The EU’s Militarized
Police
The Eurogendarmerie practise their street-fighting tactics in battle formation. George Orwell’s novel 1984 describes the typical totalitarian police state, where the prime purpose of the police is not really to stop crimes against people and their property, but crimes against the State, which is whatever the State calls a crime.
S O S
With the 2nd reading of the “EU Amendment Bill” underway, I have changed the format of this issue to accommodate two reports on the threats it will pose to one thousand years of democracy if it is ratified by Parliament. The first, which follows, is by Torquil Dick-Erikson, (1.8.07; updated 5.1.08) a commentator on legal affairs and by extension continental inquisitorial vs Anglo-Saxon systems, who writes in English and Italian law journals and was a contributor to the House of Lords report on Corpus Juris (HL 62, 9th Session 1998-99). His report has been compiled primarily from the Eurogendarmerie’s official website, the Treaty of Velsen (esp. articles 6.3 and 44) and the Portuguese Presidency website. The second report, by Professor Anthony Coughlan, Dublin, describes the supranational state created by the Lisbon Treaty. ~ Iris Binstead
1984 TO COME TRUE SOON?
by Torquil Dick-Erikson, MA Oxon
In the image above, you will notice two nationalities of policemen – the ones on the right are Italian Carabinieri (it is written across their shields), military police in Italy under a centralised national command. Though part of military police and Italian army, they are used as a “civilian” police force, and they are stationed in every borough and hamlet, tasked to keep public order. The ones on the left are from one of the other four countries that so far have decided to participate in the Eurogendarmerie force. They are still wearing their national uniforms, since a single “harmonised” EU gendarme uniform has not yet been issued, but they have the EU armbands (see above) which they all wear over their national uniforms.
They are standing here in locked-shield formation, like ancient Roman legionaries, to protect themselves from assaults by demonstrators, or from stones or other objects which might be thrown at them. The little patch of flames in front of them is presumably a Molotov cocktail which in their simulation some “subversive” demonstrator has thrown at them. They are being trained to deal with this sort of thing. From this formation they can fire tear-gas grenades over the heads of, or straight into, a crowd to disperse it (they are wearing gas-masks so as not to breathe in the gas themselves), or indeed rubber, or more usually lead, bullets; and when ordered they will charge forward swinging their batons, and anybody who is in their path is likely to get pretty seriously injured.
Today, as the nation states of Europe lose their borders and prepare to merge into one single European State, we must realise that the continental traditions of policing, like their traditions of criminal justice, are very, very different from ours. And since they are the majority, it will inevitably happen – if the planned merger goes ahead with the new Treaty – that their system will be imposed on us.
Not many know that, for example, the first chapter of the Italian criminal code (listing of course the most important and heinous crimes) is entitled “Of crimes against the personality of the State”. The code used today is still the one left by Mussolini, tinkered with over the last sixty years but never properly overhauled, let alone replaced. And in its overall approach Mussolini actually took his cue from the French, that is, Napoleon, of course.
There has been concern in Britain about surveillance cameras etc, of which there are more in the UK than in any other EU state. Well, we do feel uneasy with them at present, but not too alarmed because we feel we still have a government we can “trust” not to abuse them in fundamental ways. . .But what if a future, more tyrannical, government comes in? The line of reasoning that most people take in Britain when debating this issue is based on the assumption that in any case the government we shall have will always be a British government, that is, elected by, and dismissible by, the British voters.
But this assumption is no longer justified.
In discussions earlier this year we heard Angela Merkel quoted as saying that “The EU needs more and better defined powers than it has at present: in energy policy, in foreign policy, in justice and home affairs,” – the key here being the last item, JHA. And Blair raised no objections to that.
So the risk is looming of indeed a future, unknown and unfamiliar, government in charge of our JHA, and it not being a British government, but an EU government. How would the people of Britain feel about their CCTV footage being scrutinised, not by British bobbies, but by German policemen, wearing EU uniforms or EU armbands over their German uniforms?
