Rob Wilson's Westminster Diary, May 28, 2009

Rob Wilson MP • Published 28 May 2009 10:00 3 Comments

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IT"S HARD to believe important elections are taking place in under seven days" time!

Admittedly what has been going on at Westminster has rather overshadowed matters, but both the county council and European elections are extremely important.

More than 70% of legislation now comes from Brussels and a European Constitution, now called The Lisbon Treaty, awaits ratification.

Both Labour and the Liberals have gone back on manifesto commitments to hold a referendum on adopting a European Constitution.

The Conservative Party view is that the Lisbon Treaty is a European Constitution which removes too many powers from us, so we oppose it and will honour our manifesto commitment to let the people decide with a referendum. Given the opportunity, I believe the British people will vote against.

Of course the Liberals roll over to any European initiative (they still want to join the Euro!) and Labour is afraid of upsetting the Germans and French. Both parties are now part of the European political elite which ignores its own ordinary citizens.

This elite doesn"t think the man in the street understands what"s going on and therefore must have decisions made for him. If the last fortnight has taught us anything, it is that this condescension is dangerous nonsense. That"s why a Conservative government will put the current proposals and any future European changes that increase the power of Brussels to a referendum.

I urge you not to vote BNP because that is not a solution to any known political problem. UKIP isn"t a safe option either.

People trusted UKIP to be different after the European elections of 2004, but were badly let down. We"ve seen the scandals and in-fighting, but as David Cameron says: 'They have failed to stand up for Britain. They voted for more EU red tape, letting Spanish trawlers fish in protected British waters and against free trade!'

Hardly what you expect from their leaflets and broadcasts!

Europe and Westminster must get back in touch with the electorate. Politics must be reformed so that a much larger slice of the power lies with the electorate, not just at elections, but also in between.

The US system has its shortcomings, but I like its checks and balances and higher degree of devolved decision-making.

There is no space to develop my ideas here, but a debate is under way and I will let you know more in the weeks to come.

This blog appeared in Reading Chronicle 28 May 09

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