Unelected peers insult British voters by flying the flag for the EU
THE European Union has always been the enemy of democracy. Its relentless destruction of national sovereignty through the creation of a federal superstate has never had any consent from the British people. Leo McKinstry - Express.
Lord
Kinnock gets a huge EU pension [GETTY]
Nor
do the autocratic empire builders of Brussels have the slightest representative
legitimacy. Powerful figures such as Herman Van Rompuy, the Belgian nonentity
who was appointed president of the EU in 2012, are far less accountable to the
public than any of our district or borough councillors.In
its quest for unification under the flag of Brussels the EU has acquired a new
political ally in this country. This is the House of Lords, an unelected,
self-serving body whose undemocratic structure and outlook closely mirrors that
of the EU.
The
Upper House used to be portrayed by supporters as a bulwark of moderation,
pragmatism and British common sense. Today it has become an echo chamber for the
European Commission, eagerly colluding in our national demise at the hands of
Brussels.The
House of Lords’ contempt for our national interests and public opinion was
graphically demonstrated last Friday when Labour and Lib Dem peers collaborated
to kill off the Bill which would have enshrined in law a referendum on Britain’s
membership of the European Union by 2017.The
tactics of these pro-European parliamentarians were profoundly cynical. They
wrecked the proposed legislation by tabling a deluge of amendments which meant
there was insufficient time to complete the Bill’s passage.As
a result of this filibustering the public may well be denied any say on our
future relationship with Europe. David Cameron has said that he will try again
to force the Referendum Bill through Parliament in the next session but such a
move is unlikely to succeed if Labour and Lib Dem peers remain inflexible in the
opposition to democracy.The
antics in the Lords embodied all that is so repellent about the cause of
European fanaticism, in all its sneering arrogance, its snobbish disdain for
ordinary voters and its abject defeatism. This is a movement of ideologues who
are more eager to surrender to Brussels than show faith in the British
people.On
Friday some of the strongest denunciations of the referendum came from failed
British politicians who have done extremely well out of the EU, most notably
that serial Labour loser, congenital windbag and prickly lightweight Neil
Kinnock. As a former EU commissioner he now collects an £83,000-a-year pension
to add to the fortune his family has made from Brussels.
The
arguments used by the pro-EU peers could not have been more hollow. With
effortless pomposity they declared that the public is too ignorant to understand
the issues. They further described the referendum as “a distraction” from the
management of the economy or foreign affairs. On that basis, we would never hold
elections at all, which is exactly the way the Brussels elite would like it.Above
all they wailed despairingly about a dismal, impoverished future that awaits us
if we voted to leave the EU, a pessimistic claim torpedoed by the epic failure
of the eurozone. Today the unemployment rate in the countries with the euro is
almost double that of Britain.
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