Telegraph launches petition for a referendum

The petition which you can sign here is supported by an article from Dan Hannan MEP.  This is the beginning of Dan's excellent piece:

"Suppose – and you might not find this easy – that you were a committed Euro-federalist. Imagine that you wanted the EU to go the whole hog, totus porcus, toward statehood. What would you have most wanted to get out of the recent Brussels summit?

In fact, much of your work would already have been done. The EU currently possesses many of the attributes and trappings of nationhood: a parliament, a supreme court, a passport, a currency, a national anthem, a flag, external borders. There are, though, four more pieces to slot into the jigsaw before the EU can properly call itself a sovereign polity.

First, a head of state. Second, a foreign policy, complete with a foreign minister, a diplomatic corps and accredited embassies. Third, a system of criminal justice, including a European Public Prosecutor and a police force. Fourth, the "legal personality" of an independent government, which confers treaty-making powers and the right to sit in international associations.

All these things are in the draft "Reform Treaty" – along with the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the abolition of some 40 national vetoes, new powers for the European Parliament and a 30 per cent reduction in Britain’s ability to block new initiatives..."

Read the rest here.

Comments

[Donal Blaney]

I don't think I have come across anyone who has Dan's grasp of the English language and his downright common sense. Yet again he has hit the nail on the head.

[Chris Palmer]

My thoughts exactly Donal. It is an excellent piece and well worth reading.

[Ken Stevens]

I fully support the call for a referendum but I don't want to sign up as a Telegraph blogger (I started registration but didn't understand profiles/titles etc.Why is it confined to PC experts?!). Is there another button to press just to vote?

[Donal Blaney]

Maybe ConHome can start a petition from the grassroots to keep the pressure on the party leadership - just in case the strategists begin to worry and the foot is taken off the gas...

[John Moss]

Sign up to the 10 Downing Street website petition.

2m signatures on this is by far the most likely to be seen as "news-worthy" by the BBC and dead tree press and, hence, have the impact required to force Brown to offer a referendum.

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/EU-treaty-NON/

[Denis Cooper]

Yep, I'm afraid it's a bit too complicated and time-consuming - as Ken Stevens said it needs to be simpler to sign up to the Telegraph petition, in fact preferably simpler than signing up to this petition to the Prime Minister:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk:80/EU-treaty-NON/

"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to guarantee that the British people will be permitted a binding referendum on any and all attempts to resurrect the EU "constitution" (and any or all of its content) regardless of nomenclature."

[the man from auntie]

Call it schadenfreude.

Tonight's hatchet job on Brown by the excellent John Ware on the Panorama programme shows that, now they have him where they want him, certain sections of the media are going to crucify the incoming Prime Minister.

Let us hope that David Cameron has the gumption to take advantage of this.

[frustrated tory voter]

Looks like the Tories are back to squabbling over Europe rather than acting as an effective opposition.

[Matt Davis]

At a time when the current Govt is trying to sign away our sovereignty, and so help to create a Euro superstate, being seen to be in active opposition to this betrayal, a betrayal that is so very strongly opposed by the vast majority of British voters, is most certainly being an effective opposition and exactly what the electorate have a right to expect from us. So why don't you handful of europhiles stop trying to pretend that you are "frustrated tory voters" in a pathetic attempt to prevent that. Opposing this "treaty" is unquestionably a vote winner and not just with existing Tory voters.

[Traditional Tory]

Fantastic work by Dan Hannan. There is the kind of man we want to see leading the party in the very near future.

Cameron was only going through the motions today, but be that as it may he has finally committed himself to democracy.

He'll be leading from the rear, but now's the time for the rest of us to move forward for Britain against the tyranny of the EU.

[frustrated tory voter]

Matt Davis, why don't you just go and join UKIP. Go on, you know you want to.

Or are you already a member and are just making a "pathetic attempt" to stir up trouble within the Tory party?

[tapestry]

The need to resist the Constitution, and the need to boost Conservative support should not be taken as one and the same.

