European Union Referendum

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Voters have been cheated over the European Union for too long.
Let them decide
David Cameron should allow his MPs a free vote on whether to hold a referendum on membership of the EU.
By Charles Moore
12:01AM BST 22 Oct 2011
The Coalition recently introduced a system by which a petition with more than 100,000 signatures can force a debate in the House of Commons. Next week, on Monday, such a petition has triggered a debate on whether there should be a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union. The options in the referendum would be: in, out or renegotiate.
So popular demand has put a question before Parliament, and backbenchers, as the new law also provides, have created a motion based on that popular demand. On the face of it, there would seem to be a chance that popular demand might prevail.
A happy situation for all the parties, you might think, since, at the last general election, all three of them were committed to referendums on Europe. At that time, the Liberal Democrats launched their own petition which said: “Liberal Democrats believe we should have a real vote on Europe – whether we should be in Europe or not. We have been blocked from having a vote on this in Parliament.”
But no, on Monday all three parties will whip their MPs to vote against the petition which the reform has invited and the policy which they all gave us the impression, last time they asked for our votes, that they supported. If you ask the Liberal Democrats why they have changed, they say that their demand for an in/out referendum has been dropped as part of the Coalition Agreement. If you ask the Conservatives, they say that an in/out referendum is more than the Liberal Democrats could stand.
The Tory high command feels so strongly that a referendum should not be voted for that it has arranged to change the date of the debate so that David Cameron and William Hague, who are going to Australia for the Commonwealth Conference, can attend. Mr Miliband, Mr Clegg and Mr Cameron are at one on this subject: “Don’t let the people decide!” It’s quite a slogan.
Mr Hague made a rather poor impression when he explained the official position to the 1922 Committee last week, but I propose to be kinder to him than its members were. It is always difficult being a minister. It is doubly so when you are in a coalition. And I know that “Europe” is a peculiarly painful subject in the folk memory of the Conservative leadership.
So I feel that, out of respect for these difficulties, we should all be as tolerant as possible. We should not try vainly to insist that Mr Cameron and Mr Hague and all their busy ministers vote for the referendum motion. We should tactfully encourage the great men to fly off to Australia early and avoid voting, if it pains them, at all. We must politely leave them to wrestle with their consciences, their diaries, their Coalition colleagues and their fear of seeming rude to all their eurozone friends who are having a perfectly, perfectly ghastly time just now.
But what we can ask in return is that they allow their backbenchers to vote freely for what most of them believe and many have promised their selection committees and their constituents.
Since the motion which the Commons is debating is non-binding and is not a piece of legislation, it is irrelevant to argue about timing, or tactics, or about whether the proposed referendum question is the right one. It is not even relevant for Monday’s vote whether there is a danger – from the Eurosceptic point of view – that the sort of referendum proposed would be lost on the night. It is all much simpler than that. The point is that the public feel that they have been cheated on this issue again and again. The first Parliament which has given them the chance to put this issue before it should not vote to prove them right.
