Labour's fixed that for you

According to the Daily Wail, George Osborne (amongst others) lobbied hard against the Tories' EU referendum pledge.

George Osborne pleaded with David Cameron not to hold an in/out referendum on the European Union, it emerged last night.
Senior Tory sources revealed the Chancellor had repeatedly warned against the move in the run-up to the Prime Minister’s referendum pledge in 2013.

He is said to have warned Mr Cameron that a referendum would not resolve the tensions within the Tory party over the issue, and risked an accidental British exit from the EU.

If we exit the EU, Georgie-boy, it won't be "accidental": it will be the quite deliberate will of the British people—a people who would rather make their own laws and articulate their own priorities (for better or for worse).

But why, George? Why would you do this thing: why campaign against an EU referendum...?

[Osborne] also warned that holding an in/out vote risked putting the Conservatives on the wrong side of mainstream business opinion…

Well, if by "mainstream business" you mean big corporates, yes: if, on the other hand, you mean "the vast majority of British businesses that have to implement a bunch of regulations even though they don't actually trade abroad"—the ones that make up 80% of our trade and commerce—then not so much.

But Georgie is a sneaky little tyke: surely he can just be cuddling up to businesses? Is there, perhaps, some kind of political side to this?

... handing a political gift to Labour.

Ah. I did wonder.

Still, that shouldn't be a problem after September 12.

The Tories will have to worry far less about the opinion of businesses (or, indeed, voters) when the main opposition party is about to elect a terrorist-appeasing Communist, pushing a generally fascist manifesto—the financials of which are cobbled together by an economic illiterate.

George & Co. must be delighted.

Can anyone tell me what comes next...?

So, the Tory Party Treasurer has resigned after being caught promising to get donors into "the Cameron/Osborne dinners" for £250,000.

Prime Minister David Cameron has criticised the party's former treasurer for boasting that a big enough donation could lead to high-level access.

He said Peter Cruddas' claims, filmed by undercover Sunday Times reporters, were "completely unacceptable". Mr Cruddas quit hours after publication.

The PM pledged a "party inquiry" into the claims that £250,000 would get donors a private dinner with him.

And quite right.

Because anyone who is willing to pay a penny to have dinner with that massively-foreheaded shit or his rat-nibbled-nosed Chancellor needs their head examined.

Besides, anyone who thinks that Cameron would keep any promise made at that time also needs to get a fucking grip. The man is a shifty, dishonest little bastard.

Mr Cruddas had been secretly filmed saying that a donation of £250,000 gave "premier league" access to party leaders, including private dinners with Mr Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne, and with any feedback on policy shared with Downing Street.

Donors get an input into policy, eh? Well, that's nice. But, as Douglas Carswell indignantly tweeted...

DouglasCarswell: An input into policy making? I thought that is why I stood for election. Where are the MPs in the policy unit?

No, Douglas: what you are there for is as lobby-fodder. Now shut up and toe the damn party line, or you'll be getting deselected, sunshine.

This is an argument that I will develop in another post sometime, but I actually have little objection to rich individuals* paying for access to party policy-makers. It seems only fair, since the poor and middle-class have far greater numbers: as we have seen from all the outrage at "the rich" being thrown a bone in the budget, people in this country would happily vote for "the rich" to pay for the plebs' every whim.

Having rich individuals paying for access to the top party echelons simply redresses the balance a bit: otherwise, the politicians—pandering to their electorate—would pander to the worst desires of their electorate, i.e. vote for us and we'll give you loads of shit, and make someone else pay for it (admittedly, that is modern democracy in a nutshell, but it could be worse).

No, what I am concerned about is the greater implications. When they came to power, the Coalition promised an "agreement on limiting donations and reforming party funding", and we all know what that means, don't we?

State-funding of political parties is what it means.

Although Nick "wet dishcloth" Clegg has supposedly ruled out state funding for this Parliament, we all know that all three parties are just itching to get their hands on some of that lovely tax-payer cash.

How do we know this?

Well, because they told us last time state funding of political parties raised its head—back in 2006 (lots of swearing)—and all three major parties were in favour of it.

The trouble is, neither NuLabour nor their Change Coalition successors have worked out how to get around the outrage from the general public. The trouble with funding scandals is that the populace's response is, "well, the politicians have once again proved that they are crooks: why the hell would we want to give them more of our money?"

So, watch out for the next move...

UPDATE: well, that didn't take long...

* Corporations, however, are another matter entirely...

The Devil's Manifesto

Your humble Devil has been a busy man, and he has been unwilling to blog (unable?) for a little while—partly because I was going to give the Coalition a chance. They have blown that chance, and now it is time to lay out the manifesto on which I plan to engage their failures.

Luckily, this is quite easy because the Coalition laid out a number of aims when they came into power, and it is relatively easy to measure how they have done. In the meantime, please forgive my lack of links—I shall fill these in as I write about the separate areas. So...

1. Reduction of the deficit: it is important to note that the deficit is the difference between government income and government spending—the Coalition have never promised to reduce the debt.
   
   But, nevertheless, even by the rather less ambitious measure they set themselves, the Coalition has utterly failed to reduce the deficit: they spent more this year than any government before.


2. Increased GDP: the way in which the Coalition planned to reduce the deficit was not absolutely, but relatively: they intended to reduce government spending as a proportion of GDP.
   
   In order to increase spending whilst reducing its proportion of GDP, it required that the government ensure that GDP grew faster than spending: they anticipated increasing GDP by 2.5% per annum.
   
   They have absolutely failed to do so: we will be lucky to get 1% this year (which is a loss against inflation)*.


3. Why has the Coalition failed to increase GDP? Because they increased taxes: the higher the taxes, the lower the GDP—in almost every single case.


4. Restoration of Civil Liberties: the government has utterly failed in this. It is true that they have removed threats such as ID Cards: but these had never been introduced legally—all the Coalition did was to stop something that had never been introduced.
   
   In the meantime, the Restoration of Liberties bill has no teeth and will restore precisely no liberties what-so-fucking-ever. If you doubt me, simply look at the government's weasel words over the retention of DNA for innocents.


5. Listening to the people: the Coalition promised to listen to people's opinion on various issues. They even set up a website admirably quickly.
   
   But they failed to listen: the two biggest issues were a relief of the smoking ban and the legalisation of drugs.
   
   The Coalition ignored this. Nick Clegg issued a video stating, in no uncertain terms, that the smoking ban would not be repealed. The drugs ban had the same response.
   
   The site disappeared into the Coalition's memory hole.

The Conservative-LibDem Coalition has failed by every major metric that they set themselves: your humble Devil intends to call them out in precisely the kind of language and rage with which I called out NuLabour.

Onwards...

* Thanks to those who pointed out that GDP is already inflation-adjusted.

Beyond a joke

Via Strange Stuff, I find Dan Hannan highlighting the EU's latest intrusion into our pockets sovereignty.

As the law stands, people wishing to settle in Britain must demonstrate that they have the means to support themselves, either through work or through an alternative source of income such as a pension. The European Commission claims that this amounts to discrimination against EU citizens, who are supposed to enjoy the same rights as British nationals.

In fact, as so often happens, Eurocrats are disregarding the plain text of their own rules. Article 7(1) of the Free Movement Directive gives EU citizens the right to reside in another member state only if they have “sufficient resources for themselves and their family members not to become a burden on the social assistance system of the host Member State”.

In order to get around this clause, the European Commission is deploying a piece of sheer sophistry. It argues that, if immigrants were able to top up their income with British benefits, they would have “sufficient resources”.

