Dec 11th - 12th Dec 2008 - Brussels Commentary
Brussels Commentary Dec 11th - 12th Dec 2008 European Council Summit at the Justus Lipsius Buliding. The screech you get as some one tries to leave a store with goods unpaid was heard in Brussels today, triggered by me, but on my way in, not out. Obviously, I should not have tried to break into the building with a duff pass and my claim that it had worked the day before was no excuse. As the screech announced its rejection my pass was promptly confiscated by the chief gateman, orders are orders. This was at the Council summit, debating the Irish "No" vote and climate change, where MEP political group leaders are normally allowed in to all sessions. (I was standing in for Nigel who had unbreakable commitments in the UK). Apparently, the rules say that all group leaders are part of an MEP delegation, led by the Parliamentary President in person. If the president is not present no other MEP can be either. Hans Gert Pottering was scheduled for day 1, somewhere else day 2, so my pass was good for Thursday, not Friday. They have never bothered to use this rule before but we have got them bothered and invoking it now can only be on our account. By the way, this is a bonus of our Ind-Dem group membership because passes for this kind of event are only available to group leaders or their nominee. Only one other MEP from the UK was there, Graham Watson, leader of the ALDE group. No Tory leader, he's not the group leader. At least on Thursday I caught the Hans-Gert Pottering press conference, Breath-taking. Much time at this summit was devoted to the Irish "No", so he got questions about that. He said that, while he was not telling the Irish what to do, "they had been glib in the referendum and by voting "No", because they could not understand the treaty, they showed they had not taken it seriously"!! That, of course, is the point. Ireland has a constitution so, if they can not understand a 250 page document which alters their own constitution, they are more than entitled to say "No", in fact it is the only sensible course to take. So we must now look forward to the next time round, Oct 2009 is suggested. Meanwhile we ask ourselves, if the concessions offered to Ireland become legally part of the Lisbon treaty does that mean that the Irish will have a different treaty to the rest of us? If so when will everyone else ratify the new treaty? Moreover, if the Irish get concessions because they said no, how many other countries are going to think that they too could have got things going their way by also saying "No"? Derek Clark MEP Brussels Dec 12th 2008
Dec 7th 2008 - Bosses warn of exodus over EU carbon cuts
Thousands of British jobs will be lost if the government signs up to EU cuts in carbon emissions, the Prime Minister has been warned. The Sunday Times reports that the bosses of three big UK chemical companies have written to Gordon Brown emphasising the danger to a £60 billion industry that provides work for up to 600,000 people in Britain. They say companies will move to other countries if they are forced to accept EU carbon caps and to pay 100% for emissions permits, as the Brussels scheme demands. The plan will make the industry uncompetitive, the bosses say, because many rival firms will not be subject to such restrictions and costs. They want chemical company permits to be given free and a reduction in the emissions limits. The paper quotes Jim Ratcliffe, head of Ineos, Britain's largest private company, as saying: “Chemical businesses situated throughout the UK, especially in the north of England and central Scotland, with 80% of them foreign-owned, will be ‘decimated’, putting almost 200,000 jobs at risk.”
Oct 20th - 23rd 2008 - Strasbourg Commentary Plenary Session
Strasbourg Commentary Plenary Session Oct 20th - 23rd 2008 Tuesday Oct 21st, President Sarkozy addressed Parliament He claimed that Europe brought an end to the crisis in Georgia, ie his intervention The Lehman brothers collapse of Sept 15th stimulated action in Europe,- he supports the banks and capitalism but we must end tax havens EU must have a voice in world finances and in world economic government! we must support G8 and now G5 (to incl India, China) there must be a re-foundation of global finances Then EU protectionism crept in,- He does not want European companies to be under non-European capital we must set up SOVEREIGN ZONES (financial) in Europe we must defend European Industry and face competition from outside And then the expected,- the crisis causes us to REFORM the INSTITUTIONS of the EU so NO rotating EU Presidency agrees with Barroso, there must be a response to the Irish No vote and he was stupified to find there was no European economic government Thursday Votes on the budget for 2009 where £100,000,000,000 of taxpayer's money was allocated in about 30 minutes. Among this UKIP voted to reduce spending on a few items, especially export refunds for cereals and the special beef premium. Boring? - No, the cereals export subsidy means exporting to the third world at well below local prices, putting farmers there out of business, ie dumping. The beef subsidy in Spain translates into a subsidy for bull fighting! By the way, in voting to reduce farming subsidies I can hardly be said to support the CAP, as some misguided people believe. Otherwise, Piracy off Somalia was voted on and one amendment was passed which down-grades piracy to a criminal act as opposed to an act of war. Now EU warships can not fire on pirates without themselves incurring charges! So the Royal Navy can not properly defend our shipping, worse, this is only the EU, does not affect the USA or Russia, so now the RN can not support the Americans! Derek Clark MEP Strasbourg Oct 23rd 2008
