Archive for the ‘Foreign Affairs’ Category

A long day!  Meeting of the 1922 this evening and a warm response to the position taken by the shadow cabinet.  Will it be enough or will the Liberals back Labour?  If they do then we as a country will be in serious trouble.  What we need is a stable administration able to govern for four or five years.  A Lib/Lab/SNP/PC/SDLP/DUP agreement = problems.

We as a party have worked in the interest of the country – will the Liberals do the same?

Guto

The following is a speech delivered by Sir John Major in Stoke on Trent to a fundraising dinner for Conservative Target seats in that part of the world.  It is a demolition of the Labour spin machine and an excellent analysis of the reckless lack of judgement shown by Gordon Blair (well they were always a two man team were they not?) since 1997.

I challenge anyone who wants a better future for our country to read this speech and not feel an immediate need to get out there and knock on doors to ensure that this failed Labour administration is soundly beaten on the 6th of May or even the 3rd of June if Gordon Brown bottles the election once more.

Guto

Invited to come – delighted to accept. 

Within weeks there will be a General Election.  Bias in the system means we need a big lead in votes to get a lead in seats.  Nothing can be taken for granted:  it will be hard pounding to get a clear majority.   

When we lost – in 1997 – we had been in Government for 18 years:  it was too long, and many electors thought a fifth successive win would be bad for democracy. 

But it is ironic that in May 1997 the electorate turfed out the only Government in the last 50 years to leave Office with every single economic indicator improving, and elected a Party that has ended up bankrupting the Nation. 

I don’t believe most people yet realise how seriously we are in debt.  The man who promised to end “Boom and Bust” has led us into the biggest Bust for 70 years.  Under Gordon Brown, debt is a runaway train.  During the three hours we are here for dinner this evening, the Government will have borrowed another £60 million and it is we – the taxpayers – who will have to pay it back.  We will – literally – be repaying Labour’s debts for the rest of our lives.    

The shocking reality is that – if we win the next election – David Cameron will face a far worse problem in 2010 than Margaret Thatcher faced in 1979.  Let me be blunt:  whatever the result of the election, nearly everybody in the country is going to see the quality of their life reduced.

Nor – as he does – can Gordon Brown blame anyone but himself.  For him to do so – with no acknowledgement of his failure – beggers belief.

This is, of course, very New Labour.  Self-preservation first.  And the truth nowhere in sight.

Of course there has been an international dimension.  But most of our problems are home grown.  Even without the financial crisis:

-        We would still be in recession. 

-        Debt would still be at record levels. 

-        Unemployment would still be blighting too many lives.

-        Our banking system would still have been poorly regulated.

-        Our pension system would still have been wrecked. 

-        Our education system would still need reform. 

-        Our health system would still be unable to cope. 

-        Our civil liberties would still have been compromised.

-        And our prison system would still be overflowing with prisoners who need not be there, whilst others who should be there are given early release.    

All that is pure New Labour Britain:  this is their legacy.  Not the Americans.  Not the speculators.  Not even the Bankers.  None of it can be blamed on anyone else.  Only on Labour:  they have damaged the lifestyle of millions for years to come.

For nearly everyone, their security in life is:  job;  home;  pension.  After twelve years of Labour, none of them is secure.  Jobs lost.  Homes fallen in value.  And Gordon Brown killed final salary-related pensions with a tax, and damaged personal pensions with economic mis-management.  He is responsible for a generation of poor pensioners.  Labour cannot be trusted to put this right:  no-one trusts the mugger to set the broken bones.

At the moment, there is a dangerous gap between politicians and public.  There is a lack of trust:  only the unvarnished truth at all times will correct this.  And politicians seem to talk a different language to the public.  We need to put that right.  Because we are a serious political Party we talk a great deal about the economy, or reducing debt, or becoming competitive – all of which are important – but we should recognise also that to millions of people that is simply abstract economics. 

