Speaking at the Employment Committee – 26 January 2012

The EU: Reinforcing failure…

…and throwing good money after bad

Left: Mette Frederiksen, Employment; Right: Karen Haekkerup, Social Affairs & Integration

I’ve just spent an unedifying hour in the Unemployment Committee.  With the EU’s manic six-month rotating presidency, we’re treated twice a year to the prospect of seeing the relevant ministers from the country holding the presidency, who come to present their sparkly new plans, only to retire hurt a few months later.  The system seems designed to prevent any continuity or medium-term strategy.  It’s a recipe for constant policy churning, and a total lack of direction.

Just now, it’s Denmark, and they sent two Ministers, both (I have to say) rather attractive young women.  Neither seemed, however, to have any new ideas about the very serious employment problems facing the EU.  Ms. Frederikksen said we must “Stick to the values of the EU labour market”.  But hang on a minute — aren’t those the very values that got us into this mess in the first place?  She went on to admit, generously, that “Jobs are not created by employment and social policies”.  Quite right, Minister.  But you didn’t notice that jobs are destroyed by them?  Don’t you ever go and talk to employers?  Or is that too much to ask of an Employment Minister?

Ask any employer, and they will tell you that EU employment legislation adds to costs, massively increases administration, reduces competitiveness, prevents flexibility, and disincentivises investment, employment and growth.

All too often, the EU responds to a problem by doing more of the same — which merely reinforces failure.  Unemployment caused by over-regulation?  We need more regulation!  Job protection stopping employers hiring?  We need more job protection!

And it’s not just employment.  Problems of debt?  Borrow more!  Problems with the €uro?  Spend more supporting it!  There’s too much political will invested in it!  We must prop it up even if it destroys us!  As, of course, it will.

Merkozy talks of “fiscal union”, though that seems to mean no more than applying German rules to Greece.  The ECB has a clandestine Quantitative Easing programme — and is therefore stacked up with worthless paper from failing economies.  There are calls for debt mutualisation and big-bazooka bail-out funds.  These measures might buy time, they might stave off the evil day temporarily, but at huge expense.  The €uro is a bankruptcy machine.   Attempts to save it are misguided, and destroy value.  None of these approaches addresses the fundamental imbalance of competitiveness between North & South, which is now clearly and palpably unsustainable.

The eurocrats blame the banks.  They blame the rating agencies.  They blame the Anglo-Saxons.  The blame anyone and anything, in fact, except the real culprit — the €uro itself.

But perhaps the realisation is starting to dawn, at least in the UK.  A few weeks ago, Cameron and Osborne were arguing that a €uro break-up would be bad for Britain, and therefore that it was in our interest to support efforts to save it.  Even today there is talk of re-financing the IMF, even though it’s now run by a poacher-turned-gamekeeper, French Catherine Lagarde, whose main object seems to be to have the IMF subsidise the EU.

But we’ve seen serious voices recently, like economist Ruth Lea, commentator John O’Sullivan and former Tory leadership contender David Davis, who’ve been saying (I paraphrase) that the €uro is the problem, not the solution; that support for the €uro is vastly expensive and doomed to failure; and that recovery cannot start until there is a realignment of currencies in the eurozone — which of course means an orderly dismantling of the currency union.

We in Britain have our own experience of the salutary effect of breaking out of an unsustainable currency alignment.  Recovery starts with a competitive currency — and not without.  So it’s time to stop talking about “Saving the €uro”, and to start talking about orderly deconstruction.

Fuel-Cell vehicle: the test drive

Jan 24th: With Joe Bono, after a test-drive in the fuel-cell adapted Hyundai

After the recent European Energy Forum dinner-debate on fuel-cells,   I was invited to take a test-drive in an experimental fuel-cell car, an adapted Hyundai (from Korea, where I spent four happy years in an earlier life).

The project is funded by the EU’s Research Framework Programme (but ultimately by you and me, as EU tax-payers), and is managed by a consortium of various interests including the industry.  The car drives like a regular automatic.  Like all-electric vehicles, it is uncannily quiet.  Finding myself on a fairly clear bit of road, I put my foot down.  Not much happened (though to be fair we were five-up).  The Project Manager who accompanied us assured me that “we had plenty of power there”.  Didn’t seem like that to me, but then I’m comparing it with the XF.

