Nosemonkey's EUtopia

Post-election, and with all the joys of spring, some people have decided to opt for a complete redesign while others first went for a redesign and now profess to be thinking about giving up.

Me? I’ve opted for the middle-ground of a dinky logo type thingie for the masthead, like wot I just knocked up in Photoshop and stuff. And yes, yes that is a nosemonkey plonking its fat arse on Turkey. The buttocks/Turkey interface is not, however, meant to be symbolic in any way – and nor is the fact that the little bugger’s turned his back on Europe. At least, I don’t think it is…

Anyway – check out my mad photoshopping skillz. I rule.

Say what you like about George Galloway – and I frequently do – he turned in a largely impressive performance in front of the Americans yesterday. Chicken Yoghurt has a good take, while Martin Stabe has a roundup of US blog reactions, a particular highlight of which is this little gem:

“We won the Revolutionary War fergossake. This shouldn’t be so hard.”

Heh…

Meanwhile, Respectites Meaders and Lenin seem to have been enjoying themselves – even Harry’s Place had to admit George put on a good show, but it seems that the folk at the New York Post weren’t quite as impressed:

“SOMEBODY, please inject our senators with a heavy dose of testosterone.
“Maybe then they’ll be able to deal with thugs and bullies like George Galloway.
“…He insulted our administration. He decried the war against terror.
“…It gets worse.
“As he hijacked Congress to unleash his outrageous, insulting tirade, our senators did not pipe up.
“Rather, they assumed the look of frightened little boys caught with pants around their ankles, nervously awaiting punishment.”

I say again – heh!

IslamOnline have a good press roundup for those who fancy some other reactions.

The only question now is will he ever get a chance to go off on a similar rant in the House of Commons, or will he (as I suspect) somehow fail to catch the Speaker’s eye?

After spending the last few days churning out reams and reams of text on everything from the EU constitution to Samuel Pepys to Batman Begins (the latter two not here, obviously), I’ve hit a distinct lack of inspiration.

Come, faithful readers – assist me. I’ve got to knock up a 1000-1500 word article on the Celts in Britain – not Ireland – with an emphasis on places tourists can visit and which photograph well, and I’ve come entirely unstuck. It’s become too in-depth for the middle-brow target audience and so far has precisely no travel aspect. Help me out, go on – I need suggestions of celtic sites and attractions more than anything. Ta. This is currently about 600 words – I need to cut some bits and add some bits to make it fit:

In the 5th century BC Heroditus recorded the Celts as living between the source of the river Istros (the Danube) and the Pillars of Hercules � effectively from Germany to Portugal. Their first recorded appearance was in c.400 BC, forcing the Etruscans out of the Po valley in northern Italy and clashing with envoys of Rome in the process. Marching on to the capital of the nascent Empire, the Celtic leader Brennus inflicted one of the worst defeats that Rome would see for centuries. A few decades later, in 335BC, Alexander the Great met a Celtic delegation on the shores of the Adriatic where, according to Ptolemy, they offered their friendship, stating that the only thing they were afraid of was the sky falling down around them.

According to 1st century BC Sicilian historian Diodorus Siculus, the Celts were �terrifying… They are very tall in stature, with rippling muscles under clear white skin. Their hair is blond, but not naturally so: they bleach it, to this day, artificially, washing it in lime and combing it back from their foreheads. They look like wood-demons, their hair thick and shaggy like a horse’s mane.� Another distinguishing feature, in a world where tunics were still the norm, was the habit of the men to wear bracae, or trousers.

Today, the descendants of the Celts survive predominantly in the British Isles � primarily in Cornwall, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Scotland and Wales, though with strong remaining influences in the northern and western fringes of England, to where they were driven by successive invasions by the Romans and Anglo Saxons. But no one really knows how the Celts themselves came to Britain � were they the descendants of those who built Stonehenge, invaders or peaceful migrants? Some have even argued that they were merely an invention of 18th century Empire-builders, keen to create a sense of British national pride.

But the sense of mystery, the tales of warriors, the traces of complex and sinewy artworks and the ever-present legends of the Druids, not to mention the ongoing pride of the Celtic nations, has helped ensure that the Celtic peoples retain a very particular place in European, and especially British identity.