This is not just a theoretical risk.
And something we must realise is that German/French/Spanish/Italian etc policemen are not just like our own, only wearing different uniforms and speaking another language.
The fact is that the whole continental tradition of policing is different from ours, as a glance at the European Gendarmerie Force website will make clear. And we can see from this website that they have already set up the nucleus of their paramilitary, armed, anti-riot battalions, organised in the continental style.
So the high-surveillance machinery is set up in Britain, the heavily repressive police forces and the unelected and undismissible government apparatus is set up in Brussels, and our own government seems to be ready to hand over and join these two together. We are very nearly in 1984.
The EU is preparing for that moment, of physical confrontation with dissent against its authority, and intending to suppress it with sheer, overpowering, paramilitary, brute force, in a way that British people who have always lived in Britain will find astounding.
Have a look at the pictures on the European Gendarmerie Force website. This sort of use of paramilitary police is quite common in continental European countries and people there are accustomed to it. Indeed these photographs, which are possibly a bit shocking for us Brits, are taken from the Eurogendarmerie’s own official website. They think this is all quite normal. They have published these photographs, evidently not thinking that anyone would be at all shocked or surprised by them.
On the 18th October 2007, the same day as the new EU “Reform Treaty” was agreed in Lisbon under the media spotlight, another Treaty was signed in Velsen, Holland, between the 5 EU member states participating in the Eurogendamerie, to put it on an official footing. Britain was not amongst the signatories, because not having a militarised police force the UK is not entitled to take part.
EU military police can enter Britain
However, article 6.3 of this Treaty, the full text of which can be accessed through a link on the European Gendarmerie Force website, provides that other member states can join in with this particular form of presumably “enhanced” cooperation, simply by “agreement” of the country concerned. Since our Parliament already approved the provisions on “enhanced cooperation” (whereby states that wish to forge ahead in certain areas may do so without waiting for the agreement of all the others) with the Treaty of Nice, it is possible that this simply means “with the agreement” of the government of the day, that is, without need for any new specific Act of Parliament.
EU military police will only leave if the EU orders them to leave
On December 11th 2007 Bob Spink MP in the Commons debate (Hansard, col 188) prior to the signing of the Treaty of Lisbon asked Miliband for an assurance that the Eurogendarmerie will never be allowed into the UK. No such assurance was given, and Miliband confirmed that they could enter Britain with Britain’s “consent”, presumably just the consent of the government. What he did not mention and what was not spelt out was the (obvious) fact that once the EGF is inside a country, it will not leave that country simply because that country’s national authorities tell it to leave, for it will not recognise those authorities, but only its own supreme authority in Brussels.
EU military police may be Turks
Another disturbing element of the Treaty of Velsen is in article 44 which provides for the recruitment of Eurogendarmes not only from member states but also from “candidate states”. Indeed the Portuguese EU Presidency’s website, announcing the signing of this Treaty, stated that Turkey had already shown interest. So when the EGF does come over to Britain, we could find ourselves being policed by Turks in EU uniform. Even if they are excluded from being full members of the EU because their human rights record is not good enough, and torture in Turkish police stations is reported to be commonplace, the Turks are evidently considered good enough to be recruited as policemen to police us.
Please note – these are not soldiers, they are European riot-control policemen. They are actually members of the Spanish Guardia Civil as you can see from the flashes on their left shoulders, and it is written on the flak jacket of the man standing on the left of the picture, but if you look at their right upper arms you will just glimpse the royal-blue armband of the European Gendarmerie Force – which has as its emblem a circle of little yellow stars, and in the middle a “sword and a flaming grenade, symbolising the common military root of European police” (this logo and the armband are fully explained on their website).
This “military root” we need hardly say, may be “common” to the police forces of continental Europe, but it is utterly alien to our own policing traditions. Note their steel helmets, and their heavy automatic rifles, carried here by the Guardia “Civil”, by what they are pleased to call a “civilian” police force. . .
