How could I forget the Red Lion talks?

This is becoming something like "Chapters from my life in euroscepticism" - a tragicomedy. When I wrote yesterday about the many eurosceptic publications that I uncovered on the top shelves of my study and the depression inspired by those failed hopes I forgot about the Red Lion Talks. How could I?

As a matter of fact, I did mention them once, in my obituary of Sir Robin Williams, the Secretary of both the CIB and of the Anti-Maastricht Alliance for many years.

Some time between the two Danish referendums on the Treaty of Maastricht Alan Sked and I were invited to address the various groups that were fighting for a second no vote in Copenhagen. The meeting was very different from the ones we were used to: instead of the usual format of audience and speakers on the podium we spoke informally (in English) in a cafe. People turned up, ordered drinks, sat at tables and chatted to us afterwards.

What a good idea, I thought, and raised the subject at the next Anti-Maastricht Alliance committee meeting. Of course, in England the meetings would have to be in a pub rather than a cafe but apart from that there need to be no difference. A format of that kind might well attract an audience who would not bother to fight its way through security in Parliament or attend meetings at the LSE. If the talks turn out to be successful other people in other cities might start some, too.

Financially, only a very small outlay was required and I started organizing. The Red Lion Pub is the nearest pub to Westminster, on the corner of Whitehall and Derby Gate, well known to all in the political world and easy to get to for other people. As it happens, at the time they did not serve dinner in the upstairs room and one could hire it for a small sum, assuming that many of the audience would patronize the bar.

The talks ran for several years, as I asked various people, some of whom spoke at other eurosceptic meeting, some of whom kept away from them, to cover subjects related to the European Union. I have particular memories of Noel Malcolm (now Sir Noel) talking about the common foreign policy and, another time, about the EU and the Balkans; of Professor Kenneth Minogue (alas, no longer with us) speaking to an audience that filled the room, the corridor outside and the stairs that led to the staff quarters about democracy and bureaucracy; of Peter Shore talking about British history (on the whole, I did not want MPs pontificating at the Red Lion but I made exceptions for Peter and for Sir Richard Body). Many others come to mind as well: Professor Antony Flew, Dr Martin Holmes, then Co-Chaiman of the Bruges Group, a slightly less likely speaker, Caroline Ellis from Charter 88, Bill Jamieson who explained very clearly the economic advantages of being outside the EU, James Sherr who talked about the EU and Russia, Christopher Booker speaking to another crowded room and corridor about the regulatory disasters and, of course, the Boss. And so on, and so on.

The talks went on for several years. I produced a six-monthly programme and advertised wherever I could, including Time Out and various other outlets. The bar made good money and, sad person that I am, there were even pitta bread sandwiches that I prepared.

All but one of the talks were recorded but only two have been transcribed, one of Noel Malcolm's and Peter Shore's, which was published in the European Journal. The box with the tapes are also among the many objects I have to sort out as I restore my study. They will not be thrown out. (The various pamphlets and papers were not either.)

After several years I noticed that the talks mostly consisted of the same people saying the same things to the same audience. Time to bring them to an end, I decided, and I did. This was one of the most sensible decisions I made. It is all too easy to carry on with something because it is there, beyond what might be called the sell-by date.

Should I revive them? Would anyone be interested in the age of Farage versus Brand? I have serious doubts. But, maybe I should transcribe them and publish them on line, just to remind everyone of what the eurosceptic debate was like once upon a time.

À la recherche du temps perdu

Yes, yes, I know there is an English translation of that title but, somehow, In Search of Lost Time does not have the same evocative sound. Readers will just have to put up with the French version.

The process is, in fact, not so much evocative as depressing. As a consequence of urgent building works I have had to move everything out of the room I rather grandly call my study. (Others call it something else and make pointed references to the piles of books, papers and sundry other material, now piled up in various other parts of the house.

This morning I decided to tackle the mess that was masquerading as books, pamphlets and journals on two of the top shelves. Having removed them and cleared the shelves from the building rubble that had accumulated there over the past weeks, I began to sort things. Some journals went into the recycling bag immediately. Long out of date ones I have never read and not likely to do so.

Then I sorted the papers, pamphlets and books. That was when depression descended on me. They were all those papers etc that were written in 1992 -3 when we were fighting the Maastricht Treaty, later on when we were fighting other treaties or the euro, and a few written in between. They all tried to prove what a bad idea Britain's participation the project was, explained that the only reforms we could have were those that furthered integration and tried to deal with such questions as "how do we get out" and "what do we do afterwards". Sounds familiar? Yes, to me as well. And I did not even look at the various issues of such publications as the European Journal, which, at one time, published a good many of my articles as well. Or other journals and periodicals.

Of course, one could argue that we have moved a little. We are not in the euro though that was mostly Gordon Brown's doing with a good deal of help from James Goldsmith and it is now possible to discuss Britan's exit from the EU in a more or less serious fashion (unless you happen to be a member of UKIP).

As against that, one must point out that we are further away from that exit than we have been for some time, with little evidence that public opinion is coming round to our point of view. Just recently I was once again informed by a couple of young politicos that they really needed a good deal more time before they could seriously accept the notion that coming out would be quite a good idea. How much time would they need, I asked politely. There was no clear answer.

Many of those papers, pamphlets, books are of very high quality and deal with various aspects of the problem seriously and coherently. Perhaps, the young politicos of my acquaintance could try reading them and find out the arguments instead of re-inventing the political wheel.

One cannot help feeling depressed when on looks at all that material, remembers the work that went into it all and the hopes that accompanied that work. Just one more push, we thought over and over again.

Well, we have pushed and pushed some more. What have we achieved in reality? Nigel Farage v. Russell Brand. Golly gosh.

They are prepared (maybe)

EurActiv reports reactions from the various parliamentary groups to the possible threat of eurosceptic parties in next year's elections. Needless to say, those parties are described as populist, which is clearly a very bad thing, also far-right, which is so hard to define that they do not even bother.