It is why politics often seems so remote.  We should focus more on the hopes and fears people have in their daily lives.  Most of these are family orientated:

• Can I get back into work?
• Can I get the right school for my child?
• How quickly can / will I get treatment for an illness?
• Can I pay the mortgage – or get on the housing ladder?
• How can I get help with care for an elderly or sick relative; or care for a child that is damaged and has special needs?
• Can I get away from this sink estate?

These are the worries that keep people awake at night, and dominate their lives.  We need to think on this personal level.

I recommend a note on the desk of every MP.  It should read:  how does what I am about to do affect the people of this country?  That should be their first thought:  not “Is this popular?”  Or “Will it win votes?”.

We must end the culture of promises that can’t be kept.  The British people aren’t stupid.  They know we can’t go on living in a financial never-never land.  So – tell them the truth.  Tell them what Labour has done.  And what we must now do. 

Two years from now –when the legacy of New Labour will be at its worst ­– people must understand that the blame rests with the policies of Blair and Brown – not the remedies of Cameron and Osborne.    

As ever, Labour will try and shift the blame.  We mustn’t let them get away with that.  The blame must rest squarely where it belongs.  So, let us tell the truth about them with the same vehemence with which they lie about us.

After great crises often come great changes.  Gordon Brown is right about one thing – the world has changed.  Necessity compels us to cut our cloth according to our means.  With wise policy, we can turn this crisis into worthwhile policy. 

What can be done?

We could simply top-slice budgets, with everyone bearing an equal share of the pain.  That is easy to do – but a mistake.

Or we could prioritise. 

We could re-shape Government, reduce it in size, be selective about what Government does, cut out whole functions, abolish unnecessary bodies, cut quangos, end the billions wasted on consultancies, on rebranding, and on fake schemes that serve only as political window-dressing. 

We must wean the nation off the belief that good Government means high public spending on everything.  We must spend on priorities, but compassionate policies do not necessarily mean big Government.  Smaller Government is necessary for financial reasons:  but it is also desirable.  We are over-governed.  Tories should not be defensive about dismantling the intrusive power of the State. 

We should never accept that big is better.  Big Government inhibits and confines;  it weakens ambition;  it cuts back on opportunity;  it undermines enterprise.  Often, it is anti-libertarian.  For many people – unfamiliar with Government and perhaps unsophisticated about it – it induces wariness, even fear, of The Man in Whitehall.  Yet – in a free society – The Man in Whitehall – civil servant and politician – is the servant of the nation, not its master.  So it must be again. 

And we must lift our eyes beyond domestic concerns, to see clearly our role in the wider world.  Wealth is moving to the East:  unless we re-create a competitive economy, that will continue.  The choice is simple:  we either reform, or we become less relevant, less well-off and a political and economic backwater.

David Cameron has referred often to the “broken society”, and we all know what he means by that.  We have to sustain the family unit.  Cut crime.  End the culture of dependency.  Improve social mobility.  Last year, fewer homes were built than at any time since the 1940s.  That is truly shocking:  it leaves people trapped – and often without work – in poor communities. 

We need to move from a celebrity-drenched culture to an opportunity society.  And, for everyone’s sake, we need to give talent and genius free rein and promote excellence in education by levelling up, not levelling down.  And we should dismantle the Nanny society in which adults are treated like children and children are treated like adults.

We need to move away from a Government obsessed by presentation and short-term popularity, to one obsessed by serious policies and long-term results.  It’s time to say goodbye to this sound-bite society.  We should say to the electorate – these are our objectives and this is how we will achieve them.  The Agenda is huge and, in our complex world, none of it will be easy to deliver.  But we Conservatives have done it before, and now need to do it again. 

At the next election, New Labour will have yet another Big Lie.  They always do.  It’s in their electioneering DNA. 

In 1997, they told electors we would abolish the State Pension.  They knew this was a lie. 

In 2001, they claimed to have “saved the British economy”.  Another lie:  we Tories created the most competitive economy in Europe.  Labour wrecked it. 

