It looks like another false hope of an EU referendum is being considered - by Labour. Our hopes raised only to be dashed again after the election. The real fear, is in the hearts of the political elite; they fear the electorate may just turn to smaller parties, such as UKIP, BNP, etc. in increasing numbers.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... es-on.html
For Ed Balls to allow his name to be associated with another offer of a referendum on the EU also suggests that Labour is NOT convinced that the recent local election results were so good for Labour. About 70% of the electorate effectively voted for None of the Above at the local elections by abstaining – not a confidence winning result for Labour.

Labour are only offering this on the basis the project is coming apart at the seams, consequently it is safe to do so in the knowledge they will never have to deliver on their promise.

My guess, events will dictate what occurs from this point forward but the EU will look completely different 12 Months from now..

If Greece exits, reinstates the new Drachma and is able to reduce the stresses on the economy to such a point where life becomes better for Greeks in the street then there will be an overwhelming rush to the exits by Portugal, Ireland and Spain who will want to emulate that..

This is their biggest fear the fact that once an exit does take place the grass really is greener on the other side.

I suspect you may be right there Geezer; in time we could have a new EU. The big question is; what will that new EU look like? We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that “ever-closer political union” was, and remains, the ultimate aim.

Are we witnessing the outworking of yet another Hegelian Dialectic, where the created EU economic crisis is being used to welcome, even force, a full a total political union? Could we at some time be seeing an all-powerful EU President foisted upon us; a charismatic political saviour; a president who somehow has all the solutions to the economic insanity that has been created over recent decades of borrow-and-spend politics?

Barrosso, Von Rumpoy and a few other faceless EU crats are all unelected...... These are just the faces that pop up in Farage bashing sessions in the EU parliament outside of that building they have no real power.

Sarkozy and Merkel have been the EU driving force of the last couple of years. Sarkozy has now gone and Merkel is damaged. She has the power to keep Greece in by setting up a transfer Union where German taxpayers simply fund the Greek excesses or allowing the ECB to print (and purchase bonds directly) (as the BOE has done to keep the UK solvent). Merkel is damned if she does and damned if she doesn't.

She either refuses Greek further support Greece falls out and the EU is severely weakened (the Eurozone perhaps fatally so) or she allows German funds to flow or the printing presses in an attempt to keep it all intact and sacrifices herself on the German political alter...... She is a politician so its pretty easy to guess what it will be..

Your correct though we must remain focused on what extreme measures they will deploy to keep it all together. As things become more desperate I suspect they fall back on the rhetoric that war between Euro states is much more likely without a central Euro government..

Of course the opposing view is that a co-operative trading block where all members participate on a level playing field without barriers or embargoes will be just as effective..

After all that's what the people of the UK voted for in the referendum of 1972...

We've been softened up by Greece and Italy accepting unelected technocrats. Is Europe developing a liking for more unelected technocrats? Clearly, nothing is ruled out.

Some interesting quotes here:
http://www.nst.com.my/latest/greece-cha ... nt-1.84131

That last comment demonstrates how far the farce has gone. We now have people like the Chancellor of Germany going on the record saying Greece will have to meet the conditions or leave (a person whom by the way is accountable to her electorate so has to face the reality of the situation) and some faceless European bueracrat (not accountable to anyone other than the 'Project' itself) saying he could never envisage a situation where Greece had to leave..

It becomes more comical by the day the measures they will go to. Truly Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf type rhetoric...... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Saeed_al-Sahhaf

I am sure they would impose a technocrat on Greece in a heartbeat if they thought they could get away with it. They have two immediate problems though. The Greeks have just had an election and to install someone flies in the face of democracy and disgracefully so and the second one is they would need to send down half the German Army with the chap to stop the Greeks lynching him.....

Have just dig out some more info about the last time Labour promised such a referendum.

Gordon Brown was taken to court by Labour activist Stuart Bower for breach of contract over the last EU referendum:

"Speaking on behalf of the Prime Minister at Brighton County Court(7-2-08), Miss Cecelia Ivimy, Gordon Brown's legal representative, said that "manifesto pledges are not subject to legitimate expectation."

So they can lie as much as they like about what they *plan* to do if they get in power, it will never have to be put in action and they can do this legally.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7214384.stm

I agree; which basically means that democracy is missing in our political system. And the politicians have the audacity to blame the electorate for not taking part in politics, when it is the politicians themselves who break the relationship between themselves and the 'democratic process'.

The tories are as bad they promised and didn't deliver trying to parry the blow with a bill invoking a referendum before any further power grab..

Interesting on how there are never any politicians about these parts to rebuff these statements except at Election time when they want something!!

Or is that a figment of cynical old me's imagination?

I don't mean run of the mill councillors (nothing against these people, and they have been known to stray from the party line when conscience dictates) but those who sit at Cabinet level on the local authority or would strive to get into the big house at Westminster....

Again I agree. There is no significant difference between the Lib, Labs, and the Tories. Even the Greens are not so very different. All four of those parties are more than happy to sink the UK into the EU and UN.

Not only these parts. I have a sizable file of communications between myself and my Tory MP, where I have challenged a number of Government policies. In every case the MP responds with the offical Party line. It's as though he doesn't have a mind of his own; he repsonds as though he is an expensive puppet. He is so predictable that I could write his replies for him.

You may be cynical, but not without justification, and it's certainly not your imagination.

Time to re-arm, and conscript back into the armed services, so who's aircraft carriers do we borrow??

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Its not always the biggest and the bestest, its them that make the least mistakes.