Airstrip One

Sometimes you just despair

The United Kingdom (United Nations Association) held its conference in (sunny) Morecambe earlier this year and provided a whole document from chatter, codifying their inane hot air. They condemned the atrocities but argued against early intervention in Afghanistan. Instead, the UN should have tried to determine if Osama and Al-Qaeda was guilty. Why? Because all international coalitions would be far better if they were under the objective control of the United Nations rather than have "self-centred agendas" (like defending your country, for example) "from skewing the process".

The policy document adds up to a slew of disarmament, signing up to every international treaty that exists, placing all of our peacekeeping forces under UN control, less co-operation with the US and more co-operation with the EU. On the plus side, they do condemn human rights violations in China.

Do we need to sign up to every treaty written by the United Nations. A permanent seat at the Security Council is useful enough for our needs but should we withdraw our co-operation from the irrelevant areas of this assembly?

That ever so stable Eurozone

German Banks are going belly up at an increasing rate. Funny how we don't hear this on the BBC's business reporting?

Yes, Dorothy, it could happen here

Portugal cedes financial control to EU

It may be the case the Ambrose Evans Pritchard has a taste for the overly ambitious headline, and that the facts are not as alarming as the headline makes out, but they're still fairly alarming facts nonetheless.

Basically Portugal has breached the arbitrary limits set by the European (in)Stability Pact, which is part and parcel of Economic and Monetary Union. The European Commission have now said that they are "legally obliged" to take action against Portugal. This could take a number of forms.

1) A massive fine, about 0.75% of Portugal's GDP.
2) Portugal effectively ceding taxing and spending control to the master budgeteers of the European Commission, those chaps whose budget has been refused an audit certificate for five years due to rampant corruption.
3) The whole thing could come crashing down in the nick of time because France is also in trouble.

There may even be some riots in Lisbon, which would play well for a referendum on joining the Euro.

You may think that you've heard this all before. Germany, Italy, France and Belgium are all technically in default one way or the other and nothing serious happens to any of them. The point being that these are in the "magic circle" of original members (the other two are the Netherlands and Luxemburg). Plucky littly Portugal is not.

Could the same happen to us if we join the Euro? Put good money on it.

Homeland Security

Sir David Omand, former Permanent Secretary at the Home Office and a former Head of GCHQ, has been appointed the Intelligence and Security Co-Ordinator at No. 10. His role is as follows,

He will co-ordinate security, intelligence and consequence management matters and to deal with risks and major emergencies should they arise. Sir David will also act as Accounting Officer and Permanent Secretary to the Cabinet Office.

There is no greater indication of the emphasis that Blair places upon intelligence and the possibility of terrorist attack. The Civil Servant in charge of his own [Prime Minister's] department is a member of the JIC and is gearing up for the management of emergencies and risks by coordinating the work of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ. His appointment follows a critical report from the parliamentary intelligence and security committee.

This also mirrors, in an understated way, the office of Homeland Security in the United States. The 'war on terror' is beginning to acquire an air of permanence in the corridors of Whitehall as the paradigm for intelligence gathering, with a role directly at the heart of government.

Leave the European Movement alone

The Bruges group has been complaining about the amount of European money going to pro-Euro pressure groups, most prominently among them the European Movement.

Now this is midguided. The European Movement has succesfully stifled new and original thought among the pro-Europeans for almost twenty years now.

Imagine what would have happened to the democratic side of the argument if we were dominated to the same extent by the Campaign for an Independent Britain or the Democracy Movement? We'd be dead in the water.

Let's wish the European Movement many more years of survival, it's one of the strongest weapons in the democrats' draw.