First off, here are the socialists:

Countering euroscepticism will be a central topic of the European socialist party’s campaign, according to Massimo D'Alema, the president of the the left-wing foundation FEPS, who worries about the surge of populist and extreme parties at next year's European election.

Speaking to EurActiv, the president of the Foundation for European Policy Studies (FEPS) says that “the only way to counter such euroscepticism isn’t to defend Europe as it now exists."

“The socialist slogan of this campaign should be: ‘we want to change Europe’. We are not defending the current form of the EU,” he adds.

D’Alema is a former prime minister of Italy, who led two successive governments from 1998 to 2000. He now leads the foundation of the socialist political family on the European level, FEPS, which is involved in drafting the text that will serve as European common manifesto for the socialists' campaign.

“We cannot ignore what the eurosceptics are saying,” he says. “We must take it into account. But the problem is how to answer to their arguments; how to offer an answer – including technical solutions. This is our duty as traditional political parties. Populists don’t offer such answers.”

A winner that: let's make the EU more socialist, less viable economically and give more power to the bureaucracy at the centre, then all those nasty populists will just turn into a little hoop and roll away.

The EPP, the supposedly Centre-Right grouping is concerned but sees no reason to panic:

These worries are shared by the centre-right European People's party (EPP). At a recent event in the European Parliament, the deputy director of the European Peoples Party's political foundation the Centre for European Studies, Roland Freudenstein, addressed these alarmist calls, stressing that “there is reason to worry" but "no reason to panic".

“Populists are problem seekers, not problem solvers. This means we should not shy away from addressing the topics they address,” he said. “The worse reaction would be to cry out: ‘Help, the Barbarians are at the gate; we have to team up’.”

Presumably, the knowledge that turn-out for European elections falls every five years gives these worried but not panicky people heart: they will get back to the trough as most people will not be bothered to vote for anybody.

We shall have to wait till February and March of next year to see what the various manifestos say. Meanwhile, there is a slight tinge of worry among some:

There is a risk that the upcoming campaign becomes a battle of pro-EU politicians versus anti-EU politicians. “This will benefit the Eurosceptics, and not the pro-Europe camp,” argues Paul Taggart, who studies Eurosceptic parties from across Europe at the University of Essex.

It also distorts a debate on policy, Taggart says: “A normal [political] debate would be to have a range of different opinions. If politicians discuss the welfare state, you don’t hear a debate on whether you should have one or not; you hear a variety of positions.”

When I read comments like that with the clear lack of understanding of how the whole principle of the EU differs from simple policy making I take heart. These people cannot win an IN/OUT referendum. Then I remember that there are many on that side who are smarter than this denizen of the University of Essex. Also I look at our side and read their comments. Then I despair.

And in other news

Estimates for attendance of yesterday's Thatcher hate party in Trafalgar Square vary from "as many as 1,700" from a photographer who was there to "about 3,000" in the Grauniad, whose hack may or may not have been there. Either way, these are not numbers that deserve any kind of consideration though the flying of the Argentinian flag shows a crassness and stupidity beyond the usual left-wingery.

It seems various other groups have decided to protest against ... well, what exactly? They can't be protesting against Thatcher's death, surely. Apparently, they are protesting against her legacy, which they seem unable to define. Then they are surprised that nobody takes them seriously.

According to Sky News there were former miners from various parts of the country (or, given the time that has gone, presumably off-springs of former miners), UK Uncut, Liverpool fans who think she personally murdered all the people at Hillsborough and many people who, as has been pointed out before, were not even born when she was Prime Minister. One can't help wondering whether these political geniuses have even noticed that she has not been that for over twenty years and that much of her supposed legacy has actually been overturned by her successors.

Just to give one an inkling of what passes for thought among these people we get this straight-faced reporting on Sky:

Among the crowds in Trafalgar Square was four-year-old Jack, who was stomping around shouting "Thatcher's dead, Thatcher's dead."

His father Howard Garrick, from Islington, north London, said he was determined his son should come to the party.

"This is about his future as well, not just the past," he said.

"He needs a grounding in life and to understand how we are not going to be made into wage slaves."

Well, how nice. So the future, according to this moron (the father not the unfortunate little boy) is to consist of his son growing up to be a lay-about. He must be the little boy spotted by Robert Hardman of the Daily Mail. His account is hilarious. Read it here.

Enough of this obsession with events of several decades ago (and yes, I am going to write about the late great Prime Minister any minute now). Let us turn to the future.

The anti-euro Alternative for Germany party (here is the official website in German)  is being launched officially today, as reported by Der Spiegel and on their site.

The Alternative for Germany party wants to shake up the traditional party landscape in the country during federal elections this September with its message of "putting an end to the euro." The party is calling for the "orderly dissolution of the euro currency zone." So what do they want to do, return to the deutsche mark? Lucke describes that path as "one option." The party still hasn't defined much in terms of its party platform, but its founders have argued for the right to hold national referenda as well as streamlining tax laws. More than anything, they aim to attract voters with their "no" to the common currency.

The accepted wisdom is that the party is not likely to win any seats in the federal parliament but there is some uncertainty behind Der Spiegel's somewhat dismissive coverage. What if they do attract support, is the clear message behind this and other articles. Well, what, indeed. It has always been my conviction that no other country can destroy the European Union. The whole box of tricks requires endless feelings of guilt from Germans, none of whom can be said any longer to be responsible for the horrors of Nazism and the war. The people of Germany have, on all evidence, understood that but not the political class. Not yet.

Useful arguments

What am I to say to people who tell me that we need to be in the EU for our economic welfare or, at least, in a greatly reformed EU? This question keeps coming up and it is important. We have not managed to get our message across as successfully as we ought to have done so arguments that we can use against the other side are important.

Here are some in a letter to the Grauniad, signed by many of the usual suspects (though they are not, thankfully, calling for that referendum).