In 2005, they said we would slash public services.  Yet another lie.  And now – as we know from leaked documents – they are themselves planning cuts of nearly 10%.

When I hear such barefaced deceit by Labour, I sometimes wonder if they have any self-recognition at all?  Have they lost all touch with reality?  Or is the truth a constant stranger to their political soul? 

In 2010, when the failures of their own record in Government have been so woefully exposed, we can be sure they will resort to attacking our personalities and policies – indeed they are already doing so.  Because they cannot defend what they have done, they will attack what they say we will do.  It’s an old tactic. 

So be ready for – at least – three Big Lies.

First, the old chestnut that “ruthless, heartless Tories don’t care”:  they say we will cut schools and hospitals first.  Why on earth would we do that?  Our children go to those schools.  We use these hospitals.  It is we – not Labour – who will cut the size of the State – precisely to protect the most vital services. 

As for Tories not caring – look at Charities and Community Services up and down the UK:  who are they supported by in every town and village?  Conservative volunteers.

Second, that “all Tories are toffs – they don’t know anything about ordinary people”.  What inverted snobbery – and what a grotesque travesty of the truth.  How many of you here this evening live a carefree and leisurely life?  How many of you have not – at one time or another – faced problems with bills, mortgages and family crises?  Of course you have – we all have.  As a boy, I look back with such affection on my own privileged upbringing – full of all the luxuries life offered in a multi-occupied, multi-racial house in Brixton.  This class-based politics, setting citizen against citizen, is just beneath contempt. 

Third, Judgement.  Gordon Brown has already set this kite flying, in his Party Conference speech.

Let me quote:

“I say the test for a Government is the quality of its judgement”.

Quite so Gordon.  So let’s take a look at the quality of some of Labour’s judgements over the last 12 years:

-         Was it good judgement – or even legal – to go to war in Iraq?

-         Was it good judgement to move into Afghanistan with no clear military objective?

-         Was it good judgement to under-equip our troops – both in Iraq and Afghanistan?

-         Was it good judgement to go on such a reckless public spending spree that we have become one of the most indebted nations in the world?

-         Was it good judgement to sell our Gold reserves at the very bottom of the market?

-         Was it good judgement to force through 24 hour drinking, which has led to an increase in drunkenness and inner city crime?

-         Was it good judgement to pile so much paperwork on the police that they spend more time form-filling and less time protecting our neighbourhoods?

If judgement is the test – Labour have failed spectacularly.

Over twelve years, New Labour have debased Parliament;  undermined an independent Civil Service;  taken us to war on a false premise;  embellished that error by linking Iraq to the 9/11 attack on New York for which there is not a shred of evidence;  affronted civil liberties in an over-reaction to the terrorist threat;  and made a mockery of the criminal justice system.

So I’m glad that Gordon Brown wishes to make judgement an issue at the next election.  Indeed, further on in his Party Conference speech, he entreats us all to do the same:

Again, I quote:

“A Party that makes the wrong choices on the most critical decisions …. should not be given the chance to be in Government”. 

Alas – for our country – New Labour have been given three chances too many.   They came in when the coffers were full, and – true to form – like every Labour Government we’ve ever known – they will leave the coffers empty.

The poet Philip Larkin once wrote:  “Most things are not meant.”  Labour did not mean to damage our national wellbeing, but they have.  They did not mean to damage our personal liberty, but they have.  They did not mean to undermine Parliament:  but they have.  Larkin was right:  “Most things are not meant”, but his poem is even more prescient than you may think.  It is entitled:  “Going, Going”.  Let us hope it is not long before this Labour Government is finally gone gone – and for good good.

The following is a copy of a letter sent to a local resident who wanted to know whether I would support a referendum on leaving the European Union.  I have removed his name and one paragraph to ensure that there is no way in which the individual can be recognised.  What do you feel about this issue?

