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In this paper it is explained how successive British governments have
surrendered our democracy to layers of international bureaucracy which have
acquired completely unaccountable power over our legal, political, economic
and social decisions. At the heart of the matter, Professor Minogue argues, is
the curious form of idealism that disdains pride in Britain and British
culture, preferring to give allegiance to a far more vaguely defined ideology
of internationalism. This rejection of national sovereignty, and the
subsequent embracing of unaccountable transnational institutions, as advocated
by our political establishment, has led to the British people submitting to
more and more authority which comes dressed as virtue
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This paper looks at the development of the regulatory structure and the
forces that drive it – political ambition, the need for officials to make a
mark for their career, single-issue lobbying organisations that do not have to
deal with the consequences and, above all, the European Union. It analyses the
sorry state of affairs we have found ourselves in, gives examples and even
provides the solutions of how to create a freer and more harmonious society -
better able to help each individual achieve his or her potential
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In support of the case for a referendum the Bruges Group is exposing the
damage that the Lisbon Treaty will do to our freedom, prosperity and democracy
if it is ratified. Our research clealy shows that the Lisbon Treaty is
essentially the same as the Constitution rejected in the French and Dutch
referenda
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Should British foreign policy reflect any political and moral principles or
should it merely be shaped by current conceptions of national self-interest,
which may change from decade to decade? Does Britain have any particular long
term or
permanent interests as a nation state or are we living in an age so radically
different from previous ones that none of the assumptions and traditions of
the past have
any relevance today? Has Britain's foreign policy traditionally had a
special pattern to it that makes it unlike the foreign policy of other
countries?
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The lessons of the last sixty years are that the UK should re-think its
fraught entanglement with the EU. Britain cannot simultaneously pursue
pro-American and pro-EU policies: the two are mutually-exclusive
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Gordon Brown's Government is handing-over billions of pounds of
taxpayers' money to the EU.
The combined direct and indirect costs of EU membership will cost Britain this
year over £114,000 per minute.
As a result of the Government's surrendering of the UK's rebate, and
the mounting costs of pointless EU regulation, this figure is set to rise even
further
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By 2007 the combined direct and indirect costs of EU membership will cost
Britain close to £100,000 per minute. If the Government believes that
membership of the EU is beneficial to Britain and that we should remain a
member, then let it commission an independent and impartial cost/benefit
analysis so that the supposed benefits can be proved and the findings openly
debated
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In the latest of the Bruges Group's Alternatives to the EU series
Daniel Hannan MEP sets out the case for the European Free Trade Association.
Membership of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) comes close to
realising the dispensation that most British voters always wanted from Europe:
free trade without unnecessary regulation or political union. Its rude
prosperity is embarrassing to British Euro-sophists, who have been telling us
for 30 years that the EU is vital to our economic survival. Yet, the EFTA
states enjoy lower inflation, higher employment, healthier budget surpluses
and lower real interest rates than those countries that are members of the
European Union. It is simple, people in EFTA are more than twice as rich as
those in the EU.
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It is two years since Tony Blair promised a referendum on the EU
Constitution. The Prime Minister said in Parliament of the EU Constitution,
“Then let the people have the final say”. Surely this principle applies
equally to the Constitution’s contents if implemented piecemeal as to the
document in its entirety? So before the Prime Minister stands down from
office, he must keep at least one of his pledges and give us that say
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One of the defining aspects of a nation is that it is free to set laws and
restrictions with reference to its own historical, cultural and legal
traditions. However, the third of the Bruges Group's Micro guides shows
how recent developments in Brussels have thrown this into disarray. A
technical decision made by the European Court of Justice has turned the
constitutional development of all EU member states on their head. The
Commission has taken upon itself the right to overrule the European
Parliament, the Council of Ministers and national parliaments by reference to
judgements of the highly partisan and activist European Court of Justice
(ECJ). The European Commission can now establish an EU criminal code
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The Conservative alliance with the European People’s Party has become a hot
topic and a major debating point at all levels of the Party, from the
prospective leaders to the very grassroots. MEPs themselves have been throwing
accusations and counterclaims around via their extensive email lists of party
activists. But who is right? This short paper by the Bruges Group lays bare
the facts behind the Conservative Party's association with the EPP. The
paper uncovers for the first time key details about how the Party finds itself
today still with the group, and reveals the true behind-the-scenes story of a
Eurosceptic alliance that almost was, and still even now is very much on the
cards. Far from being a minor issue, the creation of a key new alliance will
strengthen the hand of those on the continent who oppose their nation sinking
into a federal EU
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Calls for reform of the European Union’s outmoded practices and policies
are the latest platitudes emanating from the Government during the British
Presidency of the EU, even Commission President José Manuel
Durão Barroso has been calling for change, but is this just propaganda
or is there a chance that the supporters of integration can be persuaded that
the European project was a mistake. In the first of the Bruges Group’s four
page Micro guides Robert Oulds analyses the ability of the EU to deliver the
policies that Britain needs to compete. The character, customs and culture of
the European Union and its member-states are also examined and the conclusions
are stark
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The booklet proves that the EU is dragging Britain down and unless the
alternatives to the EU are explored integration will continue to threaten your
job, your bank balance, your democracy and your freedom
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An analysis of the terms of a renegotiated British membership of the
European Union with a Foreword by Lord Tebbit
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The euro is failing and will fail without the back-up of political
integration including harmonised taxation and a centrally managed EU-wide
fiscal policy. These measures will be the inevitable consequence of the euro
and the EU Constitution. Despite the claims made by our Government the EU
Constitution, if ratified, will lead to EU-wide tax control and the
enforcement of damaging outmoded economic policies responsible for the high
unemployment on the continent.