Most people reading this column, I suspect, do not believe in government by referendum. We elect politicians to make laws on our behalf, not to keep scurrying back to ask us which laws to make. But the idea of consent is crucial to trust in the political process. For more than 20 years now, in European matters, that consent has been lacking. It has been in the interest of all the parties to make decisions which have changed our lives without offering us any electoral choice in the matter. Trust has broken down. Therefore our future consent cannot be assumed. It must be sought, in writing.
Therefore we need a referendum. It was only the referendum promise, after all, extracted by the intervention of the late Sir James Goldsmith, that kept us out of the euro. It is solely because of this that Britain is solvent today.
For all their desire to modernise, the Cameron strategists are in a time-warp on this subject. They still see “Europe” as a question of party management. Just like poor John Major, they think Eurosceptics are “bastards”. David Cameron was a young, harassed special adviser at the Treasury at the time when Britain fell out of the ERM in 1992. He knows that this was the luckiest disaster in our economic history. He is no euro-fanatic. But his mind, nevertheless, is scarred by the trauma of those days. “Europe”, for him, means lost votes in the Commons, Tory splits and three-hour speeches by Bill Cash.
He should be careful what he doesn’t wish for, because his current policy could have been expressly designed to bring back those days. Already the media, for whom “Tory split” is always the best default headline, are primed. Mr Cameron is provoking a confrontation on Monday which even Mr Cash (still, I am glad to say, with us) does not seek. He is putting conscientious euro-sceptic ministers in an impossible position. By choosing to interpret a view on an important matter of principle as a symptom of disobedient bloody-mindedness, the Prime Minister will bring that bloody-mindedness into being.
One of the images that the Cameron modernisers have rightly tried hardest to change is the idea that the Tories are smug liars. They do not seem to realise that Europe is a central reason for that image’s persistence. Right back to Edward Heath promising no loss of sovereignty 40 years ago, and right up to Mr Cameron’s “cast-iron” guarantee of a referendum, the public have been given assurances by leading Conservatives. Not wishing to be rude, I shall confine myself to saying that not one of these assurances has been fulfilled.
When this issue last began to tear the Tory party apart, a little over 20 years ago, the end of the Cold War made the European Union seem the coming thing. It was easy to argue – though it wasn’t true – that the march of history must trample over national independence. Today, it feels the other way round. The people who spoke of “our common European home” took out a mortgage on it which turns out to be unrepayable. The European Union may have been the future once, but today it looks more like the League of Nations or the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. The public see this clearly. Yet still Britain is too timid to develop and prosecute an actual policy for the “fundamental reform” Mr Hague says that he wants.
One Government loyalist complained to me that a Commons vote for the motion on Monday would be “morally binding”. Given where we are in the history of our continent, our country, and our Parliament, mightn’t it be quite a good thing if it were?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politic ... ecide.html