Cameron cannot win a vote in the House of Commons without Cross Party support. The more our resistance to the Constitution is billed as Conservative resistance, the harder it will be for Labour rebels to vote with us in a division.

It is a national, cross-party issue. The Conservative Party is providing the lead role through Hague and Cameron, but there must be room for as many Labour and Lib Dem MPs to express their resistance in a joint campaign as possible.

A petition should not be a Conservative or Telegraph owned one ideally, but a national petition.

[frustrated tory voter]

Tapestry, Spot on! You are the voice of reason and common sense.

[Torygirl]

Tapestry I agree. it is our country which is at stake here, forget party politics. The Tories need to get the support of people like Kate Hoey and Frank Field.

[Ash Faulkner]

Just been listening to Nigel Farage on talkSPORT radio. He came across very well indeed, very much a conviction politican, no spin, straight answers. Rather Thatcherian, one might say.

It's a pity he's not leading our party, though the problem is he harks on about Europe disproportionately so I don't imagine he'd do us much good on bread and butter issues. I reckon he'd make an excellent Foreign Secretary, though.

[bgp]

The points about the Telegraph poll (it's not a petition) are right - it's not easy enough, and it's the wrong place for it. The No.10 petition site is indeed the right place for it, but the petition indicated in a couple of comments is not worded ideally - the Government will simply quibble about whether the Reform Treaty is an attempt to resurrect the constitution, and argue that a constraint to hold a referendum on any treaty that contained any content from the draft constitutional treaty was an absurdly restrictive requirement that a democratically-elected government could not possibly accept. It needs a new, carefully-worded petition, and then a concerted campaign from The Telegraph, Times, Mail, Express and Sun (who all seem to support a referendum), the blogosphere and perhaps some commercial radio and TV (e.g. TalkSport - I assume we can count the BBC out) to point people at the petition. Like others have said, this should not be a Conservative or a Telegraph campaign - it needs to be as broad as possible.

If you agree it needs a better-worded petition, I have asked for suggestions/comments at pickinglosers (linked from my initials below).

[Torygirl]

The Telegraph should get an on line and telephone poll. The media should be getting behind the public's request for a referendum and supply the means by which to push Brown into giving us one.

[Treacle]

Ash Faulkner

Clearly you have never met Farage.

If he told me the sky was blue I would go outside to check

[David Belchamber]

Dan Hannan once again writes persuasively, summarising an important issue in the simplest possible English.
Can we not encourage him to become an MP, rather an MEP, where he can do so much more good for the tories and the country as a whole?

[Peter]

Assuming Dan Hannan would agree, I hope the Tory party will shortlist him. We need men who can encapsulate the issues and go for the jugular - something the party has lacked ever since Lord Tebbit retired from the main scene.
This is what the Sun readers understand. Cut out the subjunctives and weasle words, and
call a spade a spade. Tell the people that the EU is a corrupt and unaudited Franco-German racket, which is on course to to become effectively the fourth Reich. It will soon have the legal ability to declare war without our agreement , and commit our young soldiers to die for Brussels. At least we can vote our Government out of office - this cannot happen in the EU.
Until the Roman victory in the Third Punic War, Cato the Elder used to end all his speeches in the Roman Senate with "Carthago delenda est" - Carthage must be destroyed. I would like similar minded politicians today saying " 'Europa' delenda est ".
Only with the destriction of this corrupt, Hitlerite monster, will we be free again.
"Europa" delenda est.

[Daniel]

I want an immediate referendum so that we can vote NO and leave the coming Fourth Reich!

Say NO to centralization. Say NO to anti-democratic EU. Say NO to ever increasing regulation (EU, a free market it is not).

Say YES to decentralization. Say yes to national democracy. Say yes to deregulation.

Only by a united conservative party fully opposing this undemocratic monstrosity (EU) can we win the next election.

We are better off out.

And what's more, traitors like Heseltine and Clarke must be thrown out of the party.

[F A Trowern]

add my name to list of petitioners