In May, the Supreme Court ruled on the claim of a Latvian pensioner, who had just moved to Britain and had demanded Pension Credit on grounds that her Latvian pension was too small. Although our courts like to rule in favour of immigrants, the law here was so clear-cut that, by 4-1, judges turned her down. If the European Commission were to get its way, she would not only be able to claim Pension Credit, but also council tax and housing subsidies—despite not having paid a penny into the system.

There are several issues to be addressed here, and they touch on a number of issues.

1. The idea of National Insurance was that it was an insurance (or, practically, assurance) scheme: if you paid in, then you could get a pay out in the correct circumstances. But the point is that yo only get a pay-out if you pay in.
   
   If you die, your family cannot apply to insurance company for a pay-out of you haven't been paying any life insurance.


2. Yes, we all know that National Insurance is a colossal Ponzi Scheme so there is no insurance fund (which Obama's administration recently confessed). It is only a matter of time before one EU country or another tries to absolve themselves from legislation like this by pointing out they they don't have the money to pay.


3. At that point, I'd put even money on the EU suggesting that all social security taxes should go into a central EU fund which will ensure the payment of social security. At which point, of course, the EU will harmonise the level of payment across all member states in order to ensure the fair distribution of funds.
   
   At which point, of course, we can all kiss goodbye to whatever semblance of independence or sovereignty remains to us.


4. This is an especially important point: THERE IS NO FUCKING MONEY LEFT.

The low-grade panic and the pathetic desperation inherent in Obama's recent sham negotiations—coupled with our own government's pathetically-failed attempts to curb state spending have only confirmed the act that the Western economies are effectively bankrupt.

In fact, let us be more precise about this: every single soft socialist democracy is bankrupt—with the possible exception of Germany (which is, instead, being bankrupted by the other economies to which it is bound).

In fact, as Detlev Schlichter has so eloquently put it, we can, at last, welcome the death of politics.

Should we feel sorry? Worried? Desperate? – Well, with apologies to Oscar Wilde, but one has to have a heart of stone to read about the struggling political class without laughing.

The modern state is in terminal decline. Good riddance.

While I do not want to belittle the upcoming upheaval and the pain it will cause to many, all of us who love liberty should rejoice. The state is bust. Game over.

Hoorah, the state is dead!

We libertarians have been treated as slightly eccentric for years, no, for decades. Our plans to convince our fellow men and women of the benefits of small or no government, of the power of voluntary cooperation on free markets, of the global division of labor and of personal liberty – they were greeted with the pitiful smile reserved for the hopelessly naive. No political party would ever win on such a platform, we were told. If given the choice, the public votes not for freedom with all its uncertainty but for the caring, paternalistic state with free health service at point of delivery – and while we are at it, why not all sorts of other freebies, too? And, let’s face it, our critics were right. The chances of Ron Paul becoming the next American president are – well, zero. The political process – in particular modern mass democracy in which every vote counts the same whether from a taxpayer or tax-consumer – is designed to increase state power, not to limit it. As Mark Steyn has observed so pointedly, government is like coffee at Starbucks: It only comes in three sizes: tall, grande and venti.

But as good libertarians we should not rely on politics like our enemies, the statists, do. That is their game. Let’s not play it. We should rely – as befits proper anarchists – on our fellow man’s self-interest. Not more, not less. Most people prefer more goods to fewer goods. For that they need markets, not politics. Politics just gets in the way. Just as the market is working and delivering the goodies every day even if most people don’t understand why and how, so the state is collapsing under the weight of its own inconsistencies whether the people still want to believe in it or not.

“Events, dear boy, events.” All we have to do is sit back and let the state collapse. We know that in the long run, the state is dead. And the long run may be sooner than we think.

And he is right: in between the planted distractions of phone-hacking and assorted media wank, we have all witnessed the scrabblings of our Lords and Masters as they attempt to rescue their doomed political projects—do they realise that it's all in vain?

With all of the highly paid advisers at their beck and call, they surely must? But then I realise that most advisers to the (mostly) terminally stupid, ignorant and venal MPs are recently ex-students—not exactly the cleverest people on the planet in the first place—and civil servants desperate to preserve the illusion of business-as-usual in order to preserve their cushy jobs and platinum-plated pensions.

So perhaps they do not realise. Perhaps they don't understand.

The state is bust: there is no more money for any more bail-outs. The biggest bond-buyers are the banks (why do you think the world's governments agreed to bail them out?) and even they are shying away this stupidest of stupid investments.

As Detlev points out, the state is bust and all libertarians have to do is sit back and watch it happen.

Refusal to see the irony

Sitting in Edinburgh airport, I have just watched a representative of the Dowler family [...]* earnestly telling BBC News reporters that this general furore has demonstrated "the power of the public can defeat an organisation, no matter how large" [from memory and thus possibly paraphrased].

And all of this delivered from in front of Number 10 Downing Street.

The righteous and totally hysterical attitude of people like this—when, let's face it, no one at the NotW actually murdered Milly Dowler or, indeed, anyone else—would be annoying enough.

But to deliver it from in front of what might be designated the effective headquarters to a "large" organisation that maintains its power through thuggery, extortion and violence—that derives its mandate from, quite frankly, mob rule.

Oh, and look...! Here's rent-a-gob Don Foster MP, telling us all that it is a "great testament to the power of the British people that they have forced Parliament to take the strong line that they have on this matter." [Again, from memory.]

And now Don Foster MP has just dropped a massive hint that Parliament thinks that, not only should NewsCorp not be allowed to buy the rest of BSkyB—through not being a "fit person"—but that the government should use the same excuse to steal the 39% that NewsCorp currently owns.

Thus neatly proving my points, above, about "mob rule", "thuggery, extortion and violence".

Thanks, Don, you fuckwit, for confirming that we should fear and loathe you and your endemically corrupt cronies even more than Murdoch.

* UPDATE 00.47 14/7/11: I have deleted the observation used here, since it detracts from the point of the post and some people got their knickers in a twist about it.

I would point out—as I have in the reply to the vicariously-outraged Anonymous—that the Dowlers have now made themselves into a political issue. Regardless of what happened to their daughter—which was (and I really shouldn't have to say this but, given the current hysteria, I must) really unpleasant—the Dowlers are using their situation and the accompanying media profile to drive some developments that I consider extremely dangerous to freedom in this country.

The false savings of "competitive" tendering...

... are neatly illustrated by Dick Puddlecote.

To illustrate, I'll go back around a decade to when such things really did pit suppliers against each other in a cut-throat mechanism which drove down costs to provide value for the taxpayer buck. It was a time when large operators were capable of being usurped by a one-man-band offering a quality service at a homemade price. The more providers, the lower you had to pitch to be sure of getting the work.

Those days are long gone.

About five or six years ago, in our experience, the regulatory burden began increasing at an alarming rate. Health and safety was ramped up to quite absurd levels and quality thresholds were set which were impossible for small outfits in our industry to comply with. For example, a company like ours—with a tad more financial breathing space by virtue of our larger size—were able to implement all of the ridiculous (and not even mildly more protective) demands placed on the vehicles which would be acceptable to the authorities concerned. The little guy had no chance—unlike us—of throwing a load of cash at new, or adapted, vehicles to cope with the latest over-weening directive imagined by local authorities, none of which would have any effect on overall safety or provision of service.

We thrived as a result, while dozens of our competitors threw the towel in and went and did something else instead (that's if they did anything but sell their rig and roll up to the local social security office, of course). Happy days for Puddlecote Inc, but we were—as economics dictates—charging far more to the authority.

Of course, Dick fails to mention that, in many cases (especially in the NHS) if you are not a member of the "supplier framework"—for which you have to submit massive amounts of paperwork and be of a certain size (in terms of turnover)—then even being in with a chance of tendering for many public sector contracts is almost impossible anyway. The result is fewer suppliers who have to sink even more time and money into simply bidding for a contract.