Despite their warrior origins, the Celtic tradition was, until the coming of Rome, entirely oral. As such, it was only after the Roman conquest that any written record of the Celts appeared in the British isles, and it is doubtless in part due to this that the Celtic tradition today is that of the plucky and oppressed underdog. Revolts in the 15th and 16th centuries to preserve the Cornish language have been followed in the 19th and 20th centuries by concerted efforts to revive Welsh and Scottish Gaelic, while Scottish and Irish immigrants to North America have continued to cling to their Celtic roots even while, like their forebears during the coming of Christianity, they have become integrated with their new culture.

Too tedious at the moment, isn’t it? Damn. (Oh, and sorry – I wouldn’t normally do this sort of thing; highly unprofessional etc.)

I always wonder how Her Majesty can bring herself to read out the nonsensical drivel she’s always handed for the state opening of parliament. This year’s speech also had the added sick-making factor of seeming to want to identify itself more than usual with old Brenda – Blair’s lot seem especially keen to remind the country that they are the Queen’s government after their shaky election performance.

In a bored moment I decided to count up how many times her Maj was forced to refer to Blair and Co. as “my government”. In an even more bored moment, I decided to do some comparison. The last time that phrase was used as many times was back in 1999, where the poor dear had to associate herself with Blair’s lot 39 times. Back to Buck House for a few G&Ts after that one, methinks…

Is there any significance to this, or just an example of piss-poor repetitive speechwriting on the part of Downing Street? Who knows – but the last Queen’s speech under a Tory government only used the phrase 14 times, and they’re meant to be the royalists…

Here’s the Blair/Brenda Queen’s Speech love-in tally, for anyone interested:

1996 – 14
1997 – 27
1998 – 31
1999 – 39
2000 – 22
2001 – 22
2002 – 23
2003 – 27
2004 – 28
2005 – 33

(And no, I can’t be bothered to go through counting the broken promises, or to trawl through the pre-internet speeches prior to 1996…)

Poor old Liz. She, after all, has to accept responsibility for all Blair’s crap as the only person in the country who actually made him PM, and something tells me she’s not exactly in a position to break with recent tradition and use her royal prerogative and get rid of the bastard. But you can tell from the look on her face she’s not happy. Gawd bless ‘er (etc.)

The Queen’s Speech today is going to announce the revival of this particularly stupid bill (among many other, equally stupid bits of legislation).

What I still don’t get – an obvious point, maybe – is precisely how it is possible to ban incitement to religous hatred without banning religion itself?

Be it the Christians with their “one true God” (which is, of course, a slightly different one true God depending on which sect you belong to) or the Muslims with theirs, the whole POINT of religion is that you believe that you are right and everyone who believes differently is wrong – heathens, gentiles, infidels, whatever. If you are strongly religious – of whatever faith – you by definition have a massive superiority complex over all the unbelievers, as you have seen the way, the truth and the light and they have not. Such smugness breeds contempt on both sides; contempt leads to hatred.

In most interpretations of most different faiths, it is the solemn duty of any true believer to convert those who have not seen the light. Missionaries are sent out. Evangelists stand on street corners. They generally spout on about how we’re all going to burn in hell unless we do and believe exactly what they tell us. (Sounds a tad like the government and their terror warnings, come to think of it…)

Does someone telling me I’m going to burn in hell for not embracing The Lord God Our Saviour Who Died For All Our Sins (TM) count as religious hatred? Does me telling them to fuck off and leave me alone? Does slamming the door in the face of a Jehovah’s Witness count?

What about things like The New Humanist, which exist solely to dissect and challenge religious belief? Is the government proposing to ban The Rationalist Society? How about atheists – are they going to become illegal? They frequently mock and challenge religious folk and doctrine.

And in any case, isn’t part of the point of having faith to be able to have that faith challenged yet to continue to believe? The Christian martyrs were tortured to death, yet held onto their conviction that their God was the true one. Are their spiritual heirs really so weak-willed that having a few people mock them and call them idiots will make them abandon Christ? If so their faith is already dead and pointless. We’re doing them a favour.

According to that FAQ, the people affected by the new law would be

“Individuals and members of extremist and racist organisations and parties who stir up hatred of groups defined by their religious beliefs. Also, religious extremists who stir up hatred against members of other religions.”