It seemed to be a perfectly satisfactory little car.  But it left me with the odd question.  Why would someone buy it?  It seems likely to be substantially more expensive than a similar petrol or diesel.  The range (at the moment) is about 200 miles — half that of a regular car.  At today’s prices, the hydrogen fuel will be roughly the same as diesel.  We’re told that the price will eventually come down, but we hear that on all renewable technologies.  On most we’re still waiting.  And the hydrogen infrastructure for filling up is as rare as hens’ teeth.  So only someone obsessive about emissions would think about it, and there aren’t too many of those about.  And even then, we don’t know where the electricity came from to electrolyse the water for the hydrogen.  It could be from a coal-fired power station, in which case there’s little or no óverall emission saving.

One more thing.  Given that most big auto companies round the world are developing hydrogen fuel cell technology themselves — why is EU tax-payers’ money duplicating the effort?  As Peter Simple put it, “I only ask because I want to know”.

No, Vince, No

A mansion tax is not a good idea!

This is a mansion. Looks a lot better than Vince Cable

So often in politics we go for the easy, popular option — the idea guaranteed to deliver a few good headlines — rather than the right option, which may well be a tougher sell, but delivers a better outcome.  I prefer the old-fashioned route, of doing first what we believe is right, and then explaining why we did it.  Too often we adopt populist policies for purely presentational purposes — and then wonder why things go wrong.

A perfect current example is the Coalition’s (and the Conservative Party’s) pusillanimous position on the 50% income tax rate.  George Osborne knows perfectly well that it delivers no additional revenue, and may actually reduce it.  He knows that it makes the UK a less attractive place to do business, it deters investment, it invites avoidance, and therefore it militates against growth and jobs.

This is the key insight.  The 50% tax rate is a bad thing not only (in a boring and obvious way) for high earners and wealth-creators.  It’s also bad for the guy on the dole, because it increases unemployment and reduces job opportunities.  It’s bad for the nurse in the operating theatre, because it reduces the funds available to the Treasury for the NHS.  Bad for the single mother on benefit, because there’s less money for welfare.

Of course Osborne understands the Laffer curve perfectly well.  He knows that beyond a certain level, increases in tax rates actually reduce revenues.  In that respect he’s better, at least, than some of the pundits on the Today Programme.  When asked how we avoid welfare cuts, they reply “Tax the rich instead”.

There is overwhelming evidence from dozens of countries over decades that low and flat taxes deliver faster growth and higher revenues than a high tax economy.  Counter-intuitive, but true.  We know it, but somehow we dare not say it, because Ed Miliband will declare that the Conservative Party is the party of the wealthy, and doesn’t care for the poor.

And this is exactly the error that Vince Cable makes with his “Mansion Tax”, which he assures us is “a very good thing”.  No it’s not, Vince.  It’s a disaster.

Of course there are all kinds of practical problems.  Who does the valuation?  Who pays for it?  How do we respond to changes in pricing in the market, when a £2.1 million house is re-assessed at £1.9 million?  Are we happy with what amounts to a tax on London and the South-East?  Do we really want more taxes on those wealth-creators and investors (that we’re already hitting with 60% Income Tax & NI)?

The list of deliberate policies likely to drive business and jobs and investment out of the UK is already fearsome.  Travel infrastructure and London airport capacity.  High energy prices and the prospect of power shortages this decade.  Onerous EU regulation.  High taxes generally, and now Vince’s proposed Mansion Tax.  And Osborne talks about “Making the UK an attractive place to do business”.

I appreciate that there is a problem of rich foreigners buying property in London (the Greeks are at it ahead of the looming €uro débäcle) and paying no tax in the UK.  But I have to believe that those clever mandarins at the Treasury can come up with a more targeted solution.  We must also close the loophole that enables foreigners to avoid stamp duty on investment properties.  But no Mansion Tax, please.

We’ve had enough of the Lib-Dem tail wagging the Tory dog.  I shall expect Conservative back-benchers to oppose the Mansion Tax with everything they’ve got, until the unctuous Vince Cable retires hurt.

Declaration of interest (or lack of interest): For the avoidance of doubt, I should point out that neither of these measures affects me personally.  An MEP’s salary is well below the 50% income-tax level, and while I own quite a nice house, it comes nowhere near the threshold for Vince’s proposed Mansion Tax.