For example, the other day, I was talking to a friend whose company deals with the public sector: the tenders often run into the hundreds of pages and they often have to attend at least two "pitches"—with the entire tendering process often running to six months or more.

His company recently bid for an NHS project over a period of three months: the tender response ran to 187 pages, they attended three meetings (including one "pitch"), did a considerable amount of research and product tuning to ensure that they would be able to meet the technical requirements, and were delighted that they got short-listed to the final two...

... at which point the tendering organisation in question informed them that they were terribly sorry, but they had got the tender process wrong and they would have to cancel this process and start again from scratch!

Of course, once again costs have no way to go but up, and with less competition, we are likely to get more of the proportion of work available. The taxpayer gets shafted while the public sector office fills its boots with council tax cash.

And the end result? Well, they can say that greedy private sector businesses are ripping off the taxpayer and that competitive tendering—introduced by Thatcher IIRC—just doesn't work.

Clever, huh?

Remember, our industry is just one small part of public sector outsourcing. Every supplier, in every field, is being put through this. Raising costs, and punishing your bank account with every monthly council tax instalment as a result.

Indeed. And the origin of this uncompetitive rubbish...?

You see, the whole process is run according to the Public Contracts Regulations 2006, which - as I'm sure will not in the least surprise you - is the UK enactment of European Directive 2004/18/EC.

Competitive tendering is supposed to act against monopolies and cartels, yet EU legislation is actively encouraging them in every town hall up and down the UK.

The problems here are, of course, not down to one single piece of legislation at all—however, the legislation serves as a convenient fig-leaf for those involved in the whole process. If all of the rules have been followed, then the amount of judgement required by those running and judging the tendering companies is vastly reduced.

Why?

Well, the way in which a tender should work is that anyone should be able to tender for the business. Now, many would argue that this could lead to poor outcomes—the smaller company could go bust without completing the job, or their service could be worse or just not up to the job, or the service could be delivered in a less safe way, etc. etc.

But all of these things should be assessed by those doing the tendering, those running the project. However, if these people made a fuck up then, of course, their necks could be on the line.

If they have fulfilled the minimum guidelines, however, then the potential for risk is far lower: not because the judges spend more time considering the bids, but because they know that the only bids that they can get are those that meet the minimum legal guidelines.

In other words, the onus for proving that the service is suitable is thrown almost entirely onto the tendering companies. The problem being, of course, that said companies must spend more money and time on doing the judges' work for them—resulting in higher prices.

If the project the goes tits up, the judges can point out (usually) that they have fulfilled all of the legal provisions and that it must be someone else's fault that the project is 18 months late and looking like crap.

In the meantime, as Dick points out, the only person being consistently shafted is the taxpayer...

Why don't EU stop posturing?

Your humble Devil has finished performing in Barnes Charity Players' triumphant production of Terrance Rattigan's Flare Path (a production of which, starring Sienna Miller, is about to start a run in the West End); as such, it is time for me to ease myself back into the sordid tedium of commenting on the deeply sordid political scene.

Scanning through the blogs, I was heartened—if not entirely convinced—by my friend Mark Wallace's assessment of the politicos' current attitude towards the EU.

When The Freedom Association launched the Better Off Out campaign in 2006, its aim was not to convert every MP overnight but to demonstrate that the doomsayers were mistaken.

By proving that the sky did not fall in on the heads of Philip Davies, Philip Hollobone or Douglas Carswell, they started a process of erosion that has seen many other MPs feel free to speak out on the topic. There are now 21 MPs as well as numerous MEPs, councillors and Members of the Northern Irish Assembly who are signed up.

Davies, Hollobone and Carswell turned marginal seats at 2005 into hefty majorities in 2010 despite or because of their EU views – they drank from a supposedly poisoned chalice and they are in hearty health.
...

To change the politics of the EU debate, we need to sweep away a deeply entrenched system of perception and assumption. The cracks are showing in Parliament, the stubborn obstructionism of our opponents is starting to break down, Fleet Street’s unanimity is broken and – crucially – there are signs that there may be sales and votes in the issue.

Make no mistake about it, the plates are shifting.

Perhaps so, especially since Mark links to a James Forsyth report that Oliver Letwin has even mooted the idea of a referendum on our membership of the EU.

Constantly being told what you can and can’t do by Brussels is driving Ministers and No 10 deeper and deeper into the Eurosceptic camp.
Oliver Letwin, Cameron’s mild-mannered and cerebral Policy Minister, has become so frustrated by this constant interference that he has told colleagues he thinks Britain should leave the European Union if it won’t give us all the opt-outs the Government wants.
Letwin is not alone in thinking this. In one department, a recent meeting between a Secretary of State and a junior Minister ended with the pair agreeing that the only solution to the problem they were discussing was to get out of the EU.

If true, this is indeed something of a turnaround for that turn-coat Letwin; long-time readers might remember that, in 2007, I reported on an email conversation I had with Oliver Letwin—a conversation that was updated, after an incredibly spineless reply from Letwin, in June 2007.

In essence, Letwin delivered three reasons for being in the EU, all of which I rebutted in a long reply; Letwin's considered response was that "we shall have to agree to differ". If even he is considering a referendum then we may have turned a corner.

However, I think it very unlikely that this is the case—I have neither seen nor heard anything in the last four years to make me think that Letwin has changed his mind on this issue.

No, I think it far more likely that this is the first in a series of bargaining gambits: having seen their naive leader get shafted—and made to look like a total idiot—over the EU budget, the Tories have decided that it is time for them to play at being tough. This idea is contained within one of the paragraphs quoted above... [Emphasis mine.]

Oliver Letwin, Cameron’s mild-mannered and cerebral Policy Minister, has become so frustrated by this constant interference that he has told colleagues he thinks Britain should leave the European Union if it won’t give us all the opt-outs the Government wants.

This is a warning shot across the bows to the EU and the other member states—it is most emphatically not a "cast-iron" guarantee of a referendum. Nor is it even a particularly convincing gambit.

The EU will simply call Letwin's bluff, we won't get the opt-outs—and Ollie will not call for a referendum.

Apart from anything else, the Tories are in a Coalition with the deeply EUphile Liberal Democrats, and they simply don't have enough clout to push anything at this stage.

The Tories try to keep their newly hardened Euroscepticism under wraps when dealing with their Lib Dem colleagues, who remain committed to the European project. But even the Lib Dems have been shocked at how much influence Brussels has on decisions that should be taken at a national level.

Indeed. However, whoever leaked this particular news to Forsyth must be gunning for Clegg...

Nick Clegg was appalled when officials told him that the EU wouldn’t allow VAT to be set at a local level.

It is simply inconceivable that Nick Clegg—an ex-MEP, a party leader and general policy wonk—is unfamiliar with the constraints on the setting of VAT levels. It is entirely conceivable, however, that the Tories are setting Clegg up for when the inevitable backlash over the VAT rise finally hits home.

Whilst I would like to believe that Mark is correct in his assessment of the EUscepticism of our MPs, I suspect that the Tories remain as wedded to the EU project as they ever were. Although, believe me, I would be happy to be proved wrong on that...

Don't ask me...

To ease ourselves back into this lark, here's a quick post highlighting a couple of Hoby's Road To Nowhere cartoons. The first [click pic to enlarge] is—like the political party to which it refers, a little incomplete and rough around the edges—but I think that it definitely has potential...



The second [click the pic to enlarge] simply made me laugh, since it pretty much sums up what I think about the student protests...