So, that would include not only every evangelist in the country, but also the entire Cabinet, all of whom have been complicit in the post-9/11 anti-Muslim tirades (which, naturally, were aimed solely at the extremists and fanatics, but which have nonetheless ensured that Musliims throught the country are now viewed with distrust and fear by the rest of the population). Will Charles Clarke have to arrest first the Prime Minister and then himself?

Of course, what this really is is merely another facet of the “anti-terror” legislation Blair and Co. keep trying to force through. The people most likely to use inflammatory rhetoric will not be Catholic priests or the beardily inoffensive Archbishop of Canterbury, but the hardline mullahs of the more extreme mosques.

After years of trying and failing to get rid of the likes of Abu Hamza for connections to terrorism (for which there was insufficient evidence to prosecute, but we allowed him to be extradited anyway despite his holding a British passport because, erm…), a law like this would enable an instant lock-up because their overblow language – not that different to the fire and brimstone sermons of the Victorian Church of England – can happily be interpreted literally.

In other words, this will all come down to semantic interpretation. The local vicar telling us how the pharasees and Jews betrayed and killed Our Lord Jesus Christ will be fine (because, you know, the fact that Jews have frequently faced attack from irate Christians over the centuries due to their involvement in the Christian God’s death OBVIOUSLY hasn’t come from Biblical blame-throwing…). But if someone at a mosque suspected of having terrorist links happens to use the term “infidel” then we’ll lock him up and throw away the key.

By showing absolute contempt for religion in using it as a convenient veil for more suspect motives, is the government again in breach of the proposed bill? And what the pissing hell right does Tony fucking Blair have to dictate to anyone about religion in the first place? The smug little God-botherer. He was the one who incited me to religious hatred through his holier-than-though insistence that everything he does is alright because he “believed it to be the right thing to do”. This belief stems from his Christian faith, so I hold his faith in contempt.

Oooh, I’m annoyed.

While remaining overworked and uninspired, there are a couple of interesting pieces over at The Sharpener.

First up is Third Avenue with a great overview of precisely why referendums are so rubbish and anathema to the British political system. After all, how can a “yes/no” question possibly be enough to provide an indication of national feeling on issues as complex as devolution or the EU? Applying a strict monochrome interpretation to an issue which is decidedly greyscale is liable only to create further difficulties should the UK ever get to hold its referendum on the constitution.

Then we have Meaders on some of the faultlines which have sprung up after the general election, which is well worth a look. I think we can forgive him his partisan appeal just this once…

Meanwhile, the Curious Hamster has a handy linkdump of some topical stories from around the UK and the world amidst ponderings on what to do with his blog now that the election has finished and us self-appointed pundits have to try a bit harder to dig out engaging stories.

Still, expect some more of the usual trademark Nosemonkey wit and insight (*ahem*) tomorrow, probably – freelance deadlines are clogging up all my spare writing time. Hopefully by then I’ll have my radio working properly again so I can get the inspirational news hit that is The Today Programme when I wake up of a morning. Radio 3 is all very well and good, but Rachmaninov is hardly conducive to prompting topical news analysis. (And by the way – can anyone explain the mentality of running a pirate drum ‘n’ bass station at seven o’clock in the morning? The absolute bastards have wiped out Radio 4 completely for me…)

Nope, I haven’t turned into a commie or anything. I am, however, feeling rather uninspired – unlike those revolutionaries and rebels contained within the Carnival of the Revolutions over at Siberian Light – a handy summary of all the various revolts and uprisings currently kicking off around the world.

Uzbekistan is currently in the news following the slaughter of hundreds of protestors by government forces over the weekend, but central Asia isn’t the only for pro-democracy activity. It’s about time we started looking beyond our own back yards after the last few months of Anglo-centric obsession. A bit more foreign affairs will be returning to Europhobia over the coming weeks. Probably.

Update: Manic gets a tad miffed at the double standards and hypocrisy in the UK’s official attitude to Uzbekistan. Good stuff.

As predicted, the negotiations for the EU’s new budget were not exactly easy, and have ended in collapse.

Brussels really isn’t trying overly hard to make itself seem appealing in the run-up to contentious constitution referendums, is it? Bloody shambles.

