The question most of the populace sympathetic to the
Eurosceptic stance in the UK is “How will we succeed, when
we withdraw and regain our global trading environment?
 Just as this EU Constitution is virtually a closed book to
people en masse (one reason being that in the UK they cannot
buy a copy, and who is keen enough to download 350 pages?),
so is the reasoned case for Britain’s success after
withdrawal.
There has been a decade or so of powerful published
arguments saying that the UK could prosper just as well OUT
of the EU.
That reasoned case exists – but in book and pamphlet,
economic paper and reports from high-level political bodies.
Again, not easily accessed.
But the UK electorate though when it does read the case
would agree with many of the assertions, en masse there is
seemingly a deep confusion.
The great need is for the case to be made, published
strongly, and a campaign to be mounted spread over a lengthy
time-period. UKIP did a good job in publishing its
manifestos in 2001 on the web; their exposition was clear,
easily read and convincing.
Can Kilroy-Silk, or UKIP again, or the other Eurosceptic
movements achieve a real mass-communication success to sway
the electorate by the Referendum in 2006?
One poll recently (January 2005) showed that, when faced
with “The question” likely to be put to the UK Electorate on
the Constitutional Treaty Referendum in 2006, more than 50
per cent of the Poll agreed with it and said Yes.
The Question contained the words ‘approve’ and ‘treaty’,
which Eurosceptics said was unfairly slanted to the Yes
vote.
Shortly after another Question was put to a Poll street
audience, without the words ‘approve’ and ‘treaty’, and this
time there was a refusal, more than 50 per cent saying ‘No’.
That is the crunch area for Kilroy-Silk to influence and to
win. Also, though opposed to him, this is the same area of
work for UKIP and all other Eurosceptics.
The main UK parties had agreed that first “Question”. The
electoral Commission had agreed that first Question. It is a
puzzle, this Poll Question ‘psychology’ which ensures
‘fairness’ and ‘non-influence’. So the Eurosceptics had
better ensure the Electorate faces a ‘fair’ Question.
But there should be no fear, within the electorate of
withdrawal, from the EU. EU countries still need the UK
slightly more than we need them! Asia and China will be
growing problems for the EU and Britain whether we stay in
or withdraw.
----------------
The “Question” to be put to UK voters contains the words
“approve” and “treaty”, something Eurosceptics see as
unbalanced and influential. Yet it has been approved by UK
politicians and the Electoral Commission. It may not be
overturned.
UKIP gained and has now lost ground. Politicians with loud
voices which will not be silences - like Kilroy-Silk - have
immense value in the months before the real fight to refuse
comes upon us.
The Constitution is likely to be approved in June by the MEP
‘sheep’. It then goes before 25 nation-states (yes, they
still exist!) for their approval.
Already the EU Commission has sanctioned and paid more than
£200,000 to at least seven education and other locations for
what critics say is blatantly pro-Constitution propaganda.
The UK government says it has now requested that this
financial campaigning stop. The Commission says it will
continue to fund dissemination of “Information” in the UK
about the Constitution.
And £2 million a year continues to be provided by the
Commission for UK sources to spend on working to “raise
awareness of the EU”.
Eurosceptic funds, raised privately and publicly - to
present the case against the EU, to publicise “information”,
to analyse the implications of a future Monster of 25, or
27, or more countries dominated by the EU Constitution - are
of course a pale shadow
in comparison.
Britain’s EU membership costs us £20 billion-£40 billion a
year, according to several groups, including Veritas.
Yet... before today’s “EU” was even a glimmer in
possibility, it all began as a genuine ideal, hope, movement
for European Unity. It was in the hearts and minds of
progressive and generous thinkers among previous
generations. And has become “a bold overly-political
experiment”, this “EU”.
The result today is a fantastic (as in a fantasy)
centralised monolithic monster. We in Britain are the fourth
leading contributor, and we can hold any tangible benefits
for our expenditure in one hand. Nor is the future looking
brighter. Britain’s power, at the top, within the EU, is so
often marginalised.
Where the “EU” is concerned, France (by that I mean its
political leadership) was and is the supreme political
operator and as ever, crudely-commercial in its own
self-interest.
Many see it - the treaty for the EU Constitution - as the
final step in the dishonest, super-secretive long-term
manoeuvre to the integrated, super-statehood – in whatever
form this “draft – or should it be Daft? Constitution” is
proposed to the electorates of 25 nation-states.
This Constitution’s approval is essential to the most
serious Europhiles. Why? In order that the decades-long,
secret ideology and intent can consolidate the EU’s path
ahead into ....
Integration and Supra-nationalism ....
and thus into political, economic and bureaucratic
dictatorship for Europe west and east. |
