Fish in a barrel
It’s almost too easy to take all the cheap shots that David Cameron’s much-trailed, long-awaited speech about UK membership of the EU left open.
From a Scottish perspective it was difficult to suppress a hollow laugh, for example, when the Prime Minister said of some prominent non-EU nations: “I admire those countries and they are friends of ours – but they are very different from us. Norway sits on the biggest energy reserves in Europe, and has a sovereign wealth fund of over €500bn“
It’s also tempting to simply marvel (again) at the mind-boggling witlessness of the “Better Together” campaign, who spent the final weeks of last year hollering from the rooftops about how Scottish independence might bring about the terrifying prospect of Scotland finding itself out of Europe, when they MUST have known that Cameron was about to make that same thing a far more real possibility within the UK than outside it.
(The No camp’s willingness to keep on energetically hurling hefty boomerangs at the independence movement, no matter how many come flying back and hit them in the teeth, is truly one of the wonders of the modern age.)
And make no mistake – Cameron’s speech unquestionably made British withdrawal from the EU not just a possibility, but a probability. The left-wing commentator Owen Jones summed up why in a series of tweets (so apologies on his behalf for the slightly stilted prose) during the broadcast:
“Labour should have listened to Jon Cruddas and offered an EU referendum first. Disastrous if they go into election against one. Simple as. Arguments from pro-EU side against a referendum will easily be demolished as “you have no faith in your argument” and contempt for democracy. Labour should call for EU referendum, support staying in while making the case for reform to make it run in the interests of working people. Also, if Labour do not support a referendum on the EU, the Tories will simply turn the next election into one. Who fancies fighting that?”
As an assessment of the situation facing Labour, it’s bang on the money – if they oppose a referendum the UKIP vote will come back to the Tories en masse, and Cameron will win the 2015 election. The problem with it is that if there’s an in-out referendum on EU membership, then according to most opinion polls of the last decade the strong likelihood is that the UK will be leaving the EU.
And while Labour is a pro-Europe party, the fact is that they’d rather be in power and out of Europe than the reverse. If we’ve learned only one thing over the last 15 years, it’s that there is no principle Labour won’t sacrifice for power. Allow us, if you will, the shameful immodesty of quoting ourselves from the article we just linked to in the previous sentence, in case you don’t have the time or inclination to read it all:
“Imagine yourself a time traveller visiting the Britain of 1960, or 1970, or 1980. Picture yourself encountering a random inhabitant of that world, and telling them of a political party in their near future that stood for nuclear weapons, nuclear power, slashing taxes on the rich, handing billions of pounds to private companies to build hospitals for massive profits, wasting untold billions more in a failed attempt to introduce ID cards and the prosecution of illegal imperial wars despite millions marching in protest, creating thousands of new crimes, cramming the prisons and trying to lock people up for months on end without trial or charge, inflating a property bubble while letting social housing go to rack and ruin, doing nothing for unions, talking tough about immigration, presiding over a huge increase in the gap between rich and poor, demonising and victimising the unemployed and the sick, etc etc. Would that person decide you were describing the Labour Party?”
So: either Labour will oppose a referendum, in which case the Tories will win and we’ll be out of Europe, or they’ll support one and we’ll have one whoever wins, in which case we’ll be out of Europe. (Tradition and good taste demands that we overlook the possibility of either party reneging on an election pledge, something which is now more or less the last remaining hope of the UK still being in the EU by 2020.)
But in the frame of Scottish politics, perhaps the most comical aspect of the speech was that Cameron insisted the referendum would not be based on a choice between complete withdrawal and the status quo. Instead, he made clear that his intention was to first renegotiate a more favourable deal for the UK’s membership, involving the repatriation – or, you might say, the devolving – of various sovereign powers from Brussels back to the UK. In fact, basically as many as possible. You could perhaps call this new arrangement, we don’t know, something like “devo-max”.
