Let history judge

If we left the EU, we would end this sterile debate, and we would have to recognise that most of our problems are not caused by “Brussels”, but by chronic British short-termism, inadequate management, sloth, low skills, a culture of easy gratification and underinvestment in both human and physical capital and infrastructure,” Boris Johnson

THE LONDON MAYOR, Boris Johnson, has entered the great referendum debate. His intervention comes after the Deference Secretary Richard Hammond and the Education Secretary Michael Gove, were interviewed over the weekend, and each said they would vote no in an in/out referendum.

            

            Leaving the EU is no longer viewed as an eccentric position to hold. Lord Lawson, Michael Portillo, and even the ex-Labour chancellor Dennis Healy, have all joined an increasingly long list of  intellectual heavy-weights declaring themselves in favour of leaving.

             

           Now Boris Johnson has given a warning that leaving the EU would not solve all our economic problems which he believes are partly caused by sloth, low skills, short-termism, inadequate management, and what he refers to as a “culture of easy gratification”; which leaves me somewhat intrigued: is he is suggesting that great British workforce is making too many stopovers  at various  “tart’s boudoirs” on their way home from a slothful day spent at the office, or on the factory floor?

            

            But Boris is right about the British economy and believing the EU to be responsible. I do not believe Brussels should have any  kind of responsibility for the mess this country is in…if we had become part of the euro zone, it would have been a different matter. In fact,  the only creditable policy that Gordon Brown authored was to keep this country as far away from Europe’s monopoly money.

            

            No, why I want out of the EU has to do with the survival of our nation state, which implies our ability to make our own laws and raise our own taxes, and be in control of our boarders regarding European migration … and to keep our armed forces in the service of the national interest instead of the European.

I have no argument with Boris about the economy. But as a Tory, surely he still believes in a free nation  built upon liberty and independence? Many of his colleagues however, do not. They regard the nation state as a Victorian antique suitable only for history’s scrap heap. These Europhiles, or as I see them, Social Democrats in Tory clothing, would send their grandmothers to the guillotine in order to keep the thousand year European Reich alive.

One of Boris’ more free speaking Tory colleagues, Kenneth Clarke, has made the Europhile position clear. As early as 1996  (when eurosceptics were seen as nutters) Clarke was putting pen to paper in the International Currency Review; where he wrote; “I look forward to the day when the Westminster Parliament is just a council chamber in Europe”

EVEN TO THIS DAY, from the prime minister down, there are still dozens on the Tory back-benchers who will share Clarke’s 1996 sentiments; as no doubt, Clarke himself still believes… for has he not referred to Ukip as clowns?

            

            The Tory party has travelled such a distance in their long history from the 18^th century; only to now reject the nation state; the bulwark of a culture and its history; where, over the centuries,  millions have died in order to preserve it.

            

            What Boris needs to understand is that our economy has been made less important by the EU, and not by those of us who wish to remain a solvent nation. I would say this to Boris. Would the sloth he refers to, be eviscerated by us giving up our sovereignty? I think not, because, with the exception of Germany, the whole of Europe is tilted toward the welfarism of the state sector. If he thinks this country is in an economic quandary (be it of our own making), then think of what a social Europe would herald. Look at France where enterprise is restricted by over regulation (even before Hollande). Boris knows (for he laid the red carpet) what harm social democracy can do. He invited to London France’s brightest and best to enjoy what compared to Hollande’s France, would be a tax haven.

            

             Throughout the whole of Europe, the balance between the private and public sector is reaching either equilibrium, or the state sector is advancing further: and if it had not been for the euro crisis, northern Europe would still be paying for millions of state sector workers in southern European countries who have little to contribute economically to the rest of Europe.

            

             As we now know, the so-called PIGS nations should never have been entertained as members of a single currency. Boris Johnson knows this, and he knows that if this country had ever entered such an arrangement, we would have been an addition to the PIGS acronym.

EUROPEAN FEDERALISM IS JUST AS IMPORTANT as the state of the British economy. Those who suggest differently are Europhiles who wish to put the issue of  a referendum once more, as they have always done, onto the back burner. Those deploying the in/out referendum as an inconsequential argument, such as Boris, either lacks Tory values or misunderstands them. If the former, then let him declare himself a Social Democrat. If the latter, let him declare himself “ignorant” of anything that stands in the way of his own political advancement.

            

             Europe is the most important concern of the British people accompanied as it is by the question of immigration, even if it is not reflected in the polls. I cannot believe that the white British people wish to see their nation subsumed into the Borg Collective, where their votes will be rendered meaningless; and their one time national parliament will be reduced to the status of a mere county council within a Greater Europe.

            

            I cannot accept that this would be what the white British people would want. If it is, then let it be spelled out in a referendum. After which, whether it goes against the idea of a nation state or not; the people of Britain will accept it; and leave the consequences for history to judge.