The TaxPayers' Alliance - Campaign

A great EU Action Day: Stop the EU Rip-Off!

Yesterday we held a very successful action day to launch the logo and slogan of our EU Campaign:

 
TPA Activists handed out thousands of leaflets and free car window stickers to commuters at King's Cross, St Pancras, Charing Cross and Westminster Tube station:

 

 

The leaflets and the message were extremely well received and we had plenty of well-wishers and new supporters signing up on the spot. Tellingly, the only criticism we got was from people with a vested interest, like a former Eurocrat who tried to explain that it would be impossible to run the EU machine if they had to listen to the people all of the time!

 

 

The car stickers went down particularly well with London's cabbies, many of whom were not only enthusiastic to put them up in their cabs, but took more to dish out to their mates.

 

 

The TPA also had two planes pulling banners reading "Stop The EU Rip-Off" over Birmingham and London, as well - look out for a special video of that event on this blog in the next few days.

The great reaction yesterday shows that the huge £2,000 per person cost of the EU is the crucial argument as far as the taxpaying public are concerned, and that the people are way ahead of the politicians on this issue. In the corridors of Westminster, any mention of the problems of the EU must be uttered in hushed tones and garlanded with technical details to slip past the twin barriers of taboos and the whips - out in the real world around Britain, though, people are heartily sick of the EU Rip-Off. And they want the chance to say so.

 

To get your own free Stop the EU Rip-Off car window sticker, click here.

The EU Commission's view on the media is pure Kevin the Teenager

  "It's so unFAIR!"

There's an interesting blog which I've only just come across written by the new Head of Media at the EU Commission's office in London. It gives a revealing insight into the frankly arrogant view of the media often taken by the EU institutions.

It turns out that the reason the EU gets a bad press, as far as the EU's press officers are concerned, is not that it is a costly, unaccountable, corruption-ridden, wasteful and anti-democratic monstrosity after all. Oh no, it is because journalists are too busy, ill-informed and prejudiced to give it a fair hearing.

Even worse, sometimes journalists call up "writing stories on an EU decision with a deadline of an hour or so", which this press officer apparently thinks is deeply unfair. Well, I've got news for you - that is how the media works. I think it was Enoch Powell who said that "a politician complaining about the media is like a sailor complaining about the sea". It is frankly worrying that instead of working harder to respond in a timely manner, as the rest of us who deal with the media do, the Commission's press officers are apparently in a huff that they don't get longer to respond.

Similarly, we are told it is "not fair" that sometimes the EU's response isn't even quoted in the news reports! Woe is me. Instead of being a sign of bias, though, this could well be because the Commission tends to churn out mealy-mouthed bureaucratic denials, arrogant dismissals and uninteresting lectures rather than any genuine contribution to the important debates going on. The question they should be asking themselves in EU Towers should surely be "how can we improve the responses we put out?" rather than "why oh why are journalists so evil and horrid?"

This is sadly typical of the more general outlook taken by the EU institutions. The European Union's advocates are obsessed with the idea that people don't like the EU because they are too stupid, too reactionary or too ill-informed to recognise the wonder of the project. They are like those slightly barmy followers of trendy cults who, when you question their beliefs, simply say that you are too benighted to see the truth. Unfortunately they don't just think that about the media - as their continued refusal to listen to the referendum results on the Constitution/Lisbon Treaty shows, they think it about the general public, too.

When a press officer retreats into their bunker muttering that the media should be sacked and replaced with someone more friendly, rather than reassessing what they do as a media operation or advising their boss to change what the organisation does if they want to get a better press, it is a bad sign. It doesn't seem that taxpayers are getting a good deal here at all.

Daniel Hannan on the CAP

Following the release of our Youtube viral video on the Common Agricultural Policy, Daniel Hannan, the MEP who shot to fame last week through his speech in the European Parliament criticising Gordon Brown's spending and debt habits, has been in touch. By coincidence, he made a speech on the topic a few days ago, making the point that the Policy harms taxpayers, consumers and farmers alike:

From the other side of the Party divide, Caroline Flint MP, the Minister for Europe, has responded to our report, saying:

“The CAP does not serve the best interests of farmers or consumers across Europe. We will use the opportunity of the EU budget review, starting later in the year, to argue for the long-term reform that is needed.”

It's good to know that even the Government agrees with us about this, but what do they intend to do about the Policy? Arguing in the Budget Review for CAP reform was what Tony Blair was doing when he inadvertently gave away our rebate in return for essentially nothing. We need to be able to control our own farming here, in this country, otherwise we will be eternally outvoted.

