Cameron’s trivial sideshow must not distract us from the real issue

The Daily Mail reports that, ‘millions of pounds in child benefit paid to families living outside the UK will be axed under David Cameron’s plan to claw back powers from Brussels.

Cameron has insisted that it was wrong that the British taxpayer is giving cash to 40,000 children who live elsewhere in the European Union, and went on to reveal that stopping migrant workers in the UK from claiming child benefit for their offspring back home would be a ‘key demand’ of his plans to renegotiate a fresh deal with the EU before staging an in-out referendum by 2017.

This of course underlines the vacuous nature of the supposed renegotiation.  The whole thing is a complete sham.  If the detail above is a key demand, we can see that the essential issue of ‘Who should run Britain?‘ will remain a no-go area.  There is to be no change, the UK will remain firmly under the control of Brussels and parliament will remain a hollow, rubber stamping shell of its former self.

The separation of the political from the economic is the only way to ensure people see the real issue that has to be addressed – yet which the political class is determined to keep off the table.

There are various economic settlements that can be negotiated to mutual EU-British benefit to ensure concerns about access to the single market are mitigated in the event of a Brexit, but political control of the UK is a binary condition… either the British have self determination, or we are ruled by a foreign entity.  That is the only issue and we must not allow it to be kept off limits by focus being diverted to trivial sideshows such as Cameron’s pledge today.

Cameron’s supposed challenge to free movement in the EU is going nowhere

On the day when much of the world lost all sense of perspective and proportionality, to beatify by acclaim the media constructed legend of Nelson Mandela, the outcome of discussions that directly impact on the lives of Britons – and therefore matters rather more – was quietly released.

Home Affairs ministers from around the bloc have taken note of the European Commission’s communication on ‘the free movement of EU citizens’ and responded to it, making clear that.

The overwhelming majority of member states agreed that the free movement of persons is a core principle of the European Union and a fundamental right of all  EU citizens that should be upheld and promoted. They also agreed that individual cases of abuse have to be combated within the existing legal framework and in cooperation with local authorities in the member states.

Moreover, the Visegrad countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia) circulated a joint statement on this issue (17395/13), considering that the selective  application of core freedoms by member states leads to an erosion of the single market.

This, coupled with the process of qualified majority voting, means Cameron’s attempt at a putsch to dilute one of the European project’s four fundamental freedoms is dead before it even gets out of the gate.

As if to reinforce the point – and provide a timely reminder that many of the worst impacts of mass migration here are the result of the UK government failing to use powers at its disposal – the ministers, whose UK representatives were Chris Grayling and Theresa May, generously suggested actions that should be carried out instead:

In order to help national and local authorities to effectively apply EU free movement rules, the document presents five concrete actions to be implemented together with member states:

– helping member states to fight marriages of convenience (handbook);
– helping authorities to apply EU social security coordination rules (practical guide);
– helping authorities to meet social inclusion challenges (funding);
– exchange of best practices between local authorities;
– training and support of local authorities in applying the EU free movement rules.

From a democracy perspective this is valuable and instructive, as another example of how the EU circumvents national governments and talks directly to local authorities to ensures they deliver what the EU wants at a local level.  This sees to it there is no need to overcome potential resistance from Parliaments.  Westminster will therefore once again be by bypassed as our supreme government talks to the lowest levels of government and hands them their orders – which are enthusiastically followed by pro-EU council officers.

Of course, voters in local elections are never asked if they agree with what their local authorities plan to do on their behalf in respect of dealing with immigration.  They are not even told what measures will be taken or how many tax pounds will be allocated for this work, let alone have any say in what actually happens, or any veto over it.  Despite this people still witter on about this country being a ‘democracy’.

The media will not report this.  The Cameroon sycophants will ignore it, as they ignore everything that challenges their inaccurate beliefs and delusional shibboleths.  Most people will know nothing about it.  Rather than focus on how we are ruled and decisions are made without our consent, time and money is devoted to lauding a man who used violence to help achieve his ends – with one increasingly unhinged commentator even drawing comparisons between Mandela and Jesus Christ.

Perhaps the solution is for people to use social media to start sharing information like this that the media deliberately withholds from the public, and stop simply being used by the media to link to stories it has chosen to cover in pursuit of an agenda that serves interests other than ours.

EU FUD Watch: Speaking truth to propagandists

Update: The comment thread over on EUobserver (linked below) has seen a couple of Euroweenies trying to hold their fatuous line, but they are having their arguments systematically broken. This is what happens when people challenge ludicrous EUphile claims with facts from the real world.  They have no answer.

EUobserver describes itself as, ‘The trusted source of EU related news and information. Editorially independent, open-minded and balanced news about the European Union.’

In other words it is a propaganda organ of the EU, publishing stories with that service the EU view of itself and the world.  As usual, the party line is followed to the letter today by EUobserver‘s resident Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD) spreader, Benjamin Fox, who gleefully tells readers:

Japan has become the latest economic power to urge the UK not to leave the EU, warning that the move could put over 100,000 jobs on the line.

The warning comes as the UK government prepares to publish the first batch of audits on EU policy making this week as part of its ‘balance of competences’ review.

This is a story that Richard has already covered on EU Referendum.  The fact is the EU and the single market are different things.  The EU is political, the single market is economic.  We can leave the EU and still remain part of the single market, so none of the FUD about jobs being on the line or our export markets being closed to us is justified.

Given its readership, it is worth the effort to correct the record in the story’s comments section, in other words speaking inconvenient truth to the propagandists.   Being uncertain of EUobserver’s treatment of voices that challenge the party line, it remains to be seen if the comment will be permitted to stay online.  But just in case it doesn’t, a screenshot of it is shown below:

The media is determined to ignore the truth and deny a platform to those who want the British people to know and understand that leaving the EU does not mean we cannot still be part of the single market, membership of which is extremely important to UK businesses that export to other single market members and import goods we want to buy from within the single market.

Leaving the European Union is about extracting this country from political control by the bureaucrats in Brussels.  Nothing more.  There is a mechanism for it that enables us to negotiate an agreement to remain part of the single market.

An independent Britain will have the opportunity to take a seat at the ‘top table’ where rules and regulations are made at the global level – before they are handed down to the EU to implement throughout its member states.  An independent Britain can strike its own trade deals that suit British interests, rather than accept compromise deals borne of the muddled and contradictory interests of 28 competing EU member states.  This is the reality the politicians don’t want the British people to know or understand.

So spread the word loudly, far and wide.  There is a beneficial alternative to the status quo.  There can be a brighter future and a new world of opportunities for this country – and the enabler is leaving the EU.

Asking people to make a decision without giving them all the options to choose from generates meaningless results

But it doesn’t stop the media from portraying the result as a clear expression of people’s wishes.

In recent surveys held by the British Chambers of Commerce, and now by the SME networking business, BNI, business owners have been asked if they want the UK to remain in the EU and continue to import and export with our neighbours, or to leave.

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure out that a substantial majority of business owners, given this false choice, will opt to stay in the EU in order to preserve their overseas trade.  Why is it a false choice?  Because in none of these surveys have the business respondants been asked if staying in the EU would matter to them if the UK left the EU but remained part of the single market and trade continued as freely with EU states as it does today.

These surveys are inherently dishonest, therefore their results are completely meaningless.  Reporting the results in the way the Telegraph has today, while making no mention of this fundamental, deliberate and persistent flaw in the questioning, means what we are reading is nothing less than blatant propaganda produced by people who restrict the options to choose from for a reason.