Nov 17th – 20th 2008 - Strasbourg Commentary Plenary Session
Strasbourg Commentary Plenary Session Nov 17th – 20th 2008 You will be delighted to hear that your MEP was this week able to vote on a proposal by Mrs Diana Wallis, Lib-Dem Yorkshire, on, “Driver’s seat on wheeled agricultural or forestry tractors”. The vote on bee keeping might be seen as a little more useful. Six hundred and forty six MEPs travel to Strasbourg for that but there was some more. We also voted on a proposal to ensure that school children received fresh fruit in their diet. The fact that the amount specified is less than the UK recommendation to the school meals service is an illustration of what I believe to be one of the reasons for the welter of EU regulations. They are all behind us and are trying to catch up, not by taking our examples but by reinventing the wheel. Far and away the most significant event this week was on Thursday when the Court of Auditors presented their annual report. No fewer than 34 MEPs were present to hear that after fourteen years the auditors have signed the books. Before you put the flags out you should note that the auditors said that there were still great errors in the use of funds in areas such as education and aid to development. As a result improvements in accounting were no longer necessary but corrective actions would take time to be effective. The commissioner, Siim Kallas declared a clean bill of health because they are getting closer to their aim of being 98% free of error. What it means is that there are still over six billion euros lost but not by the auditors. They know where it has gone adrift, namely, in the application of these funds by member states. So they have applied the good old principle of passing the buck and all is well. All the MEPs who spoke expressed some criticism but generally praised the auditors and the commissioner in varying degrees of warmth. You may be surprised to hear that our own Godfrey Bloom took a different view. He remarked that there had been fourteen years of unacceptable accounts and he was very unhappy that UK plc was part of that. Godfrey said he had read the auditors account, it was not a clean bill of health and that in a similar situation in the UK company directors would be in jail. He completed his lone voice protest by saying that he would now watch how UK MEPs vote on this issue. You didn’t seriously expect to change did you? Derek Clark MEP Strasbourg Nov 20th 2008
Nov 10th 2008 - Northampton Commentary
Northampton Commentary Nov 10th 2008 East Midlands Regional Assembly, Friday Nov 7th 2008, where Democracy died. As usual I attended, as noted in my previous commentary, but where I was not allowed to speak my mind. Dissent was not allowed. Their usual system is that if an MEP submits a written report it is printed in the meeting booklet and the MEP is asked to speak to it and to take questions. I always do this so that I can attack the EU, speaking of the lack of democracy and of some of the craziest new Directives. I am not popular and the questions to me have noticeably dwindled over the last year or so. This time, having submitted my report on Oct 15th , two days later they asked me to revise it! They wanted me to include comments about the financial situation and about the pesticide directive. I refused, saying that what I wrote was what I wanted to say this time. At the meeting I was approached by the vice-chair, Pat Zadora, again asking me not to speak to my report and repeated the earlier request. So I spoke to my report, concentrating on my last issue about an EU health report, included since EMRA often has one. I was told to shut up as soon as I got to the point of attacking the EU. Interrupted again in speaking about the financial situation and again in speaking about pesticides. I think they took particular exception to my comments on pesticides since I started with, “Where have you been? I sent my first email reply about pesticides to a farmer on Sept 4th 2007, a written letter two days later, -nearly 100 responses all told to date-, and three press releases at that time resulting in several radio broadcasts”. “British farmers”, I continued, “are more than capable of getting it right and, in any case, where are all the queues at doctor’s surgeries of people made ill by crop spraying,” and, “ The Pesticide Directive is one of the most damaging ones yet”. That was too much for them and I was instructed to stop. Should I have done? I observed democratic protocol and accepted the request of the Chairwoman: that they are now clearly undemocratic is all the more reason for me to conduct myself properly. In any case, as I left the podium the whole shabby episode became clear. The chairwomen said that they were re-organising MEP input. In future they would ask MEPs what legislation was coming up in the European Parliament so as to table that for debate at the assembly and give the MEPs advice and guidance. Being translated that means to instruct our vote. No way. I left the assembly immediately but, given the opportunity, I shall tell them that my mandate comes from the East Mids electorate who voted UKIP precisely in order to voice opposition to the EU project. Derek Clark MEP Northampton Nov 10th 2008
Nov 4th - 5th 2008 - Brussels Commentary Employment Committee