With the French referendum vote too close to call, if you�re a pro-EU pessimist like me this is getting a tad too nerve-wracking. Given that Britain will almost certainly opt for a �No� vote in any referendum, the whole exercise of constitutional ratification also seems rather futile.

To turn Britain’s vote around would have taken a long, sustained period of campaigning which simply hasn’t yet materialised. Now there is too little time – especially as the campaign won’t kick off until at least after Blair’s managed to consolidate and work out his post-election position, and thanks to the European Parliament voting to overturn the UK’s opt-out from the working time directive, looking like yet more Brussels meddling, if a referendum happens, Britain will vote no.

If Britain is the country that scuppers the EU’s chances of advancing, it will be well nigh impossible to regain the trust of the other EU member states when it comes to matters of the Union. The constitution has already been watered down to become more acceptable to the UK, much to the chagrin of the French, and it would be pretty tricky to dilute it any further without making the bloody thing even more pointless and meaningless than it already is.

So, if Britain rejects a constitutional treaty seen in a number of quarters to be pandering to British Euroreluctance (which is, I reckon, a rather more accurate description of the prevailing attitude in the UK than Euroscepticism), it is going to be pretty damn difficult to get our voice seriously heard in any post-rejection negotiations for an alternative. The tendency on the continent will simply be to think “sod that – we’ve tried our best to keep the rosbeefs happy already, let’s just ignore the reactionary bastards” and progress without us.

This could, actually, be the best thing for the EU. Dump Britain – we’re shit, merely acting like a ball and chain around your proverbial ankle.

It would, however, as much as the more hardcore Eurosceptics in this country may celebrate, be a disaster for Britain. By sitting on the sidelines while the rest of the EU moves ahead, not only would we no longer be able to influence the future direction of the EU project (after all, why would you listen to the kid who doesn�t want to play while you�re charging around the playground with your mates?), but we would no longer be able to maintain that wonderfully privileged position we currently hold of being one of the big three of European politics while maintaining a modicum of distance.

It is Britain�s ability to be involved – but not too involved thanks to our avoiding joining the Eurozone – at the heart of the EU which attracts non-European powers to us as a broker. Yes, us speaking the same language as America helps, but does anyone really think it is just a coincidence that the closest relationships the UK and US have shared in the post-war period have been since Britain joined the European Community?

Up until the early 1970s, the US refused to give us long range nukes, buggered up our chances at Suez, and repeatedly neglected to inform us of its Cold War plans. They were a rival as much as a friend – but a rival with far more power and against whom we had absolutely no leverage. After joining the EEC, Britain finally had something to offer – a subtle means of communication and influence with Brussels and the western European states, most of whom – at the time – resented the presence of US troops on their soil and the fact that it would be their homelands which would see the brunt of the damage in any hot war that grew out of America�s standoff with the USSR. Today, the US wants (though still doesn�t need) European support on the international stage – and Britain is its ambassador.

This position would be impossible to maintain if we are no longer close to the centre of EU power which, no matter how much anti-EU voices may claim we have little ability to influence anything in Brussels, at the moment we – along with France and Germany – most certainly are.

I am not claiming that if Britain fails to ratify the EU constitution there will be an instant implosion. In fact, there will be bugger all in terms of immediate change to our situation. But those EU countries which wanted to push ahead will resent what would effectively have amounted to a veto on their chosen direction from the British people. The attitude will be, if Britain is the only country to vote against, �fine – they don�t want to join in, they don�t want to move forward, so we�ll press on without them.� This won�t be immediate. It will take a few years, as the constitution is redrafted and renegotiated. But it will come. Britain is already seen as a reluctant partner – rejection of the constitution will tip this feeling over the edge into outright resentment.

The best outcome, if you take this pessimistic view of the constitution�s chances, is for any country OTHER than Britain to vote �No�. France would be an ideal choice, as the resentment would then be focused on to her – and there has been a lot of resentment of the French within the EU ever since Paris managed to negotiate various preferential terms for French exports and industry in the Treaty of Rome. France has continued to hold an influence in excess of her size or economic might ever since the 1950s, and a French �Non� would simply make this even clearer to the other EU member states. They would see France as voting against to maintain her own power, not for the good of the Union – and in subsequent renegotiations, France would find herself with too much resentment and opposition to get her way, just as would Britain.