1. We have 3m jobs exporting to the EU but it has 4.5m jobs exporting to us. We are its largest client. 2. The EU has free-trade agreements with 63 countries worldwide and another 63 on the way, so why not with us, on satisfactory terms? 3. Switzerland, not in the EU, exports three times more per capita to the EU than we do. 4. Only 9% of our GDP goes in trade with the EU (in deficit), 11% goes to the rest of the world (in surplus), and 80% stays in our domestic market. Yet Brussels overregulation strangles all 100% of our economy, and handicaps our exports to the countries of the future. Leaving the EU would create jobs, and restore our democracy.

While I have some reservations about the last sentence (leaving the EU will not automatically do either of those things), the four cardinal points made in the letter are not only true but are also useful arguments. Mind you, when one produces them, one still has to deal with the dubious facial expression and a muttered "yes, of course, but even so" from a lot of people.

They are all eurosceptics now

Everybody seems to be a eurosceptic these days. Or so they say. The latest one to come out with that odd self-identification was Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. According to the Wall Street Journal,:

“I’m not a euro-enthusiast of the sort that has eyes only on the yellow stars on the blue background, forgetting the white-and-red flag,” he said Saturday, referring to flags of the EU and Poland. “I’m a common-sense euroskeptic, without any unhealthy fascinations.”

It's a little hard to tell what he means by that. After all, we have enough trouble trying to disentangle what our own Tory eurosceptics mean in reality. But, as far as I can tell, he means that as things are not very good in the eurozone at the moment, he does not think Poland should join any time soon but, of course, there is no need to suppose that the eurozone will fall apart and some time in the future, if the conditions are right and there is a good deal of money coming to Poland we shall try again.

Just as in Britain, however, the mention of the word seems to send everyon scurrying for journalistic phrases. A completely uninteresting and meaningless little statement is being described as a "significant about-face". What would happen, I ask myself, if a politician did decide, on the basis of facts to change his or her mind and come out seriously against the whole project.

Are we getting anywhere?

Several people, whose genuine euroscepticism or eurorealism cannot be doubted have said to me that the result on Monday was the best one could imagine. The referendum motion was lost, which is a good thing since we are not prepared for the battle but the issue was raised and dissatisfaction in the Conservative Party was displayed.

I am not so sure. For one thing, I suspect the dissatisfaction had more to do with the accurate analysis that reneging on that cast-iron promise cost the Cameroonie Conservative Party many votes and contributed strongly to their inability to win against the least popular government in living memory. There is dissatisfaction with Cameron and his team, in general and, no doubt, annoyance with his childishly petulant behaviour.

Are the right conclusions being drawn from it all, though. Sadly, no. The Daily Wail managed to interrupt its constant complaints about immigration long enough to have a go (quite justifiably) at the Lib-Dims who were the only party to float the idea of an IN/OUT referendum in the last election and who all but one voted against one now, though with a three-option proposal it was not exactly IN/OUT. But any newspaper that calls William Hague and Michael Gove lifelong eurosceptics has not been attention.

Nevertheless, when the lambasting of our politicians is completed (and I have no arguments with that, as readers of this blog know) the Mail says this:

Let the Mail lay all its cards on the table. This paper has no desire for Britain to pull out of Europe — and particularly not at a time like this, when withdrawal would add immeasurably to the uncertainties threatening our recovery and rocking the confidence of the markets.

For the same reason, we earnestly hope EU leaders will find a solution that saves the euro from disorderly collapse.

Inevitably, we believe, this will mean re‑writing the EU constitution yet again, to bring the countries of the Eurozone under a single economic government, with more uniform tax and spending policies — almost certainly to be dictated by Germany.

Whether this can work in the long run is anybody’s guess. The Mail doubts it. But in the depths of this crisis, we see no other way. Herein, of course, lies great danger for Britain. For as a leopard never changes its spots, so the Euro empire-builders will surely seek to extend any new fiscal and regulatory powers beyond the Eurozone, with their eyes fixed firmly, as ever, on the wealth of the City of London.

But here, also, lies a golden opportunity, perhaps never to be repeated, to redefine our own relationship with the EU in a way that sets democracy back on its rightful throne at Westminster.

For what the Mail wants passionately — and we believe the overwhelming majority of Britons share our wish — is to reclaim powers over such matters as immigration, social policy and business regulation, which should never have been conceded to Brussels and which are daily threatening our ability to compete with developing super-giant economies such as India and China.

So that is what the Mail going to be campaigning for: redefining our relationship "with the EU" and reclaiming powers. Oh and for a whole squadron of flying pigs.

What of the Daily Express, the torch-bearer of something or other? Well, they seem to have Britain's withdrawal from the EU as an aim though the words are carefully chosen not to be held against them at some later date:

For Monday’s vote did not mark the end of the matter. The mood of the public and the acknowledgement of that mood by politicians of all parties cannot now be ignored.

There is a growing sense of outrage that Britain’s right to determine its own affairs, unquestioned for 1,000 years, is now being rapidly eroded with every new piece of legislation from Brussels.

Who in their right mind would have agreed to this if we had been given the choice? Who would agree to this if we were given the choice now?

On Monday the motion to hold a referendum was defeated. But it is a defeat that for many will also be seen as part of a process that will ultimately lead to victory for those who want Britain out of the EU.

Not clear what the newspaper would campaign for if there were a referendum. Best leave it that way. After all, you never know. Of course, one could argue that the choice to vote against this is there at every election: there is a party called UKIP and with all its many faults, it stands for withdrawal from the EU. People could vote for it if they really cared about not having a say in the way things are developing.

Finally, there is this Letter to Members of Parliament, though he means Conservative ones, from Glenn Beck. Not sure what to make of it. It's full of errors, the least of which is equating England with the United Kingdom. Many of them Mr Beck obviously picked up from the British media and rather hysterical Conservative commentators. It is all a bit of a muddle with odd references to Tahrir Square and the Occupiers at St Paul's Cathedral and old uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all. People might want a referendum in general terms but there is no reason to suppose that they will vote in it when it happens or vote for withdrawal, especially if there is that bogus third option.