Brussels Commentary Employment Committee Nov 4th - 5th 2008 A very good week for UKIP Monday attended the NEC and the following Press release explains my heading,- UKIP rejects a BNP take over Yesterday, Monday Nov 3rd, the National Executive Committee of the UK Independence Party repulsed a blatant attempt at a BNP takeover. Although uninvited, one time member "Buster" Mottram, had infiltrated this private meeting and refused to leave. He had come direct from the BNP leadership with their takeover plan. He proposed a deal in which each party would stand aside from the other, BNP not to oppose UKIP in the south of the country and UKIP to give them the north. Undisclosed but substantial sums of money were mentioned as sweeteners. Your UKIP MEP for the East Midlands, and the Party's permanent MEP representative on the NEC, Derek Clark, addressed Mr Mottram directly, denouncing his plan. "I will never, under any circumstances, contemplate any offer made by this party", he said. "We are", he continued, "non-sectarian and non-racist and I will always reject any approach from this quarter". Immediately after Mr Mottram had been removed, with police assistance, the plan was formally rejected and a motion to expel Mr Mottram from the Party was tabled. Derek Clark voted in favour and he is pleased to place on record that the motion was carried unanimously, effective instantly. ENDS Tues, Second reading vote in Employment Committee, Nov 5th 2008. Following notes for next press release,- In passing this Directive the Employment Committee brought about further restrictions for employers. * The Common Position was endorsed. * On the vexed question of on call time any inactive On-Call time may not be included in the calculation of rest periods. So an employer must now pay for extra periods of inactivity. * People holding more than one job must add up the hours of work and rest in all employments so that they do not exceed the 48 hours regulation in total. * Employers must consult workers who are not under a collective agreement regarding working patterns and taking measures in the health and safety area but, even under collective agreements,- * Overtime and other work conditions are to be subject to trade union agreements and the worker can withdraw his agreement to work overtime at any time in the first six months of a maximum one year agreement, even after having signed an agreement to work overtime. This undermines collective agreements made by trade unions and threatens to de-stabilise a company's work force. It boils down to a weakening of our opt-out. How could it be otherwise when the rapporteur, Alejandro Cercas, in opening the debate yesterday, spoke of promoting a "social Europe", that the WTD was all about protecting workers, especially in Health and Safety and that," it was nothing to do with economics". Weds,- first the votes on the WTD, among others. Roger Helmer appeared to vote on this, it was due to be the first vote. He was lost because they had changed the voting order the previous day. I helped him out, so he resumed his newspaper, voted as per the Tory whip, and left the chamber before the rest of the votes. It was all he had come for. I stayed for all votes. Debate,- Rights in cross - border Health Care I did not contribute, I've already done that. Main points made by speakers were that, "popular countries would find themselves over burdened", and, "how could patients find the costs up front for repayment later". Where have they been? If you look up my speech of Sept 25th it will be more than these speakers have done! My week finishes Friday with EMRA meeting. Comment,- I sent in my written report three weeks ago but was contacted ten days ago for a re-write. They wanted me to include that which I had not;- comments on the financial situation and on the pesticide directive. I refused, not prepared to alter. In any case, as I said to them, the financial situation is a state of flux and what I wrote then would be out of date by the time of the meeting. But I promised to make verbal comments. On pesticides I shall ask them where they have been, the pesticide directive has been on the go for months and Paula is currently sending off the latest of my replies to letters from farmers and pesticide producers, more than 50 so far! Not quite the end. Looking forward to seeing some of you at the Nottingham campaign event this Saturday. Derek Clark MEP Brussels Nov 5th 2008
Oct 6th - 9th 2008 Brussels Commentary Employment Committee & Plenary
Brussels Commentary Employment Committee & Plenary Oct 6th - 9th 2008 Monday & Tuesday, Employment Committee With committee followed by Plenary on Wednesday & Thursday, saving at least one day's travel, if not two, one would think that most committee members would attend. Not so, barely more than 50% attendance. After voting on Tuesday morning only 8 members plus president and two vice -presidents, (out of 46), attended a presentation on, "Cancer and Long Term Illnesses in the Workplace". Four members spoke in the debate, all of them women. Just for interest. All 27 EU countries have compulsory Health Care Insurance. Nationally, the lowest spender on health care is Hungary, with several East Europeans spending a little more; these countries also have the greatest incidence of cancer and long term illnesses. Lowest incidence of illnesses are the "club-med" countries but the biggest spenders are The Netherlands, Luxemburg, Sweden and Cyprus. At number 15 the UK is below half-way in the spending table, we are near the bottom for cancer incidence, but we have the fourth highest number of people with long term illnesses still at work. Make of that what you will. Wednesday & Thursday, Plenary Weds, Debate on Financial Crisis. The