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Campaign for a referendum?

Submitted by Bruno Prior on Tue, 26/06/2007 - 00:35

I don't like referenda. But it is perfectly obvious that the majority in the country does not believe that the "Reform Treaty" is not the Constitutional Treaty dressed up, and that they want a referendum on the subject as promised. And yet Tony and Gordon seem inclined to push on with ratification without allowing the public to have a say. The question is, what are people going to do about it?

If we leave it to the parliamentary process, Gordon will be able to ram it through despite opposition. People need to demonstrate their strength of feeling on this issue, to force him and his MPs to consider the electoral consequences.

The Telegraph has the right idea, but is botching the implementation. They have launched an online "petition" for a referendum on the subject. Except, it's not a petition, it's a poll (and as such will be accused, rightly, of not being based on a representative sample). And you have to register with their site in order to vote. Currently, 58 people have voted. I wonder how many clicked on the "Yes" button, but then, like me, gave up when they were asked to register with the site before their vote could be registered? This isn't going to work, and will be used by the Government to argue that opposition is negligible.

Even without these obstacles, the Telegraph website is the wrong place to do this. The Times, Mail, Express and Sun have all called for the Government to honour its commitment to a referendum. In this age of modern media, we ought also to consider the readership of the various blogs, and those who get their news from the TV, radio, or from one of the pro-Treaty papers (The Mirror, Guardian, and, to some extent, The Independent) but disagree with their stance on this issue. Most of these people are not going to go to the Telegraph website to register and vote.

What is needed is neutral territory, where all the papers, bloggers etc can point their readership to register their call for a referendum. There is one obvious location. The road-pricing protest showed its power. It is the No.10 petition site.

There are already a number of petitions on there on this subject, but none of them expresses the issue clearly and in a way that is likely to find the greatest common ground amongst the public. And the existence of several alternatives dilutes the message if people don't know which one to vote for.

We need a new petition, carefully worded to attract a range of opinion, from those who want a complete withdrawal, to those who support the European project but feel that there is a point of principle at stake here - for the Government to honour its commitment. Once we have a good form of words, a new petition should be created, and all the papers, pundits and other members of the media and the blogosphere (is the blogosphere part of the media? I'm never quite sure) who support the call for a referendum should run campaigns to point their readers, listeners or viewers to the petition to vote.

This must be concerted action. A half-cocked campaign that did not garner substantial support would be thrown back at opponents of the Treaty as evidence that the country does not feel strongly on the issue. But if the five papers mentioned, the blogosphere and independent TV and radio (e.g. TalkSport) threw their weight behind a petition, I am confident that they could comfortably beat the number of signatures garnered for the road-pricing petition.

So what should the precise wording be? Something along the lines of:

That Her Majesty's Government should not ratify the so-called Reform Treaty without putting it to a referendum of the people of the United Kingdom.

How would you change/improve this? Drop the "so-called"? I put it in, because I didn't want to imply acceptance that this was a fundamentally different treaty to the Constitutional Treaty by appearing to accept the alternative designation, but it is probably unnecessary. Will everyone know what is being referred to by the "Reform Treaty" or does it need more clarification? Should it refer to "honouring their promise to put it to a referendum", rather than simply "putting it to a referendum"? I kept it simple, because it offers less wiggle room for the Government to cavil about whether this Treaty is sufficiently similar to the Constitutional Treaty for their promise to be relevant.

Does this offer the option for the Government to hold a referendum and then ignore the outcome, and still be able to say that they complied with the terms of the petition? I reckon that would be a sophism too far, even for this Government, and that they would be destroyed at the next election if they tried it on. But if you think it needs tightening up, how would you clarify that the results of the referendum should be binding? Have I just answered my own question? If I make that "...putting it to a binding referendum...", does that do the trick?

Or is this whole suggestion barking up the wrong tree?

Poll result

Submitted by JG on Mon, 25/06/2007 - 14:04

Surprisingly, maybe, over two thirds of you were against the smoking ban on the principle that the government should not be able to intervene on our actions on private property. I suspect the figure would have been even higher if I had not mentioned smoking in the question... I do fear that this is just the start - the trend this government shows is to legislate and legislate and legislate. Until they have stamped out just about everything that can risk the slightest bit of harm to ourselves or others, they will continue to pass laws.

FOI reform - "Unnecessary, unpopular and undesirable"

Submitted by JG on Mon, 25/06/2007 - 13:49

Will one of Gordon's first acts of his premiership be to put behind him the scandal and sleaze of the Blair years and do a symbolic act and abolish all talk of freedom of information exemptions for MPs?  The Constitutional Affairs Select Committee is certainly for the abandonment of the "unnecessary, unpopular and undesirable" reforms.  Their report even concludes that "There is no objective evidence that any change is necessary.

"Green" taxes are just there to boost the Treasury's coffers

Submitted by JG on Mon, 25/06/2007 - 10:00

Keen readers of Picking Losers will know that I am not likely to become a fully paid up member of the Green lobby any time soon.  I do believe that we have a duty to look after the environment and that it is a duty we have neglected in the past.  However, much of the nonsense our politicians and members of the green lobby come out with are simply unbalanced opinions portrayed as fact; often with the intention of getting more money out the tax payer or pushing through a potentially unpopular policy packaged as a green measure.  Fuel tax is one of these areas.

