Toby on Tuesday

'Strange Unexpected Limits'

Probably the most poignant of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories is “His Last Bow:  The War Service of Sherlock Holmes.”   Set on the evening of 2nd August, 1914, with all Europe collapsing into the abyss of the Great War, two German agents, Von Bork and Von Herling, meet on the coast of Kent to discuss their years in England.   Von Bork declares, “They are not very hard to deceive, these Englanders...A more docile, simple folk could not be imagined.”   To which Von Herling replies, “I don’t know about that...They have strange unexpected limits, and one must learn to allow for them.   It is that surface simplicity of theirs which makes a trap for the stranger.   One’s first impression is that they are entirely soft.   Then you suddenly come upon something very hard, and you know that you have reached the limit and must adapt yourself to the fact.”   The truth is that the limit of Britain’s patience with its EU membership has now been reached.   No political sophistry and no bullying by the “Remain” campaign can work now, as our country prepares to face down the bullies once more, as we have done so often in the past.

Those bullies can really be divided into two camps, those within the EU and those outside.   For the EU countries, and especially those within the Eurozone and the Schengen Area, which by a miracle Britain has never joined, the bullying will come from those pushing for a United States of Europe, with its own Euro-armed forces, Euro-treasury and aggressive EU foreign policy.   Last week, their apologists in Britain tacitly agreed to collude with them in return for some cosmetic changes to social security benefits.   But given that both the Eurozone and Schengen Area have already proved themselves to be unsustainable, it is from the second group, those outside the EU, Turkey, the U.S., and their allies in Saudi Arabia that the most unpredictable bullying will come.   The war of words between Turkey and Russia is escalating into something far more dangerous.   Turkey, a NATO member and candidate for early EU membership, is coalescing with Ukraine against Russia, which it accuses of acting as “a terrorist organisation”.   We may dislike Mr. Putin’s way of doing business, but there is no appetite in Britain for a war with Russia.   Yet if we are not careful, we are at risk of being bullied by Turkey and Ukraine and their sponsors in Washington and Riyadh into an accidental and unpredictable war.

The same poor judgment and impetuousness which coloured David Cameron’s EU “renegotiation” also marked his failed attempt to seek Parliament’s support for a bombing campaign against the Assad regime in Syria in 2013, when we would have found ourselves allied to a host of terrorist groups, including ISIS.   Yet again, Britain’s luck held and the House of Commons restrained the folly of our rulers.   Now there is a chance to face down the bullies once more and make Britain a safe haven in a troubled world, something which our people want above all else.    Soon we shall all have one last chance to remind the bullies, wherever they are, that in the words of Conan Doyle’s Von Herling on the British people, “One’s first impression is that they are entirely soft.   Then you suddenly come across something very hard, and you know that you have reached the limit.”   And we must never forget that bullies are cowards and, not for the first time in our history, must be faced down!

Until next Tuesday!

Toby

Toby on Tuesday

'Ponzi Schemes and Political Scams'

 

Last week I wrote about the Italian author Carlo Collodi and his “Adventures of Pinocchio”, the little wooden puppet who told dreadful lies just for the fun of it.   Today I want to write about another creative Italian, but a far more sinister and malign one, Carlo Ponzi, creator of the Ponzi Scheme, the financial scam that bears his name.   Now Carlo Ponzi was born in Lugo, Italy in 1882.   At the age of 21 he left for Boston with less than 3 Dollars in his pocket but a wealth of money-making plans.   America was full of Italian immigrants then including his mobster friend Ignazio “The Wolf” Lupo.   Dealing first in postal coupons, Ponzi promised investors that he would double their money in 90 days.   The cash poured into his Securities Exchange Company and, sure enough, the first investors certainly doubled their money, paid from the funds that continued to come in from greedy speculators.   Of course his venture, the original Ponzi Scheme, crashed but there will always be gullible investors and the financial world is still awash with fraudulent projects – the equivalent of “best of both worlds” political offerings.

 

Now on Thursday the European Council will meet to approve our very own David Cameron’s personal Ponzi Scheme.   Like the clients of Carlo Ponzi, or more recently of Bernie Madoff or of China’s Ding Ning, we are being asked to take on trust a financial package that is unverified, unaudited and unstable.   For David Cameron is trying to bounce us into a referendum on 23rd June on an improbable deal the terms of which can be altered in the European Parliament during July.   In the words of Guy Verhofstadt, Prime Minister of Belgium until 2008 and founder of the Spinelli Group in the European Parliament, in speaking of Cameron’s agreement, the European Parliament will then be able “to accept it, to change it, to modify it.”   And Martin Schulz, President of the European Parliament, has added that any decision taken at this week’s meeting of the European Council can be reversed, “Nothing in our lives is irreversible.   Therefore legally binding decisions are also reversible.”   In addition countries in Eastern Europe have been assured that there will be time “to modify” the proposals as they pass through the Brussels system.