My biggest problem with it is that Glenn Beck, who is entitled to his opinion though one would prefer it to be better informed, comes perilously close to that idiotic performance by the Guardian when they tried to interfere in the American election by setting up a website to call on people in one county in Ohio to vote against Bush.

So are we getting anywhere? Are we going to use the time we have gained to build up real exit and post-exit strategies and put together real ideas for how to fight for a withdrawal from the pernicious European project and what to do afterwards? Not so that you'd notice. Well, this blog will continue to do its poor and unfunded best to explain the situation and propose some solutions. But we shall not put our trust in kings and famous people.

Someone agrees with me, broadly speaking, and that is Autonomous Mind.

That campaign continues

The Express, home of at least one, maybe more In/Out referendum campaigns, has an article about the Boy-King moving "to switch EU power back to Westminster". Much to be said for it, but how is he going to do it. It sounds a bit like he is going to thcweam and thcweam until he is thick. It may have worked for Violet-Elizabeth Bott because she was a determined young lady but I can't quite envisage the Boy-King following in her footsteps.

The Express is quoting yet another interview with the Spectator, which is in the front-line of the campaign to prove that the Conservatives are the real eurosceptics as this blog has said, repeatedly.

DAVID Cameron last night promised to negotiate a new relationship between Britain and the European Union that will bring back power to Westminster from Brussels.

In a shift in Government policy, the Prime Minister predicted that fresh opportunities for loosening the UK’s ties to the EU were certain to arise as a result of the eurozone crisis.

Well, to start with, we do not have a relationship with the EU, we are part of it. What sort of relationship does Devon or Sussex have with the United Kingdom?

Secondly, changing the structure of the EU requires, which is the only way those powers can be brought back to Westminster, requires a change in the Treaties and the agreement of all the other member states. Will the Boy-King achieve that?

Thirdly, his great boast of "getting Britain out of the bailing out mechanism" amounts to very little.

He said: “I got us out of the bailout mechanism, which has been used repeatedly and from 2013 cannot be used again, so I think I exacted a good and fair price for Britain.”

Jam tomorrow, and today we pay. Also,one can't help wondering whether this is yet another cast-iron guarantee. The great shift in the British position, according to James Forsyth who conducted the interview is an acceptance that the eurozone may not be such a wonderful idea after all and a stable eurozone, not being something that will be achieved any time soon, does not need to be part of British calculations. That's it. Oh and bringing power back to Westminster.

Are they really planning for an earlier election than most of us think?

While we are on the subject of fudging of issues, I note with interest that the People's Pledge (which always makes me think of East European furniture polish) is quoting widely Bob Crow on the horrors of job losses because of the Bombardier fiasco. (No, I am not linking.) Having managed to fudge the question of a referendum with the question of EU withdrawal (not the same thing at all but that is the line People's Pledge and the EU Referendum Campaign are peddling) they are now busy destroying support for both by quoting the man who must be more hated in this country than anyone else. Of course, theoretically, he is merely supporting a referendum but, thanks to the fudge exercised by the two campaigns, it will seem that Bob Crow is supporting the withdrawal. We know how well that played in 1975 and can guess how well it will play now.

Time to stop laughing

Though it is rather difficult to do so. I don't know which is funnier, watching the Lib-Dims rubbing their collective behind where they were kicked soundly yet again, while insisting that somehow they have enough popular support to be in government or watching the Tories burying their collective heads in the sand yet again. Of course, they were not going to win in Barnsley. But to come third behind UKIP is not quite what the Boy-King had promised them. Given that it is UKIP that came second, it is reasonable to say that the voting was not just about student loans or possible cuts in the bloated NHS.

Nevertheless, it is time to stop laughing. The results are bad for the Cleggerons but not that good for the rest of us. First of all, as ever, over 60 per cent stayed away from the polling booths, saying, in effect, a plague upon all your houses. By all, they meant all, even the small parties. I find it hard to understand that people prefer not to cast their votes at all to casting them for a non-main stream party but that is the situation and it is not a happy one. If we ever have that in/out referendum (not under this government but it might happen one day) how many people will decide that they can't be bothered to cast their vote?

Secondly, UKIP did well but not quite well enough. It got 2,953 votes and as an American friend and supporter said to me, the gap between that and Labour's 14,724 is just too depressing. Not unexpected for Barnsley, I replied, without adding that a three-legged stool with a red rosette would win there.

However, coming a distant second in a by-election and even being, possibly, the biggest party in Brussels in 2014 as Ed West says in today's Telegraph is not enough to make a real difference either to the political structure of this country or to introduce a real debate about freedom, democracy and sovereignty. We have a long way to go and campaigns for a referendum that we might or might not win is not the right way. Neither is a change to the AV system.

What is to be Done?

I make no apology for using that hackneyed title again. Like so many political ideas it emanates from Russian radical circles, first used by Nikolay Chernyshevsky as title to his highly influential and immensely boring novel Что Делать?, which means just that: What is to be Done?. Written in the early 1860s, it outlines in many many badly written pages ideas about revolutionaries and the formation of the revolutionary elite. It says something about those radicals that they took to this novel (or pretended to do so) in a country that boasted at the time some of the world's greatest writers.

Other writers responded as did Dostoyevsky, viciously, in Notes from the Underground (Записки из подполья), published in 1864. This was a protest against the soulless materialism of what he perceived to be the modern age but, in particular, it was a sarcastic attack on Vera Pavlovna, Chernyshevsky's heroine and her interminable dreams, particularly the last one in which people appear to live in some sort of a crystal palace.

The great novelist Tolstoy wrote a pamphlet with that title in 1886, which is a description of Russian social conditions, presumably as seen from Yasnaya Polyana, Tolstoy's mansion and estate. What was required, he thought, was change within people themselves.

