ukiprule

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Membership of the European Union costs Britain £60.1 billion per annum UKIP wants to leave the European Union and spend the money here in Britain.

To put this figure in perspective, just £1 billion would pay for:

222,000 hip replacements
Or 46,893 nurses
Or 38,782 teachers
Or 34, 585 police officers

Agree? Join UKIP
www.ukip.org

Earthling

In other words we are all completely doomed to live under an EU super-state.

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Earthling's Blog

Don't let EU rule Britannia! Vote UKIP and say NO to Brussels Bureaucracy.

Westcountryman

Yes my fellow European, it certainly looks that way.

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Manus haec inimica tyrannis ense petit placidam sub libertate quietam - "This hand of mine, which is hostile to tyrants, seeks by the sword quiet peace under liberty."

chikrodah

Nothing has changed. The European Parliament is a collection of over 700 members with audience-participation buzzers in a bureacratic version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire". Given the chance, there wouldn't even be an "Ask the Audience" option.

There is no debating chamber; one minute speeches have always either been adulatory, self-aggrandising or (occasionally) anti-EU soundbites. They signify nothing other than that the EP can congratulate itself on its democratic principles by pointing out that all members have an equal opportunity to speak.

Eurosceptics have always been in a minority as evinced by the Ind/Dem group where there are more pro-change than pro-withdrawal MEPs.

This was inevitable. Corbett, never forget, was the British co-architect of both the EU Constitution and the Lisbon Treaty. He is performing to type.

More than ever, this is a sign that the only way to withdraw is to get a favourable government into the House of Commons. All eurosceptic MEPs can do is network within the EP so that there are sufficient votes in favour of our withdrawal when the time comes.

If eurosceptics aren't prepared to work together to that end, then the only way is that of Bonde and Buitenen - "improving" the EU until such time as its own bureacratic sluggishness kills it off.

Raymond Finch

Not the point at all.
The thing is that this has been done to silence Ind-Dem. They would only want to silence the group if it is having an effect. We need to be in there for finances to spread the message, to find out what is going on and for electability. NF gets on the TV and radio to spread the message precisely because he is an MEP and leader of the Ind-Dem group.
As for "working together". Those who are not in UKIP can work together by joining the only party with a cat in hells chance of doing anything about it.

Geoffrey Collier

Whatever else may be the subject of disagreement, the predictions of Alan Sked have been fully vindicated. He used to argue that Westminster took us into the EU, and only Westminster can get us out: that is true and undeniable. We have had nearly a decade of UKIP MEP's sitting in the Eu Parliament, and we have nothing to show for it other than publicity to our discredit.

Should we have taken Professor Sked's advice, 'stand for the EU Parliament but do not take our seats', we would be in a much stronger postion to-day. Whether we judge our postion from membership numbers, local authority election seats, parliamentary elections, or by various polls in the media, we are not doing well. In the 2009 elections we should require our elected candidates not to take their seats. That would show us to be a party with principles and not one in the possession of careerists. We would deny pro-EU candidates representation, while not being a charge on the public account ourselves.

This stance has been given further credence by reports in the Daily Telegraph of to-day.
If anti-EU parties are not going to be allowed to form, 'opposition groups ' from within the EU Parliament, what purpose will our presence serve? What need have we to be in a parliament which cannot legislate or amend Bills, but are required to 'rubber stamp' EU decisions. We have not influenced events, but have willing sent people like Derek Clark to Rumania, in order to assist the influence of the EU Parliament itself. Nigel Farage tells us that we are now a Pan-European Party. When did the membership agree to that change? We must return to our original purpose, which was to extricate this nation from the EU. Let other nations and parties decide their own fate; we know what we want.

UKIP, sadly, is now a byword for corruption. What has the party gained, for example, by seeing one of our MEP's making a visit to India at public expense. India will not be the agent for our national liberation. Our financial incompetence and corruption is legion, and has made us a laughing stock. We are going in the wrong direction and must change our course. The fact that Nigel Farage gets a few television appearances, from his status of MEP, has not been sufficient compensation for the damage over which he has presided.

Before next year we must have that, 'regulatory control' from the statutoty bodies, which Nigel Farage says they have negligently failed to provide. That control is becoming more urgent by the day. We want a full forensic audit of the accounts, and all
bank accounts appertaining to UKIP identified. This would cost nothing, but would greatly enhance our reputation. We still have a year before the 2009 election, we should spend that time wisely. Our message is powerful and relevant, and it is that on which we should expand our energies.

chikrodah

The new rules mean an average of 5 MEPs from each of 7 member states (yes, I know the figures don't add up but I doubt if the EU will accept an average of 4.44 members from 6.75 states).

That means, oddly enough, that parties which only get a few elected MEPs will have the opportunity to create the equivalent of "hung parliament" groupings. It means that we Britons will either have to learn to network politically with other MEPs from other countries, or learn to do without the extra EU funding. It also means we will have to compromise, or do without extra EU funding.

Judging by the recent tone of posts on this forum, I'm surprised that UKIP members aren't leaping with glee at the ability to do without EU funding.