The unmistakeable implication was that Cameron didn’t take people for such gullible idiots that he’d expect them to vote to stay in the EU merely on a vague and nebulous promise of getting a better deal afterwards when all the UK’s bargaining chips – that is, the threat to leave – had been thrown away.
You can finish this post yourselves, right?
‘You can finish this post yourselves, right?’
Yes, the contradictions/hypocrisies abound between the two ‘independence’ referendums.
I agree with Cameron rying to get powers back from the EU, and agreed with him his fight to get far too many rules and regulations wound back. The EU is not competitive outside the EU itself.
In a UK referendum on EU membership I’d vote to come out.
In a Scotland referendum, I’m not sure which way I’d vote, we might engage better.
To my simple mind, politics used to be fairly straightforward. Now it’s a convoluted nightmare!
“You can finish this post yourselves”
And everybody lived happily ever after.
Does that work?
Luke 6:41-42
Listened to his speech, seemed to me he was only pleading for the city of london and to stop the rise of England UKIP. The EU have his number, they know what all his twaddle is about and the same EU will continue to isolate the casino bankers in the cit of london and shift banking power over to the mainland. Nothing spoken in that speech was relevant to the people of Scotland who have little or no voice in the UK.
EU referendum – surely we need this now. The uncertainty will mean business loses confidence and jobs will be lost and why to people have to wait years for it. How long does it take to organise one – they are scared of losing that’s why they are waiting…..
Ehem does anyone recognise these “arguments” from say another context 🙂
Wanted to keep this piece short and punchy, but If I have a moment later I’ll pick out some amusing quotes about Scottish and EU referendums respectively from the Tories, just for the laffs. Feel free to make my life easier…
Excellent post, Stu.
And let’s not forget the ‘uncertainty’ that’s being caused by pushing the referendum on EU membership back to 2017. I trust Mundell, R Davidson, M Moore, Darling and Mr Ian McMillan of the petite organisation that is CBI Scotland will be loud and unending in voicing their disapproval of this uncertainty. Doubtless the Scotsman and Herald will also highlight their outrage.
I’ve gone to the trouble of amending Anas Sarwar’s little speech in the Commons last week to better suit the occasion:
“We have a minority Tory Government in the Westminster Parliament, but that is not a democratic place in the conventional sense; it is a dictatorship of one posh twit sitting in 10 Downing Street, who will do not what is in Scotland’s interests, but what is in his own or his party’s interests.”
What are the chances of hearing it from the man himself?
Ah, all those threats, repeated ad nauseum since 2011 – if Scotland votes YES in 2014, there is no guarantee of us remaining in Europe? We wake up this morning to find that, shock, horror, if we vote NO in 2014, there is no guarantee of us remaining in Europe. Better Together are running out of feet to shoot.
David Cameron looks as if he is trying desperately to take lessons from Salmond, but failing to realise the situations are totally different.
There seems to be a feeling within the English right wing that the whole independence referendum is nothing but brinksmanship to force the UK into giving what – they believe – Salmond really wants, which is devo-max.
Some commentators last year believed that if they took away the option of devo-max, poor old Alex would be crying into his porridge and looking for a way to back out of holding an in/out referendum. So Cameron is trying the same trick with the EU – trying to force their hand into offering more powers before any referendum, in the hope that they’ll blink first and hand back powers to stop a referendum happening.
This totally fails to understandScotlandor the SNP, where there is a very real, genuine desire for independence and/or vastly more powers and autonomy. It was never brinksmanship with Salmond – he wants a referendum, and preferred only one question because that is more likely to bring about the independence he wants. Real change is needed in theUK, and that could be federalism or independence but not just a few crumbs tossed from theWestminstertable.
But it also fails to understand the EU. The EU also needs reform, and is trying to reform, but in many ways is hampered by aUKthat carps and whinges from the side-lines and is trying to actively disrupt things like banking and finance regulations.