The best known work is, inevitably, V. I. Lenin's. It is as boring and badly written as Chernyshevsky's but it is shorter and there are no dreams in it. The book is the most important one Lenin wrote as it gives a precise, if badly phrased, idea of the "need" for a revolutionary elite that would impose its own views on the people. There are also reasonably clear instructions on how that elite is to be formed into a coherent and disciplined party.

The reason for these musings is an internet conversation I have been having with no less a person than Gawain Towler (name published with his permission and encouragement), Head of Media at UKIP who linked to this story in the Telegraph.

If you were a Brussels bureaucrat and David Cameron dumped a cheque for a few billion onto your desk to spend on foreign aid, what would you do with it? Would you spend it (a) on poor people or (b) on cocktails and dancing for white European socialists, and on some vanity projects to promote the power of the EU?

Well, if you were a genuine Eurocrat, you’d probably have gone with (b). Thanks to the EU – which takes a fifth of our international development budget – a chunk of our aid isn’t spent on fighting global poverty at all, but on promoting the EU’s own political goals – which is why so much of it ends up in states that don’t need it, such as Russia, Singapore, India and China.

Last week, however, the Eurocrats decided to spend our money a little closer to home by hosting a major conference in Brussels. Along with providing lots of European Leftists with cocktails and a dance floor, this promoted “the key role of the European Union” in international development and helped to “improve European cohesion”.

To top it all, as Martin Banks and Gawain Towler report, the conference spent aid money to host a fashion show, showcasing seven European designers and one Moroccan. Apparently, this helped the delegates understand the Millennium Development Goals, but it strikes me that it was just an excuse for a jolly at the taxpayer’s expense.

Foreign aid or international aid, as we are supposed to call it now, money spent on parties and fashion shows is not precisely news. My response was that at least money spent on a party and fashion show in Brussels would not go into the coffers of evil, bloodthirsty kleptocrats who use it to fight nasty wars and oppress their people. I was accused of being ultra-cynical.

(In parenthesis let me add that I have been accused of cynicism many times, though not by Mr Towler, but I have never until a recent exchange on a particularly ridiculous forum, been accused of being a do-gooder and, by implication, a bleedin' heart liberal. This was not a person who knows me; nor had he bothered to read anything I write. There is a first time for everything.)

Anyway, moving right along, the discussion between Mr Towler and me then developed into the usual one of "well, what should we do to get people interested". As many times before I maintained that producing silly stories and yet more examples of corruption gets us nowhere. They produced two reactions: people either 1. shrugged their shoulders and said well what do you expect, yawn, what's on the tele, or 2. started getting worked up about the need for reform, control, supervision and transparency. When 2. did not produce the necessary results because they could not, people would revert to 1.

Well, what would you do, asked Mr Towler quite reasonably. Should we start swinging from the Cenotaph? No, I pointed out, as, apart from anything else, it achieved nothing beyond annoying very many people.

It is time, I continued, to start assuming that most people are adults and capable of assimilating serious ideas, such as international aid does not help poor people but keeps bloodthirsty kleptocrats in power and the EU is a state in the making that has already destroyed Britain's sovereignty and constitutional democracy as well as being economically, politically and environmentally regressive and destructive.

Ah yes, said he, but the media does not want that - the media wants silly stories. How well do I know that and how well do I recall being press officer for the Campaign for Independent Britain (CIB) and getting calls from journalists who wanted really stupid European stories. All right, I'd say, how about the really stupid common fisheries policy. Nothing doing. We want something our readers can easily understand. Square strawberries, for instance. Those stories kept appearing as did stories of corruption and wasted money and where has all that got us? We are ever more integrated in the Project and have a non-Labour government that is fully as bad as John Major's Conservative one was (which is when I became involved in all this).

When I say that we should accept that most people are adults who are capable of assimilating serious ideas I do not mean journalists or politicians. Sadly, I probably do not mean people who are involved in party politics either but those are ever fewer in number as we keep being told. But I do mean others - the electorate of all ages and social positions.

There is no question in my view: while it is quite a good idea to produce those stories of wastage and corruption, what we really need to do is go for the central problems, whether it be the EU, international aid or, for that matter, education in this country. Nothing else will get us anywhere. We do miss the likes of the old IEA that changed economic thinking in this country and there seems to be no money around for a eurosceptic think-tank as money tends to go to useless campaigns for referendums or to perestroika organizations like Open Europe or the Taxpayers' Alliance. We do have the internet, of course, and the American example of a blogosphere that became enormously powerful.

So here is my first response to the question of what is to be done - concentrate on the main issues and assume your audience is capable of understanding them and fight through the new media, whether it be the blogosphere (as Mr Towler does as well), other websites or, let's accept it, social media. That might get there somewhere. Anyone has any better ideas?

Here we go again (and again)

One would like to think that the myth of Conservative euroscepticism was killed some time ago but it appears to be a latter-day hydra. For every head that is cut off nine more appear in the shape of bloggers, commentators and activists who assure us, the rest of the world, that the party has become, if anything, more eurosceptic. So why cannot we see it? Well, Cameron and Co will not listen to them. Really? Why is that? All the fault of the Lib-Dims. He has to be nice to the Cleggeron Coalition partners. That begs a question or two, such as why should the Boy-King go for a coalition with the electorally unsuccessful Lib-Dims instead of forming an all-Conservative and, if we are to believe the bleaters, eurosceptic minority government.

Iain Martin, Deputy Editor of the Wall Street Journal Europe, has written before about the "strange death" of Conservative euroscepticism, to which this blog replied by pointing out that in order to die one has to be born first.

He is at it again and so are the excitable ToryBoys. His clog blog posting today is all about the Tory dog that didn't bark over Europe. Well, if you have a cardboard cut out dog it will not bark not if it were ever so.

To be fair to Mr Martin he has understood the Tory leadership and, indeed, the party.