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'This isn't a #@!#X*!# sixth form debate: Chief Whip accused of 'bully boy' bid to kill off EU vote
By Simon Walters and Brendan Carlin
Last updated at 12:33 AM on 23rd October 2011
Handbagged: Margaret Thatcher was voted best PM to take on the EU in our poll, ahead of David Cameron
Allegations of ‘bully-boy’ tactics were made against Tory Chief Whip Patrick McLoughlin yesterday as the Government fought to kill off a Commons bid to win a referendum on the EU.
Amid reports that up to 100 rebel Conservative MPs may defy the Prime Minister, there were claims that some had been subjected to a number of threats by Mr McLoughlin to make them toe the line.
According to one MP, ex-miner Mr McLoughlin was overheard shouting at a rebel MP: ‘This is not the f****** Oxford Union. This is not some f****** sixth-form debating society. This is the bloody House of Commons.’
Other threats allegedly included:
• Banning MPs having extra time off at Christmas.
• Giving their seat to a rival MP.
• A four-year veto on becoming a Minister.
The alleged threats were revealed as David Cameron faced his most serious Commons revolt since winning the Election.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1bZicAZI8

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EU referendum: how the MPs voted - 215 Labour MPs voted against the motion

Sir Stuart Bell MP for Middlesbrough voted against the EU Referendum

Diane Abbott (Hackney North & Stoke Newington), Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East & Saddleworth), Bob Ainsworth (Coventry North East), Douglas Alexander (Paisley & Renfrewshire South), Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East), Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green & Bow), Dave Anderson (Blaydon), Mr Jon Ashworth (Leicester South), Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West), Willie Bain (Glasgow North East), Ed Balls (Morley & Outwood), Gordon Banks (Ochil & Perthshire South), Kevin Barron (Rother Valley), Margaret Beckett (Derby South), Anne Begg (Aberdeen South), Sir Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough), Hilary Benn (Leeds Central), Joe Benton (Bootle), Luciana Berger (Liverpool Wavertree), Clive Betts (Sheffield South East), Roberta Blackman-Woods (Durham, City of), Hazel Blears (Salford & Eccles), Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South & Cleveland East), Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central), David Blunkett (Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough), Ben Bradshaw (Exeter), Gordon Brown (Kirkcaldy & Cowdenbeath), Lyn Brown (West Ham), Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East), Russell Brown (Dumfries & Galloway), Chris Bryant (Rhondda), Karen Buck (Westminster North), Richard Burden (Birmingham Northfield), Andy Burnham (Leigh), Liam Byrne (Birmingham Hodge Hill), Alan Campbell (Tynemouth), Martin Caton (Gower), Jenny Chapman (Darlington), Tom Clarke (Coatbridge, Chryston & Bellshill), Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley), Vernon Coaker (Gedling), Ann Coffey (Stockport), Michael Connarty (Linlithgow & Falkirk East), Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract & Castleford), David Crausby (Bolton North East), Mary Creagh (Wakefield), Stella Creasy (Walthamstow), Alex Cunningham (Stockton North), Jim Cunningham (Coventry South), Tony Cunningham (Workington), Margaret Curran (Glasgow East), Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe), Simon Danczuk (Rochdale), Alistair Darling (Edinburgh South West), Wayne David (Caerphilly), Geraint Davies (Swansea West), Gloria De Piero (Ashfield), John Denham (Southampton Itchen), Jim Dobbin (Heywood & Middleton), Frank Dobson (Holborn & St Pancras), Thomas Docherty (Dunfermline & Fife West), Brian Donohoe (Ayrshire Central), Frank Doran (Aberdeen North), Jim Dowd (Lewisham West & Penge), Gemma Doyle (Dunbartonshire West), Jack Dromey (Birmingham Erdington), Michael Dugher (Barnsley East), Angela Eagle (Wallasey), Maria Eagle (Garston & Halewood), Clive Efford (Eltham), Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central), Louise Ellman (Liverpool Riverside), Bill Esterson (Sefton Central), Chris Evans (Islwyn), Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme), Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar & Limehouse), Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South), Caroline Flint (Don Valley), Paul Flynn (Newport West), Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield), Hywel Francis (Aberavon), Mike Gapes (Ilford South), Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East), Pat Glass (Durham North West), Mary Glindon (Tyneside North), Paul Goggins (Wythenshawe & Sale East), Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland), Tom