Dear Mr ________,

Thank you for your e-mail.  From your message I would hazard a guess that you are an individual who would appreciate an honest response to a simple question.  As such I have to state that I would not advocate a referendum on our continued membership of the European Union.  I state this despite having a strong record on the European issue dating back to the mid 1990’s.

I was, for several years, a Council Member of Business for Sterling.  I sincerely believe that this business based campaign kept the UK out of the Euro and thus the worst aspects of monetary union.  In Business for Sterling we never advocated withdrawal since far too many businesses depend on being able to trade freely without any barriers with the two dozen and more countries which comprise the EU.  We should not, as a trading nation, create barriers or problems for our business community in their dealings with our main export market.  Business for Sterling did more to create a two speed Europe than any political party but it would not have happened if we had advocated withdrawal.

Following the winding-up of Business for Sterling I became a member of the think tank Open Europe.  We advocated a vote on the EU constitution by every means available to us.  Open Europe supported the Irish ‘no’ campaign in both referendums held in that country – with differing results as you know.  We held ten UK constituency postal ballots in order to show that there was a demand for a vote on the Treaty.  My efforts ensured that the Welsh constituency chosen was Aberconwy where we won a 90% ‘no’ vote on a 37% turnout.  The Labour Government did not listen.

As a Conservative candidate I would have supported fully a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty.  However, it is now ratified and advocating a Lisbon Treaty referendum would now be no more than a quixotic exercise in futility.

I believe strongly in the need to re-define our relationship with the EU.  I would be delighted to see the current two speed EU develop into a three or four speed Europe with some countries moving to an ‘even closer union’ but without the current insistence on taking everybody else with them on the journey.  I believe that a strong Conservative mandate would give William Hague and David Cameron the platform to negotiate a new relationship with Europe with some powers currently vested in Brussels being returned to the UK. 

I have a confidence in the UK being able to negotiate as effectively as the Irish and the Czechs did over Lisbon.  The Irish, a state of 4 million, saw their ‘no’ vote win them concessions on neutrality and the status of the Irish commissioner whilst the Czechs, a nation of 10m, had the audacity to insist on being excluded from regulations relating to property rights which would have seen Sudetenland Germans lay claim to property rights lost after the second World War.  As one of the main economies of the EU and a key treading partner of all the largest states I simply do not accept the UKIP view that we do not have the ability to change things for our own benefit.  Mrs Thatcher did so over our rebate (now surrendered by Labour) and John Major kept us out of the Social Chapter (again surrendered by Labour).  It can be done!  

In Aberconwy your choice is clear.  You can vote for me and have an assurance that I will support every move to bring a more flexible two speed EU into existence through diplomacy and, dare I say it, deals in the corridors of Brussels.  By voting for me, however, you will not elect an MP who will advocate an in/out referendum because I do not believe it to be the right thing to do. 

In terms of a in/out vote your choice will therefore be UKIP or the BNP.  Plaid, the Liberals and Labour are all committed to further integration.  I suspect that you would not vote for the racist BNP thus you are left with UKIP.  I am 100% certain that a vote for UKIP will not give you a referendum on leaving the EU since there is no chance of UKIP winning any representation at Westminster. 

I apologise for the length of this response.  I do share many of your frustrations and concerns with the nature of the current European Union.  I feel strongly that we need a much more flexible Europe for the benefit of all the component nations.  However, I do not advocate leaving the EU and would not want to be in a similar position to countries such as Iceland, Norway or Switzerland where they have to accept all EU regulations in order to trade with the EU without having any influence on the decision making process.

I have a real confidence that a Conservative delegation led by David Cameron and William Hague will be able to show that many of the worst developments of the past 12 years in our relations with the EU have not been a result of some wicked pact amongst the other countries but simply poor negotiations undertaken by a craven New Labour Government that was in thrall to the vision of Europe sold to the Trade Unions by Jacques Delors in the mid 1990’s.

Yours sincerely,

Guto Bebb

The expectation is that the Czech Republic will ratify the Lisbon Treaty within days.  When this happens the Conservative Party need to be ready to state with some clarity where we stand on the European issue.  Will there be a retrospective referendum on Lisbon?  Will we re-examine our relationship with the EU in detail?