Naseby Battlefield wind farm:

Official contempt for the public

The man from Whitehall: Sir Michael Pitt

On January 9^th I wrote a piece about the proposed wind-farm overlooking the historic battlefield of Naseby, and I undertook to write to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, The Rt. Hon. Eric Pickles MP.  I also promised to share his reply with you.  I attach it below.  Clearly Mr. Pickles is a very busy man, so he referred my letter to Sir Michael Pitt, Chief Executive of The Planning Inspectorate.

Sir Michael writes with commendable courtesy.  His mastery of mandarin-speak is exemplary.  It is worthy of the BBC’s “Yes Minister”, so much so that I wonder if the BBC consulted him on the script.  That being so, and in the interests of clarity and the avoidance of doubt, let me offer you my paraphrase in more earthy and vernacular terms.

He is saying, in effect, that we local oiks, Luddites and Nimbies can do whatever we want, but it won’t make any difference and he won’t care a scrap.  He isn’t interested in normal planning criteria, but only in national policy on energy and wind farms (which is, of course, not really a national policy at all, but a Brussels/EU policy).  We can organise our little protest groups, set up our web-sites, raise funds with our wine-and-cheese parties and our Quiz Nights, hire our lawyers and consultants, engage our local papers and local authorities, make our presentations at local planning enquiries, win our cases and break open the champagne in celebration.

But it’s all for nothing, because the government’s Planning Inspectorate (acting as the local face of Brussels policy) will ignore all we’ve done, and reverse the decision on appeal, never mind that local people, local media, local authorities and even national organisations like English Heritage are opposed.  The Inspectorate doesn’t care about the heritage or the environment, or the health issues or the housing blight, and still less about the utter futility of wind farms in economic and environmental terms.  Oh No.  National/Brussels policy is everything.  We could all have saved the time, and the trouble, and the money, and the heartache, and sat at home in our slippers and let them get on with it, because that’s what they’re going to do anyway.

I particularly recognise this problem, because it is exactly what happened with Low Spinney, in Leicestershire, and I now have 400 foot turbines within a mile of my home.

Localism?  Forget it.  That’s for winning elections, not for informing policy.  Here’s Sir Michael’s letter:

Dear Mr. Helmer,

Land to the south of the A14 and north of Haselbach, Kelmarsh

I am writing further to your e-mail to the Rt. Hon Eric Pickles dated 8th January regarding the above planning appeal decision.  Your correspondence has been passed to me, as the Planning Inspectorate has responsibility for the planning appeal process.

You may be aware that this appeal was the subject of a question addressed by Baroness Hanham, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Department of Communities and Local Government, during the parliamentary debate held on Tuesday 17 January.  Baroness Hanham expressed the view that the decision has been independently reached by a Planning Inspector acting on behalf of the Secretary of State and is final unless successfully challenged in the High Court.

I note your concerns about the possible implications of such decisions on the localism agenda.  I can, however, assure you that whilst appeal decisions are made at the national level, they are informed by evidence submitted by the parties locally.  This would include the degree of compliance with local planning policies and the views of local residents.

I am unable to add to this except to say that, due to the strict timescales in place, any High Court Challenge must be lodged by January 30^th 2012.

Yrs etc.

He knows very well, of course, that while local groups may raise tens of thousands of pounds to fight their case locally, they are most unlikely to be able to fund an appeal to the High Court.  I should stress here that I mean no personal criticism of Sir Michael.  He is merely doing his job.  On the contrary, I blame Brussels, and the pusillanimous politicians in London who have accepted the EU policy.

Come to think of it, perhaps my paraphrase of Sir Michael’s letter was unnecessarily long.  In plain English, the letter says “B****r Off”.

Croatia votes for a noose

Croatia’s President Ivo Josipovic

Croatia is a delightful country with wonderful beaches on its Adriatic coast-line, and historic cities like Dubrovnik and Split.  A popular tourist destination, it has a place in European history, and claims to have invented the neck-tie.