Greatrex (Rutherglen & Hamilton West), Kate Green (Stretford & Urmston), Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South), Nia Griffith (Llanelli), Andrew Gwynne (Denton & Reddish), Peter Hain (Neath), David Hamilton (Midlothian), Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East), David Hanson (Delyn), Harriet Harman (Camberwell & Peckham), Dai Havard (Merthyr Tydfil & Rhymney), Mark Hendrick (Preston), Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow), David Heyes (Ashton Under Lyne), Meg Hillier (Hackney South & Shoreditch), Julie Hilling (Bolton West), Margaret Hodge (Barking), Sharon Hodgson (Washington & Sunderland West), Jim Hood (Lanark & Hamilton East), George Howarth (Knowsley), Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central), Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore), Glenda Jackson (Hampstead & Kilburn), Sian James (Swansea East), Cathy Jamieson (Kilmarnock & Loudoun), Major Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central), Diana Johnson (Hull North), Graham Jones (Hyndburn), Kevan Jones (Durham North), Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South), Tessa Jowell (Dulwich & West Norwood), Eric Joyce (Falkirk), Sir Gerald Kaufman (Manchester Gorton), Barbara Keeley (Worsley & Eccles South), Elizabeth Kendall (Leicester West), Sadiq Khan (Tooting), David Lammy (Tottenham), Ian Lavery (Wansbeck), Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North & Leith), Christopher Leslie (Nottingham East), Ivan Lewis (Bury South), Tony Lloyd (Manchester Central), Andy Love (Edmonton), Ian Lucas (Wrexham), Michael McCann (East Kilbride, Strathaven & Lesmahagow), Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East), Gregg McClymont (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth & Kirkintilloch East), Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham & Morden), Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East), Alison McGovern (Wirral South), Jim McGovern (Dundee West), Anne McGuire (Stirling), Ann McKechin (Glasgow North), Iain McKenzie (Inverclyde), Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North), Fiona Mactaggart (Slough), Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham Perry Barr), Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham Ladywood), John Mann (Bassetlaw), Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South), Michael Meacher (Oldham West & Royton), Alan Meale (Mansfield), Ian Mearns (Gateshead), Alun Michael (Cardiff South & Penarth), David Miliband (South Shields), Ed Miliband (Doncaster North), Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port & Neston), Madeleine Moon (Bridgend), Jessica Morden (Newport East), Graeme Morrice (Livingston), Grahame Morris (Easington), George Mudie (Leeds East), Jim Murphy (Renfrewshire East), Paul Murphy (Torfaen), Ian Murray (Edinburgh South), Lisa Nandy (Wigan), Pamela Nash (Airdrie & Shotts), Fiona O'Donnell (East Lothian), Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central), Sandra Osborne (Ayr, Carrick & Cumnock), Albert Owen (Ynys Mon), Teresa Pearce (Erith & Thamesmead), Toby Perkins (Chesterfield), Stephen Pound (Ealing North), Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East), Nick Raynsford (Greenwich & Woolwich), Jamie Reed (Copeland), Rachel Reeves (Leeds West), Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East), Jonathan Reynolds (Stalybridge & Hyde), Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West), Steve Rotheram (Liverpool Walton), Frank Roy (Motherwell & Wishaw), Lindsay Roy (Glenrothes), Chris Ruane (Vale of Clwyd), Joan Ruddock (Lewisham Deptford), Anas Sarwar (Glasgow Central), Alison Seabeck (Plymouth Moor View), Virendra Sharma (Ealing Southall), Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield), Jim Sheridan (Paisley & Renfrewshire North), Gavin Shuker (Luton South), Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith), Angela Smith (Penistone & Stocksbridge), Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent), Owen Smith (Pontypridd), Mark Tami (Alyn & Deeside), Gareth Thomas (Harrow West), Emily Thornberry (Islington South & Finsbury), Stephen Timms (East Ham), Jon Trickett (Hemsworth), Karl Turner (Hull East), Derek Twigg (Halton), Stephen Twigg (Liverpool West Derby), Chuka Umunna (Streatham), Valerie Vaz (Walsall South), Tom Watson (West Bromwich East), Dave Watts (St Helens North), Alan Whitehead (Southampton Test), Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North), Chris Williamson (Derby North), Phil Wilson (Sedgefield), David Winnick (Walsall North), Rosie Winterton (Doncaster Central), John Woodcock (Barrow & Furness), Shaun Woodward (St Helens South & Whiston), David Wright (Telford), Iain Wright (Hartlepool).
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... voted.html

