Daily Express Campaign - Get Us Out Of Europe

[snowychap]

Policing - The police in EU member states can now use an EU arrest warrant to get suspects moved from one country to another where they will face serious charges without lengthy extradition procedures.

Apologies if anyone else has remarked upon this but is this statement supposed to be put in the 'pro' or 'con' camp? :?

I know where it goes for me (firmly in the latter).

I've yet to be convinced that EU arrest warrants are anything better than an utter abomination (though still not as bad as the extradition agreement with the US).

[snowychap]

The introduction of the Human Rights Acts has provided a legal framework to prevent abuses of power. (so conveniently forgotten - pah!)

Human Rights have been around in modern form since Churchill:

“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

—Article 1 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) 1948.

British citizens have had similar protection since 1683 and the ‘English Bill of Rights’. Why do we suddenly need the EU to tell us we can have something we’ve had for nigh on 350 years anyway?

I'm not sure who is arguing against whom, how and why.

The HRA is really just the enactment in the UK of the ECHR, isn't it? Am I wrong in thinking that the ECHR is the convention that was put in to place mainly by us, the English, after the war to put our values of decency, human rights, &c. at the heart of the Council of Europe (which has nowt to do with the EU). If any problems have arisen why do these problems get associated with 'Europe'? If anything, wouldn't or shouldn't they be 'associated' with the UK? At the heart of the convention are our values (the values of british justice) - if you want to argue against them then argue against them rather than Europe for them.

[Chindie]

A small correction Snowy, IIRC the Council of Europe has been subsumed by the EU and now is another element of the organisation (but a comparatively small one). IIRC one of the main duties of the 'EU President' was to chair the Council of Europe.

Doesn't change your point at all but does somewhat return to one I made earlier - the EU is so complex it's hard to debate it's merits. Even little things like that can change perceptions of some aspects of it.

[snowychap]

A small correction Snowy, IIRC the Council of Europe has been subsumed by the EU and now is another element of the organisation (but a comparatively small one). IIRC one of the main duties of the 'EU President' was to chair the Council of Europe.

You might well be right, mate, but I do wonder how a group of 40 plus countries could be 'subsumed' by a group of 27.

Perhaps there may be 'closer co-operation' or some such.

EDIT: Rethinking that, it can't be the case as that would be impossible, wouldn't it? It just doesn't go.

I'm not sure, though, what effect that would have on the legalities concerning the ECHR and the like which I really don't believe have anything to do with the EU regardless of who is the chair of what.

[snowychap]

Duplicate thingie.

[snowychap]

IIRC one of the main duties of the 'EU President' was to chair the Council of Europe.

I wonder whether that isn't chairing the European Council (which is not the Council of Europe).

[Chindie]

Poor choice of words, tiredness is catching upto me.

It might be better to say that they work very, very closely together and the EU more or less 'hosts' the Council of Europe. Also the EU now has a policy of working much closer with those outside of it's membership meaning the 27 members doesn't quite tell the whole story of what the EU is. Can't remember what the exact term they've given it is, but the countries on the edge of the Union (both metaphorically and geographically literally) are being involved increasingly in it's decisions, either directly consulted or simply heavily considered. Theres even talk of a kind of 'second class membership' where those on the outskirts can be brought to the table but not signed up for the full kit and caboodle.

Which even more brings the integration with the Council of Europe into focus. A Council of Europe held by the EU would have a room of delegates who all are rather au fait with the EU and would most likely be doing their own policy dealings with the organisation themselves without even being part of it officially.

As I said it doesn't change your point at all, but it raises another - this organisation is so absurdly complex that it a)isn't good for it or us, and it makes it incredibly hard to really make an informed decision on. I only managed to reconcile myself with it when I came to the conclusion that much of it's ideal is a good thing, more or less skipping over the bad points or accepting they need change.

Of course the complexity is basically an offshoot of it's genesis - made up as it went along. After all this an entity that started out as being interested only in coal and steel .

[Chindie]

IIRC one of the main duties of the 'EU President' was to chair the Council of Europe.

I wonder whether that isn't chairing the European Council (which is not the Council of Europe).

Aye I know the difference, Three months of this look on my face is testiment to that

I've got the wrinkles to prove it.

I'm still fairly sure the EU President chairs the Council of Europe, acting both as a rep for the EU as a whole and a kind of chairman (the Speaker role if you will).

I could be talking out of my arse but I'm pretty sure I'm not.