I have spent a certain amount of time on the issue of Croatia’s proposed accession to the EU — including a week-long visit in May 2007, with my colleague Emma McClarkin, to Zagreb and Split.    I wrote at some length of my experiences there, and the concerns I had over Croatia’s readiness to join the EU.  I formed the view that Croatia was not a democratic state under the rule of law, with free media, free markets, property rights, enforceable contracts and a transparent judicial system.  I was concerned about crony capitalism (and that’s real crony capitalism, not the ersatz kind that’s just found its way into the UK’s political discourse).  Unexplained wealth amongst politicians.  Organised crime.  Endemic bribery and corruption.  Trafficking of all kinds.

The European Commission argues that huge reforms have taken place over the last five years, and that Croatia is now ready for EU membership.  They said the same, of course, about Romania and Bulgaria (already EU members).  But many commentators feel that those countries saw the EU’s entry criteria as an obstacle to be overcome, rather than as new standards to be embedded in public life.  It was like limbo dancing — a huge effort to get under the bar, but a chance to resume business-as-usual once you’d made it.  My contacts in Croatia feel that such progress as there may have been is slight, and patchy, and largely cosmetic, and easily reversed once the accession pressures are off.

Which is a shame, since as I write, Croatians are going to the polls in their EU referendum, and pundits are predicting perhaps a 60% Yes vote.  After all, relatively poor countries like Croatia tend to see the EU first and foremost as a source of subsidies.

I was particularly alarmed by an interview I saw a couple of days back with Croatian President Ivo Josipovic.  Accepting that there was opposition to EU membership in Croatia, he nonetheless felt that membership was in his country’s best interests.  Asked specifically about the €uro, he again accepted that there were concerns, but thought it would all come out in the wash.  “After all”, he said (as near as I can remember), “we must recall that the real economic problem is the indebtedness of nations, not the single currency”.

The naïveté of this view is positively scary.

Of course the President is half right.  Many countries around the world — the USA, UK, Japan — have very serious debt problems that cannot be attributed wholly to the €uro.  But his failure to recognise the specific problems of the eurozone is surely a matter of concern.  Few eurosceptics will need a briefing on those problems, but John O’Sullivan on ConHome offers a superb discussion and analysis.  

In short, the €uro adds a whole new dimension to the economic crisis, by creating imbalances of competitiveness between northern and southern Europe (think Germany & Greece) that simply cannot be resolved within the €uro’s fixed-exchange-rate structure.  €uro break-up is increasingly seen as the only viable long-term solution.  Ten years ago there was extensive discussion about “the right rate at which to join”, and I used to argue that there was no right rate, since the rate which is right today will be wrong tomorrow, and in ten years’ time.  Now we see it happening before our eyes.

I hope that the Croatians know what they’re getting into.  I suspect not.  Never mind the neck-tie.  Today, they’re voting for a noose.

Fool Cells?

As I said earlier -- fuel cells are not pretty!

I recently wrote a piece about hydrogen fuel cells, and I happened to send a copy to my brother-in-law Oliver Winterbottom, now retired, but formerly an automotive engineer and designer.  He started his career many years ago with Jaguar, and also spent many years with Lotus.  He had some helpful comments on fuel cells (or as he called them, “Fool Cells”), and I have paraphrased his contribution here.

For land transport, fuel cells overcome the problem of the very long recharging time for batteries in electric vehicles. To fill up with hydrogen takes a similar time to conventional liquid fuels.   This gives us emission-free vehicles on the roads — but the generation of hydrogen uses electricity.

Of course we can use renewable electricity to make the hydrogen.  But the amount of energy needed to supply current transport is huge, with mega-supertankers bringing in fuel for up to 30 million vehicles in the UK alone.  Wind power, even on a good day (for them) produces very little.

So to make the hydrogen, we would have to use a vast amount of electricity, of which about 90% would be “dirty” generation.  Goodness knows, the lights are due to go out in 5 years’ time without this extra demand!

Hydrogen fuel cell technology works -– see the Honda FCX Clarity -– it’s a lovely car, good drive, horrendous cost!  Interesting that there seems to be less R & D activity with buses, probably because there is not the volume sales return.

As for storing the occasional surplus from wind farms: First it would not be a reliable resource for vehicle fuel – wind no blow, holiday cancelled – no fuel.  As I pointed out in my earlier piece, converting electricity to H2 then back again is very inefficient.