Euroscepticism, a strand of thinking that once divided the Tory party and which it was predicted would cause David Cameron trouble in government, has all but disappeared from view. In Birmingham, at their annual gathering, it was barely mentioned. A couple of weeks ago, at the start of the party conference season, I wrote a column for the paper on the “Strange Death of Tory Euroscepticism”.

Ask senior Conservatives about all this and they point to the coalition with the Liberal Democrats–enthusiasts for integration. It necessitates compromise.

But that is talk designed to make Lib Dem leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg feel good. Mr. Cameron had decided long before he failed to win an overall majority at the general election that he was not going to die in a ditch over Europe. He prepared accordingly, removing his commitment to a referendum on the Lisbon treaty on the grounds that it was too late and would look ridiculous.

Mr. Cameron also put in a lot of effort into wooing Ms. Merkel and Mr. Sarkozy ahead of the election, reassuring them that he would be a good member of the European leaders’ club. This work has continued since he took office.

He is aided by having William Hague at the Foreign Office. One of the most enduring myths of public life in Britain is that of Hague as Euroskeptic. He was once so minded, when he lost the 2001 election heavily pledging to “Save the Pound”. Since then he has kept the reputation while moving steadily onto mainstream establishment territory. As a fellow Conservative puts it: “William has a couple of years ahead of him doing an agreeable job, and then a lifetime of book signings and profitable speech-making afterwards. He’s not going to do anything confrontational that puts all that at risk.”

Mr Martin thinks that Mr Cameron (he clearly rates Mr Hague about as highly as this blog does, though the chances of Mr Hague having an agreeable couple of years are slim) wants to concentrate on reducing the deficit and does not want to be distracted by arguments about "Europe". If the Boy-King really believes that he can separate the two he is stupider even than I have always believed.

Not so much died as was never born

There is a good deal of excitement on certain forums or fora (take your pick, they are both correct) about this article by Iain Martin in the Wall Street Journal. Mr Martin is the Deputy Editor of the Wall Street Journal Europe and used to be all sorts of things in the Telegraph group. In other words, he ought to know about British politics. When it comes to the title of his piece: "Strange death of Cameron's Euroskepticism" one could argue that the more accurate one of "Euroskeptic critics of Cameron are proved right" does not have quite the same zing to it.

To start off, he lists all the things that were going to happen according to "the widely accepted wisdom". Interestingly enough, they were all things that this blog and EUReferendum dismissed as so much froth and got a fair bit of abuse for. You'll see, our abusers, said, Cameron in Number 10 will be the best thing for Britain and the eurosceptics. To some extent, the second part of that is true: Cameron in Number 10 has made ever more eurosceptics realize that they cannot ever rely on the Conservatives and that is a good thing. In the same way, President Obama and House Leader Pelosi have been a good thing for the right in the United States.

Mr Martin lists all the things that were going to happen: troubles with the EU, fraught relations with Sarkozy and Merkel, an explosion of opposition to further integration. Notice that even now Mr Martin cannot give any kind of definite ideas as to what the Boy-King was going to do in the EU. In any case:

Absolutely none of this has happened. Why?

Almost unnoticed, his MPs have voted for a list of measures that would a few years ago have triggered full-scale Tory war. There was the expansion of justice and home-affairs powers, involving the extension of the so-called European arrest warrant. The European External Action Service—or EU diplomatic service—was nodded through. New regulations for the City of London require the establishment of three pan-European supervisory bodies. This was accepted by the Treasury and if there were protests from the Conservative benches they didn't make much noise. A higher budget for the EU has also been approved.

Oh dear. Oh dear, dear, dear. Well, why?

Ask senior Conservatives about all this and they point to the coalition with the Liberal Democrats, enthusiasts for integration. It necessitates compromise.

But that is the myth designed to make Lib Dem leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg feel good. Mr. Cameron had decided long before he failed to win an overall majority at the general election that he was not going to die in a ditch over Europe. He prepared accordingly, removing his commitment to a referendum on the Lisbon treaty on the grounds that it was too late and would look ridiculous.

Mr. Cameron also put in a lot of effort into wooing Ms. Merkel and Mr. Sarkozy ahead of the election, reassuring them that he would be a good member of the European leaders' club. This work has continued since he took office.

He is aided by having William Hague at the Foreign Office. One of the most enduring myths of public life in Britain is that of Mr. Hague as Euroskeptic. He was once so minded, when he lost the 2001 election heavily pledging to "Save the Pound." Since then he has kept the reputation while moving steadily onto mainstream establishment territory. As a fellow Conservative puts it: "William has a couple of years ahead of him doing an agreeable job, and then a lifetime of book signings and profitable speech-making afterwards. He's not going to do anything confrontational that puts all that at risk."

True enough except for one thing: neither the Boy-King nor the disaster we call the Foreign Secretary are all that pragmatic. Mr Martin is still trying to be nice to them and showing them to be a lot smarter than they are. In actual fact, Cameron is a europhiliac as we have known for a long time and Hague does not exactly know which way is up. [OK, stop sniggering at the back.]

Nor do I exactly agree with Mr Martin that the scene is tranquil and everything in the garden is coming out roses because the old Tory civil wars over the EU have died. Mr Martin does not seem to realize that those promises of strong euroscepticism and standing up for Britain's interests that he and his media colleagues produced before the election are likely to backfire as supporters of the party (not exactly an overwhelmingly large proportion of the population) and people who are a little bemused as to why politicians keep not being able to see the problems turn on Cameron.

I am still waiting

Yesterday I attended a conference organized by Legatum Institute about liberty and economic growth. I shall blog on it in detail as there were some interesting aspects to it. For the moment I want to concentrate on the drinks party at the end of the afternoon, at which Daniel Hannan MEP spoke as an expert on liberty and economic growth or, at least, the person who is often invited to speak on such matters.

Our Dan is an excellent speaker - witty, clever, full of quotations from the Bible, Edmund Burke, Friedrich Hayek and many other people. He also attacks all the right objects: the EU, overweening government, politicians who meddle in business and so on. In fact, a pleasure to listen to.

