help to pay off accumulated debt. If Gordon Brown was a spread better or trader he'd lose so much money. Just take a look at how much he got for the nation's gold reserves when he sold them off at a quarter of the current price. Maybe the Tote isn't best placed in his hands!

 

The other point is that you can only sell them off once. This does nothing to bring down the structural deficit. As an example, we would have to sell off the assets identified every month to break even! They still need to outline a plan for cutting costs.

 

Squiffy.

 

David Cameron speech : The verdict

David Cameron's speech was bit more positive than George Osborne's, but was still a bit downbeat. It was a good speech, but not great. Two years ago I was ecstatic, this time I'm merely impressed!

 

It was a personal speech, and he was obviously trying to look Prime Ministerial. I think he succeeded in that aim. He gave a broad brush of conservative values and there were no policy announcements, which is as expected.

 

So my verdict is 7 out of 10.

 

After all the conferences, George Osborne's speech stood out. It was extremely candid, and brave. But I don't think any speech will be seen as a game-changer.

 

Squiffy.

 

The Tories are reverting to type on law and order

I was dismayed last year when David Davis resigned as shadow home secretary to force a by-election, but thought that the appointments of Dominic Grieve and then Chris Grayling as replacements would be a good thing. The former is thoughtful and the latter a bruiser. Unfortunately, the speech yesterday by Chris Grayling showed that the current thinking on law and order has reverted to a traditional Tory message. More prisons and tougher sentences are the refrain we hear time and time again.

 

I find it disappointing, not because I don't like those proposals. We obviously need more prison places and I'm all for tougher sentences for the worst crimes. There was a lot ideas which remain unsaid, which were apparent in Tory thinking a few years ago. I thought the 'Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime' was a great Tony Blair line, unfortunately nobody has pursued it and I was under the impression that the Tory party were genuinely interested in thinking out of the box on some issues.

 

This country needs a fresh approach on law and order. Here's a few ideas:

 

1) For a start, we need to acknowledge that the war on drugs has been lost. We need to look at legalisation, taxation and a vast increase in the number of rehabilitation centres. If we can take drug dealers off our streets and have drugs available over the counter from Boots the amount of crime in this country will plummet. The police would then be able to redirect resources to murder and violent crime.

 

2) In a similar vein, we need to legalise brothels and take the working girls off our streets.

 

3) We need to provide compulsory education in prison for all, only when people are able to take employment when leaving incarceration will the re-offending rate be reduced. It should be a condition of release that everyone can read and write (unless there are some medical reasons why not).

 

That's for starters. If Chris Grayling cannot deliver new thinking, he should be replaced by someone who can. Maybe David Davis again?

 

Squiffy.

 

The public say they want honesty - let's see how they react to it

Yesterday was  a major speech by George Osborne and also a major gamble. Not since the shadow budget in 1992 has an opposition told the people that they will have to suffer some pain to get the things they want. Generally in the run up to an election the parties try to give some cheap give-away, who can forget the reduced council tax for pensioners in 2005 - it only lasted one year!

 

So George presented a list of policies which would affect people negatively and that is brave. In fact, in Sir Humphrey speak it could be 'courageous'. After the expenses scandal, the public said they wanted honesty. They now have some. By all means, they are not getting the full picture - there would be other cuts and tax rises under a Tory Government. But after the Labour party conference, when the debt mountain was hardly mentioned and another list of spending pledges were made, half a picture is better than looking at the reverse of the frame!

 

For me, I thought it was a deeply serious message and would have done George Osborne some credit as a future Chancellor. The bond markets have already improved. So for him, I think it was job done. It was a depressing speech though, so for David Cameron's speech I want him to touch on the tough message, but bring some light and optimism back to the nation. We need to see the darkness, but the light at the end of the tunnel must be visible and within reach.

 

Squiffy.

 

Lord Falconer makes an arse of himself

On the Today programme this morning Lord Falconer asserted that it is right to separate out the law lords from the House of Lords because the House makes laws and the judiciary do not. What an arse!

 

As someone who sat on the woolsack for several years in the House of Lords he should know something about the place! Has he never heard of legal precedence? Law Lords can change the law by interpreting the law differently, hence creating a precedent. It's common practice, and sits alongside the two Houses as being creators of laws in this land.

 

I would have thought he would know this, but wonders never cease. The fact that law lords (people who actually understand the law) sat in the Lords actually can help make better laws. If the Labour party had made more use of them we may have more effective law rather than page after page of the muddled thinking which has passed on the statute book over the last 12 years. It's not surprising that the Labour party has done much to wreck the great constitution of this land when they don't even understand it. The supreme court was a fudge after a botched re-shuffle, and they have not given a good enough reason to practice this constitutional vandalism.

 

Squiffy.

 

What is wrong with good grammar and spelling?

I was listening to the Today programme this morning, and there was piece about the state of written English. Written English from English students showed three times as many errors than from foreign students. It sounds quite shocking, but you must remember that most people in Britain start learning English orally. Written language comes later.

 

The argument seems to have been distilled down to whether we need to teach spelling and grammar, or whether we need to change the English language to make it less confusing and hence easier to write. For me, it's quite straightforward - we must resume teaching of spelling and grammar.

 

As someone who went through the schools system from 1978 to 1991, I never had an English lesson on grammar and only a few on spelling. My first lesson on grammar came in French, when I first found out about nouns, pronouns and verbs. At the time I couldn't believe that we weren't being taught this in English, and my incredulity grows with the years. I've always thought hard about the words I use in my blog posts to try to express what I feel, but I guess a greater grasp on grammar and a wider vocabulary would help. I'm still a stickler for typing full words in text messages, and I try never to use smilie's - as I think it's cheating!