But there is promise of a better candidate to both halt the constitution AND prevent acrimonious post-rejection squabbling. The “No” camp in Holland is currently leading in the polls with 60% – compared to just 21% for the “Yes” camp. That’s even worse than in Britain – and the Dutch referendum is less than three weeks away, on June 1st.

While the Netherlands may be small, it was one of the original six, so its reservations really couldn’t be ignored. There is far less history of anti-EU troublemaking there than in Britain, and Holland has less to lose than France from the constitution’s attempts to bring greater equality to the EU.

If Holland rejects, then the thing would actually be able to be reassessed in a rational, non-confrontational manner. It may be possible to finally take our time over this thing, and produce a blueprint for future change within the EU which is not only better, but clearer than the rambling vagaries of the current document. And, of course, Britain would not get the blame – which really should be the biggest consideration for anyone in the UK�s pro-EU camp.

If Britain is seen to bugger up the rest of Europe’s chances, the anger and irritation towards us will be even greater than that experienced by us towards the EU this week when we got told we had lost one of our opt outs. If Holland does it, the surprise will be such that genuine reassessment will be possible. Fingers crossed for June 1st…

When ARE the Tories going to realise that the hardcore anti-European fringe are not their way back to power?

The anti-EU parties (including here UKIP, Veritas, the BNP and the Greens, not all of which are by any means solely made up of disaffected Tories) between them got 1,109,987 votes. But I’d say it’s a safe bet that most people voting for the Greens weren’t doing so for their stance on the EU, so knock off their total, you’re left with just 852,229. Though this is more than the difference (in terms of popular vote) between the Tories and Labour, it’s nowhere near enough for a majority – just 68,000 votes. On top of that the anti-EU vote tends to be readily mobilised, so it’s unlikely there are many more of them knocking around.

I mean, I can fully understand why the withdrawalists reckon leaving the EU is the answer to all their problems (and it’s not just because some of them are barking), but the Tories really need to reclaim the positive side of the EU. I mean, after all, the EU got a lot of its impetus from Churchill, it was Macmillan who tried to get us in to start with, Heath who finally got us there, and Thatcher and Major who signed us up to a bunch of the subsequent treaties. Britain’s place in Europe is thanks to the Tories – it’s about time they reclaimed it, even if they have to do so with a slightly sceptical take.

A reserved pro-EU stance – acknowledging its major faults but with a positive message of evolution and change (which will be much easier to bring about with the new member states on board, tipping the balance of power away from France) – may not only be a handy way for the Tories to bring together their various sects, but is also what the pro-EU camp in this country sorely needs.

This could in turn bring back to the Tory fold some of the semi-sceptics – those who don’t like the way the EU is currently being run, but who don’t want to pull out altogether – while simultaneously allowing those who don’t really care much about the EU but who are put off by the often massively overblown rhetoric of the anti-EU camps to vote Tory without worrying that they’re going to be tainted by association. A lot of the reason for the repeated splintering of UKIP is that sensible eurosceptics simply didn’t want to be associated with the more rabid variety. The Tories need to appeal to the sensible ones while shutting out the mad ones, and work together with those pro-Europeans (like me) who want to make the EU better.

It is frequently fogotten, amidst all the invective, that there is actually a lot of common ground between the sensible eurosceptics and sensible europhiles – both groups can see the problems with the current EU. The Conservative party could make itself the place where they can come together to work out solutions.

(Inspired by and originally a dashed-off comment to this post on The Sharpener by our New York correspondent, Third Avenue.)

I am very glad she is still my MP, despite my not voting for her, and have just emailed her to that effect. Those members of the Labour party who have maintained their principles and have the guts to speak out in the face of yet another propaganda offensive from the Blairite core need the support not just of traditional Labour voters dissatisfied with the current leadership (and I am not one of those, having only ever voted Labour once before), but of all of us who value a healthy, accountable democracy.