The only problem is his inability to explain how the party he belongs to will deal with all the problems he so assiduously attacks. To be fair, he did admit that his own favoured agenda of localism is likely to get short shrift under a Conservative government but added that David Cameron has gone further than any Tory leader.

The real problem is the European Union. Mr Hannan is against it and has on occasion expressed the view that we should start negotiating our way out. Mr Cameron, on the other hand, thinks that we should stay there because that is where we belong and we can repatriate some powers by some mysterious magical means. When questioned, Conservatives between the two will repeat the same mantra: what is in the past is in the past, we need to deal with what we have and look to the future. Yes, I know it is meaningless but you can't expect these people to think as well as talk.

Mr Hannan took some questions and there was one about that very subject. A very smug looking gentleman asked him what he thought of UKIP taking away Tory votes and whether that was a good thing. Having asked the question the gentleman looked around with a self-satisfied smirk as if he expected to be congratulated on his imbecility. I should like to think that he thought otherwise when he met my stony glare but I am afraid I am probably wrong.

Mr Hannan did not, curiously enough, point out that those votes do not belong to the Tories. Apparently, he sees nothing wrong with people saying insufferable things of that kind. Let me just point out: they belong to us, the voters, and we decide where we lend them.

But Mr Hannan did talk at length at the stupidity of people voting UKIP and splitting the eurosceptic vote while it was perfectly obvious that the only way to advance to agenda was to stay within the Conservative Party as he had done and push that party towards accepting that agenda.

Let us not spend any time on discussing whether it is worth swallowing all the stuff the Conservative Party leadership produces in the hope that the party will some time move half an inch in the right direction. Let us simply concentrate on the core message, if I may use that expression. The only way to advance a eurosceptic agenda is to support the Conservative Party. Could we now have some more or less precise idea of how the said party is intending to advance that agenda. In fact, can we have some idea of what they think the agenda is.

Yesterday evening I put that challenge out into cyberspace. I am still waiting for any replies. Maybe I shall get some on this blog.

And this is why we get nowhere

It is one of the truisms of any kind of political life that one's supposed friends and allies are far more vexatious than one's enemies. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the whole debate about the EU and Britain's role in it and in the world.

Open Europe, for instance, remains a source of much frustration. Well-funded, more than adequately staffed, it produces good factual reports about the way the EU affects the life of this country. Having done so, it draws the most ridiculously silly conclusions and prevent the discussion from moving on. In fact, it seems to be determined to keep the whole EU debate at a level of water-treading.

It has just produced a list of Top 100 EU regulations to cost UK economy £184 billion by 2020 and has had this list noted in a number of publications such as the Sunday Times and the News of the World. (It is based on more extensive research published in February.)

Using the government's own estimates the research concluded that the Working Time Regulations, the Climate Change Act (which they think goes too far though "fighting climate change is vital"), Energy Performance Certificates for Buildings and Temporary Agency Workers Directives are, in that order, the top most expensive pieces of EU legislation as implemented in this country.

I have no intention of arguing with that and, in any case, the particular order is unimportant, though it is always useful to have figures to play around with.

Open Europe has even grasped that there is no point in trying to tackle over-regulation in the UK without tackling it in the EU.

Open Europe’s Research Director Mats Persson said:

“Despite some attempts at reform, the cost of EU regulation continues to rise year on year. Some of these regulations might be helpful but far too often the cost of EU rules outweigh the benefits. The UK is facing a massive public deficit, so the Government should be doing everything it can to save money. Targeting even just a few of the most costly EU regulations could save taxpayers and business billions every year.”

“There is almost no point in trying to cut regulation without concentrating on EU rules, since 72% of the total cost of UK regulation now originates in Brussels. The next UK Government must take a new, radical approach to cutting red tape, and this means getting smarter and tougher when negotiating in Europe.”

Well, that's been a hugely successful approach up till now. Exactly, how is one member state out of 27 going to get smarter and tougher across a whole range of regulations? Still, one can imagine David Cameron coming up with that in those much-vaunted debates between leaders: "and we shall be much smarter and tougher in our negotiations in ....errrm ... well, whichever forum it happens to be".

Is something stirring?

A seriously disturbed commenter on ToryBoyBlog has described the Boss of EUREf as “a bitter ex-UKIP researcher” and, without bothering to find out how to spell my name, added for good measure: “His partner is the dreadful helen Samuelly who manages to antagonise anyone she deals with.” As the person in question hides under the name of Better Off Out and gives no website or blog link I cannot tell who it is though I suspect that his or her suggestion that we are paid either by the EU or MI5 (if only!) is libellous. One cannot sue someone who is too cowardly to give a real name and, clearly, Tim Montgomerie and Jonathan Isaby are not responsible for some fruitcake who chooses to comment on their blog. But I thought our readers on this blog might like to know. My response, I thought, was a model of restraint.

The somewhat unpleasant discussion is going on in response to a posting by Tim Montgomerie, entitled The Future of Euroscepticism. I shall refrain from making some obvious comments about Conservatives, euroscepticism, streets, being bitten and recognizing. Mr Montgomerie, staunch Tory though he is, happens to be a member of Better Off Out. (We noted its re-launch in April and updated a few days later.)

The idea of being lectured by Conservatives at this stage in the game on whither euroscepticism is going would be quite infuriating if it were not quite so ridiculously funny. Tim Montgomerie, I am sad to say, compounds this problem by starting his posting with this sentence:

It's been a disappointing few weeks for Euroscepticism and for the Eurosceptic movement but The TaxPayers' Alliance are leading the way in consolidating popular unhappiness at the EU.

None of that is exactly accurate but one cannot blame organizations like the TPA and Conservative Home from closing ranks in the six months before the next election. The truth is that the last few weeks have not disappointed any real eurosceptic or so I shall call them for want of a better name. We expected nothing else from the Boy-King of the Conservative Party. Indeed, this blog and EURef predicted several times that he would duck out of a referendum. We also predicted that eventually the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty will go through.