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The EU has ambitions to harness the key military technology of our age -
the ability to use satellite-positioning technology, which has revolutionised
military operations, making possible the development of high-accuracy
all-weather weapons targeting and enhanced command and control systems. This
will give the EU a greater role on the world stage but at what price to the
Trans-Atlantic Alliance? Furthermore, the EU’s courting of business partners,
in particular the People’s Republic of China could also threaten world
peace
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In the first of the Bruges Group's A New World Order: What Role for
Britain? papers Professor Minogue argues that national interest are being
undermined by two factors: the "Olympian" attitude of legal
activists and international bureaucrats, backed by academics who wish to
create a new international order that would not be accountable or responsible
to anyone except those who run it and by the supposedly supranational but
really ersatz-national European Union. As a result of this dual development
Britain and Britishness may fade away
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The future of the NHS is an emotive political subject. In this paper, which
has a foreword by Tim Yeo MP, Dr Lee Rotherham details how the future of the
NHS will be directed at an EU level. This is traced through successive
treaties, legal cases and in the Constitutional Treaty. The Constitution
appears set to carry further threats in its Charter of Fundamental Rights. In
short, this paper demonstrates that the EU Constitution establishes this key
public service as an area which national governments will no longer be able to
control: a bombshell that Labour supporters have yet to discover.
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The fourth of the Bruges Group’s papers on the draft EU Constitution
dissects the threat it poses to Britain’s legal system. Oliver Letwin exposes
one of the least noticed features of the EU constitution. He argues that it
provides the basis for the gradual transfer of virtually the entire criminal
law from national Parliaments to Brussels. The Criminal Justice provisions
will undermine Britain’s laws, legal system and procedure and the unique
safeguards that have developed in Common Law. Oliver Letwin also critiques the
Government’s slight-of-hand in pretending that the Constitution does not
represent a significant change to Britain’s laws and legal traditions.
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The third of the Bruges Group’s papers on the draft EU Constitution studies
the cloak of subsidiarity – the Eurospeak term – used to disguise the
ever-increasing arrogation of powers to the institutions of the European
Union. John Bercow seeks to analyse the history of subsidiarity and rebut the
claim that the EU Constitution safeguards the role of national Parliaments. He
also provides further evidence that the Constitution does not define the
limitations and extent of EU power and is not just another power grab.
According to John Bercow it also enables the EU to further expand its power to
unprecedented and virtually limitless proportions. In short, the EU
Constitution will accelerate the EU's legislative imperialism.
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The probable economic consequences of the draft EU Constitution. Bill
Jamieson, economic journalist, author of numerous books and pamphlets,
Executive Editor of The Scotsman and Director of the independent Scottish
think-tank, The Policy Institute, analyses what he sees as the already present
economic disaster of European integration and looks at future developments
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The EU Constitution: It is a muddle. It is dangerous. It is not for us.
The EU Inter-Governmental Conference will begin in Rome on Saturday, 4th.
Therefore, the Bruges Group has commissioned a leading Barrister – Leolin
Price, CBE, QC – to give a legal opinion on the draft
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The Convention on the Future of Europe is finalising the details of a
proposed Constitution, incorporating the controversial Charter of Fundamental
Rights. Therefore, the Bruges Group has published a pamphlet that draws
attention to the EU’s possible use of the Charter as an illiberal and
authoritarian tool to underpin the European State, even at the expense of free
speech.
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‘Federalist Thought Control: The Brussels Propaganda Machine’, exposes that
the European Union is spending at least €250m on subsidising pro-EU groups and
campaigns with the intention of manipulating public opinion to support the
integrationist vision of Europe. The consequence of this will be to subvert
fair and democratic debate as to whether or not Britain adopts the Euro.
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Nigel Farage, UKIP Member of the European Parliament sounds a timely
warning in this much-needed paper published by the Bruges Group. Disregarding
the conventional media obsession with Inter-Governmental Conferences and even
the newly demonstrated interest in the European Convention, presided over by a
long-retired former President of France, Mr Farage analyses the less
well-known but more sinister White Paper on Governance.
