Latest posts
The pro-EU campaign is reduced to dressing up Eurocrats as businessmen
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There are very few pro-EU industrialists left in Britain. That is the only inference we can fairly draw from the letter in today’s Independent, signed by some hoary-headed Euro-grandees hilariously described by that newspaper as ‘eminent...
Worried about swivel-eyed loons? Try open-source politics!
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People who join political parties exhibit the same altruism as people who work for charities, become special constables or come forward as Olympic volunteers. They are giving up their time and resources to advance a cause they believe in without expe...
This is the closest we have been to leaving the EU
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On 5 July, the House of Commons will divide on on a Bill to give Britain a referendum on leaving the EU. This gargantuan development – one which would have seemed unthinkable just two years ago – risks being missed amid the tumult and the...
A small reminder of why we need to leave the EU
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What's the most objectionable thing about the EU? The way it artificially redirects our commerce away from growing markets across the oceans? The openly anti-British financial services rules? The ecological catastrophe of the Common Fisheries Policy?
An In/Out referendum and a Bill in this session: David Cameron has delivered
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David Cameron has done what Eurosceptics wanted. He has offered an In/Out referendum and, so as to remove any doubts about his bona fides, he is pursuing the legislation now. I won’t repeat my complaints about the tendency of lobby journalists...
EU referendum: Now the pressure is on Labour
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I recorded an interview with a BBC radio station in my constituency this afternoon. Why, asked the interviewer, were we Tories 'banging on about Europe yet again'? Because she had asked me the question, I replied. It hardly seemed reasonable to inter...
Michael Gove and Philip Hammond would vote to leave the EU. So what?
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Inevitably, the declarations by Michael Gove and Philip Hammond that they will vote to leave the EU unless better terms can be secured are being covered in a hackneyed, retro-nineties, 'Tory splits' manner. In fact, neither man has said anything...
Iceland chooses independence
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A time-lag distorts our perception of foreign countries. Whenever I mention, for example, how well Norway is doing outside the EU, a dozen half-clever Lefties shoot back: 'Yeah, so you want Norwegian spending levels, do you?' Well obviously I'd rathe...
Why politicians admit to being Eurosceptic only after leaving office
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First Nigel Lawson argued that Britain would be better off outside the EU. Then Michael Portillo agreed. Now we learn that Margaret Thatcher reached the same view after leaving Downing Street. Hannan's First Law, it seems, is as robust as ever: no pa...
The unbearably shallow way we report the EU debate
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The European issue brings out the worst in some of our Westminster journalists. Here is a question with vast economic, constitutional, diplomatic and legal implications. Yet it is almost always covered in the most trivial way imaginable as a story ab...
Our political leaders are way too young
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It's odd to think that Tony Blair, who stood down as prime minister nearly six years ago after a decade in office, turned 60 today. That was once the age when a British politician was just coming into his prime. Palmerston died in office a few days s...
A Conservative-Ukip coalition might come sooner than you think
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The prospect of a Tory-Ukip coalition is no longer theoretical. A blue-purple pact – which I think this blog may have been the first to propose – is now at least a mathematical possibility in Cambridgeshire, East Sussex, Gloucestersh...
Who are these extremists pulling David Cameron toward an In/Out referendum? Eighty-two per cent of the electorate
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The last piece of the jigsaw may soon be in place. Back in 2011, I proposed a way for David Cameron to settle the European question. He should, I suggested, commit to a referendum on leaving the EU, but be prepared to give Euro-enthusiasts time befor...
Tory-Ukip spats could put Ed Miliband in Downing Street
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If we carry on like this, we’ll give Labour a massive parliamentary majority with a minority of the popular vote. Together, the Conservatives and Ukip could deliver the referendum on leaving the EU which more than 80 per cent of people want. In...
I know who will win the next election
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The next election being, of course, the county council poll (and some other local ballots) on 2 May. It will be won by the Stay-at-Home Party, which will secure more support than all the others combined. Indeed, I shouldn't be at all surprised if mor...
Czechs don't belong in a federal Europe, and Václav Klaus knows it
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They're tremendously like us, the Czechs, though I'm not quite sure why. Most of the Continental Europeans who resemble us in temperament – the Scandinavians, the northern Germans and, obviously, the Dutch – are linked to us by geography...
My short tribute to Margaret Thatcher in the European Parliament
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I managed to turn a debate on greenhouse gases into a 60-second tribute to Margaret Thatcher. Not a popular cause in the European Parliament, as you can imagine, but the presiding MEP, a popular and affable Catalan conservative called Alejo Vidal-Qua...
'If only the Boston bomber had been a white American…'
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One of the most unpleasant things, in the aftermath of terrorist attack, is the way commentators want the perpetrator to fit a particular profile. The title of this piece tells you pretty much all you need to know: 'Let's hope the Boston Ma...
Teachers' convenience trumps students' needs – again
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A primary school where I was a governor had difficulty starting its first lesson on time. The children would drift in one by one, meaning that registration was stretched out throughout the period, much of which was consequently wasted. When the issue...
Thank you, Margaret Thatcher
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You didn't have to be a Thatcherite to be moved by this morning's funeral. Almost everything about the service was perfectly judged: the hymns, the readings, the anthems, the military procession, the Bishop of London's beautiful address: Margret That...