 

We all know why David Cameron is so anxious to push us all into a referendum in June before his agreement comes before the European Parliament in July, the month when both the Eurozone and migrant crises are likely to explode again.   Carlo Ponzi would certainly have been proud of David Cameron’s gifts of persuasion but in the world of politics, just as in the world of high finance, scams are eventually found out and those who commit them receive their just reward!

 

Until next Tuesday!

Toby

Toby on Tuesday

'I'm a real boy!'

Today, just for the benefit of our beloved Prime Minister “Call-me-Dave” Cameron, I’d like to retell the story of Pinocchio.    He was the little wooden puppet whose nose grew longer every time he told a lie.   And now that our Dave is back from his tour of EU capitals, holding that piece of paper drafted for him by Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, we get a fair idea of his capacity for truth.   Of course Dave spent the whole of his tour reassuring EU leaders that his purpose was to “lock Britain into the EU once and for all” and they took him at his word.   In fact his proposals are far, far worse than anything that Britain has faced before, as they represent formal acknowledgement that nothing at all can change here without the consent of Brussels and Berlin.   In truth, Mr. Tusk has run rings around silly Dave and achieved a negotiating triumph at our expense.

It was an Italian writer, Carlo Collodi, who first wrote his “Adventures of Pinocchio” in 1881.   His creation was a little wooden puppet, carved by a woodcarver called Geppetto, who longed to become a little boy.   But he told the most terrible lies and every time he lied his nose grew longer.   And he mocks and insults the good woodcarver who first gave him life.   Geppetto calls him a “wretched boy”, yet for a long time he gets away with all his mischief and deceit.   And what is extraordinary is that, in the illustrations to Collodi’s original masterpiece by the Italian artist Enrico Mazzanti, Pinocchio looks astonishingly like our Dave Cameron.   But in the end, Pinocchio’s enemies, the Fox and the Cat, just like Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission, decide that they have had enough of the little puppet.   They put a noose around his neck and hang him from the branch of an oak tree, “...a tempestuous northerly wind began to blow and roar angrily, and it beat the poor puppet from side to side, making him swing violently, like the clatter of a bell ringing for a wedding.   And the swinging gave him atrocious spasms.   His breath failed him and he could say no more.   He shut his eyes, opened his mouth, stretched his legs, gave a long shudder and hung, stiff and insensible.”

Pinocchio is a cautionary tale, which our Prime Minister should really take to heart.    He has allowed himself to be the EU’s puppet, he has told the most brazen lies to anyone who would listen and his nose has no doubt been growing longer all the time.   But in the end the Fox and the Cat, Donald Tusk and Jean-Claude Juncker, will decide that they too have had enough of him and to do away with him.   His great blunder of course has been to trust them while mocking and insulting the honest woodcarver, in this case the British people, who first gave him life.   So the story of Pinocchio should serve as a warning to our Prime Minister of what happens when you lie.  The British people are patient and forbearing but they are not to be mocked and, when their patience runs out, justice follows as day follows night!

Until next Tuesday!

Toby

Toby on Tuesday

'Maximus Decimus Meridius'

Russell Crowe is a part of the great wave of new talent that has poured out of New Zealand and Australia over the past 30 years.   Although a New Zealand citizen, he has lived most of his life in Australia and identifies himself as Australian.   He first won international acclaim for his role as the Roman general Maximus Decimus Meridius in Ridley Scott’s 2000 epic “Gladiator”.   A stream of heroic parts followed, including his role as Captain Jack Aubrey in “Master and Commander:  The Far Side of the World”.   And last year he directed and starred as Joshua Connor, an Australian farmer, in “The Water Diviner”, one of a host of commemorative films released in Australia to mark the centenary of the doomed Gallipoli campaign.

 

Of course the Allies’ great failure at Gallipoli was to underestimate the resilience and determination of the Turkish army.   The Turks are a people of ruthless courage, aware that their country is the meeting point between Europe and Asia and wholly justified in exploiting this geopolitical strength to the limit.   And at Gallipoli they had the added advantage of battle-hardened German officers and the finest artillery pieces and naval guns from the Krupp works at Essen.   The outcome could have been easily predicted, as could the resulting and enduring friendship between Germany and Turkey.   Indeed, there are now well over 3 million German citizens of Turkish origin, while the soaring population of Turkey, now over 80 million, has overtaken Germany’s own declining population.   And of course Turkey is the springboard for the relentless tide of migrants coming to Europe from its war-torn neighbours of Syria and Iraq.