Last night an interesting post appeared on the Conservative Home site written by Tim Montgomerie.  I found it to be an interesting commentary on what could prove to be a more effective way of dealing with the ambitions of the anti-democratic EU elite than a difficult post ratification referendum on Lisbon.

As a former member of the Council of Business for Sterling in Wales and a member of Open Europe (who campaign for a more democratic and less centralised EU) I have always held strong views about the EU 'project' but have seen the option of voting for UKIP as nothing more than a desperate protest vote.  Will the proposals outlined within the Conservative Home site provide a policy on the EU which will both satisfy the need to reduce the influence of the european institutions whilst also keeping those who want a referendum on Lisbon on side?  I'm not sure but would appreciate your views.

Guto   

Labour were at it again at their conference attacking mainstream Poltical Parties in Eastern Europe in order to try and score cheap and nasty political points against the Conservative Party.  The letter, re-produced below in full, is a pretty comprehensive demolition of the childish jibes of Miliband.  Read the letter and then ask yourself a simple question; who would you prefer to have speaking fro Britain on the World Stage?  William Hague or the 'novice' David Miliband?

Dear David, 

I was appalled by some of your remarks in the speech you gave to the Labour Party conference. I do not understand why the Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom should choose to recycle false Soviet propaganda, apparently for the cheapest party political purposes.

As Foreign Secretary you must surely know the true facts and historical circumstances. You must know that to describe the Latvian forces who fought the Soviets as ‘Waffen SS’ is misleading. As you ought to know, the American Displaced Persons Commission declared in 1950 that ‘the Waffen-SS units of the Baltic States (the Baltic Legions) are to be seen as units that stood apart and were different from the German SS in terms of goals, ideologies, operations and constitution, and the Commission does not, therefore, consider them to be a movement that is hostile to the government of the United States’. You should also be aware of the fact that, far from being treated as war criminals, those Latvians who became British prisoners of war were allowed to settle in the United Kingdomby the Labour Government of the time. I am very surprised that you appear to think that you have better judgement in this matter than Clement Attlee.

You must know that TB/LNNK form part of the coalition Government in Latvia. You must know that the majority of Latvia’s political parties, the majority of parties forming Latvia’s current Government including the Prime Minister’s party, have attended the commemoration of Latvians who fought in the Second World War. Your remarks are a slur on the reputation of a country that is a good friend to Britain and a close ally in NATO and the EU. There is a real danger that you could damage relations with Latviaand other countries who suffered under totalitarian Communist rule. More broadly, by endorsing Soviet propaganda as fact you implicitly denigrate the oppression of tens of millions of Eastern Europeans under Communism and abet those who still try to justify the crimes of the Soviet era. I suggest that you withdraw your remarks immediately and apologise to TB/LNNK and the Latvian Government.

My colleague Eric Pickles’ record of combating anti-Semitism and other forms of racism speaks for itself. Your allegation that he defended the Waffen-SS is contemptible and I hope you will have the good grace to apologise to him.

I was also shocked that you chose to repeat smears made against Michal Kaminski without any apparent effort to check the facts. Had you done so, you would have known that Michael Schudrich, the Chief Rabbi of Poland, has said that his remarks have been misrepresented, that it is a gross slur to suggest that Michal Kaminski has a neo-Nazi past and that Mr Kaminski has a noted record for denouncing the elements of anti-Semitism that still linger in Poland. Did you not wonder why, if your allegations were true, the Israeli Government welcomed Michal Kaminski on an official visit to that country last month? I strongly suggest you apologise to Michal Kaminski for your disgraceful remarks. 