Europeans distrust police
In continental Europe, our idea of “policing by consent” is considered a bizarre and incomprehensible contradiction in terms. Of course one of the duties of continental police is to tackle crime. But they are also regularly and normally considered to be a fairly blunt instrument whereby the State imposes its will on the citizenry in general. It has always been that way. They are occasionally admired, more often feared, and sometimes hated by the population at large, law-abiding and criminal elements alike. They are seldom recruited locally.
One unfortunate result is that whenever they try to investigate a crime, they often receive little help from the public – people are most unwilling to “step forward” (hence the phenomenon of omertá – which is a tremendous obstacle to any serious police detective work). So the extent to which crime goes unchecked is often higher on the continent than in the UK, although it is worsening in the UK as we are
being brought into line with continental practice, with our own policemen being taken off the beat and so out of that daily contact with the local population, which would enable confidence and trust to be built.
As we know, unlike in Britain, all continental police carry lethal weapons at all times. In the simulated exercise above, the protester has been handcuffed and arrested, and is being led off to prison.
EU criminal code – Corpus Juris – no Habeas Corpus
Incidentally, under the proposed Corpus Juris EU criminal code, which reflects most continental procedures, on arrest a person may be held for up to six months in prison, renewable for three months at a time, with no right to a public hearing in the meantime, nor any obligation on the prosecution to exhibit any evidence. This is what happens when there is no Habeas Corpus, as indeed there is no Habeas Corpus in the nations of continental Europe to this day.
I remember reading a few years ago that the present UK government started a centralised militarised police force of sorts with a “Ministry of Defence police” – who at once got called “ModPlods”. Until we get a centrally commanded British paramilitary police force, we won’t be allowed to join the Eurogendarmerie. This is doubtless why the Home Secretary made the announcement earlier this year about the centralising of police under government control which caused the letter of protest published in the Times from former Deputy Assistant Commissioner Roach. The criteria for a national force to join the EGF are displayed on their website.
Combating fellow-countrymen
The fact of having different nationalities drilling side by side is clearly part of a “harmonisation of police” plan, so as to create a unified European military police force. This is frightening because the European Union is not democratic and not accountable. The possibility that sooner or later the military police will be manipulated and will be fighting the people is very high. The CV of the former French general who led the force indicates that his main professional expertise was in confronting and combating his fellow-countrymen when they try to riot in the streets.
The best way to stop these fellows from coming over to the UK and demonstrating their skills on a high street near you, is – as a very first step – to make sure that as many people in Britain see the European Gendarmerie Force website.
This will help people to realise with some urgency that the EU is NOT just about our prosperity, it is about our very basic freedoms, and what in an old-fashioned phrase used to be called our national security – the safety of each and every one of us.
And it should help each and every one of us to realise that a merger with our continental neighbours will NOT just mean that things will carry on much as before, only on a larger scale.
We must realise that our continental neighbours have a very different history from ours and do not share many of our traditions, in particular our traditions of policing, and in a merger their voice will prevail over ours, and our traditions will be uprooted and erased, and their traditions, new, unfamiliar and alien to us, will be imposed on us. Their ability to control the EU’s military police will be lost as well because they will have lost their own national controls over their police just as we will . This makes us all extremely vulnerable.
Let us persevere in the defence of freedom.
SOS
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RUNNING DOWN OUR POLICE FORCE AND ARMED SERVICES—PENNY DROPPED YET?
Taking over our health services
Posted by Richard Thursday, July 19, 2007 France, Spain
The news of Scarborough heath trust in financial difficulty may be a strictly local affair – with the announcements of 600 job cuts to recover £10 million of the overspend – but, if the EU has its way, the days of the National Health Service being able to determine its own spending priorities are numbered.
Only yesterday, the EU commission took another step towards creating an EU-wide market in health care, announcing that it was starting infringement proceedings against the UK (and Spain) following the refusal of health authorities fully to refund the costs of urgent hospital treatment received in another member state.
