THANK GOD WE ARE QUITTING EU
Brussels boss reveals plot to grab even more power
JEAN-Claude Juncker provoked fury last night by claiming that Britain will soon “regret” voting to leave the EU.
In a keynote speech to MEPs, the European Commission President described Brexit as “sad and tragic” while insisting the bloc will flourish without the UK.
And he mapped out plans for turning the EU into a super-state ruled by a single president with its own military defence force and compulsory membership of the euro single currency.
Ukip MEP Nigel Farage said it was a “truly worrying” speech, adding: “All I can say is – thank God we are
leaving”. Other Eurosceptics also seized on Mr Juncker’s federalist blueprint as confirmation that Britain made the right choice in voting to leave in last year’s EU referendum.
Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg said last night: “No one ever regrets liberty. Mr Juncker does not understand our desire to rule ourselves according to our own democracy and never will.”
Mr Juncker’s swipe at Brexit came in his annual “state of the union” speech to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, setting out the commission’s view of the EU’s current achievements and challenges.
He claimed the EU was bouncing back after the travails of last year’s Brexit vote, migrant crisis and economic stagnation.
“The wind is back in Europe’s sails,” the European Commission president claimed.
Progress
Of Britain’s scheduled departure from the EU on 29 March 2019, he said: “This will be a very sad and tragic moment. We will always regret it and I think that you will regret it as well, soon.
“Nonetheless we have to respect the will of the British people. But we are going to make progress.
“We will move on because Brexit isn’t everything, it’s not the future of everything, it’s not the be all and end all.”
Mr Juncker told MEPs the EU was ready to progress towards far greater integration after Brexit.
“My hope is that on 30 March 2019, Europeans will wake up in a union where they know that we are defending their values, where all member states vigorously respect the rule of law, where being a full member of the eurozone, banking union and the Schengen Area have become a standard for every member state of the European Union,” he said. He called for a renewed effort “to build a more united, stronger and more democratic Union”.
Mr Juncker insisted the EU’s border check-free Schengen Area should be extended to Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia.
He also called for the euro to be the only currency in the bloc.
And he proposed that his job should be merged with that of EU Council President Donald Tusk to ensure the bloc had one sole leader with sweeping executive power. “Europe would be easier to understand if one captain was steering the ship. Having a single President would better reflect the true nature of our European Union as both a Union of States and a Union of citizens,” Mr Juncker said. Responding to the speech in the European Parliament, Mr Farage said: “Mr Juncker, that was the most open, honest and truly worrying speech I’ve heard in my long years in this place. “The message is very clear, Brexit has happened, full steam ahead.” He pointed out Mr Juncker’s plans included a single president, a powerful new finance minister and “a stronger European army in a militarised European Union with a stronger and perhaps more aggressive foreign policy too and more Europe in every single direction and all of it to be done without the consent of the people.”
He added: “All I can say is thank God we’re leaving. You’ve learnt nothing from Brexit.”
Mr Farage said the failure of Brussels to give former Prime Minister David Cameron any concessions, particularly on tighter curbs on migration, in his push for a new EU membership deal was to blame for the Brexit vote.
He said: “Yet the lesson you take is you’re going to centralise, you’re going to move on to this new, I think, very worrying, undemocratic union.”
He added: “If these plans of Mr Juncker come to fruition, far from the populist wave being over, I doubt it’s even begun.”
Senior Tory MEP Syed Kamall said: “Today President Junker said the EU had the wind in its sails. Anyone that heard his speech now knows what direction he is sailing it in – towards a United States of Europe.
“Juncker’s plan is to step-bystep move more power away from Member States, and move it towards Brussels.”
IN THE US the president’s annual state of the union address is not just a glitzy setpiece event in the political calendar. It is also an opportunity for members of both houses of congress to scrutinise the president’s record and agenda, an important part of their democratic process.
By way of contrast the EU version, delivered yesterday by Jean-Claude Juncker, is nothing more than a monument to the overwhelming arrogance and preening self-regard of the bureaucrats in charge.
Juncker himself was never elected and yet he still feels justified in grandstanding as if he were an important statesman. Meanwhile the elected MEPs forced every year to listen to his nonsense have little say in how he behaves or the decisions he takes.
Yesterday he gave full vent to his federalist dogma, outlining plans for further integration of the bloc and saying that Britain will “regret” voting for Brexit. As is so often the case, Juncker could hardly be more wrong. Not least because while it continues to have such an unappealing figurehead we will want as little as possible to do with the Brussels regime.
What Juncker failed to get across was the severity of the problems facing the federalist project such as the economic flaws in the eurozone or the failure to tackle the migrant crisis. He can stand in front of MEPs and tell them everything is wonderful as much as he wants but that does not make it true.
The British people have seen through this propaganda and realised that the EU model is broken. The sooner we are freed from the bloc and the malign influence of these bumbling bureaucrats the better.