 

Now as part of a long-term agreement with Turkey, the EU has recently agreed to “re-energise” Turkey’s application for EU membership, including visa-free travel from Turkey to the Schengen zone from October of this year and the payment of a further 3 billion Euros in return for Turkey doing more to “prevent irregular migration”.  This is in addition to Turkey’s 5 billion Euros of “pre-accession funding.”   Yet the other day the Turkish Prime Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, declared that still more EU funding would be needed as, “the 3 billion Euros is just to show political will to share the burden.”   And our own government continues to press for Turkey’s accession to the EU, despite its population being forecast to reach 100 million by the middle of the century and a GDP per capita of only a quarter of our own.   To think that in 1972 we turned our backs on Australia and New Zealand, and all those astonishing talents like Russell Crowe, to be part of this.   As Russell Crowe’s Maximus Decimus Meridius might almost have said, “Those whom the gods wish to destroy, first they make mad”!

 

Until next Tuesday!

 

Toby

Toby on Tuesday 

'Gannex and Government'

No one in Yorkshire over the age of 60 will ever forget Harold Wilson, or Lord Wilson of Rievaulx - in our constituency - as he became.   He was the canny Labour MP from Huddersfield who became Prime Minister from 1964 to 1970 and again from 1974 to 1976.   His famous one-liners like “A week is a long time in politics” and “You ask me what’s going on – well I’m going on!” have long survived him.   His trademarks were his pipe, although in truth he was a relentless cigar smoker and the pipe only came out when the cameras were on him, and his Gannex coat, made in Elland by his great friend Lord Kagan who in 1980 went to jail for theft and false accounting.   Harold Wilson was never an effective Prime Minister as, like David Cameron, he thought that once he had made a speech his job was done and no follow-up was needed, but he was a truly brilliant manager of the Labour Party.   His one real achievement was to have kept Britain out of the Vietnam War while maintaining good relations with Washington, something that Tony Blair and his “heir”, David Cameron, should really have tried to emulate.   In the end, however, his heroic consumption of brandy did for Harold Wilson and he stepped down as Prime Minister in 1976.   In 1983 he went to the House of Lords at Lord Wilson of Rievaulx in the heart of our constituency, with which he claimed a family link.   He died in 1995 but, extraordinarily, his truly delightful poetry-writing widow Mary is still with us.   Earlier this month, on 12th January, she reached her 100th birthday and UKIP Thirsk and Malton is proud to offer her many happy returns on her centenary.

 

Now of course where all this is leading is that, for reasons of party management, on 5th June, 1975 Harold Wilson gave our country a referendum on membership of the then EEC.   Like David Cameron now, he offered fundamental reform but in reality made only a few cosmetic adjustments, which all sounds very familiar.   The usual litany of big corporations, the BBC, the Government machine and the CIA all weighed in and, by a two-to-one vote, Britain opted to remain a member.   And, for identical reasons of party management, 41 years on David Cameron is also offering our country a referendum which might take place as early as June too.   In all of this, Cameron is not so much the “heir to Blair” as the “heir to Wilson.”   To remind ourselves, before the General Election David Cameron promised to opt out of EU employment laws and social policies, to repatriate control of criminal justice, to disapply the Charter of Fundamental Rights and to recover control of who could settle in the UK, all aims which have now been dropped.   And a further promise in the General Election campaign was that Britain would never be called on to bail out the failing Euro.   Yet a month after the poll, he was obliged to pledge £850 million to bail out Greece and then three months later he was called on to pay the balance of a £1.7 billion “prosperity surcharge”, based on Brussels’ previous estimates of the value of illegal services such as prostitution and the drugs trade which he had previously described as “completely unacceptable.”    In effect David Cameron won the General Election on a false prospectus, behaviour which in the private sector would have resulted in his sharing the fate of Lord Kagan.

 

Of course the real reasons for David Cameron’s rushed referendum are that both the EU’s migrant crisis and the collapsing Euro are now approaching their critical stages.   The EU’s supporters are trying to prevent reporting of the consequences of both uncontrolled migration from the Middle East and financial meltdown in France and Italy, but truth will out.   For Britain to survive, we need to be a safe haven and to protect ourselves from the fallout of these self-inflicted disasters.   We can only do this if our country votes to “Leave” when the referendum comes.   Of course there will be disruption, but nothing like the disruption that we face if we remain trapped inside the doomed EU ideology.   In 1975 Harold Wilson kept his party together and kept Britain inside the EEC.  The same voices which supported membership then, the same voices which sought unsuccessfully to browbeat us into joining the failed Euro currency are now back in force to bully us into a “Remain” vote.   But here in Yorkshire we all know that the project is unsustainable and that something better, something that is right for our nation, must now take its place.   And I suspect that even canny old Harold Wilson, with his pipe, his Gannex coat and his Yorkshire shrewdness would agree, for above all else he liked to be on the winning side!