On the other hand, we are convinced (well, I am convinced and the Boss is coming round) that this was a pyrrhic victory. The dirt and nastiness of the last eight years, which is how long it took to get this treaty through, the bullying and shameless manipulation have all contributed to turn many people’s opinion against the EU. The notion that we might actually come out and survive is gaining ground, if very slowly. What worries the Conservative Party and its outposts as well as front organizations (Open Europe, TPA and others) is that they might not benefit from this change.

The other slight error is the one about the TPA “leading the way in consolidating popular unhappiness at the EU”. Actually, the TPA is reversing the debate by concentrating on financial matters: how much we pay in and how utterly fraudulent is all is. These points have been discussed for decades with very little effect.

Given the general incompetence and lack of honesty in governments and regulatory authorities in this country, other countries and the EU, most people fulminate a bit when having a drink with their friends then shrug their shoulders and move on. It is the other issues, the lack of accountability, lack of democracy, destruction of our constitutional and legal system and the appalling regulatory structure whose aim seems to be purely destructive that rouse real anger in people.

That is why the issue of the Lisbon referendum has become a flashpoint: this was specifically promised by all three (well, all right, both) parties and both, Labour and Conservatives, have reneged on it. No amount of discussion about the cost of it will make up for that. And that makes the last few weeks exceedingly good for real eurosceptics – dead wood is being cleared out.

If Conservative Home, the TPA and such blogs as Iain Dale’s are all cautiously probing the idea of Britain being outside that organization, one can safely say that there has been something of a shift in the debating positions. Mr Dale, incidentally, makes two very good points. In this posting, which is really about a forthcoming BBC programme on what would happen if Britain left the EU, he pours contempt on the europhiliac position that we would be out on our own with nobody trading with us.

Ridiculous. As if European businesses wouldn't want to sell us their goods if we were outside the EU!

Indeed. And I agree with him on Lord Pearson’s comment that “they would be glad to get rid of us”. They would not be all that glad and not just because of the money we put in. As it happens, Britain is one of the most enthusiastic members, always thinking of new regulations that cannot be passed back home and have to be imposed through the EU, as well as implementing rules as soon as it is required and sometimes before.

I also find it amusing that Mr Dale reminds the TPA that their famed new cinema ad is quite similar to an old 18 Doughty Street video.

Well, what of the TPA’s new cinema advert? There are, as it happens, strict rules about political advertising in this country and all the TPA could do is produce what must have been a reasonably expensive ad for their new book, Ten Years On Without The European Union by Dr Lee Rotherham, the TPA’s expert on the EU. The books is free to all who order it, so Tim Montgomerie’s comment about 22,000 ordered already is not all that meaningful. Would people pay for it, is the question.

Anyway, I have not seen the book yet as the TPA are reluctant to reply to my e-mails. (And what do you expect, hmmm? I hear someone muttering.) So I have to go by what they say on their website about it.

The book is a sort of a utopian fantasy about Britain being outside the EU and managing very well, thank you, all the problems that, for example, small business owners faced being the fault of the EU. There are other blogs that deal with farmers, fishermen, MPs and the workforce (there’s an expression from the glorious past). All tell us how wonderfully easy life will be outside the EU.

Well, there is no harm in it. People should get used to the idea that there is life outside the EU though it might be more useful to examine how we get from here to there and to accept that there will have to be many negotiations, agreements and reforms before we can achieve the state of utopian ecstasy. The trouble is that once you start talking ordinary politics people might ask awkward questions. Much easier to present a rosy picture that rather mindless eurosceptics accept and gloat over while the rest of the country continues to shrug its shoulders.

A more interesting point is the BBC. The idea of a programme, broadcast this evening at 8.30 and repeated on Sunday, 22nd at 10.30 (all in the evening) about the very possibility of Britain being outside the EU is intriguing.

The article on the website makes two points that we, on this blog, would find it hard to disagree with:

Up to 55% of those asked in recent British opinion polls say they would support it. But it's hardly ever discussed in polite political society. What is this great taboo? Britain leaving the European Union.

After all the constitutional wrangling and embarrassing referendum results within the EU in recent years, reluctance to talk about this among the EU mainstream may be greater than ever.

They then spend some time discussing the so-called heresy that in the Constitutional Lisbon Treaty there is a possibility of a member state leaving, without explaining that the decision depends largely on other member states agreeing to it. And so it goes, with the usual canards about Continental member states allegedly thinking that it would be a good thing if Britain left, for which there is no evidence; europhiliacs threatening us to a return of boiled mutton and cabbage and so on and so on.

None of that matters. Even if the programme this evening is absolutely dire, what really matters is that the BBC has decided that this subject needs to be aired and the question to be asked is whether Britain can survive outside the EU. The BBC asking that is a little like the Pope wondering whether that chap Luther had a point after all.

We have complained (whined, some people might say) in the past that we have been sidelined and our work not acknowledge while other, grander, better funded and less well researched programmes have been touted by the media and other members of the political class. But we can, severally and together, take some credit for this change in attitudes.

Finally, the best evidence yet: Daniel Hannan, darling of the Tory eurosceptics has written a blog in which he sort of makes the case for Britain leaving the EU. It is, as you will note, complete with one of his usual videos and, well, um, it turns out to be another plug for the TPA and Mr Hannan’s old friend, Dr Rotherham. So, as usual, Daniel Hannan, MEP is treading very carefully. But, at least, he mentions the unmentionable in the heading.

UPDATE: I have now received an e-mail from the TPA, which informed me that they had not got my own missives (entirely possible), offered to send me the book (I said as I had done before that I can pick it up) and thanked me somewhat ironically for giving a "grudging" plug to their Great EU Debate. As the Boss of EUReferendum said to me, even a grudging plug is more than any of our blogs gets for them. Could we join the great debate? Should we rename EURef as The Great Eurosceptic Blog?