An edited extract:

“May 5 will go down in history as the day when the myth of the great Blairite coalition was finally exposed. Tony was able to secure the support of 2 million fewer voters than Neil Kinnock did in 1992, the election that supposedly represents the crucible upon which New Labour was formed…

“Of course, it may well be that Tony Blair and those around him will be able to reach out to the disaffected. David Blunkett’s savage attack on “the self indulgent” voters who expressed disquiet over trivial issues like the death of 100,000 innocent Iraqi civilians may well herald the dawn of a new progressive centre-left consensus – but I have my doubts…

“The fact is that the process of renewing the party has to begin, and it has to begin today. Not in four years, not in two years, but now. Those who are calling for a “moment of calm reflection” should reflect on just how calm we will all be feeling in 12 months’ time if the collapse in our national support is repeated at the local elections or in a Euro referendum.

“That process cannot be started, never mind completed, by Tony Blair. Renewal cannot be accomplished by someone whose authority and popularity are so visibly eroding. We must move forward, not back. The prime minister has spent his premiership distancing himself from his party. Now the time has come for him to leave it for good.”

I was at that meeting at the Commons last night run by the Electoral Reform Society, and in the pub afterwards for the freaky experience of meeting a few other Britbloggers in the flesh. Open Democracy has a good write-up.

It was interesting, attempted to be realistic, had some bizarre moments, and Committee Room 14 (where I once had the fun of shaking Gorbachev by the hand, and where the Parliamentary Labour Party did their best show of loyalty to Blair earlier in the day) was packed to the rafters.

The overall message was simply that we have to make our voices heard, and the best way to do that at this early stage is keep as non-specific as possible. No suggestions of specific systems, just vocally pointing out the flaws in the current one. Build up the grass roots, push for local election reform first, and hope it builds momentum.

A few key quotes I managed to jot down:

Polly Toynbee (sub-par Guardian columnist)

• “gross distortion of the whole political process… you have to treat the electorate as if they were all idiots” (hadn’t noticed from your columns, Polly…)
• “for the moment what we need is a spirit of rebellion and revolutiion, the chartists, the suffragettes… money… huge demonstrations… from whatever side of the political process”
• “Let’s target every marginal seat with a member who doesn’t support reform” (this coming from the woman who only last week was telling her readers they were idiots if they voted tactically to send a message to Blair about Iraq… Just a tad hypocritical…)

Billy Bragg (Lefty singer/songwriter/activist)

• “there’s a huge amount of tribalism out there” (hence The Sharpener – trying to break down the ideological divide to enable proper, open debate with none of the usual petty protectiveness over individual party / ideological loyalties)
• “The Conservatives – how willing will they be to reform a system where a 1% extra share fo the vote gives them 30-40 extra seats? …we can’t kid them this is their way back to power”
• “take every opportunity to move the constitutional debate forwards”

Martin Linton (Labour MP)

• “people who were for the Labour government but not going to vote Labour… voting Green or Lib Dem in a constituency like mine does mean letting the Tories in” (he won after three recounts with a majority of just 163…)
• “probably the worst voting system in the world… we voted for a shift to the left and ended up with a shift to the right… it is the least sophisticated voting system in the world”
• “it has needed reform since the 1860s… you can’t toss a coin between three people”
• “of the people who voted Labour… 1 million said they were voting to keep another party our and 1 million Lib Dem voters said the same thing… so the popular vote is a very bad indication”

Chris Rennard (Lib Dem peer)

• “the simple fact we have to explain is that 36% of the electorate voted and got 55% of the MPs in parliament”
• “tactical voting is what a rotten and corrupt electoral system requires”
• “it is absolutely not about keeping the Conservative party out”
• “The House of Lords ironically is more representative of the country than the House of Commons” (too true – currently we need to reform the Commons before the Lords, I reckon – at least the Lords is doing its job properly)

Peter Tatchell (Gay/Human rights campaigner – speaking from the floor)

• “We need to learn the lesson of history for how people win democracy – chartists, suffragettes – the leaders will not listen to rational arguments… it is necessary to take to the streets, breaking the law”

In short, interesting, but with little in the way of concrete suggestions. There’s a vigil planned outside Downing Street on Tuesday 17th to coincide with the opening of parliament, but beyond that it looks like being a slow process.

Europhobia’s Matt chips in via email:

PR won’t get anywhere if it’s just mocking Blair and the tories. If it does that it links it too much to the political situation of today, and circumstances will change. If the Labour Party dumps Blair after next May’s elections, and the tories are still an ineffective minority (both of which are likely), what will we need PR for?

