We’re better off out of this failing EU superstate
UNABLE to comprehend the result of the 2016 referendum, Remainers like to claim the British electorate was misled by Leave campaign lies. Yet by far the greatest act of deceit was perpetrated by pro-EU activists. They pretended that if the public voted in favour of continued EU membership, Britain would remain a sovereign nation as part of a stable, successful international association.
This is a travesty of the truth. By staying in the European Union, we would have been dragged ever-more deeply into a vast, sclerotic federal empire, which would have destroyed the last vestiges of our national identity and democracy.
Robbed of all independence, Britain would have been shackled to a ruinous, unaccountable bureaucracy that, through its fixation with political integration, continually fuels decline, debt and division. The status quo was never a choice. The real alternative to British freedom was to become a province in a German-led superstate.
Contrary to fashionable Remainer propaganda, the prospect of the United Kingdom’s withdrawal is not causing meltdown in our economy. Indeed, it is the dysfunctional, dogmatic European Union that is in real trouble. Official figures published this week showed that wages in Britain are increasing at their fastest rate for a decade, with weekly earnings up 3.4 per cent at the end of last year. Despite all the orchestrated gloom from the pro-EU brigade, living standards here have now risen for the tenth month in a row. malaise on the continent. New statistics this month revealed industrial output in the eurozone was down 3.3 per cent compared with last year.
Even Germany is facing a real chance of recession. Driven by a fall in industrial production, the German economy shrank by 0.2 per cent in the third quarter of last year.
Long the dominant force in European politics, Angela Merkel is seeing her authority rapidly erode as she enters the twilight of her chancellorship.
Her opposite number in France President Emmanuel Macron, who regards himself as the new champion of the federalist cause, is engulfed by an even deeper crisis as the country’s economic woes feed a populist revolt against his rule. In recent polls, 70 per cent of the public have expressed their disapproval of his presidency.
The reality is that the European project is failing badly. In a pattern of relentless self-harm, the EU has continually sacrificed economic pragmatism on the altar of federalist ideology.
It is exactly 20 years ago this month since Brussels launched the single currency. Hailed in 1999 as an engine of growth, it has turned out to be an instrument for jobs destruction and economic paralysis. That is because the euro was never really a monetary tool at all, but rather was seen by its advocates as a political weapon to impose unity. In the quest to build the new superstate, national needs and interests count for nothing.
A‘Europe is not moving forward but drowning’
S A RESULT, the single currency has not only created a permanent mood of crisis, but has also pulverised the concept of national sovereignty, as shown by the recent experiences of Greece and Italy, whose budgets are subject to the diktats of Brussels officialdom.
The EU has learnt no lessons from its failures. Instead its federalist ambitions have intensified. To the true believers, the solution to every problem is more EU intervention, more integration. That was graphically illustrated on Tuesday in the German city of Aachen, where Merkel and Macron signed a new treaty promising closer co-operation in order to promote European unity.
Brimming with his usual federalist fervour, Macron argued the Aachen agreement would “bolster Europe’s capacity to act autonomously”, while Merkel said it would contribute “to the emergence of a European army”. The EU already has its own flag, anthem, parliament, currency, embassies, executive, laws and civil service. Now it is planning the creation of its own armed forces. That is why the Aachen deal has been welcomed by the high priests of the federalist creed.
Declaring that “Europe needs a revival of faith”, Donald Tusk, the President of the European Council, expressed the hope that the accord would pave the way “for integration”. With even more enthusiasm, the Belgian politician Guy Verhofstadt proclaimed “a strong Franco-German alliance is crucial to moving Europe forward”. Yet such language is deluded: Europe is not moving, it is drowning.
Because the integrationist project has been imposed by the elite without any mandate, it lacks popular legitimacy. It has therefore become a recipe for friction, chaos and resentment, as shown in the wave of populist movements across Europe. Brexit was a courageous part of that rebellion.
Whatever Remainers shout, the British people knew we would be better off out of this mess.