Do wander over to Hoby's place to see more cartoons (or even to hire him): I particularly enjoy the Road To Nowhere strip.

On leadership...

The wife has a post up in which she discusses some issues around leadership, Obama, politics and the general shit we inflict on ourselves (mainly, politicians' egos).

At least back in the day, those couple of dudes were honest about it: ‘I’m the best fighter, peasant, and if you don’t do what I say, I’ll do you.’

Now, the justifications are a lot more spurious. On the one hand, you have the politician, who starts with ‘I’ve consulted and studied and learned and listened, so vote for me,’ then moves to ‘Lots of people voted for me, so STFU,’ and ends with ‘I’ve got the bombs, motherfucker.’

Do go and read the whole thing...

Time for EU to see if they've lied (again)

A few weeks ago, I pointed out that the Tories' "referendum lock" on EU Treaties was a pointless piece of posturing that would be utterly ineffective, even if applied.

The whole issue has quickly become relevant because of the desire for the EU—driven by Germany—to gain control over Member States' economies. David Cameron was supposed to have won a great victory by enabling Britain to opt out of the EU's budgetary vetting, in return for supporting the three new EU QUANGOs gaining regulatory powers over the City and banking in general.

I would say that was, at best, a Pyrrhic victory and, at worst, a craven and stupid piece of negotiation which Cameron—and, more to the point, everyone else in Britain—is going to regret bitterly.

As President Sarkozy pointed out...

"Only four months ago, the words 'economic governance' were a taboo. But the idea is progressing."

Indeed. And it seems like Tough Dave Cameron is totally on board with the project. And even were he not, has Dave really managed opt out of EU oversight of the British budget?

In the words of a German diplomat, who upon reportedly hearing British claims of a victory at the summit, said, "Let's wait until October".

Well, it is now October and, sure enough, Douglas Carswell MP has found a puzzling piece of small print in the proposed Treaty.

If you read the European Commission document 11807/10 [PDF], however, it doesn’t seem quite so clear cut. Studying it, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the new rules on fiscal oversight are going to apply to all EU Member States, not just members of the Euro.

The paper – subtitled “Tools for stronger EU economic governance” – focuses on how Member States, not just Euro countries, “will act in compliance with the EU framework.” The “new structured mechanism” for vetting each countries budget will be applied to “all Member States”.

In or out of the Euro, the paper suggests Britain may indeed have her budget subject to EU Commission vetting – albeit that the time table for this “semester” process might allow officials to claim that the Commons gets to see it first.

And what if Brussels did not approve of the tax and spend policies of our democratically elected government?

If such rules only apply to Eurozone countries, why does page 5 of the document, under the heading “Corrective Action”, say that “This mechanism would apply to all Member States”. Use of that word “all”, again. If there’s a caveat saying “all” excludes Britain, I couldn’t find it.

On the next day, Douglas reminds us that "the cast iron guarantee" on the Lisbon Treaty was reneged on. And now there looks like there will be another Treaty—without any referendum.

Prepare for the government spin, which will likely say:

1. This new agreement involving France and Germany etc is not really a new treaty.

2. It doesn't involve giving the EU new powers in new areas. Just transfers in existing areas. And when we promised a referendum on any further transfer of new powers, we meant in new transfers of power within new areas. Obviously.

3. Besides, this is not a significant transfer of power. We were careful to say there'd be a referendum only when there were significant transfers. And we don't think this is significant. So there.

4. This new thingy, which isn't really a treaty, doesn't involve us, as we're not in the Euro. Despite what the small print [PDF] might say.

5. Anyhow, look how tough we've been, getting Europe to mug us for a little less with a slightly reduced budget increase!

By Friday, there's a fair chance you'll have been fed variants of all five of the above...

Of course, what the government actually seems to be doing is keeping the whole thing very quiet indeed.

This may, of course, be because there is nothing to worry about—Britain's opt-out is in an as-yet-unpublished addendum, and this isn't therefore a Treaty that transfers any powers. I'm sure that Eurogoblin, Nosemonkey (award-winning darling of the EU establishment) or Jon Worth will pop up and tell me that there is nothing to get excited about.

Unfortunately, Douglas believes this not to be the case, and another betrayal by the government is on the cards.

EU competence is to be extended into member state’s fiscal policy, with the power to make law for "all EU Member States". And it appears to have been kept hidden until today.

Not even the European Scrutiny Committee, I’m told, had sight of a paper by the “Task Force to the European Council” called “Strengthening Economic Governance in the EU” until today.

This hidden paper appears to confirm two things:

a) Despite what we were told in June, UK budgets will now become EU business. They might not be able to impose sanctions on us if they disapprove – yet. But they are involved.

b) According to the document, “The Task Force recommends a deeper macro-economic surveillance with the introduction of a new mechanism underpinned by a new legal framework .... applying to all EU Member States”.

Yep. That’s right. The EU is to legislate in a new area. In a way that could apply to all EU Member States.

And you thought there would be no further transfers of power to Brussels, eh?

Douglas's post is entitled "Have we been had?"

The answer, I'm afraid, looks to be "yes, we have been deceived by a bunch of utter bastards who are quite as unscrupulous and inimicable to the interests or desires of the British people as the previous administration."

In other words, not only will regulation of our great financial centre be controlled by Brussels but our supposedly sovereign government will still have to run its Budget through an EU vetting process. In other words, Euro or no Euro, the EU will control vast swathes of our economy.

And what can we do about it? Nothing, it seems—not whilst we are "led" (for want of a better word) by the spineless, massive-foreheaded Dave Cameron.

On my bookshelf, there is a well-thumbed copy of 2008's The Plan, signed by its two authors. Both messages, though concise, are personal—and embarrassingly flattering (I am, after all, a vain man). It is the one written by Douglas that finishes with this uplifting phrase:

Our time will come!

I certainly hope so, Douglas. But whilst I fail to lead a small party, and The Kitchen (a shadow of its former self) slides down the popularity rankings, you are in government—and yet seem almost as powerless as I.

Our time may well come—but if not now, when?

Is it in their Nature to lie?

In his real life, your humble Devil is a Product Manager for a small software company. Given that it is a small software company, your humble Devil actually delves into the methods and programming of said software.

As such, I know a little about how software programming works, and what is considered acceptable and what is not—both by the programmers themselves, and by those performing the "acceptance tests".

Having established some vague credentials, I would like to draw your attention to this article in Nature—as highlighted by His Ecclesiastical Eminence—regarding the ClimateGate data releases last year.

As most people will know, most of the forensic fury was focused upon the emails exchanged between the key players in this fraud, but a few people started delving into the data that was released alongside those communications.

In fact, your humble Devil highlighted a large part of this in my collation of comments around the HARRY_READ_ME.txt file (a post that resulted in over 24,000 absolute unique visitors in one day).

What this file displayed was not what Nature dismisses as "wonky code", but an utter failure of any kind of systematic programming ability, plus a total lack of verification and testing.

As far as I—and, I am sure, most programmers—are concerned, the construction of models based upon such obviously inaccurate software is tantamount to fraud. Regardless, Nature does not agree...

When hackers leaked thousands of e-mails from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK, last year, global-warming sceptics pored over the documents for signs that researchers had manipulated data. No such evidence emerged...

Where to start? The fact that there was far more data than the HARRY_READ_ME.txt file to examine, and I hadn't the time to collate the results—if anyone can donate links to those who did, please leave them in the comments.

But the HARRY_READ_ME.txt is enough: it details the lack of raw data, the rough estimates, the use of rainfall as a substitute for temperature, the use of synthetic data (i.e. "data" that was made up to fit the climatologists' prejudices) and any number of other really poor practices.

