‘G’.   What does the proposed new Constitution have in store for us?

 

The worst feature of this Constitution is that the EU will acquire its own legal personality, superior to that of the Member States. There is no longer even the pretence that the EU is an arrangement between sovereign nations.  The EU, the Brussels system, becomes Sovereign.  The EU flag, which at the moment is flown as mere advertising, becomes real.  The EU anthem becomes the anthem of the new MEGA-STATE. (Alas, poor Beethoven!)

 

The Prime Minister [THE GREAT DECEIVER] claims that he defended his ‘red lines’ at the Inter-Governmental Conference on 18^th June 2004 (21), which decided the Constitution’s final shape.  These include foreign policy, social security and tax.  But large chunks of these areas have in fact already been ceded to the Treaties.

 

For Instance- Mr Blair’s red –line on tax is clearly a red herring [Surely Not!].

 

If you look at the tax provisions of the Treaties (Clause 93 of the Treaty Establishing the European Communities) you see that we have indeed retained the veto for indirect taxation.  The Treaties are silent on direct taxation as such, but if you look at the Single Market provisions (Clauses 43 and 44) you will see that all direct tax is exposed to the ‘anti-discrimination’ and ‘right of establishment’ provisions.  In other words, the Commission could claim that our direct tax system gives us an unfair advantage over the member states.  When the Court agreed, we would have to fall in line.

 

It is a little known fact that the Court has already moved into corporation tax, and has issued some 90 judgements, usually against nation states keeping control of Multi-National companies’ dividend policy.etc. (22)

 

M. Giscard D’Estaing, who drafted the proposed Constitution, has done us all one great favour.  The wording of the document is really easy to understand; it is written in the usual impenetrable verbiage of the Treaties.  Anyone who takes the trouble to read it can understand it.  Even so, there is one attempt at Euro-deception.  The Constitution introduces the concepts of ‘Exclusive Competences’ and Shared Competences’.  ‘Competence’ itself is an old Euro-deceptive word.  It does not mean being able to do something well.  It means ‘Power’, and it usually means power transferred to the EU, where of course it is always exercised incompetently, and corruptly.

 

So the Exclusive Competences are clear enough; the EU alone can act in those areas of our national life, which are transferred to the EU’s Exclusive Competence. (Mostly concerning competition, customs and the power to make international treaties).

 

The description lies in the ‘Shared Competences, where you could be forgiven for thinking that power might be shared with Member States. 

 

Not a Bit of it.

Member States can only act in areas covered by ‘Shared Competences’ when Brussels can’t be bothered, and with Brussels’ permission.  These ‘Shared Competences’ are pretty wide.

 

They include the internal market, which covers all of our commerce and industry, the ‘area of freedom, security and justice’- so our legal system and judicial procedures will gradually pass to Brussels’ control.

 

Our agriculture and fisheries (of course).

 

All European transport and trans-European networks.

 

Our energy (bang goes our oil and gas).

 

Social Policy.

 

Economic, social and territorial cohesion -which will mean almost anything when the Luxembourg ‘Court’ gets going.

 

Our environment.

 

Consumer protection.

 

Common safety concerns in public health matters’.

 

Not much left, you might think. (23)

 

Sitting astride and above all this is not only the superior legal power of the new Union.  There is also the fact that the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights will be all embracing and justiciable in the Luxembourg ‘Court’. (23)    Even the Europhile Confederation of British Industry is worried about what the new right to strike, etc. will do for our international competitiveness.

 

The Eurocrats pretend that the Constitution returns power to national Parliaments because the Commission has to reconsider a new law if one-third of national Parliaments don’t like it.  But the Commission can go ahead anyway. So this is no big deal.

 

When we come to debate the Constitution, we really mustn’t fall for one of the best tricks up the Eurocrat’ s sleeve.

 

The trick is to proclaim that some feature of the Constitution is ‘nothing new’ because it is already in the Treaties, as though that makes it acceptable to the British people. It doesn’t.

 

If much of our Sovereignty has been taken away when we weren’t looking, that should not stop us from demanding it back, now we have discovered what has been going on.