Cameron is attempting to play the same “game” he thinks Salmond is but with a totally different hand and, I strongly suspect, a different desired outcome – ie he really doesn’t want to hold a referendum unless there are firm proposals on the table. If the EU call his bluff, which they may well leap at doing, in the same way the UK believe they called Salmond’s (though really his wasn’t a bluff) the UK is screwed.
Is it just me or does everything seem to be falling into place for Scotland to have an easy path to Independence.
The EU issue has more or less been made redundant now that David Cameron has created uncertainly over the UKs future in the EU for the next five years, and now it looks like the Trident issue will become mute if there are no plans to renew it.
Is it possible that David Cameron and The Conservative party have done the maths and realise that they may struggle to get an outright majority in 2015 if Scotland returns 40 or so Labour MPs to Westminster, especially now that the Lib Dems have blocked boundary changes which would have given the Tories an extra 20 seats.
The uncertain uncertaincy that this leaves will make uncertain business feel uncertain about their uncertain future etc etc. Now I want to hear what Iain McMillan makes thinks about this or is he uncertain?
yes – If Scotland votes for independence it probably won’t keep a triple A rating…..
Oops, stay tuned.
gerry p
delete ‘makes from my last line – I cannot edit it.
We need to know all the numbers, costs and policies that a the UK government has in place if it wants to SEPARATE from EU.
I prefer the EFTA route and the Sc$!
All this damaging uncertainty.
Have the referendum now. Why do the UK separatists keep putting it off?
Of course, it’s ridiculous to think there will be any further devolution of powers without an EU-wide referendum.
Blah blah federalism.
Once we separate from the EU, there’s no going back.
What’s the point of becoming separate from the rest of the EU, only to remain in the single market? That’s not independence in any real sense, and will just lead to us coming back into the EU. Why go through all this fuss just to arrive back at the same position?
The UK is BetterTogether in the EU.
We fought two world wars alongside the French. Why become separate countries?
Why break up the most successful union of the past 100 years?
The French might bomb our aircraft carriers if we separate.
49% of our exports go to EU countries. Obviously, this will stop if we leave the EU.
European culture will no longer be ours. We won’t be able to listen to Mew or watch The Killing or Borgen if we’re a separate country. We’ll have to stick to morris dancing, shitty reality TV and poorly-written programmes like Eastenders.
Most importantly, if we leave the EU, our European friends will suddenly become foreigners, and it’ll be passports at the bor… Oh.
And what about the other possible outcome? However remote, we must acknowledge the possibility that even a political incompetent like Cameron might actually be able to extract from the EU something that he can represent as concessions. It might just be that he could go into his proposed EU referendum with an offer to the UK electorate of terms that could quite convincingly be spun as favourable. But favourable to whom?
Are we seriously to suppose that the UK Government’s priority in negotiations with the EU will be the interests of Scotland? Or Wales? Or, for that matter, the periphery of England? Who do we really think will be set to benefit from any such deal? And whose interests can we sensibly expect to be traded away in order to secure something Cameron can sell to those borderline UKIP voters?
Will ex-pat Britons be given the vote? My aunt lives in Europe which means her half Scottish sons will have their EU citizenship and identity ripped from them. Surely they must therefore be entitled to a say in what happens?
And also, given this will affect the whole EU, really shouldn’t everyone in the EU be given a vote on whether Britain should leave?
The UK EU Neverendum!
Well done Doug – magic!
I have to say though, our friends south of the border wouldn’t even begin to get the irony. None that I know anyway!
On the other hand, I might just compile some of these excellent lines 😀
Labour made an election pledge in 2005 to hold an EU referendum. Gordon Brown was castigated by Cameron when he reneged on that promise.
Cameron has been calling for an EU referendum since 2007. However, according to the Telegraph in 2011: “David Cameron and William Hague have firmly rejected calls for a referendum on British membership of the European Union. In the words of the Foreign Secretary, “our place is in the European Union,” even if the EU single currency “is a burning building with no exit.”