Perhaps the solution is to store the wind.  Set up a Wind Trading Agency modelled on the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme.  He with the most wind wins. That should strengthen some of the member states of Europe!

It seems that the UK Government is debating tax-payer support for Hydrogen service stations. This means we pay for an infrastructure to support vehicles most of us could never afford.  Another eco-friendly dead-end.

Why Warsi is wrong on Rupert

 

Straz, Jan 18th. L to R: RFH; Sir Winston Churchill; Rupert Matthews

I’ve just returned from a week in the European parliament in Strasbourg, where Rupert Matthews was a guest of the Conservative delegation.  But while the delegation made Rupert welcome in Strasbourg, Central Office has not had a lot to say to him, or to me, or to East Midlands Conservatives, recently.  But according to the BBC, “Conservative Central Office had earlier said it could not begin the process of selecting another MEP until Mr Helmer officially resigns”.

This illustrates CCHQ’s ignorant (or perhaps deliberate) determination to disregard the established euro-election process.  Their mind-set is relentlessly UK/Westminster-based, single-member/first-past-the-post.  Their attitude is simply irrelevant to the euro-regional-list/proportional-representation system.  In fact, of course, they don’t need to “start the process of selection”, because it was completed in 2008!

And even if they did need to start a new process, their determination not to start even when I’ve announced my intention to resign is just plain obstinacy and obstructionism.

At the risk of repetition, let’s recall that the East Midlands Conservative list was established in 2008, according to Party Rules, by an elaborate and expensive hustings-plus-postal-ballot system, to establish a ranked list of five candidates.  More than 3000 Party members voted.  That list exists, it is in place, and Rupert Matthews is Next-in-Line, Number Three on the list.  He is also a sound Conservative who has campaigned vigorously for the Party for best part of thirty years, and is well-liked and respected in the region.

The Party has also said, repeatedly, that there is a Party rule requiring the Next-in-Line to be on the MEP candidate list at the time of succession — though there is some doubt that any such list exists at all at this phase of the European parliamentary cycle.  Any such rule would, of course, make nonsense of the whole list system.  It is another bizarre attempt by CCHQ to read-across from the Westminster system, but it simply doesn’t read across.

What’s more, it is just plain not true.  I and others have studied the rules and been unable to find any such rule.  It isn’t there.  Yet Ed Young, the Party Chairman’s Chief-of-Staff, insisted repeatedly that it was so.  Let’s be generous and assume that he made an honest error — a less charitable explanation would be that he attempted a downright lie.  Pressed again and again on the issue, Ed Young finally produced two rules that clearly related to the Westminster by-election situation, and were completely irrelevant to the MEP succession process.

Any such rule would be redundant in any case, since of course Rupert was on the approved list, and was duly selected according to Party rules, in 2008.  His position on the list was confirmed and validated by around a million voters in the euro-elections of 2009.  This remains the case until the next euro-election in 2014.

It is a sad reflection on today’s Conservative Party that the Party Chairman (inexperienced as she is) should disregard due process, and defy the democratic decision of Party members and voters in the East Midlands.

The answer to wind power intermittency? Maybe not!

Fuel cells aren't pretty -- but cars with them may be

One of the things I’ve enjoyed hugely during my years in the parliament has been the European Energy Forum (EEF), organised by my good colleague Giles Chichester MEP (SW).  EEF arranges dinner-debate events, where I’ve learned a great deal about a wide range of energy issues.  The latest one focussed on Hydrogen Fuel Cell technology, touted by some as the solution for low-emission vehicles.  In that rôle, it has to compete with hybrid; all-electric; LPG; bio-diesel; and, indeed, diesel itself.  I don’t pretend to be an expert on these questions, and I’m happy to leave it to the technical folk and the market.  But of course a major problem for fuel-cell vehicles (and for most exotic fuels) is the provision of distribution infrastructure.  A fuel-cell vehicle is not a lot of good without a hydrogen supply

This involves a huge investment in hydrogen filling stations, and the old chicken-and-egg dilemma.  No one is going to buy a fuel-cell car without a filling station.  No one is going to build a network of hydrogen filling stations if there are no hydrogen cars out there.  Hydrogen will start, if at all, with commercial vehicles on regular routes — like buses, which can all be re-fuelled at the bus station.