This arises from the situation where many health systems in Europe do not cover the full costs of treatment and the users have to top up payments, usually from health insurance.
But an anomaly arises for UK citizens who have their treatment provided free at the point of use, as long as they are treated in the UK. When they travel abroad and get treatment, there is the facility to reclaim medical expenses but the UK currently reimburses only the amounts that would be repaid by the state in the country where treatment is sought.
In France, therefore, where for some treatments the state will only cover 20-30 percent of costs, a British traveller will only get the same by way of reimbursement, having to find the difference themselves.
It is to this practice which the commission objects, arguing on the basis of the earlier Vanbraeckel judgement (Case C-368/98), that the patients specifically seeking treatment in other member state have to be reimbursed at the same rate that they would receive in their home countries. In other words, British travellers in France – for instance – would be entitled to recover the full cost of treatment from their own government.
Now, the commission argues that this principle should apply when a tourist or anyone else temporarily resident in another member state is in need of urgent hospital care. It is this issue that is the subject of the infringement proceedings.
Although, in itself, a relatively arcane issue, this follows on the back of other ECJ cases (here and here) which are gradually eroding the ability of health services to control their own spending. If, like Scarborough, a health trust is forced to slow down treatments rates for economy purposes, residents can simply opt to have their treatment in another member state, and the health trust must pay for it. Furthermore, if the commission’s infringement proceedings are successful, it will have to cover holiday-makers and expatriates’ costs – which would hitherto have been covered by insurance.
There is, of course, an argument that this will be beneficial to individual patients, but there is a downside. One can see a situation where local health trusts will find it necessary to cut back local services simply to pay the costs of people who travel abroad for treatment. If (or when) when that happens, for good or bad, we will no longer have a National Health Service. The EU will be in control.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2007/07/taking-over-our-health-services.html
PLENTY MORE TITBITS IN LINK.
The corruption of the Beeb
Posted by Richard Thursday, July 19, 2007
With the corrupt activities of the BBC firmly in the news, it is a joy to see the responses to the Telegraph’s rather naïve question, “Do you still trust the BBC?”
What is heartening is the preponderance of responses framed in terms of, “whaddya mean still, paleface?”, indicating (albeit from a self-selecting sample), a deep well of suspicion of the output of the Beeb.
Enter Tory MP, Bob Spink, recently elected Chairman of the Campaign for an Independent Britain, replacing the much admired Lord Stoddart who had stepped down after 23 years in the post.
Spink has seized the moment to table an early day motion (EDM) in the House of Commons, broadening out the debate to remind members that there are bigger issues at stake than the petty corruption of rigging phone-in contests and the like, thus bringing the reporting of EU issues into the frame. His motion reads:
That this House is concerned that the BBC’s new Charter, which took full effect from 1st January 2007, has so far failed to change both the perception of the Corporation’s bias and its editorial and policy directions; and calls on the BBC’s governing body to address these issues frankly and openly, particularly in respect of partiality on issues such as the European Union, and to publish a statement on how it intends to improve public trust in the BBC as a strictly impartial and much valued public service broadcaster.
Spink is asking for examples of BBC bias and can contacted here. We have sent him this and, no doubt, readers will have their own examples.
However, as we have pointed out, the most egregious examples of BBC bias are in what they do not air, rather than what they do – the phenomenon of selection bias, which is harder to prove.
That makes Spink’s initiative very much complementary to the tireless work of Lord Pearson and the ongoing review of BBC coverage, following his allegation that the Radio 4 Today programme is so biased in favour of the European Union that only one in five interviewees is a Eurosceptic.
Even this, though, does not deal with the “elephant in the room” syndrome, where the EU connections between government policies and EU initiatives (and laws) are rarely acknowledged, so much so that few people (who rely on BBC output) even begin to understand the extent to which Brussels intervention rules our lives.