This hasn't been done purely to silence the Ind/Dem group. The ITS group, of which Mote was a member (and which Corbett hated with a passion), had 20 members before it collapsed.

The Ind/Dem Group has 23 members from 9 countries, of which only the 9 UKIP MEPs can be regarded as eurosceptic by the British definition. The rest are pro-transparency eurorealists in the main. UKIP would need to persuade another 7 MEPs to join, either as defectors from the Tory mothership or perhaps from the more eurosceptic left-wingers or Greens. The Lib Dems, Greens and left-wingers are all against this proposal as well.

The GUE/NGL has 41 left-wingers from 17 countries.
The Greens/EFA has 42 members from 13 countries.
The ALDE has 99 members from 22 countries.

It's a symptom of the refusal of eurosceptics to work with others that this is seen as a disaster rather than an opportunity.

Sorry, Raymond, but I'm entitled to my own view of UKIP; I've seen too many disfunctional branches, too much weak, biased or non-existent regional co-ordination, too much infighting to ever want to rejoin UKIP. I'm already a member of two pressure groups. I don't need to rejoin a third.

douglas denny

I disagree. It was right to engage in the EU parliament with our MEPs. It gave us money, credibility and publicity through the normal media channels when we had absolutely zero. We would have remained at zero without it.

The time to disengage might indeed be now though, if and when the EU makes it impossible for small parties to exist in the form of small opposition groups. The EU will have made a visible as well as material step towards despotism in so doing. That is the time to declare against engagement and withdraw - when the process of engagement is halted by them.

We might then become like the political wing Sinn Fein who refused to enter Westminster although elected as MPs. What worries me is that eventually there might come into existence an active armed wing of 'independence fighters' out of extremist elements ... a 'British Independence Army' which bombs and assassinates politicians who got us into the EU. (!?!) That would be terrible for Britain and destroy our community. It would be Civil War.
This is not fanciful; it happens time and again in history. It is happening now in the Basque area of Spain/France and in Sri Lanka with the Tamil Tigers. Also in Afghanistan and Iraq against us and the US. I am surprised it has not arisen in Burma or North Korea. They are still in the deeply suppressed phase though by the army. When people are denied democracy and independence they usually fight for it eventually by armed conflict.

DED.
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Geoffrey Collier

Douglas D: If taking seats in the EU Parliament, gave us access to funds, what has happened to it? When we decided to enter the EU Parliament, we struck a bad bargain.
Our MEPs', in the main, have been of poor calibre, morally corrupt and easily distracted from our central mission. They have been the source of our misfortune and changes are desperately needed. Presumably, as a NEC member, you are fait with the latest efforts on one of our MEPs to bring us into disrepute. These people have been a political cancer within our midst, and good leadership should have been more concerned to expel them, than try to laugh and justify such depravity. Let the membership make their own judgement when the information is placed in the public domain.

Let us forget about political theorising; if we are to leave the EU, Westminster is the place for our endeavours. Should the Tories win the next election, we will be in more serious trouble than we are now. It is they who are the party of Europe; they took us in, kept us in and now want to consolidate the power of the EU with the admission of Turkey. For UKIP to have a policy of concentrating on the 2009 elections to Strasbourg, from whom we cannot get our independence, while stepping aside to accommodate conservative candidates bids to be elected to Westminster, is the stuff that madness is made of. This is not serious politics: indeed, we even refused to give a donation to Stuart Wheeler's L.T. legal challenge, while having done virtually nothing ourselves. Not a single UKIP MEP made a submission to the House of Lords about the L.T despite being invited to do so. These are not kind of people who change history.

douglas denny

Geoffrey; I find myself both in agreement and dissagreement with some of what you say. You are, however, living in the past too much to be healthy for the future.
The past is only useful insomuch as it teaches us the errors of our ways (politically or otherwise) and gives a pointer of how to proceed into the future.

Any opinion of whether our MEPs have done good bad or indifferent in the past does not help much right now except to indicate where to try to do better forthwith. You are too concerned to condemn them outright without recognising they have done a great deal to bring UKIP from complete and utter oblivion electorally, into at least a known position with the electorate here in Britain with a core support; even if the support more generally by the public is not enthusiastic enough by everyone yet voting for us.
You are so focussed on bringing down the whole edifice you fail to see any progress (there is!) or of the very real gains by UKIP - for example with members in the HO Lords and now Commons. You are like Sampson wanting to bring down the building - but unlike him blind to what is going on with most of the good guys within the temple not without.
UKIP is still in the nascent stages of its development, and like a lot of people you want results NOW - but you do not get them so you grizzle about it too much.
It takes a timescale of around a decade before there are definite and recognisable results in politics which are lasting. UKIP itself as a political entity proves that.

Back to the discussion: The next great decision of UKIP in the above analysis Re. small groups in the EU if they are effectively banned by refused funding, will be for the party to decided if it wants its MEPs to engage still or to disengage in a visibly despotic system.
That will, I predict, cause a great deal of heart-searching by many; especially the MEPs.

DED.