Of course we should remember that hydrogen is not an energy source — merely a way of storing and distributing energy.  The vast majority of hydrogen comes from electrolysis of water, which requires electricity to start with.  This in turn will come from conventional or alternative generation, which may or may not be “clean” (in the eco-freak jargon).  So while fuel cells give you zero tail-pipe emissions, they may give you the same total emissions as petrol, depending how the electricity was generated to start with.

I was interested in another potential application of hydrogen fuel-cell technology: energy storage.  Which brings me to my bêtes noires — wind turbines.  The killer problem for wind (well, one of the killer problems) is intermittency.  Various solutions have been suggested, ranging from pumping water up-hill, to drive hydro-turbines when the wind drops, to charging up a fleet of ten million electric vehicles (part of the green pipe-dream for the future) and borrowing some energy back again when we’re short (OK, so it’s a daft idea, but no dafter than wind farms to start with).

Our industry spokesmen at the EEF event proposed that excess electricity generation when the wind blows should be used to electrolyse water (into hydrogen and oxygen).  The hydrogen can them be stored, quite cheaply and safely, and used with fuel cells to generate electricity when the wind drops.  Bingo!  Intermittency solved, at a stroke!  The greatest obstacle to wind power swept away.

Except that, as always, there’s a fly in the ointment.  I did a bit of checking with those who know about these matters, and they pointed out that whenever you convert energy from one form to another, you lose some of it.  Efficiency is never 100%.  And in this case, we’re converting it twice — from electrical to chemical, and back again.  I’m told that the losses in this double conversion are likely to be of the order of 75%.

So we start with expensive electricity from wind, and we lose three quarters of it in the process.  So we’re now paying four times as much per kilowatt-hour as regular wind energy — which was expensive to start with.  And that’s before we’ve started paying for the hydrogen storage, electrolysis and fuel cell kit, which doesn’t come cheap.  So a technically feasible solution proves to be hopelessly uneconomic — which is what wind power was to start with.  Back to the drawing board, guys, I’m afraid.

Shock report: Wind Farms do not reduce emissions!

Wind turbines are expensive, unsightly, noisy and damaging to health.  But Chris Huhne tells us we need them to reduce emissions and prevent global warming.

Now a new report shows that the turbines fail even on that rather suspect objective.  Wind turbines do not reduce emissions!

This is a counter-intuitive conclusion.  Surely if they generate any “clean” energy at all from wind, they must reduce emissions, at least somewhat?  But because wind is intermittent and unpredictable, it needs conventional back-up to fill in the gaps.  Most commonly, the back-up is gas, because that is the only mainstream generating technology sufficiently flexible to balance wind.  But a conventional gas-fired power station is most efficient — in both costs and emissions — when it’s run consistently, close to capacity.  It runs inefficiently when it’s constantly ramped up and down to reflect changes in the wind.  I’ve been arguing this case for years, and those who promote wind rarely consider the back-up costs and emissions.

Now new research from the Netherlands shows that the total CO2 emissions of the system — wind turbines plus gas back-up — are as great or greater than the emissions for the same output from gas alone.  This research is incorporated in a recent report published by think-tank Civitas, and written by the estimable Ruth Lea, a first-class economist of very sound views. 

So let’s just think it through.  First of all, we’re paying twice for our generating capacity — turbines, plus gas back-up.  Then, we’re getting very expensive wind power, mixed with relatively expensive gas power.  High energy prices are a huge and unnecessary burden on our economy.  Then, to cap it all, we’re not even getting the savings on emissions that Chris Huhne thinks we need.  It’s a lose-lose-lose deal — and that’s before we think of the visual intrusion, the housing blight, the industrialisation of the countryside, the environmental damage, the birds and bats killed, the noise, the flicker, the negative health impacts on local residents.  All for nothing.

You can sense that change is in the wind when the Guardian (of all newspapers) reports the claims that wind power can actually increase emissions.  I’ve no doubt that their environment correspondent Leo Hickman choked on his cocoa when he saw the Civitas paper, and with the assistance of the vested interests of the wind industry, he sets about debunking it.   As he says, analyses of the efficiency of wind power are complex.  But however you cut it, and making every allowance for alternative views and special pleading by the industry, it’s a moral certainty that any potential emissions savings from wind power are way less than Chris Huhne imagines.