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Based on first-hand anthropological research into the European Commission
and its civil servants, this paper explores the role of 'culture' in
the process of European integration; how European policy-makers have
appropriated concepts of 'culture' and 'identity' since the
1980s; and whether the 'organisational culture' of the EU institutions
represents a microcosm of European unity, in practice, for Europe's people
at large.
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Explores why our involvement with ‘Europe’ has introduced into our politics
a culture of deceit in which British politicians and civil servants routinely
try to conceal the extent to which our lawmaking and government are becoming
taken over by a new system of government centered on Brussels.
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The Spectator's 1970s campaign to highlight the political costs of
European integration swam against a tide of consensual opinion. A quarter
century later it stands ultimately vindicated as astonishingly prescient — a
harbinger for discordance with the European Union freely expressed by our
mainstream media today.
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Evidencing the shift in policy in a eurosceptic direction since William
Hague became leader of his party the author says Hague must now seize the
opportunity to take the next logical step: to advocate renegotiation of our
continental relationship on the basis of free trade not political union (with
EU withdrawal an accepted option, as in 1975, in the event of failure).
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The psychology and weak arguments of the Europhiles are suberbly
pulled-apart by the author who also brilliantly sets out the case for a
decentralised, deregulated Europe of nation-states.
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Three essays from British citizens with alien backgrounds reflecting their
concerns over the changing identity of the British nation -
The British Conundrum by Helen Szamuely,
Liberties, Negative and Positive by Robert W. Cahn &
Civis Britannicus Sum by Yahya El-Droubie
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The authors examine Central Bank independence and the ECB and determine
that independence itself offers dubious anti-inflationary prospects and that
the ECB as constituted is anti-democratic and economically inept.
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As the European elections approach, the Conservative Party will shortly
begin selecting its candidates. Yet a controversial issue has not been
resolved: The Party is still a member of the federalist European Peoples Party
grouping in the European Parliament
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The stark truth is that the Franco/German friendship has set its compass
for a federalist destination. If the British people want to prevent their
incorporation into a suprantional, superpower Europe then they will have to do
it themselves, by challenging the status quo of European Union membership.
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Bruges Revisited
The Rt Hon. Mrs Margaret Thatcher MP, FRS
Margaret Thatcher's historic speech, spawning The Bruges Group,
delivered at Bruges in September 1988. Famously rejecting the centralised,
unaccountable, federal Europe of Delors, Margaret Thatcher proposed instead a
wider, decentralised, outward-looking democratic Europe of independent,
freely- trading and cooperating nation states
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The author analysis the ever-misguided political approach of British
politicians to Europe's "Community" revealing the incremental
passage of legislative powers to the EU from our accession in 1972 to the
Amsterdam Treaty. John Bercow also details the costs of Britain's
membership of the European Union and shows that the UK has many attractive
alternatives to European federalism.
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Businessman and entrepreneur urges Britain to ignore the pro-euro
propaganda - businesses will be hurt if Britain joins the euro
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The economic dangers and folly of Europe's drive towards Economic and
Monetary Union are exposed. The Chancellor's so-called five-tests are
also dissected and shown to be spurious indicators as to whether or not
Britain is suited to scrapping the Pound.
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Reviews of interesting literature from both sides of the Europe debate
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On Europe, John Major blew it. As Neville Chamberlain is remembered as the
Prime Minister of Munich, so will John Major be remembered as the Prime
Minister of Maastricht. Major’s European policy was an unequivocal failure,
the legacy of which the Conservative party will wrestle with in Opposition for
perhaps too long.
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A.J.P. Taylor understood the menace of the European Union, as it then was
not, with total clarity. Even in the 1960s he exposed how the Common Market
was imposed on sceptical British voters by a conspiracy of "top
people" and right-minded opinion.
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A gripping exposé of lifelong Communist Altiero Spinelli's
central role in the development of European federalism and how his thoughts
and actions are imprinted in the Treaties of the fledgling superstate we see
today.
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This paper is addressed to those who feel that there are economic gains to
be had in joining the euro. 'A Single European Currency' shows that
the benefits are illusory and that Economic and Monetary Union will result in
dire economic consequences.
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This pamphlet seeks to assess the extent of Euro-scepticism amongst
Conservative Party grassroots members and clearly shows that that the
Party's grassroots are Euro-sceptic and strongly object to the Europhile
policies of John Major. The suppression of debate on Europe by the Party
leadership is also exposed.
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The European Union has embarked on ambitious, but unwise, economic and
political experiments - The Single Market and Economic and Monetary Union.
'From Single Market to Single Currency' is the definitive text for
showing just how badly the EU has led Europe down the wrong economic path.
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The origins of the Conservative Party's civil war over Europe are
analysed. And it becomes clear that Conservatives, in the next couple of
years, have to make some fundamental choices. It is no longer sufficient for a
Conservative leader simply to paint a picture of the type of Europe that
Britain would like to lead. This approach has been tested to destruction and
the Continentals are mightily unimpressed by it.
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