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100108617/david-cameron-should-hold-an-eu-referendum-and-give-the-british-public-the-final-say-on-europe/
I fully expect that, should the Tories win the next election, Cameron, like Brown before him, will renege on his promise.
Apologies or the Telegraph copy and paste.
OT
1 hour 17 minutes and 30 seconds link to bbc.co.uk
Alex Neil rips into waiting lists scaremongering and explains new freephone number for NHS24
It’s all simply xenophobic anti-Europeanness. Knowing those anti-johnny foreigner Tories they’ll hold the EU referendum on the anniversary of the battle of Trafalgar or VE day.
Comical. You couldn’t make this stuff up. Certainly goes to show that Westminster operates as if Scotland does not exist.
Also interesting to see the ‘UK can’t afford Trident and a Scots exit is a great excuse for dumping it’ theory increasingly looking like the case.
Stu – I was thinking this morning of writing a mock article written by Alistair Darling using some of those lines, but I couldn’t be bothered pretending to have hairy caterpillar eyebrows.
Feel free to use them at will though!
I forsee a sudden upsurge in English/Welsh/N.Irish people applying for Scottish passports in 2017.
Doug Daniel – like it. 🙂
You forgot that anybody who wants a referendum on the EU is a Europhobic racist…
On the other hand, I might just compile some of these excellent lines
I can see some excellent quotes coming from Alan Cockrane and Alex Massie if anyone has time to seek out and contribute quotes.
Scott Minto –
Ta much for posting that link, and pinpointing the time – saved raking about. Well worth a listen.
YES to independence means YES to Europe. NO to independence means NO to EU and EFTA.
Simples.
No more Spanish fitba on the telly then or even a go at the Euromillions lottery? 🙁
The New Statesman has done one for you
link to newstatesman.com
@Scott
Just listened to the GMS rerun. Well done Alex. It is long past time that the SNP Ministers pussy-footed about. I assume that they now feel that the most obvious lies and misrepresentation by the BBC in Scotland has weakened the publics ‘gullibility’ (I mean that in the most polite way) about BBC honest reporting. Probably their own internal polling?
Maybe we now have part two of the YES strategy:
Part 1. Give the NO campaign a long rope
Part 2. Begin to tighten!
The BBC NHS stuff is a gift.
Look! The BBC lied about the NHS. You can’t trust a word they say!
We now know why the No campaign, and their media chums, were acting like hyenas at the end of last year over the EU issue. They knew fine well this was coming. This changes things significantly. We had to wait for Cameron’s speech but this has major implications for the referendum on independence. Unionists always like to portray independence as isolationism. Now it looks like the opposite is the case. This looks like the beginning of the end of the UK’s membership of the EU. It will massively benefit UKIP in England for the European elections next year, and mean they have an incentive to vote for the Tories in the next general election.
The Yes campaign can now legitimately argue that a Yes vote will be a vote for remaining in EU, and it is the No campaign who are the isolationists.
Thanks for that sneekyboy, Alex Neil certainly fucking told them, and about time too. I don’t know the facts of that situation, but that’s exactly the point – the BBC should be doing a proper job of making sure IT knows the facts of the situation and then do the job it certainly SHOULD be doing – holding the government to account.
At the moment even I, an ordinary punter, can drive the QE2 through the inaccuracies the BBC comes out with on an hourly basis – not just about Scotland either, but just about anything it reports on.
Perhaps Cameron is more astute that we are giving him credit for.
If he is in receipt of more powers, or doesn’t come under various EU rules then he is in a position of some strength come a 2014 Yes vote in Scotland. Just think for a moment. Any post Yes rUK is going to be significantly weakened, both economically and politically. rUK will require every ounce (they’ll revert to imperial measurements) of power to manage a reduced ecomomy. Who needs EU emplyment laws and EU social rules in that scenario? Not a Tory rUK government.
I think Cameron is moving his pieces on the board quite cleverly.
The elephant in the room, when Cameron made his speech, isn’t UKIP, Tory marginals or internal party opinion. It’s Scotland!