The rhetoric has to be timeless. This is about a better system for the next century.

For similar reasons, I wouldn’t take up the Chartists and direct action- smacks too much of class politics. We need to get the Conservatives onside. All the debates around radicalism in the 1760s revolved around creating a parliamentary system representative of and answerable to ‘the People’ (handily never defined). Perhaps its time to revive John Wilkes and Major Cartwright. Pitt the Younger was a reformer early in his career, too, so there’s one role model for the tories.

But I have a horrible feeling that any pro-PR campaign will end up like the pro-Euro campaign, staffed by true-believers for true-believers.

Splitting into factions is inevitable, as everyone has their own preferred systems (viz. the anti-European campaign, with UKIP splitting, splitting, then splitting again). So for the time being, any movement for reform has to avoid advocating any specific scenario.

Even the phrase “proportional representation” should, I reckon, be avoided – it summons up too many images of the loss of local representatives, strict proportionality by popular vote, a succession of chaotic and impotent coalition governments and the like, none of which are necessary outcomes of PR, but which are linked with it in the popular imagination.

The call is not for proportionality. The call is for fairness.

It’s big news, the European Parliament’s vote (378 to 262) to remove Britain’s opt out from the working time directive. But the focus has largely been on the fact that Labour’s MEPs voted with the Socialist group in the EP rather than follow the party’s official line, which was to maintain more flexibility. As this blog is nominally supposed to have a bit of an EU focus, have some:

There have been scare stories of understaffing and job cuts if a 48 hour maximum week is imposed, and scare stories of overworked and knackered doctors and firefighters and whathaveyous if it isn’t.

To be honest, I can see the merits of both sides of the argument. No regulations on working hours and employees can continue to be exploited (a certain person sitting not too far from me being obliged by contract to work as many hours as are needed to get the job done – without overtime pay); regulations on working hours and overly keen employees who have the luxury of getting overtime may miss out on extra pay.

Tricky, though I am beginning to lean towards the opinion of the eurosceptic Scotsman on this one. I also reckon it should be more than possible to prevent employee exploitation without putting caps on the number of hours they can work via better regulation of other areas of employment contracts. Because, let’s face it, when you’re offered a job you’ll often sign up for pretty much anything – if you don’t, someone else will.

Britain now has to gain a bit of extra support from our EU friends to get the thing thrown out at the Council of Ministers and then it’ll take three years to come into force, so it’s not over yet. Perhaps by the time that it is I’ll understand it all a bit better…

More at the European Parliament, EU Observer and The Financial Times. There’s also a handy working time directive Q&A from the Guardian.

Via The Sharpener, a particularly fine defence of abstaining from the whole damn mess at Stumbling and Mumbling:

“there’s something irresponsible about voting. A vote means you’re giving 100 per cent support to your candidate; there’s no room on the ballot paper for caveats. Isn’t it irresponsible to give unqualified support for someone whom you cannot recall for at least four years, and who – even if you sack him at the earliest opportunity – will get a big pay-off? And, what’s more, if this MP imposes costs onto the electorate through his stupid votes, you’ll bear no higher a burden of these costs than anyone else. That seems irresponsible to me.”

Good point well made. There’s a lot more that’s dodgy about the British electoral system than merely the lack of correlation between popular vote and number of seats.

Why is it only an MP’s party / constituency association which can sack him/her, not their constituents? Why do the central parties have so much control over candidates? Why is there no separation of powers? (Important sections of both the judiciary and the executive are STILL part of the legislature.) Why is our executive wholly unelected? (And they are – as members of the executive – the elected members of the cabinet have only been elected as MPs, just as Tony Blair has not been elected as Prime Minister, merely as MP for Sedgefield.) Why are the parties even allowed to use the whips to get people into line when they could well have been voted for by their constituents because their stance goes against the party’s on certain issues?

The whole thing’s a mess. The only thing that’s working as it should is the House of Lords – and that’s both been bastardised with little reasoning and is the one section of parliament most likely to see reform take place.

I may well pop along to that meeting tonight, if only so I can hear how massively confused everyone is about the whole thing.