 

The opposing argument reminds me of one of those English lessons, when we learnt about newspeak in George Orwell's 1984. Words were stripped out of the language which could be expressed by other means, so "bad" became "ungodly". It's a horrible, dumber down vision of the future.

 

We should respect our language. Allow it to evolve by all means, but organically rather than as some get out clause for correct teaching. We must bring back proper English lessons, teach grammar and allow ourselves some pride in the language of Shakespeare, Dickens, Fry and Chaucer.

 

Squiffy.

 

Why Tony Blair should not be EU president, and why he will be

Now that it looks likely that the Lisbon treaty will be ratified by all countries, the focus has now turned to the who will be the first President. Most believe it will be Tony Blair, and under normal circumstances I would find that ok. He would, in my opinion, be preferred to a European socialist such as Valéry Giscard d'Estaing as he does have a feel for the English middle classes and would try to protect the British Financial centre.

 

The big but, though, is that it was this man who duped the British public over the Lisbon treaty in the first place. He duped us by promising us a referendum, getting re-elected and then reneging on his promise. He knew he would not have to face the electorate after the referendum plan had been revoked.

 

If you believe in conspiracy theories you could almost imagine,  in the weeks leading up to his announcement of the referendum, Tony Blair and Peter Mandelson looking at the options of what Tony might do after he left number 10. How about another big job? EU President. All he needed to do was make sure that he could deliver the British public, which meant he had to win the election (against the public who were hostile to the treaty), retire and then come back when the job was done. The plan has worked out brilliantly for TB.

 

I don't believe that they could have been so clever to pull everything off, so it just happens that it has worked out this way. But for the simple reason that he pulled the plug on the referendum at the first possible opportunity means he should be stopped from being the EU president but also why he will be the first. The EU leaders must have known it would be extremely difficult to ratify the treaty in Britain. If Michael Howard had won in 2005 it would have failed, if the referendum had happened it would have failed. They have a lot to thank Tony for! Hence, Gordon Brown will be able to greet his old friend and foe as Mr. President not long from now.

 

Squiffy.

 

Europe, what to do?

Now that the Labour Party conference has finished, the spotlight will turn on the Tories. But the beam of light will be shining at midday on Saturday, rather than on Sunday when the conference begins.

At noon-ish, the Irish referendum result will be announced and the likelihood is that it will be yes, which is a great shame. I would have liked the Irish to say "no means no", but the scare tactics of the yes camp seems to have worked.

David Cameron will then be faced with the problem of what to do with his sentence "We will not let matter's rest". What does it mean? If he doesn't spell it out, it will cast a shadow over the whole conference - and he won't want that.

There's several things he could do, all of them difficult.

1. He could say that it's unfortunately a done deal. There's not much that can be done, but he will be make sure that there are soon negotiations on a new treaty which will repatriate some powers.

2. He could announce a referendum on a package of measures he wants to put forward to the EU. He may then have the backing of the public to go to the EU for some repatriation of powers.

3. He could say that he will enshrine in law that any future EU treaty will need a referendum to be passed in the UK.

4. He could make a British written constitution enshrining that referenda are needed to pass EU treaties.

5. He could go deliberately obstructive. He could threaten to withhold funds until the accounts are signed off and he gets a treaty to reduce the EU powers.

6. He could continue with a referendum on Lisbon, and then renegotiate our EU position. Effectively being out of the EU.

7. He could propose a referendum on associate membership of the EU. Taking us back to the single European Act.

8. He could propose complete withdrawal.

All of these are very difficult and electorally dangerous. I think options 1 to 3 are viable, option 4 fills me with dread. Trying to create a new constitution is extremely difficult. 5 just looks petulant. 6 to 8 are extremely problematic, possibly an election loser.

Wouldn't want to be in DC's position this weekend.

Squiffy.

Did the Labour party have a good week?

A common commentary at the end of this week, is that not much changed at the Labour party conference, but that the troops have been slightly re-energised which means it's not as bad as it was before.

I could agree with that partly. There weren't the splits of the year before and it was subdued but good natured.

I think though that the Labour party is in a worse position now than before. It was their last opportunity to explain a new vision for the country, and it takes time to bed an idea in the public's collective head - a new idea will need longer than an official general election campaign.

They repeatedly said "change", but the scatter-gun of policies announced by the Prime Minister and others were more of the same. There was no new vision and no change of direction. The run up to the general election campaign will now resume from the point before the conference season.

It's an opportunity lost. There's only the pre-budget report and budget to change the narrative.

Squiffy.

Massa wants Lewis stripped of the 2008 title

Apparently Felipe Massa wants the Singapore Grand Prix wiped from the record books because of the Renault crashgate scandal.

I can understand that, Lewis would lose his points from that race and Massa would be crown World Champion.

It's not as simple as that, you would have to at the impact of that changed result on the rest of the races. Or imagine that the Singapore race had not taken place at all.

Without the points Lewis Hamilton took at Singapore, would he have driven differently in the remaining races. I think so. For a start he wouldn't have driven for a 5th place in Brazil.

In that Singapore race, Massa and his pit crew screwed up (with Massa setting off with the fuel hose still attached). That was the reason that he didn't win that race, otherwise he could still could have done it. In the following races, their pit lights gantry was removed. If that race hadn't taken place, would the pit cock-up have happened later, possibly at Brazil?

We just don't know. The fact is that the race was held, and Alonso won it albeit by circumstances contrived by his team-mate. But he drove magnificently that day, and should not be stripped of the win. And so, Lewis Hamilton should not be stripped of his World Championship.

Squiffy.

The incredible sulk, you wouldn't like it when he gets angry

How will he cope in general election campaign?



Squiffy.