Nevertheless, keeping the pressure on the BBC has to be an important priority of the Eurosceptic movement. We need, as this example demonstrates, to fight them on every front.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2007/07/corruption-of-beeb.html
Helicopter blues
Posted by Richard Tuesday, 11 August 2009 Afghanistan, Ainsworth, Canadian, Chinook, Merlin
The demand for more support helicopters in Afghanistan cannot be met fully because there are not enough crews to fly them, RAF commanders have acknowledged. Five trained crews were required for each one to ensure safety. So says The Times which cites Air Commodore Simon Falla, deputy commander of the Joint Helicopter Command.
He also reveals another reason why Britain could not send too many more helicopters to Helmand – a shortage of parking space. “There is pressure on real estate. There is this cry for more helicopters but where are you going to park them? They have to be parked somewhere,” he says.
Backing up the military inertia is defence secretary Bob Ainsworth, who blandly declares that the military will not be rushed into redeploying Merlin helicopters to Afghanistan, as “we won’t jeopardise safety”.
The helicopters are on now display at RAF Benson in Oxfordshire, following the return of the last two from Iraq. A flypast took place to celebrate their achievements, with senior RAF and Joint Helicopter Command officers gathered at the base, along with friends and families of personnel from the armed forces.
Meanwhile, the Canadian government has announced a $1.15 billion contract for 15 new CH-47F Chinook heavy-lift helicopters, which are expected to be delivered between 2013 and 2014.
Pending delivery, Canada’s defence minister Peter MacKay has said that Canada would overcome a critical shortage of support helicopters by buying six used machines from the United States as well as leasing six Russian-made aircraft.
Presumably, the Canadian government have already booked the parking slots, and one assumes that pilots will be found to fly them – unless, of course, the Canadian military take lessons from the British military and find ever more inventive reasons why the aircraft cannot be deployed.
http://defenceoftherealm.blogspot.com/2009/08/helicopter-blues.html
Who governs Britain
Posted by Richard Friday, September 09, 2005
Following the dismal attempts of Tory leadership candidates to offer anything resembling a sensible idea of what they would do if elected, much less – heavens forbid – form a government, we thought we would have a go. The following, therefore, is something like what we would wish to see from a Tory leadership candidate:
People are fed up with politics and politicians because they know that their vote has little impact on how they are actually governed. A vote in a local government election will have little bearing on the level of council tax or the manner in which refuse is collected because most of local government finance and the tasks imposed on local government are decided by central government.
Victims of crime cannot change their local policing policy or their Chief Constable because these are decided by central government which dictates national policies. No vote in any election will elect politicians capable of changing the Working Time Directive, the most expensive piece of legislation ever imposed upon the British people. The European Commissioners are effectively a one party state; no Commissioner can ever be removed by a popular vote.
The other great problem of contemporary government is that there is simply too much of it. Central government has taken on so many responsibilities that it is not possible for the politicians to discharge their responsibilities adequately, with a result that vital decisions are delegated either to civil servants or the growing number of agencies and quangos. Again, those that run these quangos spending huge sums of public money run no risk of losing their jobs in an election.
Conservative policy should be driven by a simple ideal. No organisation which supplies a citizen with services should be exempt from the citizen’s ability to change that supplier either by voting or by spending his money differently. Privatisation has given citizens unprecedented choice and the power to change suppliers of telecommunications and energy supply.
The State has a lousy track record as a supplier of health and education services and these can be returned to the market. Under a voucher system, patients and parents would have the power to choose between state, private and charitable provision as in every other successful Western country. The whole costly paraphernalia of centrally directed targets and bureaucracy, requiring providers to satisfy political objectives laid down by national politicians rather than the demands of individual patients and pupils, would disappear at a stroke. Huge sums would be released from unproductive bureaucracy to satisfy customers.
At local level, it is essential that we return local accountability to police forces by introducing elected chief constables to take charge of each force and dictate local policy in accordance with the wishes of the people they serve.