Are they fraudulent? Maybe not.

But the fact that the software programme created by Harry was used to construct the next lot of models—despite the fact that the file existed and that it is inconceivable that Harry didn't tell his employers what a fucking massive pile of shit it was—most certainly is.

These people knew that the software did not operate according to specification, but they used it anyway. FAIL.

These people knew that much of the original data was missing, corrupted or faked, but they used it anyway. FAIL.

These people knew that, together, these factors would produce results that were incorrect. FAIL.

These people knew that, regardless, the software would produce the result that they wanted. FRAUD.

But the killer comment is made by Bishop Hill...

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but none of the inquiries actually looked at the computer code, apart from there being a brief word from Tim Osborn in evidence to Muir Russell, denying that the bodges he'd mentioned affected published results. I'm pretty sure the Harry Readme was not looked at by any of the inquiries.

You are not wrong. None of the "independent" enquiries looked at the code, and this was for the same reason that none of the media rebuttals mentioned the code.

The reason that it was only the emails that were mentioned was that they had some kind of plausible deniability. Excuses were wheeled out, along the following lines...

"Oh, don't worry! Scientists are always having little spats. These were personal emails, not intended for release."

Well, we know that they weren't intended for release because the scientists in question were all urged to delete data and emails to prevent them being released under FoI.

This was to ignore the fact that the data had been examined—the code had been examined too. And from looking at those files, there were only two conclusions to draw:

1. the climatologists were deliberately defrauding the community about their results (very likely), or


2. the climatologists were so fucking incompetent that their data and results mean nothing at all (even more likely), or


3. both.

Either way, there is simply no way that we should be restructuring the world economy—and, by the by, killing fuck-loads of poor people—on this evidence.

Of course, facts, logic and science are seriously unlikely to trouble the idiots at Nature—they might lose some of their share of "the money flood"...

Accountable goverment

If there's one thing that pisses me off—and there are actually, as regular readers will know, loads of things that severely grip my shit—it's people who wank on about how governments are accountable because the sheep get to vote for them every five years.

This is absolute horseshit.

Apart from anything else, the civil service is not accountable and, apparently, doesn't even think that it should be.

But we don't even really get to choose any kind of accountable politicians either. I mean, the Coalition might be just very slightly more liberal and a teensy bit less profligate than NuLabour, but it's hardly as though we are even heading for a minarchist state any time soon—let alone an anarchist society.

I've written hundreds of posts and thousands of words on this theme, but few of them have been as utterly effective as the UK Libertarian's reply to one of his commenters, concerning the relative accountability of the state versus private, voluntary charity.

Before slavery was abolished you wouldn’t expect abolitionists to “offer a viable alternative” because some farmers had become used to the slave labour and it might inconvenience them to lose their workers. No, Slavery is wrong, by any empathetic human yardstick, and so it was ended. After that if the plantation owners want to voluntarily offer those people work for a wage they both arrive at, then that’s between them, but slavery is wrong, and so is theft.

I’ll change “completely unaccountable” to “almost completely unaccountable” then. The truth is elections are every 4 years. And just because one candidate gets a majority of “votes” (from people who usually don’t even know what thy’re voting for) it doesn’t make it okay for the minority to be stolen from to pay for things they don’t approve of. In the private sector I can IMMEDIATELY “vote” not to fund something by simply opting out. So no 4 year wait, instead it’s immediate, and no compromising, I can decide EXACTLY what I want to fund.

I often hear that it’s “up to me” to create a new party if I disagree with the existing ones. This is shifting the blame to the victim. If me and my friends all “Vote” that it’s okay to rob you, then you are the victim, and we can hardly ask you to devote every moment of your spare time frantically trying to rally enough support so you’re no longer in the minority and can “vote” not to be stolen from. It’s a crazy idea. Theft is wrong. Tyranny of the majority is wrong. And I’ll pose the same idea back to you: If you think it’s “up to me” to change the system, why can’t I say it’s “up to you” to voluntarily setup your own NHS or Welfare system on the free market and try to persuade people peacefully and voluntarily through persuasion to fund your charity?

I really recommend that you go and read the whole thing...

Obama: extra-judicial killings are the American way!

Obama: "Hey! Americans! Wave goodbye to your civil liberties, ya fuckin' mooks..."

Back in May, your humble Devil pointed out that America's great white hope—Obama, the Boy Blunder himself—was quite keen on ordering the extra-judicial killings of American citizens.

However, I am quite sure that Obama has reconsidered his position, and realises that due process and the rule of law were really important to people. After all, governments murdering their own citizens without any kind of trial is hardly in the great traditions of freedom, is it?

I mean, sure, just over the last century, many governments have spent a lot of their time wiping out their own countrymen —the USSR, Cambodia, Chile, Argentina, China, Germany, etc.—but it is not generally viewed as being A Good Thing by anyone except the murderous regime itself.

And given how Obama is a symbol of hope and change (not to mention change and hope), I reckon that the leader of theLand of the Free would never indulge in such authoritarian behaviour.

What's that?

Oh.

At this point, I didn't believe it was possible, but the Obama administration has just reached an all-new low in its abysmal civil liberties record. In response to the lawsuit filed by Anwar Awlaki's father asking a court to enjoin the President from assassinating his son, a U.S. citizen, without any due process, the administration late last night, according to The Washington Post, filed a brief [PDF] asking the court to dismiss the lawsuit without hearing the merits of the claims. That's not surprising: both the Bush and Obama administrations have repeatedly insisted that their secret conduct is legal but nonetheless urge courts not to even rule on its legality.

But what's most notable here is that one of the arguments the Obama DOJ raises to demand dismissal of this lawsuit is "state secrets": in other words, not only does the President have the right to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind, but his decisions as to who will be killed and why he wants them dead are "state secrets," and thus no court may adjudicate their legality.

As Timmy asks "So how’s that hopey, changey thing workin’ out for ya?", the Agitator elaborates on the point in question.

There are no mitigating factors, here. Obama is arguing the executive has the power to execute American citizens without a trial, without even so much as an airing of the charges against them, and that it can do so in complete secrecy, with no oversight from any court, and that the families of the executed have no legal recourse.

You can’t even make the weak argument that the executive at least has to claim this power in the course of protecting national security. Because it doesn’t matter. Obama is arguing that he has the right to keep everything about these executions secret—including the reasons they were ordered—merely by uttering the magic phrase “state secrets.” In other words, that this power would only arise under a national security context is deemed irrelevant by the fact that not only is Obama claiming the president’s word on what qualifies as “national security” is final, he’s claiming the power in such a way that there’s no audience to whom he would ever need to make that connection.

So yeah. Tyranny. If there’s more tyrannical power a president could possibly claim than the power to execute the citizens of his country at his sole discretion, with no oversight, no due process, and no ability for anyone to question the execution even after the fact . . . I can’t think of it.

Quite.

So, at the risk of this becoming repetitive, how is that hopey-changey thing working out for ya?

Or, to put it another way, is Obama progressive enough for you, punk...?

Time to kill the unions

Bob Crow: thug.

As I have pointed out a number of times, there are no real cuts in prospect: in fact, spending will be some 9% higher in five years than it is now.

For those who don't understand, the Adam Smith Institute has published some handy figures, the textual highlights of which I reproduce below...

As this table shows, the government's proposed cuts are pretty small beer. In nominal terms, spending will rise every year. In real terms (assuming 2 percent a year price inflation) this equates to small cuts in 2011-12, 2012-13 and 2013-14, followed by small rises in 2014-15 and 2015-16. Compared to the c.60% real terms public spending rise that took place under the previous government, this is, frankly, insignificant.
...