It is true that it is unwise for people in glass houses to throw stones. So how do you justify that fact that in the last European Parliament Labour MEPs sat alongside an MEP from the Polish Self-Defence Party, whose leader has praised Adolf Hitler, and the Italian MEP Giulietto Chiesa, who has promoted the conspiracy theory that the CIA was responsible for 9/11? Does it not cause you some unease that while so many of our allies in the European Parliament were active in the struggle for democracy east of the Iron Curtain so many of your allies were Communist Party members at the time, including two Polish MEPs named by the official Institute of Polish National Remembrance as collaborators with the secret police?

Democratic politics is at its best when it is a civilised and constructive debate between different points of view. It is deeply regrettable that you have listened to those who prefer the politics of slur and smear. Your duty as the country’s Foreign Secretary is to support our nation’s good relations with our allies. By putting your immediate partisan interests before that duty you have fallen short in that responsibility.

Yours sincerely,

The Rt Hon William Hague MP

I'm very open about my views about the European Union.  I was an active member of the Council of Business for Sterling in Wales and later played a key role in attracting the 'I Want a Referendum' campaign to the Aberconwy Constituency.

I'm opposed to the idea of the UK joining the Single Currency and feel a sense of betrayal at the way in which the Liberal Democrats colluded with the Labour Government to stop the people of this country having a vote on the Lisbon Treaty.  I was even in Ireland during the referendum held by the Irish State which resulted in a substantial no vote.  As with any vote opposing further powers to the European Union the Irish have been told to think again and come back with the response demanded by the anti-democratic European elite.

However, I have always been confident that my view of an Europe of co-operating states can be achieved best through working within the Conservative Party.  I understand the views of those who voted for UKIP and I met plenty of local residents who intended to vote for that party at the Euro elections in May but I feel that they are wrong.  A single issue party will not, ultimately, change the way in which Europe works.  The Conservative Party can.

A key promise made by David Cameron when he stood for the leadership of the Conservative Party was to leave the European Peoples Party group in the European Parliament.  Not before time.  The EPP is a right of center grouping in the Christian Democrat tradition.  I would agree with them on many economic issues and some social issues but they are a Federalist Grouping.  On the most important issue facing Europe the views of the Conservative mainstream are completely at odds with the views of the European Peoples Party.  If the Conservative Party were to be serious about communicating a new agenda for an Europe of co-operating nation states than we simple had to leave the EPP.  And that is what David Cameron has delivered. 

People often question the willingness of David Cameron to take difficult decisions that go against the grain of the London media elite or the BBC.  People asked whether he was willing to shake the Conservative europhiles from their complacent acceptance of the European agenda once elected to Brussels.  In his decision to leave the EPP and form a new, Eurosceptic alliance (The European Conservatives and Reformists) David Cameron has shown leadership, integrity and political courage.

The new grouping has been met with outrage by the few remaining Europhiles masquerading as Conservatives in the European Parliament and with smear any inaccurate attacks on our partners by the media elite of the UK.  Articles have appeared in many national newspapers accusing the Conservative and Reformists Group of everything from being stridently homophobic to being crudely and violently prejudiced against the Jewish people.  These accusations have been made by the usual rent a quote Labour MP Dennis McShane and many other hardened europhiles.  Unfortunately one of the most vocal has been Edward McMillan Scott MEP who has been thrown out of the Conservative Group following his personal and vicious attempts to smear the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists, Michael Kaminski MEP. 

In a full rebuttal of the claims made by the awful McShane and McMillan-Scott, the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists has written eloquently for the ConservativeHome website.  I would ask readers to consider his arguments before accepting the media narrative peddled in the UK by the BBC, The Guardian and others.

As for the people in Aberconwy who voted UKIP and questioned David Cameron and his willingness to make the correct decision regardless of the media response – this episode should give you confidence.  

GUTO BEBB      

New development

William Hague has written to Edward McMillan-Scott providing him with conditions for acceptance back to the Conservative and Reformists Group.  They are reightly harsh and I suspect that a man who stood on a platform of leaving the EPP only in May will not have the character to accept that he was wrong, ill-informed and frankly devious in his comments about Michael Kaminski.