What percentage of our laws actually come from the EU?
Last week on the BBC’s Question Time, eurosceptic Conservative MEP Daniel Hannan mentioned 84%; UKIP leader Nigel Farrage said it was 75%.
The figure most often mentioned by anti-EU types (such as French National Front leader Jean Marie Le Pen or the Libertas Party) is that 80% of our laws come from the EU, while in a speech elsewhere last week, Conservative leader David Cameron said that “Almost half of all the regulations affecting our businesses come from the EU”.
These figures (or, at least, figures in this rough ballpark) are widely accepted, with everyone from universities to charities seeming to accept them at face value.
But are any of them actually true? And which is it? 84%? 80%? 75%? 50%? Or some other figure? Because they can’t ALL be right.
Tom Watson & Jacqui Smith stepping down
The BBC reports:
It has been reported that Ms Smith, 46, told Mr Brown two months ago that she wanted to step down as home secretary.
…
But she has since come under pressure over issues – including attempts to extend pre-charge detention limits for terrorist suspects, a pay row between the government and police and the home office leaks inquiry that led to the arrest of Tory MP Damian Green.
Three more Labour MPs have stepped down (of which only David Chaytor was due to MPs expenses). Our list of MPs who have stepped down is now updated.
Sunny updates: News just in that Tom Watson MP is also resigning from government. This is big news because Brown has always seen Tom as a loyal minister. So, why?
So is he stepping down in advance of a plot to behead Gordon Brown (please lord, I hope it comes soon), or merely going to the backbenches so he can better support the PM from there? Given how much he enjoyed his brief, I can’t see the latter option being valid.
What direction will Israel take now?
Three pieces of legislation proposed recently by members of Israel’s Knesset have been making headlines: banning the commemoration of the Nakba; introducing a mandatory ‘loyalty oath’ to the Zionist state; and criminalising public declarations of opposition to Israel being a ‘Jewish state’.
None of these efforts may actually become law – the loyalty oath has already been voted down by the cabinet’s law committee. The Nakba bill though has now been tweaked, so that rather than straightforwardly outlawing any events, there will be economic sanctions for the local authorities and organisations involved.
The response in the Western media to the sight of of 47 MKs voting for prison sentences for anti-Zionists has often come in the form of a warning that Israel is in danger of turning into a racist state. Taking into account other authoritarian trends, this assessment sees Israel’s democracy as under threat by the far-right groupings within Netanyahu’s government.
continue reading… »
Guardian endorses Libdems at election
I somewhat predicted this only a month ago, and today a Guardian editorial endorses the Libdems in the coming elections. Given that the Greens are not yet effective opposition to the Tories, I think this is an inevitable and wise move. Endorsing a Labour party headed by Gordon Brown now is like trying to convince the electorate that contracting herpes is a good idea. Even in 2004, despite Iraq, the Guardian did not go the whole hog.
So this is quite an impressive turn of events. Most surprisingly of all, it follows Polly Toynbee’s endorsement. Does this mean the Libdems will now break through as the real opposition? Interesting analysis of this was offered by both Sunder and MatGB in the previous thread.
But I think the Libdems are missing a key constituency: The Economist readers, as suggested by Amol Rajan at the Indy. I think Nick Clegg’s lot should aggressively pursue the Economist and convince it’s editors of their progressive economic ideas. If they get some traction, then the Libdems would enter the conciousness of the commentariat much faster. Endorsement from the Indy and the Guardian alone isn’t going to swing it for them.
New campaign highlights Cameron ‘losing track’ of houses
A new web-based campaign has been launched to highlight David Cameron losing track of how many houses he owns.
Drawing close comparison to the US presidential candidate John McCain, it highlights the gaffe mentioned on LC last week by Don Paskini.
The site is here, with a video below.
Tories up 22%, plus earlier polling
An Ipsos Mori poll out today puts Conservatives 22% ahead, with Labour and Libdems tied. Here is a quick snap-shot of recent polls, in reverse chronological order, with links to more information about each. If you have more links, please post them below.
| Poll by: | Tories | Labour | Libdems | Greens | UKIP |
| Mori | 40% | 18% | 18% | - | - |
| ICM | 40% | 22% | 25% | (11% on Euros) | (10% on Euros) |
| YouGov | 39% | 22% | 18% | ||
| Populus | 41% | 21% | 15% |
Most polls are headline voting intentions, focused on general elections as opposed to how people would vote in the upcoming European elections. The Sunday Telegraph poll putting Greens at 11% is significant because it’s the first time the Greens have overtaken UKIP. The national media however continues to ignore them.
It’s time to nationalise Vauxhall
General Motors’ chief executive Charles Erwin Wilson apparently never did utter the precise words ‘what’s good for General Motors is good for America’, although he did say something like it at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing in 1953.
And what is good for General Motors these days is de facto nationalisation. The Obama administration is expected to have a 72.5% holding in the Detroit-based car giant when it re-emerges from bankruptcy.
continue reading… »
An attack on all of us
post by ‘Don’t get mad‘.
How do you feel about gay and lesbian adoption? It’s probably OK, isn’t it? I mean, we’re all human, how much difference will gender make? But what if I told you that the research into the outcomes for children adopted by gay and lesbian couples showed that these adoptions were harmful – that there were ‘repeated studies’, an ‘increasing weight of academic research’ showing this harm and that studies showing positive outcomes for children were ‘thin on the ground’, ‘almost non-existent’ and ‘too methodically flawed to be valid’?
That changes things, doesn’t it? We don’t want to discriminate on the basis of sexuality, but when we’re talking about the lives of children in care, discrimination looks like the lesser of two evils. It’s not prejudice, it’s unfortunate common sense.
The Daily Mail tells this to its 1.6 million readers whenever it runs a story about adoption or homosexuality. But there’s a lot it doesn’t say.
continue reading… »
Will Cameron’s words come back to bite him?
It is not good enough for Members of Parliament to say, “What I did was within the rules”… David Cameron to Adam Boulton… presumably recorded before this story hit the news stands.The Conservative Party response was entirely predictable. Apparently, what Cameron did was “entirely within the rules.”
What’s unsurprising about the revelations around David Cameron’s tax-payer funded mortgage is that all the right-wing bloggers, including Guido Fawkes, are either playing silent or excusing it. What’s more surprising is that the Guardian, which has desperately been trying to charm Cameron, is completely downplaying the story; it’s not even on the front page.
Cameron now says he’s ready to repay it back. But why would you do that if you were within the rules? Let’s wait and see if all those calling for the heads of Labour cabinet ministers (incl myself) will also apply the same standards to Cameron. Somehow I doubt it.
(PS – Alastair Darling should go to, for removal of any doubt)
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