[snowychap]

The point that I was making, though, is that the ECHR (the court) is the court that is the legal top of the Council of Europe which decides upon points of law about the ECHR (the convention), i.e. that which we didn't just help to shape but really shaped.

Now that is based upon whether one is a signatory of the convention (which is the 47, isn't it?) and regardless of how closely one organization might wish to align itself with another along whatever lines, the discussion about the EU and the HRA/ECHR seems to me to be utterly bizarre as it would seem that one could disband the EU and it would have sweet fanny **** all to do with one's obligations under the ECHR (and good job, too).

[rjw63]

Get us out, and take our European manager as well

[snowychap]

Get us out, and take our European manager as well

Oh, Pierre, you're so...

[rjw63]

I'll give you ****' Pierre :-)

[snowychap]

I'll give you ****' Pierre :-)

A heffalump like me ne'er forgets.

[theunderstudy]

I tell you what, get MON to take over the government for a short while, we'll be out of Europe in a blink!

[Awol]

I think thats far too simple a line of thought AWOL but fair enough.

Often the simple answer is the right one. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and looks like a duck....

Serious question Chindie, why else is the EU acquiring and using the functions of a state? If the aim of the EUcrats isn't federalisation then surely the current institutions and there ongoing expansion is just a collosal waste of money? Why replicate the functions of the individual nation states if the intent is not to ultimately replace them?

Still I don't expect you to take my word for it:

"The Constitution is the capstone of a European Federal State"

- Guy Verhofstadt, Prime Minister of Belgium, 2007

"Sometimes I like to compare the EU as a creation to the organisation of empire. We have the dimension of empire. What we have is the first non-imperial empire," José Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, July 2007

"We are building something which is truly federal or a true union of states. We must ...... go towards a United States of Europe". Pierre Moscovici, French Europe Minister, speech to EU convention, 28 Feb 02

"Monetary Union has to be complemented by political union - that was always the presumption of Europeans" Chancellor Schroder, 22 Feb 02

"The single market was the theme of the 80s; the single currency the theme of the 90s; and we must now face the difficult task of moving towards a single economy and a single political unity" Romano Prodi , Head of the European Commission, speech to MEPs, 1999

"Transforming the European Union into a single state with one army, one constitution and one foreign policy is the critical challenge of the age" J Fischer, German Foreign Minister, speech to MEPs, November 1999

"In the next six months, we will talk a lot about political union, and rightly so. Political union is inseparable from economic union" Laurent Fabius, French Finance Minister, FT 24 July 00

"The single currency is the greatest abandonment of sovereignty since the foundation of the European Community... It is a decision of an essentially political nature. We need this united Europe .. we must never forget that the euro is an instrument for this project" Felipe Gonzalez , former Prime Minister of Spain, Apr 99

"We now need an economic government .... Ultimately the corporate tax system as a whole will have to be harmonised." Lionel Jospin, French Prime Minister, May 2001

"The process of monetary union goes hand in hand - must go hand in hand - with political integration and ultimately political union. EMU is, and always was meant to be, a stepping stone on the way to a united Europe. " Wim Duisenberg , President of the European Central Bank, 1997

"It is essential for the EU to become a political power and not just a group of nation states". Pierre Muscovici, French Minister for European Affairs, interview in Corriere della Sera, Oct 01

The national budget policies are still too often conceived on the basis of national interests. Romano Prodi, Head of European Commission, May 2001

"The introduction of the Euro is probably the most important integrating step since the beginning of the unification process. It is certain that the times of independent nation states are definitely over" Chancellor Schroeder

"Monetary union is the motor of European integration." Jean-Luc Dehaene, Belgian Prime Minister

If EMU does not go ahead, there will be great danger of seeing Europe drift progressively towards a free trade zone - precisely what we have been trying to avoid for 25 years. Yves Thibault De Siguy, Monetary Affairs Commissioner

I'll remain considerably surprised if a genuine majority push ever comes about for a truly federal European state.

I agree it's a hard sell to the populations of the EU but so far they've tended to get around that by increasing the power of EU institutions incrementally and not consulting the people. However you definitely shouldn't be surprised that a United States of Europe is the goal of the EUcrats, they are quite open about that fact.

[Chindie]

I think it is the goal of some of those involved in the EU. Unfortunately for them theres also a lot of people that also want to the EU in a different direction that isn't with a federal end game. There are a number of factions as I said that want to take the EU in different directions and it's by no means the racing certainty that it's being made out that a federal Europe is the ultimate endgame. To suggest otherwise is misleading imo.

[mjmooney]

At least we've still got the Empire.

Oh wait.