Current spending meanwhile (and almost all 'vital, front-line public services' fall into this category) will rise every year between now and 2015-16, even in real terms...
...

Now, OK, these are not exactly big rises - but nor are they swingeing cuts that will (a) have any significant effect on the economy or (b) on the public services-using population at large. What the coalition's spending plans really amount to is a five-year, real terms freeze of current expenditure, combined with three years of significant falls in capital expenditure. The overall impact of that is a a very small, real terms drop in TME (roundabout 1.5%) between now and 2015-16.

Now, personally, I don't think that there is any real reason to be calm, since this doesn't solve the problem of our fucking enormous deficit: as the Cobden Centre points out, the government is already effectively insolvent.

Leaving that aside—for the problem is so big that it boggles my tiny mind—one cannot quite see why the unions are making such a fuss; regardless, the leaders of the trades unions are gearing up for some seriously militant action.

A ‘call to arms’ for workers across the country to go out on strike in protest at Government spending cuts will be issued by a senior trade union leader today.

Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT, will also urge employees in both the public and private sectors to take part in civil disobedience during a wave of 1930s-style all-out general strikes.

In a speech at the RMT annual conference in Aberdeen, he will say that “a sustained campaign of generalised strikes” was necessary due to the “fiscal fascism” being imposed by the Coalition Government.

So, the unions will go on strike and everyone will realise how much they don't need these people. If public transport is at a stand-still, people will drive to work (or wherever). If there is no other way to get to the office, the internet and access-anywhere applications will enable people to work from home.

The vast majority of people—especially those who are employed and productive—have very little interaction with the agents of the state services (which, of course, are rather more dominated by union members than private companies are).

The people who will be hit hardest will be those whom Bob and his fellow union buddies profess to be so very concerned about—the poor and the feckless.

Nice one, Bob.

What is doubly irritating, of course, is that we are paying for the unions' war against ourselves; and these chunks of cash are, as Mark Wallace points out, substantial.

The TaxPayers’ Alliance has produced a crucial report on the Trade Unions today [PDF]—exposing the true scale to which unions are subsidised with taxpayers’ money.

As well as the Union Modernisation Fund, which lives on despite its growing notoriety, the TPA have uncovered 2,493 full time Union employees who are paid for by public sector bodies at a cost of £67.5 million a year.

This is crucial for two reasons. First, it means that key union overheads like recruitment and organising of branches are funded by the general public without their knowledge or approval. Even more importantly, it means that the levies raised from union members are freed up for campaigning war chests.

It is bad enough when politicians use our money to conspire against us, but what the Coalition is doing is insane.

Poilitically, and most importantly, what should be done about the Unions’ taxpayer-funding, and their political activities as a whole? It is telling that the payments to the union movement rose by 14% in Labour’s last year in office – they chose to buy union support (and donations) using taxpayers’ cash.

Some Conservatives may believe that by continuing these payments they will be able to keep the unions sweet. Far from it. The union movement as a whole is bitterly, eternally opposed to the essential spending cuts that must be carried out. They’ll merrily pocket cash from a Tory Government – but they certainly won’t change their tune just because the enemies they love to hate are foolish enough to appease them.

Continuing to make these payments would mean that the Coalition is actively subsidising groups who intend to apply political pressure against Coalition policies. Worse, when the inevitable strikes begin, those 2,493 paid officials will be manning the pickets, rallying the troops and helping to organise the disruption of public services. This is worse than appeasement – it’s helping to pay the wages of the opposing army.

Our New Coalition Overlords™ are effectively throwing our money at the unions, who then conspire to make our lives a misery—and to bring down the government which is authorising the payments.

Further, since union demands are almost always for shorter working hours and more pay, the government is paying these bastards large chunks of our money so that they can afford to lobby the government to be given even more of our hard-earned cash for doing even less work.

It is barking fucking insanity. And, frankly, it's deeply fucking insulting.

Still, it is time for the government to be libertarian: quite simply, the antiquated laws that prevent employers from sacking striking workers must be removed—as I proposed to Brendan O'Neill at the IEA debate.

In conversations afterwards, in the pub, I pointed this out to Brendan. I was consistent, I maintained, because—like him—I did not want the government propping up (and being lobbied by) business. But trades unions are just as much of a vested interest as the corporates. If one truly believes in libertarianism, then one should not support the laws against sacking strikers. In fact, there should be no government interference on either side.

The whole point of a trade union was to be able to motivate large numbers of workers so that, if an employer behaved unjustly, then they would have to negotiate because otherwise they couldn't carry out their business. This is far more true now—when most workers are skilled and require considerable training—than it was when the trades unions were first formed (when much of the work was repetitive manual labour).

In the end, Brendan appeared, at least, to agree with me that the state should be involved on neither side, although he still maintained the right to strike was one of the most fundamental. I countered that everyone has the right to strike, law or no law—they just don't have the right to remain employed if doing so.

I suspect that workers would be far less happy to vote for strikes if they were fully aware that there might be no job for them to return to. And all we would be doing is levelling the playing field.

As usual, I don't expect Our New Coalition Overlords™ to do anything so bold. However, I would hope that they would stop paying the union danegeld: history shows that giving into blackmail never works for long...

I wouldn't go abroad if I were you

Theresa May: Home Secretary and an evil, loathsome woman.

Having woken up to the existence of the European Arrest Warrant, Iain Dale shows a touching faith in Our New Coalition Overlords™ in his confident assertion that they will do something about the disgusting injustices visited on British citizens under this legislation.

And if Theresa May is the woman I think she is, she will pick up the phone to her Greek counterpart tomorrow morning and ask him to put right this apparent massive injustice.

Go on Theresa. You know you want to.

If Theresa May is the woman that I think she is, she will sit on her fat arse and do fuck all. Theresa May couldn't give two fucks about the rights of British citizens, and nor do the rest of the Coalition: as many of us have said for years, the only thing that the Tories and their massively-foreheaded twat of a leader care about is power. And not power to be wielded on behalf of the citizens who they are supposed to serve: no, it's power for themselves.

So, much as I wish it were otherwise, I am damn sure that Theresa May will do fuck all... Oh, wait... I'm wrong.

Theresa May has recently extended the powers of the EAW by signing up to the European Investigation Order. I hope she understood what she was doing.

Yes, Iain: she knew precisely what she was doing—following the Coalition's well-publicised plan of falling into line under the EU jackboot. Did you ever—seriously—think that they were going to do anything else?

We all saw which way the wind was blowing when Cameron refused to hold a referendum on the EU Constitution Lisbon Treaty. Oh, yes: and we also knew that the Tories would be more than happy to knuckle down because Call Me Dave is a spineless, ball-less sack of shit.

Iain has the good grace to apologise for his extreme lateness to this particular party...

I feel rather guilty that this is the first time it has come across my radar, but I suspect I am not alone.

That's as may be, Iain, but I can tell you that these arseholes who have inveigled themselves into government knew all about it. After all, as Trixy highlighted in June 2008, some of the cunts voted for it. [Emphasis—of well-known figures in the British politics—mine.] (It's also worth noting that Trixy first highlighted Andrew Symeou's case in July 2008.)

Whilst we are debating the decision of David Davis and Magna Carta (which some of us are) Some home truths:

European Arrest Warrant.

The European Arrest Warrant (EAW, or more rarely, EUAW) is an arrest warrant to allow the arrest of criminal suspects and their transfer for trial or detention which is valid throughout the states of the European Union (EU). The EAW is an attempt to increase the speed of extradition throughout EU countries, as well as change the mechanism from having a "political and administrative phase" into a system run by the judiciary.