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EU referendum: how the MPs voted

Labour MP’s with the BALLS to vote for an EU Referendum

Nineteen Labour MPs defied the party leadership to support the motion:Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley), Rosie Cooper (Lancashire West), Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North), Jon Cruddas (Dagenham & Rainham), John Cryer (Leyton & Wanstead), Ian Davidson (Glasgow South West), Natascha Engel (Derbyshire North East), Frank Field (Birkenhead), Roger Godsiff (Birmingham Hall Green), Kate Hoey (Vauxhall), Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North), Steve McCabe (Birmingham Selly Oak), John McDonnell (Hayes & Harlington), Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby), Dennis Skinner (Bolsover), Andrew Smith (Oxford East), Graham Stringer (Blackley & Broughton), Gisela Stuart (Birmingham Edgbaston), Mike Wood (Batley & Spen).
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1bl7XRn5r

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EU yellow balls up

Eurozone seeks bailout funds from China
The head of the eurozone's bailout fund is beginning attempts to persuade China to invest in a scheme to help rescue member countries facing debt crises.
After meeting Chinese leaders, Klaus Regling said there were no formal negotiations and would be no deal now.
It is thought China may pay about 70bn euros ($100bn) into the fund, which is expected to be boosted to 1tn euros.
Meanwhile French President Nicolas Sarkozy said debt-ridden Greece's entry to the eurozone was a mistake.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15489202

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David Cameron: London is under constant attack from Europe
The City of London is "under constant attack" from European Union regulations, David Cameron has said.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... urope.html

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God help us all

Help us out, Europe begs China: Desperate Euro chiefs look East to fund huge bailout gamble
Further embarrassment as one trillion euro bailout fund announced yesterday does not really exist
By James Chapman
Last updated at 8:45 AM on 28th October 2011
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1c3qm8etQ

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Greece to hold referendum on EU debt deal
Greece is to hold a referendum on whether to accept the rescue package from the European Commission, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund troika.

Responding to the riots that followed last week’s proposal, as well as dissent from within his own Socialist party, Prime Minister George Papandreou said: “The command of the Greek people will bind us. Do they want to adopt the new deal, or reject it? If the Greek people do not want it, it will not be adopted.”
Staging a referendum, reportedly to be held in January, threatens to throw the eurozone further into crisis as the majority of Greeks object to the bail-out, according to a survey published last week.
If Greece were to reject the plan, which requires deep spending cuts, it would risk a full-scale default and possible ejection from the euro. The country could even run out of money to pay civil servants or state pensions if the troika decided to pull the plug.
The decision by the embattled Mr Papandreou has the potential to be a major blow to efforts by German chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy to tame a crisis that most economists expect to push Europe back into recession in coming months.
The move is also likely to rattle investors whose initial euphoric reaction to last week’s agreement in Brussels has been replaced with a scepticism over whether European governments, including those of Greece and Italy, will be able to drive through the tough austerity measures demanded by the agreements.
The deal that European leaders and the IMF struck last week would see banks take a 50pc writedown on Greek loans, cutting the country’s debt by up to €100bn, alongside a €130bn international rescue effort on top of the existing €110bn package. No dates have been set for the referendum, which would include a confidence vote in the government.
“Heightened Greek uncertainty could propagate to other fragile euro countries, in particular Italy,” said Thomas Costerg, an economist at Standard Chartered Bank.
Mr Papandreou’s move is a high-stakes gamble designed to win greater legitimacy for austerity that’s proving deeply unpopular in a country where the economy is already forecast to shrink 5.5pc this year.
While polls show a majority of Greek voters see last week’s rescue package as a “negative”, they also signal that most would like to stay in the euro.
“I can no longer look at polls where the majority is against the agreement, the majority is against the programme, but a majority is also in favour of staying in the euro,” Evangelos Venizelos, the Greek finance minister, said on Monday.
Meanwhile, Willem Buiter, chief economist at Citigroup has called for the EU bail-out fund to be increased to €3 trillion. Writing in the Financial Times, Mr Buiter said that "the €1 trillion figure bandied around ... assumes that a 20pc or 25pc first loss guarantee would reduce Italian and Spanish borrowing costs on new debt issues to sustainable levels. It would not."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/fina ... -deal.html

lordbarnett
33 minutes ago
As Britain is a democracy we too will be having a referendum on Europe,hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahawooooooooooohahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahah,democracy? hahahaha,freedom of speech?hahahahaheheheheheh,we are govened by honourable people who just want whats best for all of us. all you doubters out there,repent,and see the error of your ways,three cheers for the coalition,hip hip...............

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Greek vote set to sink euro bailout: Shock referendum could see cuts rejected... as OECD warns EU growth will grind to a halt
By James Chapman and Hugo Duncan
Last updated at 1:45 AM on 1st November 2011
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z1cR668SXH