Qatada case shows the law is a disgrace

The news today that Abu Qatada, "Bin Laden's right hand man in Europe", and several of his fellow extremists are not only still in Britain but are being paid compensation for the inconvenience of their detention, have caused understandable disgust.

Let us be clear. Qatada hates Britain and everything it stands for. Free speech, equality for women, the right to determine one's own sexuality and religion, rock'n'roll, democracy - you name it, he has made very clear that he despises it. He has been linked in a series of judgements to extremists, and in their recent judgement to deport him back to Jordan the Law Lords made clear that if he was at liberty to do so, he would cause harm to our nation.

So why, then, is he still here, having cost taxpayers £1.5 million is benefits, legal fees and prison costs since his arrival, and cashing in compensation cheques from the taxpayer despite rulings by the Law Lords that he should be slung out of the country?

The answer is that our legal system has been hamstrung. The introduction of the bungling, unclear and absurd Human Rights Act meant that Qatada's lawyers have effectively been able to keep him in this country for years by arguing that the British people's sovereign right to expel people who hate them and wish to see Britain destroyed comes second to the right of preachers of hatred to be protected from their own countrymen.

This Human Rights Act fiasco meant that we had lost the legal right to decide which foreign individuals can and cannot remain in our country. The Government which placed this bind on our laws was then faced with the question of what to do with Qatada and his ilk, who clearly remained a threat. Any right minded person would have recognised that the Human Rights Act was deeply flawed and repealed it, allowing us to get on with the job of getting rid of him. This Government, though, decided it was preferable to alter the fundamental principles of the law and intern Qatada without trial.

That was what has led to this compensation claim, backed by the European Court of Human Rights, which has power over British law. Of course, if Qatada really objected to his internment he could have simply upped sticks and left the country - he was free to do that at any time - but why bother when you've got a free meal ticket, a public platform for your hateful views and yet more opportunities to milk the British taxpayer that you hate so much for all they are worth?

His deportation order by the Law Lords will now be appealed, inevitably at our expense, to the European Court, meaning he will certainly remain here, living off the British taxpayer, for several more years at least. If he wins in the ECHR - and in that Cloud Cuckoo Land almost all things are possible - he could be here for the foreseeable future, using our money to pour poison into the ear of the nation.

This is a shocking case about a shocking man. Qatada is a hateful, evil piece of work, but without the ridiculous behaviour of our politicians in crippling our laws and handing power over to the European Court of Human Rights, he would have been out on his ear years ago.

Jacqui Smith has been cheering on rulings in favour of his deportation, and criticising Human Rights verdicts that support Qatada, but it is base hypocrisy. The Government could repeal the Human Rights Act, ditch the European Convention that underlies it and tell the Court to take a running jump, which would genuinely solve the problem and make our laws meaningful again, but for reasons of misguided ideology and euro-enthusiasm, they won't. Until some politician has the guts to do so, they are as much to blame for this farce as Qatada is.

TPA protest pictures: For cod's sake, stop the EU fish disaster!

The TPA and Global Vision have just held a great protest to publicise the findings of our new report on the disaster that has been the EU's Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). Under the slogan "For cod's sake, stop the EU fish disaster!" TPA supporters joined with famous botanist and environmental campaigner David Bellamy outside the London Office of the EU Parliament to highlight the huge quantity of dead fish dumped into the sea as a result of the CFP by dumping fish on the EU's doorstep!

Here are some high resolution photos of the protest - for the files themselves please contact mark.wallace@taxpayersalliance.com or phone 07795 084 113.

 

Click on the pictures for a high-resolution version

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Ivory Tower Group launches pro-Euro campaign

The competition for most poorly timed campaign of 2009 is already heating up, despite us only being two weeks in. Reuters is reporting that Willem Buiter, former Bank of England bigwig, has today launched a new campaign to persuade Britain to join the euro.

The fundamental plank of Buiter's campaign seems to be that now there's an economic crisis, people will want to seek safety and security in the Euro's cloying embrace, no matter what the cost. Unfortunately for him, he's wrong.

Our polling of last week produced two informative results on this issue.

In a referendum on the Euro:

64% would vote No
24% would vote Yes

Asked whether the financial crisis has made them more or less likely to support Euro membership:

18% say it has made them more likely to support the Euro
27% say it has made them less likely

That hardly suggests the "overwhelming" case that Buiter claims is now obvious in favour of Euro membership. If anything the research suggests that people are highly sceptical of the idea that bigger and more lumbering is in any way better, particularly in a crisis which is seeing America so hard hit.

Economically, the idea that is would be better for us fighting a recession if we had no control over interest rates, and had our economic reputation pegged to those of Greece and Portugal, for example, which had lie about the economic data just to join the Euro, is bizarre in the extreme. Add to that the political implications of losing control over one's currency and money supply and Buiter's on to a loser.