Newsnet did an article about the NHS/BBC story on Monday. Its an interesting read!
link to newsnetscotland.com
Doug Daniel – great
Craig – they are all little Islanders
Ironicism, yes! Independent Scotland in the EU, rUK, out. rUK isolated and alone, even the US won’t take calls from No 10.
Big Aww! Wonder if 16 years old will get to vote?
Mmm, in light of the UK situation regarding the EU, Scottish Nationalism = Internationalism.
You’re nothing if not entertaining Wings, utterly delusional with a chip on both shoulders but entertaining nontheless.
That being said, the moment you start quoting Owen “Arthur Scargill for teens” Jones and using him to support your article you know you’ve lost the debate.
The most hypocritical aspect of your rant is your attempt as a supporter of the SNP to take the moral high ground over EU issues. Particularly taking in to the account the lies and misinformation put out by the Scottish Government over EU membership in recent months.
Unless I am mistaken your stance remains that the President of the “Guardian of the Treaties” the EU Commission doesn’t know as much about EU membership entry as either Dear Leader or Sturgeon?
If I didn’t know better I’d say you were making things up as you went along.
In terms of the debate of course……
“That being said, the moment you start quoting Owen “Arthur Scargill for teens” Jones and using him to support your article you know you’ve lost the debate.”
So you think Labour should oppose the EU referendum?
“your attempt as a supporter of the SNP”
I’m a what now? Lib Dem voter since 1993, my friend. You know, your coalition partners.
The don’t like it up’em these BBC churnalists.
Well done Alex Neil.
Boxing gloves off!
I think the choice of date for this referendum, 2017, is nothing more than a cynical attempt to capitalise on the 600th anniversary of Henry V’s invasion of France, and the restoration of English as England’s official language.
1417….Remember Normandy!
I can’t get Sneekyboy’s link to work because my PC is ancient. Can anybody tell me what was the gist of Neill’s remarks? Did he have a go at Eleanor B?
New Statesman article – very good, at last a non-biased article mentioning Scotland’s eferendum. Craig M – I agree. I think he’s considerably increased the chance of his re-election success, while explaining way the delay by “seeking a mandate” in the elction, same as Salmond did.
Apart from the odd rousing speech “together, long history of, mutual, stronger …” I don’t expect Cameron to take much part in the NO campaign.
Who is Allan Smith?
“Who is Allan Smith?”
“Scottish Conservative & Unionist 2011 Holyrood Election candidate. 2012 Local Election candidate. Proud unionist & Jambo. Better Together”
Explains the rant, and indeed its timing Rev Stu…A Scottish Tory eh, bit of an endangered species.
Perhaps Cameron chose 2017 because 2017 will be:
The 20th anniversary of cloning Dolly the sheep.
The 20th anniversary of New Labour routing the Tories and becoming the new Tory Party themselves under Blair.
The 100th anniversary of the OBE being established – which could later be handed out to creepy BBC employees like Jimmy Savile.
The 150th anniversary of the Fenian rising in Ireland.
The 150th anniversary of Westminster decisively rejecting to give women the vote.
The 200th anniversary of the Typhus epidemic in Glasgow and Edinburgh.
The 300th anniversary where as part of the treaty between Westminster and France, Scotland’s king James VIII has to leave France and seek refuge at the Vatican.
utterly delusional with a chip on both shoulders
But, doesn’t that make us ‘well-balanced’?
lies and misinformation put out by the Scottish Government over EU membership in recent months
You mean the fact that the NO campaigners didn’t listen properly, and projected their own ideas onto what what EXPLICITLY said. I agree that there remains a lot of opinion on whether an Independent Scotland would remain in the EU until they formally became Independent, or whether the EU might (for some inexplicable reason) wish to throw the Scots out of the EU while they are still part of the UK.
So, why doesn’t the UK government resolve this matter NOW. They simply have to ask the EU for a ruling. Quite easy, and will save us all from ever more “opinion” from experts.