Rapporteur: Graham Watson, Liberal Democrat MEP

In favour:

[Lib Dems]
Nick Clegg, Chris Davies, Andrew Duff, Chris Huhne, Sarah Ludford, Liz Lynne, Bill Newton-Dunn, Nicholson of Winterbourne, Graham Watson

[Tories]
Sir Robert Atkins, Chris Beazley, John Bowis, Philip Bradbourn, Philip Bushill-Matthews, Martin Callanan, Giles Chichester, Den Dover, James Elles, Jonathan Evans, Robert Goodwill, Dan Hannan, Malcolm Harbour, Chris Heaton-Harris, Roger Helmer, Caroline Jackson, Timothy Kirkhope, Edward McMillan Scott, Neil Parish, John Purvis, Robert Sturdy, David Sumberg, Charles Tannock, Theresa Villiers.

[Labour]
Gordan Adams, Michael Cashman, Richard Corbett, Robert Evans, Glyn Ford, Neena Gill, Mary Honeyball, Richard Howitt, Stephen Hughes, Glenys Kinnock, Eryl McNally, David Martin, Ben Miller, Simon Murphy, Mel Read, Catherine Stihler, Gary Titley, Mark Watts, Philip Whitehead

[Respectively Plaid Cymru, SNP and Green]
Jill Evans, Ian Hudghton, Jean Lambert

Against:

[UKIP]
Nigel Farage, Jeffrey Titford

You might have recognised some names up there, most notably Clegg and Huhne—noble fighters for civil liberties, eh? All of the people who voted in favour of the European Arrest Warrant are traitors to the British people, enemies of liberty and colossal shitbags who should be put in a gibbet and eaten by crows.

Anyway, to explain why the European Arrest Warrant is so very bad—and to highlight the hypocrisy of our lords 'n' masters—Timmy's comment at Iain's is concise and coherent so I've replicated it in full.

Yes Iain, I think you're being a little off the ball here in stating that Gilligan's the first to have anything to do with this case.

Gerard Batten (as one of Symeou's MEPs) has been following this case for years. Including turning up at each of the various court hearings about extradition so as to support the family and be there for any press. There are multiple instances of TV and radio reports being done on it, as well as several Press Association pieces.

He was, you might want to note, the only politician who did that, supported the Symeou family, tried to bring attention to this injustice.

I know because I was the UKIP press officer while all this was going on.

We can actually take it further as well. The "rapporteur" for this law in the European Parliament was Watson, the european head of the Lib Dems. That of course means that both Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne voted for it when they were MEPs.

Then, another case, the Toben case (vile man with vile views, but the Germans tried to get him extradited for something that isn't actually a crime in this country) meant that the EAW was going to violate the traditional "double criminality" required for extradition. It must be a crime here as well as a crime there for extradition to be lawful.

The EAW abolishes double criminality. So, Toben is arrested and held, who pops up in the papers? Chris Huhne, telling us all that this wasn't what the EAW was all about. So, fool, why did you vote for it then?

This really is something that UKIP have been banging on about for years. UKIP were the only British political party to vote against it in the European Parliament.

Yes, it's fair enough to think that we might be a little single minded about Europe, those of us in UKIP. But at least could you pay attention when we tell you, for years upon end, that there really is something seriously wrong with a certain proposal? Like this European Arrest Warrant?

Just as one example: if you get extradited under it you'll not be given bail. No chance, no way. So you'll rot in prison until someone deigns to try you.

Why won't you get bail? You're a flight risk as a foreigner. But, of course, the EAW itself, this thing that delivered you up to be held without bail is the very thing that means you're not a flight risk, doesn't it? Because they can come and get you where you live.

Indeed. Of course, it comes as no surprise to learn that, whilst other countries have put in safeguards, our own spineless politicians and civil servants—led, no doubt, by the traitors who have long occupied the Foreign Office—have breezily signed away the rights of British citizens with no fight at all.

Anger at Britain’s “gold-plating” of the controversial European Arrest Warrant is growing after it emerged that other EU countries have secured significant safeguards for their citizens that are not available to British nationals.

More than 1,000 people in Britain last year were seized by police on the orders of European prosecutors, a 51 per cent rise in 12 months.

Many are accused of trivial crimes overseas such as possessing cannabis or leaving petrol stations without paying. No evidence need be presented in British courts of the alleged offence and judges have few powers to resist the person’s extradition.
Those affected can spend long periods in jail here and abroad for crimes which might not even be prosecuted in this country.
They can also be seized for offences which are not even crimes in Britain.

Although the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) was intended to operate in the same way in all 27 EU states, The Sunday Telegraph has established that many other European countries have given themselves “opt-outs” or conditions to protect their citizens.

Well, ain't that a fucking surprise...? Not. And do we think that Our New Coalition Overlords™ will do anything about it? No, we don't. As I pointed out above, some of them voted for the damn thing. And, as Iain pointed out, our Home Secretary has signed up the European Investigation Order—a story that the Telegraph headlines with "Britons to be spied on by foreign police".

The power allows prosecutors from any EU country to demand details such as DNA or even bank and phone records on anyone they suspect of a crime.

Officers in the UK would be almost powerless to refuse the request even if they believed it was disproportionate to the alleged offence being investigated.

Tellingly, at the time when this measure was coming up for consideration, a Home Office spokeswoman said that...

"... the Government will approach legislation in the area of criminal justice on a case-by-case basis, with a view to maximising our country's security, protecting Britain's civil liberties and preserving the integrity of our criminal justice system."

In other words, "we're going to sign up."

How do I know (apart from the fact that it has happened!)? The spokeswoman said that the Coalition would look at "protecting Britain's civil liberties"; not "Britons' civil liberties" or "the civil liberties of British individuals"—it was "Britain's civil liberties". As we all know, a country—a state—cannot have civil liberties: civil liberties pertain to the freedom of the individual.

In any case, as Big Brother Watch have also highlighted, this European Investigation Order does not even require the sign-off of a British judge.

Worst of all, as barrister and former MP Jerry Hayes points out in strong terms, none of this even requires sign-off from a judge:

In its present form the EIO would allow any EU police force to start investigations and gather evidence on UK soil... where it offends against everything we hold sacred, is that no judicial authority is needed to verify whether there are reasonable grounds for an offence to have been committed. In this country the police can’t investigate on a whim, they have to have reasonable grounds to believe that someone is up to no good. So, potentially, every corrupt police officer in the pay of the Mafia in Southern Italy, could come over here, obtain your DNA and bank balances without going to obtain permission from a judge first. Insane. And downright dangerous.

For fuck's sake...

Look, our own police are corrupt, violent, venal thugs with absolutely no interest in defending anyone from fuck-all: there is absolutely no way in hell we should let even more corrupt, violent, venal thugs from the rest of the EU in here to spy on us. I mean, the British police are utterly contemptible but they are paragons of virtue next to the fucking Italian fuzz. Or the Greek ones, for that matter.

Let me spell this out: the state's primary and over-riding purpose is the defence of its citizens. Even were the government to do nothing else at all (please, please...), it should protect British individuals.

It would be bad enough had the government merely proved that it was not able to do so, but it is worse: this government (like the last) is quite simply not willing to do so. Our New Coalition Overlords™ are not willing to protect our citizens, our freedoms and our justice system—indeed, some of them forged our shackles with their own hands. Members of the British government have not only failed to protect our freedoms, they have actively created the instruments of our imprisonment.

And that, my friends, makes them the enemy...

UPDATE: there seems to be some contention over whether or not Dan Hannan did actually vote for the European Arrest Warrant. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find the relevant voting records—could anyone with more experience find them...?

UPDATE 2: Dan maintains in the comments to this post, at 10:02 AM, that he didn't vote for the EAW.