 

Until next Tuesday!

 

Toby

Toby on Tuesday 

'Napoleon’s Dream'

 

A very happy New Year to the 3,000 and more weekly followers of the UKIP Thirsk and Malton Facebook and website! And in this part of North Yorkshire, 2016 has got off to a flying start with the Sunday evening appearances of our home-grown superstar, James Norton. Alongside Lily James as Natasha Rostova, Paul Dano as Pierre Bezukhov, Jim Broadbent as Nikolai Bolkonsky and Mathieu Kossovitz as Napoleon Bonaparte, James stars as Andrei Bolkonsky in the BBC’s superb six-part adaptation of Tolstoy’s “War and Peace”. We are now half-way through the series and James is definitely proof of the old belief that all the finest talent still comes out of Yorkshire! And, in true Yorkshire style, James has made his career a family affair. The Nortons’ are a delightful family of teachers, doctors and nurses from near Malton and one of his most charming gestures is that he takes his father, Hugh, with him to appear in all his productions as an extra so that he too can enjoy the adventures.

In episode 5 of “War and Peace”, the amiable Hugh will appear as a peasant crossing a town square. In James’s words, he “fancied himself as a count, but was told he was going to be a Cossack!” Now where all this relates to the looming referendum on Britain’s EU membership is that “War and Peace” is set against the background of Napoleon’s calamitous 1812 invasion of Russia at the head of the largest army ever assembled. His insane ambition had cost France over half a million men by the time of the retreat from Moscow, while Russia suffered similar civilian and military losses. Three years later, it took a British-led army under Wellington to bring Napoleon’s crazed attempts to conquer all Europe to an end.

 Interestingly, Sylvie Bermann, now France’s ambassador to Britain, declared last year that “the French had finally got over their humiliating defeat at Waterloo because the EU represented the United Europe which was Napoleon’s dream.” Well, Madame l’Ambassadrice, I have to ask you to think again, as by the end of next year Britain will have finally voted to leave the disaster zone that is the EU, will have regained control of our borders and, like Russia in 1812 when faced with Napoleon’s invading hordes, will have decided that enough is enough. And just as James Norton’s Andrei in “War and Peace” is the very model of Yorkshire grit and determination, so shall we in UKIP Thirsk and Malton play our part in thwarting the EU bullies who threaten us, be they in Berlin, Brussels or Paris!

Until next week!
Toby

Toby on Tuesday

'Going Postal'

This is my final post before the New Year, so where better to close 2015 than with a cool look at this month’s Oldham West and Royton by-election?   Our candidate there was the highly credible John Bickley, but to understand a Labour heartland constituency like this the best place to begin is the Oldham Council website.   Under ‘Postal Voting’ this reads, “You can have a postal vote instead of going to your polling station.   We can send it to any address, even abroad.   The ballot paper must be returned by the day of the election.”   

When Tony Blair introduced postal voting on demand in 2001 he knew just what he was doing, as did the public sector unions and Labour Party client communities at whom the change was directed.   So did Jim McMahon, former leader of Oldham Metropolitan District Council and Labour by-election candidate, and it would be fascinating to know just how many postal votes were in fact sent abroad and to which countries.   So it is in this context that we need to read the by-election numbers.  

The following table really says it all:

Of the 27,706 votes cast at the by-election, a low 40.3% turnout, 7,115 (25.7%) were postal votes.   Given its mastery of the system, it is a safe bet that the vast majority of these were for the Labour Party.   And so the by-election marked solid progress for UKIP but not the hoped-for breakthrough in Labour’s heartland.   Both the Conservative and LibDem vote collapsed and it continues to surprise me that neither party is pressing to repeal the 2001 postal voting legislation which the Labour Party continues to exploit in a way that is certainly irregular if not illegal.

And what of UKIP?   Over the next four years we must persevere in the knowledge that a Corbyn-led Labour Party will entrench itself still more in constituencies like Oldham.   And we must offer an upbeat message about what Britain can become at a time when the politics of identity are all-important.   The narrative over the dysfunctional EU is nearly won now and so we need to build a new narrative of a post-Brexit Britain.   This will be of an outward-looking nation of brave, creative, enterprising men and women, well able to cope with all the challenges of the new world.  

If we find that we have to stand alone, so be it, as we have always been at our best when we have stood alone.   This is the positive message that can forge a renewed identity for UKIP, enabling us to win elections across the country however much our opponents twist and bend the rules to their advantage.   There’ll be more on this in the New Year.   In the meantime, a happy and peaceful Christmas to all the readers of this blog, website and facebook, who now number well over 3.000 every week!

Until 2016!

Toby