pick of the hot air was Martin Schultz, PSE leader,- The Irish must organise the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty because we need it, otherwise we shall have to make do with Nice etc, - which produced an outcry from us and a few others, his response being,- " the outcries in the chamber tell you where some members are getting their money from"!! (ref to the allegation that Declan Ganley/ UKIP was funded by the CIA!) Schultz then insulted the Irish, remarking that Irish Commissioner Charlie McCreedy was incapable of helping to sort out the financial crisis because he is, "an untrammelled Market Capitalist", and that sending him to help would be like ,- "sending an arsonist to run the fire brigade"!! Nigel spoke without hot air, remarking that mention of solidarity at the Elysee Palace (he had been invited to dinner) drew weak smiles last week, for after the joint declaration Angela Merkel promptly took Germany off on its own. Which led Nigel to remark that the EU extremists want control of National Taxation and government spending. He thought that might be a ray of light for,- " it might possibly bring about the end of this whole mad project". Thurs, I have a visitor group from Lincoln College, second party they've sent, so I will not see much business apart from voting, where in lies this week's story. Our beloved government reneged on the referendum vote promise because the Lisbon Treaty is not they claim, the abandoned Constitution. Their excuse that it was different is due to Lisbon not having written in to it the required use of the European Flag, the EU motto (Unity in diversity) & the Anthem. This morning the Gonzalez report was up for vote. This says that, Parliament shall recognise and espouse the symbols of the Union, which are described as,- The European Flag, The European Anthem, The Motto, The Euro and Europe Day (May 9th). The supporting document actually says that they abandoned these symbols under pressure as, "collateral victims of the constitution", of the French and Dutch "No" votes, in order to reach an agreement on the Lisbon Treaty. These symbols were first mentioned in 1979, endorsed in 1985 at Milan and again in the Gama report of 1998. They reintroduce them now to strengthen EU activities and to send a clear message to the people. It also requires the Commission to, "use its power of initiative to propose general measures in this context". It also notes that 16 member states decided to annex the Lisbon Treaty to reaffirm the symbols and that this was done on the eve of signing the Treaty. Does that surprise you? The report was adopted by 503 votes to 96, and illustrates the basic EU mentality, that nothing is ever deleted or abandoned, it is shelved and brought back. They will not stop, they will not listen to the people, ever. Derek Clark MEP Brussels Oct 9th 2008
Sept 22nd - 25th 2008 Brussels Commentary Pleanary session
Brussels Commentary Pleanary session Sept 22nd - 25th 2008 As you all know this should be Strasbourg but, for the second time running, it had to be transferred to Brussels due to the ceiling of the debating chamber in Strasbourg having collapsed. This happened on Aug 7th and, apparently, had we been present UKIP MEPs in particular would have been engulfed by over 7 tons of material. Repairs costing 6 million euros are now, we are told, complete so back to Strasbourg we go. Or do we? Due to inadequate information,- this is the EU you know-, we do not know the full story. Serious claims are being made that there is asbestos in the construction of the building and that it was constructed from steel of a sort which failed in another building. Fire escapes are said to be inadequate and so it goes on. Never-the-less the president of Parliament assured us this week that all was well. But is it so when all he said was, "trust me, its OK". Of course all parliamentary business should be conducted here in Brussels. The building contains more facilities, all the parliamentary assistants are based here and those that are detailed to attend Strasbourg are on an expenses paid "mission". The Commission building is ten minutes away and all the lobbyists come here, media too. I now learn that the cost of conducting business in Strasbourg is 30% more per day than in Brussels. With Brussels being easier for all but a handful of MEPs to get to there would seem to be an unanswerable case for a "Single Seat" in Brussels. It was written into a legally enforceable document at the 1993 Edinburgh summit, signed by John Major, that 12 sessions per year must be held in France. A while ago a case to take one week to Brussels led to court where the ECJ upheld the Edinburgh decision. So there we are, and I will see that my hard hat finds its way to Strasbourg for October! The high spot, or is that the low point, of business this week centred around the several reports included in the joint debate on Maritime transport. See my speech on that which I have recast as an article for the party web site. Otherwise there is the other matter of my second speech this week on the Social Package,- Cross-Border healthcare. The material for this was insubstantial and difficult to pick the bones out of it; it was been invented to cast a smoke screen over the Irish referendum result. To a brighter note. On Wednesday Parliament received the Commission Work Program for 2009 and when put to the vote it was rejected by 306 - 102 with 207 abstentions. Now what do they do? My guess,- a helping of fudge. Derek Clark MEP Brussels Sept 25th 2008
Sept 9th - 10th 2008 Brussels Commentary Employment Committee