The BBC's idea of business

Submitted by Bruno Prior on Mon, 25/06/2007 - 00:10

The BBC ran a half-hour promotion on Thursday night for government-funded investment in businesses or technologies that government judged to be promising. In other words, a promotion for picking losers (the policy, not the site, sadly). I'm sure the institutionally-biased BBC didn't think that was what they were doing, but that's what it was.

That advert was masquerading as one of their business programmes - Radio 4's In Business - which ought to be the last place that one would find such a concept promoted. But this isn't real business, this is the BBC's idea of business. Perhaps it is unreasonable to expect a commercial perspective from a state-funded organization, and from a business reporter (Peter Day) whose background is an English degree, four years with a Glasgow newspaper, and then a lifetime of service with the BBC. This guy has barely been close to a commercial organization or a set of accounts, let alone tried to run a business in a world of government-funded competition.

You can download an MP3 of the programme here (careful, it's a 12MB file). Those of a rational disposition may want to ensure that they have a punchbag (a BBC employee would be ideal) to hand before starting playback, to avoid stress-related injury due to excessive internalization of anger.

There was nothing wrong with looking at the issue of picking losers. But even the most Trotskyite of BBC producers [Tautology - Ed] might have to admit that there are two sides to this story. There was an almost complete failure to examine the arguments against, and plenty of commentary that said to the listener, in effect, "of course government should be picking losers". Let's look in detail at how the programme went about this issue.

Policy Announcements, Friday 22 June

Submitted by LP on Fri, 22/06/2007 - 15:17

Government  

  • Gordon Brown has said he has learned his lesson about "top-down" government and has pledged to involve ordinary people in his decisions. He told BBC News the public needed to be fully involved if big challenges like climate change were to be tackled. He also agreed that tax as a percentage of national income had risen under Labour, but said people supported the decision to increase NHS funding. The Tories have accused Mr Brown of being addicted to "state control".

Panic on the streets of London, Morris dancing in the corridors of power

Submitted by JG on Fri, 22/06/2007 - 11:15

"Panic on the streets of London, Panic on the streets of Birmingham, I wonder to myself, Could life ever be sane again?" So the song went. Now I don't think the Smiths had Lord Falconer and the Ministry of Justice in mind when they wrote these lyrics, but there is a certain aptness to them that allows them to be applied perfectly.

Sarkozy, The Constitution and Free Markets

Submitted by Bruno Prior on Fri, 22/06/2007 - 10:26

Some people claim that Nicolas Sarkozy is France's Margaret Thatcher. Yeah, right.

To quote from the BBC report:

"A reference to 'free and undistorted competition' was pulled from the draft [Treaty that isn't the Constitutional Treaty] after French pressure late on Thursday. Instead, the treaty refers to 'social cohesion' and 'full employment'."

Sarkozy did not hide his contempt for free trade during the election. This is consistent with his position. But those who thought they were getting an economic liberal, simply because they heard someone who talked tough on immigration and liked to swing a handbag, were fools.

Anyway, two good things stem from this.

Firstly, it is clear that this is not just a tidying-up exercise, and that this goes to the heart of what Europe is about. The Government has absolutely no excuse to deny the British public a referendum, given their promises that one would be held for any significant changes.

Secondly, Jose Manual Barroso, Angela Merkel and the rest of the con-merchants can no longer argue that certain aspects, such as voting rights, ought not to be opened up again, as they have already been settled. If something as fundamental as this is still subject to change, then nothing should be off-limits. We should support the Poles in demanding that the German stitch-up on voting rights be re-examined. They were right anyway, but now there is no excuse for trying to railroad them.

Stop this government backed monopoly

Submitted by JG on Fri, 22/06/2007 - 10:05

Like most men, I do like a good list. I could real off my top 3 greatest footballers, my top 3 meals, my top 3 films, my top 3 just about anything. Alas this is a political blog and not a Nick Hornby novel so I will save you from the controversial news that Teddy Sheringham is the greatest footballer of all time and that Kate Moss narrowly beats Sienna Miller to number one female in the world. My lists are subject to change every now and then, of course, as a comedian starts to sounds dated and a new comedy genius arrives on the block, for example.

Taxes flowing North of the border

Submitted by JG on Thu, 21/06/2007 - 13:34

I have long been a supporter of self determination. That is to say, if a country wants its independence then it should be granted, or in cases like Gibraltar (for example) if they want to remain part of the UK or return to being part of Spain then it is the citizens there who should decide. No-one else. Ever since 1998 when devolution was granted to Scotland from Westminster, the West Lothian question was a raging debate just waiting to explode.

Time to lay off them now and let common sense prevail

Submitted by JG on Thu, 21/06/2007 - 11:55

When exactly did smoking become the new paedophilia? They are the pariahs of modern society, and all common sense and decency can go to hell if it means the government and media can whip up a frenzy about these evil doers. There is the tale (it may well be true) about the paediatrician who had a baying mob outside his house calling for his blood and parents refusing to let their children out of the house until this man was removed from society, all because he had a brass plaque outside his home which doubled up as his place of work stating he was paediatrician.

The Liberal Tory Labour Party

Submitted by JG on Wed, 20/06/2007 - 10:35

The Tories are pledging to create an independent NHS board that will take the day-to-day running of the health service out of the hands of ministers. Brilliant! Who came up with that idea? As regular readers of Picking Losers will know (and just about everyone else who reads a newspaper) it was Gordon Brown. Instead of trying to create new policies and actually offer an alternative, the Tories are once again just pursuing the tactic that Cameron will be more trusted and liked than Gordon Brown so if they have the same policies they will win. It isn't going to work though.