In order for local authorities to act independently and be responsive to their local voters, they should be given clear areas of policy which they would have to fund themselves. This would give responsibility to Council candidates to present a programme of activity that they would have to finance and justify to their electorate. The current revenues from VAT are approximately the same as the central government funding to local authorities. VAT and uniform business rate should be abolished and replaced by a local sales tax, paid to local authorities. This would create a virtuous circle of tax competition between local authorities driving local taxes down.
This would free local authorities from central government interference to provide services in accordance with the wishes and the purses of their electors, instead of being subject to targets or any other performance indicators set by central government. Councillors would be accountable to their electors. Services would conform to the wishes of local people expressed at a local election rather than being imposed by European directives or central government diktats over which local government electors have no control whatsoever.
There is a strong case for returning local services to delivery by county authorities. Counties have a long track record of showing that they are small enough to be trusted by local people, that they can be represented by genuine locals but that they are large enough to have the momentum to deliver. Returning real power to these units would be true devolution and would render the current, totally imbalanced, devolution settlement void. The devolution referendums excluded 85 percent of the population i.e. the English but the disgracefully wasteful talking shops in Edinburgh and Cardiff are supported by a preponderance of English taxpayers’ money. This is wrong and there should be an all UK referendum on the issue of abolishing the existing devolution settlement and replacing it with real genuine devolution to county units.
Other functions should be devolved to elected local authorities or other bodies. These would include sea fishing, with the establishment of regional marine management authorities and agriculture, which could be managed at county level.
For those functions retained by central government, Parliamentary scrutiny should be improved and the system of Parliamentary Select Committees strengthened. Members should be elected by MPs and chairmen should be drawn from opposition parties or independent members. There is much to be learnt from American Congressional Committees. Inquiries should be properly funded and staffed, with trained researchers. The Committees should have power to summon witnesses and to demand evidence under oath, with criminal sanctions for perjury.
There is a common feeling of helplessness that officials, more than elected politicians, run the country. This must change and Parliamentary Select Committees should have a role here. Employment terms of public servants must be revisited. The perception is that, in far too many cases, when large amounts of public money are wasted or there have been serious failures of duty, no one is found responsible, or those responsible are not punished and in some cases are actually promoted. Governments, whether central or local, must also have the power to terminate the employment of those who fall short of the standards set and should be prepared to exercise that power.
We must get back to the Conservative concept that the State exists to serve the people and that the people are genuinely sovereign. It should therefore be a central tenet of a Conservative government that it cannot delegate its law-making powers to any other organisation or institution. This applies to external bodies such as the European Union and internally, where currently so much effective law is made by officials without political input or control. Law-making must remain in the hands of politicians directly elected by the British people to serve their exclusive interests, affording the people an opportunity to remove legislators if they do not approve of their actions.
It is ludicrous that over 60 percent of the laws imposed upon the fourth largest economy in the world are created by people who have not been elected and cannot be removed in elections. A Conservative government should regain the power currently vested in the European Union by a fundamental renegotiation of all the existing treaties. Central to this would be the removal of the supremacy of the European Court of Justice and other international courts, including the Court of Human Rights. This would entail the withdrawal from the Convention on Humans Rights and the repeal of the Human Rights Act which give excessive powers over British citizens to those who have not been elected. All existing EU legislation should be reviewed and unless an overpowering case can be made for its retention – in which case it should be re-enacted as British law – it should be repealed.
Parliament should not only be supreme but in respect of the actions of British citizens or legal entities in the UK, no institution other than a British court should have jurisdiction over them. In the application of law, British courts should be supreme, headed by the House of Lords which should be the sole, final arbiter of law. Furthermore, no British institution should have the power to levy fines or other penalties on citizens, without their having recourse to a court of law. As to our relations with other countries, we should look to normal government-to-government treaties.
80% TODAY LAWS FROM THE EUSSR.
MPs moan they only get £70.000 plus for four months acting.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2005/09/who-governs-britain.html
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2007/07/target-brown.html
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Nice work mate