Over to you.
Border controls on the Chunnel should be interesting. We’ll see the setting up of ack ack guns at Heathrow and Gatwick. I mean without any friends in Europe to help out somebody may invade England and as a precaution, the SDF would have to bomb their runways. 🙂
EU nationals living in the UK should not have the right to vote in the referendum. UK nationals living abroad should have the right to vote.
@ Allan Smith
I think you misrepresent the YES camp when you suggest that we have doubts over Senor Barroso’s grasp of EU membership rules.What we have issue with is his grasp of the nature of the union with England and how this pertains to EU membership.Scotland would not be a new state but a successor state in terms of EU membership.
Celtic fans will need visas to go to Turin. 🙂
We will need a new passport when we leave the EU.
Allan Smith—-always the bridesmaid…never the bride……
I think I’ll invest in barbed wire. They’ll need a lot of that to go around the coast of England and Wales. Pill-boxes on the beaches, automated ack-ack for microlites, every sea-gull to be questioned whether they have a return ticket and sufficient droppings for their visit.
But – will Washington allow this? I think Obama should be consulted!
This Tory referendum on Europe is all wind and piss. There is no way that Britain will come out of Europe entirely. There are hundreds of thousands of people from mainland Europe working in Britain with EU passports who would immediately find themselves as aliens and unemployable.
The same would apply to those people from the British Isles who were living and working in mainland Europe. ‘Fuck off! If you don’t accept the terms then you don’t get the benefits’ they would be told.
It’s just spin. Even if they held the referendum and even if the people voted to withdraw from the EU, the Government would say that it was merely an advisory and fact finding poll and it would be used as a bargaining tool to renegotiate some terms of the Treaty.
Meanwhile, Scotland will still be getting stuffed…..unless.
Cameron always wanted the Devo-max question on the ballot paper, because he believes he will lose the referendum on secession from the EU. Current polls show that the UK is only 33% in favour of seceding from the EU, so that’s two-thirds against.
Gotta say dads, I don’t think I’ve chuckled this long in some time. Just checking through the related threads on the Guardian you’d swear you were looking at the Scottish independence debate. The comments from some of our continental cousins are just perfect.
If yer gonnae go, go!!!! None of this half in, half out stuff.
Just Brilliant 😀
But – will Washington allow this? I think Obama should be consulted!
This is the million dollar question. Good shout dadsarmy.
@dadsarmy
Where about is Severin Carroll’s article you were talking about (Cameron accused)?
Rangers fans will need visas to play Berwick Rangers.
I’m missing England already 🙁
@Macart
I could imagine. They’ll have been watching threads about Scottish Independence, and there’s loads of pre-fabricated ammunition there. It shows really the value of Goodwill, and the danger of not generating it. Personally I agree with Cameron for the UK, but with all the Unionist taunts, it’s so hard to get away from crowing with delight and triumph they’re now in the same boat – I’m not even going to try!
OT: Mmm, interesting article in the Guardian “Trident: no need for like-for-like replacement, says Danny Alexander”. I agree, there can be an Astute option, and from a defence point of view I think it’s far better, let alone cheaper and more resilient. It can also be based easily at Barrow and Portsmouth / Devonport, so Faslane /Coulport could be cleared in a few years. To fire Trident these days of peace takes days, not hours, as missiles are now no longer pre-targetted.
It’s looking good – one piece of good news after another.
@Mutley79
Sorry, that was taking the p out of Severin – it hasn’t happened. Yet!
@dadsarmy
I get ye.
On Daily Politics Today
Tory Party Chairman Grant Shapps said:
“Keeping Scotland in the UK is in the UK’s interest”
Not cause it’s better for Scotland to be in the uk , but it’s better for the uk if we’re in it .
Wan tory slips up and says the truth for once
They know they need us more than we need them
Seasick Dave says:
Rangers fans will need visas to play Berwick Rangers.
LOL