I have opposed the EAW consistently. Indeed, I have just been in Athens to meet Andrew Symeou and his mother. I'm afraid I can't remember the vote that DK cites which, from the names, must have been seven or eight years ago; but it can't have been a vote on the EAW.

Glad to hear it. Trixy—the ball's in your court...

Sir Hugh Orde: disingenuous swine

The Adam Smith Institute comments on the latest load of waffle from an unnecessary policeman.

Sir Hugh Orde, President of the Association of Police Officers, has responded to proposed budget cuts by warning that it will mean reduction in the number of front line police officers. He says, "It would be misleading in the extreme to suggest the size of this service is sustainable."

This is not true, of course. It is a text-book response to proposed budget restrictions in public services. Always the claim is that it will be the most popular aspect of the service which will have to be cut. In this case it is the number of police on the streets.

One famous case was when US customs faced a cut and immediately took out the staff who looked for drugs coming in at airports.

The purpose is to pressure the political leaders by exposing them to hostile public opinion, with a view to weakening their resolve on the proposed savings. Never is it backroom or bureaucratic jobs that are proposed for cuts, because that would not achieve the purpose.

It is called rent-seeking, and is designed to maximize the amount of public funds directed to their department or service. It is without merit, and government should respond accordingly.

There is also another aspect to this, of course. As the ASI points out, Sir Hugh Orde is, indeed, the President of the Association of Police Officers (ACPO) which—despite being a private company that mainly exists to lobby the government on behalf of authoritarian police scum—is funded with our money.

To the tune of £10 million per annum.

Now, given that Sir Hugh Orde is so very worried about the levels of policing in this time of austerity, I can only assume that he would be thrilled were the government to withdraw all of its funding for ACPO—money which will, in any case, only be spent on champagne for Hugh and his buddies—and, instead, directed that cash to frontline policing.

Admittedly, darling Hugh would lose his £183,000 salary but, nonetheless, I am sure that he will be delighted to know that it is going to pay for about five front-line police officers.

So, well done for speaking out, Hugh! And thank you for finding a nice new source of funding in these difficult times!

Yeah, right

Well, that's everything sorted then, aye?

Leaders at the G20 summit in Canada have agreed to cut national budget deficits without stunting economic growth.

In other news, Our New Coalition Overlords have agreed targets to release unicorns into the wild, the USA has announced that it can't stop the oil gushing out but the oil pollute anything, and the Saudis have announced that women will walk around in bikinis whilst obeying sharia law.

OK, I might be exaggerating but—seriously—do any of these morons have any idea of how they are going to achieve any of this?

After all, Our New Coalition Overlords™, for instance, have announced savage cash cuts of precisely fuck all.

So the cuts are going to be long and deep, which nobody can deny.

Well, nobody that is, except extremely naive people who simply look at the government's spending projections. People like John Redwood, who at the TPA's budget briefing today, drew attention to the plain fact that under the Osborne plan, total public spending is not facing any cut at all. In fact, it is projected to increase from £697bn this year to £758bn in 2015-16, a rise of 9%.

So, when anyone talks of these "savage cuts", I can but utter a hollow laugh. Because, in truth, this government is going to carry on spending more and more of our money, and racking up more and more debt.

The simple fact is that there are no cuts; the government has simply said that they will increase the rate at which they spend our money by a smaller amount than the previous government wanted to. And the other simple fact is that the government is still overspending by far more than £100 billion per annum.

So, according to this BBC story, the G13 governments have agreed to "halve their deficits within three years" but—given that they seem unwilling or unable to sack hundreds of thousands of pointless bureaucrats and to cut hundreds of millions of pounds worth of pointless projects—our own government is not going to achieve anything like that.

Unless, of course, they massively increase taxes.

Of course, our government is already spending about 50% of the entire economic output of the country and so, if they raise taxes, you can be damn sure that they will increase the "stunting [of] economic growth".

So, you'll excuse me for thinking that this pointless posturing (at our expense) is going to achieve precisely fuck all, apart from making our leaders feel that they have "arrived" on the world stage...

Unethical politics

Via the wife, I see that—in commenting on some joke award for "ethical politician of the year" given to the egregious Caroline Lucas—Mr Civil Libertarian has written a nice summation of why ethics is incompatible with politics.

Politics and ethics aren’t easy bedfellows. That’s because there’s nothing ethical about politics. Politics as we know it consists entirely of: Using the force of the state (which is unethical) to coerce (which is unethical) otherwise peaceful citizens into a) giving up their preferred way of life (unethical), b) giving up their justly acquired property (unethical), c) obeying the rules of a small section of society under threat of severe punishment (unethical), and also d) committing violent, coercive acts against citizens of other Nation States that they can claim no possible right over (VERY unethical).

There’s very little politics can do that is ethical, since ultimately, the power of politicians comes, not from namby-pamby “social contracts” (which you never knowingly signed, cannot rescind, and cannot see the terms of) or from any sort of “God given right”, but ultimately from the use of, or the threat of use of, violence against you. What Lucas, as a Member of Parliament, does, is work as yet another embodiment of this established violence. That’s her job. That’s her role. To claim she is “ethical” makes a mockery of ethics.

Of course, and as Mr Civil Libertarian points out, the above only applies if you believe that initiating violence against other human beings is unethical.

I do.

In which I disagree with Dan Hannan...

It's not that I disagree with his premise (I am undecided), but I do disagree with the way in which he argues it.

If there's anyone out there who still opposes reform of the House of Lords…

… I have two words for you: Ian Blair.

What? This is utterly wrong on two levels:

1. Difficult cases make bad laws. Yes, The fact that Ian "shooty" Blair has gained a peerage makes me want to fucking vomit—but is every appointment in this round of honours utterly unsuitable? In fact, we don't even know that Ian Blair will not be a good, sensible and conscientious legislator (although I seriously doubt it).


2. Ian Blair's peerage is not a symptom of the need to reform the House of Lords: it is an indication of how bankrupt is the elected House of Commons. Blair was not given his peerage by the Lords—he was nominated and approved by Members and servants of the elected House of Commons.

So, when Dan Hannan asks this question...

How can an elected Upper House be worse than what we have now?

... I would tell him to look at the self-serving corruption of the elected House, and cite the elevation of Ian Blair to the Lords as evidence of said turpitude.

So, yes, Dan: I can think of many, many ways in which an elected House of Lords could be worse than what we have now—how long have you got?

In Europe, ruled by Europe...*

Via the ever-scathing EU Referendum, I see that Our Delightful New Coalition of Doom is about to break the first of its promises.

David Cameron’s fledgling coalition Government faced its first major test in Europe last night as European regulators looked set to push through controversial new hedge fund and private equity regulations despite fierce opposition from the new administration.

In the face of last-ditch lobbying by UK officials during the past two days, the European Parliament looks set to go ahead with a draconian crackdown on alternative investment fund managers early next week.

George Osborne, the Chancellor, is likely to be in Brussels for the agreement on the new rules, which are being driven by France and Germany. He is expected to try to extract a compromise but is resigned to the vote going against him, as he believes that the process is too far advanced for him to intervene.

Now, the EU Relations part of the agreement which brought us Our Delightful New Coalition of Doom states how we should deal with this really rather clearly.

We agree that there should be no further transfer of sovereignty or powers over the course of the next Parliament.

OK. So, if this legislation goes through the EU, it will obviously be a "further transfer of sovereignty or powers" and so Our Delightful New Coalition of Doom will...

... er...

... do what?

Now, my bet is that they will sit back and take it. Does anyone disagree...?

* Obviously, this should be "in the EU, ruled by the EU".