He's not exactly helping himself, either, though. His quote on Reuters displays a remarkable arrogance which is hardly going to win people over:

"There's a real risk of a triple crisis hitting this country -- a run on sterling, a sovereign default crisis and the banking crisis. It's a small risk but it is an unnecessary risk that would be substantially diminished if this country had a real currency."

Wow- what a great way to persuade people that you respect them. If anything, talk of the Pound not being a "real" currency is going to alienate people more. His campaign doesn't seem to have a name yet - given this arrogant display, perhaps we should dub them the Ivory Tower Group.

An opportunity to save taxpayers' money - but MEPs just don't care

There's disappointing news from Brussels, where MEPs it seems simply can't be bothered to go to the effort of savings taxpayers £200 million a year. The One Seat campaign collected the signatures of 1.2 million people to call for an end to the ludicrous practice of moving the whole EU parliament from Brussels to Strasbourg every month, at vast expense. Unfortunately, theParliament.com is reporting that only 235 MEPs have signed the declaration to end this farce, which is a long way short of the 393 MEPs required to move the proposal on towards becoming official policy.

This is a great shame. The Strasbourg move, which involves literally packing up MEPs' offices into crates and shipping them on a special train from Parliament building to parallel Parliament building, was agreed purely as a sop to the vanity of the then French Government, and is of no actual or even procedural benefit to the working of the Parliament. 

The fact that so many MEPs seem to care so little about the huge cost involved is emblematic of the problems with the EU. As long as they are well-compensated, given cushy pensions and kept wined and dined the majority of our representatives apparently aren't bothered about the running up of unnecessary bills at taxpayers' expense. I suppose in a way the monthly Strasbourg-Brussels pilgrimage is quite a good summary of the current state of the EU as a whole: unnecessary, wasteful, so used to navel-gazing that it can't see the absurdity of its actions and lacking any regard for public opinion.

Every one of the people matters, Mr Barroso

Who knows what Jose Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, and Peter Mandelson were thinking when he decided to take up lobbying for Britain to join the Euro again. As well as being politically insane, it would be economically foolish to join the Single Currency. Mr Barroso's comments, though, contain a particularly revealing comment that gives an insight into the kind of mindset held by the pro-Euro lobby.

Barroso's comments went thusly:

"We are now closer [to Britain joining the Euro] than ever before. I'm not going to break the confidentiality of certain conversations, but some British politicians have already told me, 'If we had the euro, we would have been better off'. I know that the majority in Britain are still opposed, but there is a period of consideration under way and the people who matter in Britain are currently thinking about it."

That effectively summarises the elitest, anti-democratic views of the EU elite. How on earth can he in one breath acknowledge that the majority of British people are opposed to the Euro, and then dismiss them because they are not "the people who matter"? This project is at core one driven by a self-interested elite of politicians and bureaucrats, with at best a disregard and at worst out and out contempt for democracy and public opinion. It stinks.

MEP sacked over expenses fiddle

Den Dover MEP has been thrown out of the Tory Party after having been forced to pay back £500,000 of EU parliamentary expenses.  An EU parliamentary investigation found he had claimed this money for ‘unaccountable expenditure’ and the case has been referred to Europe’s anti-fraud office.

Since 1999 Mr Dover channelled £760,000 of your money to his firm to pay his wife and daughter for secretarial and research duties.  This is despite his daughter having another job 4 days of the week.  Arrogantly, Dover declared no financial interest in this firm, blithely siphoning taxpayers’ money to his family for seemingly little to no work. 

The tragedy here is that Dover is only under orders to pay back two thirds of the money falsely appropriated from public funds.  Surely – you would agree – he should be forced to pay back every single penny so to act as a warning to any other sleazebags out there that when they’re caught, the taxpayer will get back the lot.

You can ask Mr Dover to pay back the whole sum at: ddover@europarl.eu.int

Tax harmonisation = high taxes

The German Government are apparently threatening to veto an EU Commission proposal to extend member states' rights to reduce VAT on a variety of services (yes, you really do need unanimous EU permission to cut taxes on haircuts).

The fact that we have sacrificed our right to set our own tax levels on so many services is outrageous enough, but the reason the Germans have given for their obstruction is very revealing. The German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck said:

I am very reluctant to extend the reduced VAT rates as it makes no sense in terms of harmonising tax rates in Europe

So now it's official - as we've always said, EU tax harmonisation equals higher taxes all round. The idea that Britain can secure a low tax economy by handing over our tax sovereignty and then persuading everyone else that it's a good idea is total, utter and unadulterated bunkum.