Brussels Commentary Employment Committee Sept 9th - 10th 2008 On Wednesday,- a solid three hour voting session. Even the chairman lost his way, several times, during one report of 18 pages crammed full with over 200 amendments. That was one report of 8 voted on in that time. Now just consider, did everyone get it right, from their point of view, every time? Difficult at best but made much worse by the rapporteur combining several amendments together in compromises. Compromises are often done overnight, so the voting lists are altered and final version not seen until the morning. Its almost impossible for an MEP to make out the voting lists, especially this time having to plough through the documents; 6 books of 130+ pages each. Our assistants make out the voting lists and Ralph tells me that the last ones came through at 11.00 pm last night! Voting always begins at 9.00 am! Elsewhere you can see my two contributions to the employment committee debates. that was yesterday, Tuesday. Responses were quite revealing. For the first one, cracking down on employers of illegal immigrants, the rapporteur was Mrs Bauer. Her response was to say that the report did not deal with illegal work and that I ought to understand that employers had responsibilities and they should observe them. Now, I did stretch a point a little in using the fruit picker example. The directive, if passed, is about the chain of sub-contractors so when does the chain of picker, farmer, trucker, packager, wholesaler and shop cease being sub-contractors. In some cases the producer is tied to the retailer, via a freezer. In the event the committee voted down the amendment about illegal working not invalidating a contract and the one about not prosecuting those who provide assistance to illegal immigrants to enter. That leaves the rest, including all those in the chain being responsible and what I did not address; those employing illegals as domestic servants will be treated very lightly. Guess who, over here, employ servants! The rapporteur for the qualified people report took issue with me clearly thinking I was against immigrants, in spite of what I had said. He informed me that such qualified people had the right to remain after five years residence, quite. Very difficult to make these MEPs understand. Or do they just not want to? Derek Clark Brussels Sept 10th 2008
June 24th- 25th 2008 Brussels Commentary Employment Committee
Brussels Commentary Employment Committee June 24th- 25th 2008 First, on Tuesday morning, a special Plenary; Slovenian Presidency winding up. Every one thought Slovenia had done ever so well, and friendly with it! They also had a go at Ireland, of course, where Kathy Sinnott was naturally the lead Ind-Dem speaker. She told them how the Irish are losing democracy at the hands of the EU and that employment in a variety of areas is now at risk. She concluded, "If you want to know how to make the EU more acceptable ask the Irish, otherwise they'll say No again". Other speakers were full of eyewash about, "respect for the Irish vote etc, etc". The pick was Fine Gael MEP, for PPE, Gay Mitchell. He described the Ind-Dem booklet, which UKIP had funded by half, as, a vile document, full of lies encouraged by UKIP who had rewarded Kathy Sinnott with the Co-Chair of the group! Not being a listed speaker I had to wait and take a chance in "catch the eye", which is taken after all the nominated speakers. Having rearranged flights to go over a day early and get here on time I waited on. Five speakers only on catch the eye, but the President extended by three more and took me as the last. Patience rewarded,- "Thank you Mr President. We have heard a lot about respect for the Irish vote recently, I would be more impressed to hear about respect for your own regulations. The Treaty of Rome is still the document which governs what you do and that is quite clear on the matter of the adoption of new treaties. Any new treaty, it says, will come into force after ratification by all member states in accordance with their constitutional requirements. Well, the Irish did just that, so their No vote kills the Lisbon Treaty stone dead. There must therefore be no further ratifications, they must be stopped. If you can't do that out of respect for Ireland, do it out of respect for your own founding Treaty of Rome." In summarising, neither the Slovenian President, nor Barroso, seemed to have heard what I said! Employment Committee You may be glad to hear that the Working Time Directive is even further from agreement. The committee was visited by the Slovenian Labour Minister yesterday, June 24th, to a much less welcome reception that her president got in plenary. It seems that they have a new formula whereby a worker, after 4 weeks and without prejudice, can agree to work an average of 70 hours per week. Consternation,- "we've gone backwards" "what about our social Europe", "the Lisbon Treaty will need revision". Commissioner Spidla was also under attack about low wages to cope with Asian low wage economies. The following day the collective bargaining fracas came up again. Remember my notes about Laval, Viking and Ruffert?, well, the ECJ have done it again. Two weeks ago a similar case was heard about Luxembourg, same ECJ result. The committee are now in a complete twist over firms operating cross-border. The ECJ is, "turning everything upside down, social Europe is disappearing". Rarely have I heard the committee so at loggerheads. Me, I just sat back and enjoyed the show! Derek Clark MEP Brussels June 24th 2008
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