And this conclusion is based not on one single report from one country.  Just days after the publication of the Civitas report, we hear of similar results from Ireland (See tenth letter down).   This letter cites a study by Dutch engineer Dr. Fred Udo.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that wind power, far from being “free, clean energy” is quite simply a scam.  Not a scam in some vaguely metaphorical sense, but quite literally.  We’re being conned out of money, we’re damaging our economy, we’re desecrating our countryside, on a promise of emissions reductions that simply cannot be delivered — even if you thought that emissions reductions were a priority, or that the EU alone could ever deliver them when the rest of the world, quite rightly, is losing interest.  And wind farms are massively regressive.  They deliver millions of pounds to rich landowners (including David Cameron’s father-in-law), while driving millions of families into fuel poverty.

This is a wholly damaging policy which simply has no redeeming features at all.

Diana Wallis throws her toys out of her pram

Diana Wallis, who failed just this week in her bid to become the new President of the European parliament, has thrown her toys out of her pram — or at least (I understand on good authority) has resigned.  Unlike me, she just did it, without further discussion.

Both she and our own Nirj Deva sought to break the “Buggins’ Turn” system in the parliament where the big groups stitch up the Presidency for the full five years.  Sadly, both failed, and it went to the “official” socialist candidate, the aggressive and unpleasant German Martin Schultz (whom Silvio Berlusconi suggested would make a great Nazi Camp Commandant).

Amusingly, the Independent newspaper, writing about the contest beforehand, reckoned that Diana should do reasonably well, but argued that Nirj Deva, as a British Conservative Eurosceptic, stood no chance at all.

In the event, Nirj pipped Diane to second place, albeit by the narrowest margin, with 142 votes to her 141.  This, perhaps, was the final straw that broke the Wallis back, but for whatever reason, the word today is that she has quit.  It is rumoured that she had rather burnt her boats with her Liberal group, and after her recent term as a Vice-President of the parliament, could not face the humiliation of returning to the back-benches amongst a group where she is by no means flavour of the month.

So this raises the question of succession (one which I find interesting and topical).  It seems that the second candidate on the Yorkshire Lib-Dem list in 2009, behind Diana, was a chap called Stewart Arnold.  Three things you might like to know about Mr. Arnold.  The first is that he is currently on Diana’s staff.  The second, that he is (despite the surname), the husband of Lib-Dem MEP …. Diana Wallis.  And third, based on hearsay in the corridor, he’s not that highly rated by other Liberal MEPs.

Ho hum.  I wonder if the Lib-Dem High Command will “do a Warsi”, and have second thoughts about the succession?

Decision time on the EU

The first big question on the Coalition’s EU policy: is Cameron frustrated by the constraints of coalition with the euro-fanatic Lib-Dems?  Or is he secretly delighted that Nick Clegg offers the perfect excuse for putting all that difficult re-negotiation stuff on the back burner?

Politicians find it easy to talk tough in opposition, but harder to make it happen when in power.

It may seem churlish to challenge Cameron’s commitment in the wake of his courageous Veto, and I happily joined the chorus of adulation as a British Prime Minister finally said “NO!” to Brussels.

But with the cynicism of hindsight — he really didn’t have much option.  If he’d to accepted the deal on the table there would have been uproar in the press and the Party.  And the House of Commons would probably have voted it down.  He had to say No.

Which leads us to the second big question.  Can the Veto stick?  The EU is a past master at bypassing and overwhelming obstructions, like an incoming tide sweeping aside a child’s sand-castle.  (The classic example was their re-classification of the Working Time Directive as a Health & Safety issue, not Employment, thus bypassing the UK veto).

We may well have a formal veto on EU-wide taxes like the disastrous Tobin Tax.  But Brussels will find a huge range of new QMV regulations designed to punish the City.  Then comes Cameron’s tough choice.  Either break EU law, defy Brussels and the ECJ, and edge towards the exit.  Or accept defeat.

It seems bizarre and perverse that our EU partners seek to scapegoat the City for a monetary disaster of their own making — and one against which we have warned them for a decade.  It’s equally perverse that they seek to solve the problem of debt with more debt, the problems of EU integration with more integration.

Merkozy’s “fiscal harmonisation” would not solve the €uro’s problems — even if they could make it stick (which they signally failed to do with the Maastricht criteria).  Debt mutualisation would only defer the evil day.  Perpetual fiscal transfers could hold the €uro together, but at the expense of making Greece a German dependency.

Without a €uro break-up, Brussels simply cannot address the structural problem of competitiveness between North and South, because that is inherent in the architecture of monetary union.

The EU is not primarily an entity, but a process.  The Coalition’s policy is effectively to ensure that, for the UK at least, that process will cease.  We have to recognise that having repudiated the process, we cannot indefinitely remain part of the entity.  Roll on Independence Day.

Resignation Postponed: A Short Personal Statement

In October, I announced my intention to resign from the European parliament on Dec 31^st.  I was asked by our Delegation Leader Martin Callanan to postpone that date to Jan 20^th to cover some key votes in Strasbourg in January, which I agreed to do.  However I have not yet signed the Parliament’s formal deed of resignation.

I made it clear at the time that a key reason for my decision was my disillusionment with a wide range of Conservative policies – a view which has been strongly reinforced by David Cameron’s vocal backing for further fiscal integration in the EU.

I announced my resignation in the confident expectation (shared by just about everyone) that I would be replaced by the Next-in-Line on the 2009 Conservative East Midlands list, Rupert Matthews.  Since the introduction of the regional list system of voting, there have been nine mid-term vacancies for UK MEPs, and on every occasion the seat has gone to the next available name on the list.

It has now emerged, however, that the Party has reservations over the succession.  After the 2010 General Election, a large number of very good people, including Rupert, were taken off the Westminster candidate list.  Because he is not currently on that list, the Party has referred his case to the Candidates’ Committee, which will require him to undergo a Candidate Panel.

This is entirely wrong-headed.  The Candidates’ Committee exists to pre-qualify names for future elections.  It cannot retrospectively disqualify names from previous elections.

Rupert was on the list at the relevant time, 2008.  He was duly selected under Party rules, in a postal ballot by around three and a half thousand East Midlands Conservative Party members, as #2 on the list (subsequently moved to #3 under the positive discrimination process).  He was then confirmed as Next-in-Line in the national euro elections of 2009.  He has earned his place, he has a democratic mandate.  It is outrageous that the Party should be minded to set aside the result of a national election, and many East Midlands Conservatives are very angry indeed.

However the Party needs to issue a Certificate in respect of such an appointment, and believes it can withhold the Certificate in this case.  But the Party’s right to withhold the Certificate must be exercised fairly, proportionately and transparently.  The Certificate is intended to enable the Party to refuse someone who has (for example) been convicted of a serious offence, or who has left the Party.  But where no such impediment exists, withholding the Certificate would be arbitrary and perverse.

I have made it clear that I will not sign the formal resignation papers until the position is clarified and Rupert is confirmed.  I was happy to resign in favour of the Next-in-Line in the normal way, but I am not prepared to stand aside for some A-List Cameron protégée from St. John’s Wood.

However the Party says it will not call the panel and make the decision until I do resign.  So we have a Mexican stand-off.

I think that both I and Rupert (and our respective families) are entitled to some certainty and resolution on the issue.  Accordingly I have indicated to the Party Chairman that if the situation is not resolved within a few weeks, I shall withdraw my offer to resign.  I am quite prepared, if necessary, to stay in place for the remaining 2½ years of my mandate, until 2014.

I have always argued that when a Conservative MEP is out of sympathy with Party policy, and unable to defend it, he should resign to make way for another Conservative.  I believe that that is the decent and honourable thing to do, and I have sought to do it, but my intention has been frustrated by the Party’s reprehensible prevarication.

I have also made it clear to the Party Chairman that I believe that my obligations on this point have been fully and finally discharged by my offer, made in good faith, to resign.  Accordingly, if I am obliged to stay in place until 2014, I shall feel no further sense of obligation or responsibility to the Party.

This article first appeared on ConservativeHome

Interview on BBC Radio Lincolnshire

Today I was interviewed by BBC Radio Lincolnshire on my proposed resignation. To listen to the full interview click here.

The BBC follows Rupert Matthew’s visit to Strasbourg

BBC East Midlands have done an interesting piece on Rupert Matthews which I wanted to share with you. You can access the video here.