Monday 3 September 2007

Referendum News: Daniel Hannan Has Got The Message About the EU and The Montevideo Convention

I emailed Daniel Hannan on 4th. July 2007 with my observations on the position in which the EU will find itself on 1st. January 2009, when the Constitution of the EU comes into effect. Regulars here will know that my view (for which see HERE) is, in short, that as a matter of customary international law, the EU will at that moment have acquired all the institutions that it needs for it to declare itself to be a Sovereign Independent State and, if that be right, the status of each of the 27 members of the EU will, on that date, have changed from their being themselves Sovereign Independent States to being that of mere component parts of a Federal EU.


It is with considerable regret that I have to relate that Mr. Hannan did not have the courtesy to reply to my email. Doubtless he is a busy man, far too busy and important to write the words “Thank you. I shall read your views with interest”.

I am very old-fashioned about such things. When someone comments on my blog I will always publish it unless it contains unnecessary swear words, is evidently a ‘round robin’ piece of spam, is defamatory of someone or is otherwise just offensive. I try to make a reply to all comments, though there are some which can stand by themselves and require no further comment. Sometimes I will email the commenter direct. In time it may be that the blog acquires too many comments to pursue that policy, but for the moment the urges of upbringing are too strong.


Mr. Hannan apparently sat next to Bill Deedes at the DT for some ten years. I cannot imagine the late Bill Deedes failing to acknowledge an email of the kind I sent and one is sad that his unfailing courtesy did not apprently rub off on Mr. Hannan.

Still, he has plainly taken my arguments on board for today he writes in his column for the Daily Telegraph:

“Eurocrats are too close to their final objective to let a little thing like democracy stand in their way. The new constitution will bestow on the EU all the characteristics that international law recognises as attributes of statehood: a head of state, a foreign office, a criminal justice system and the "legal personality" needed for the EU to sign treaties and displace its member nations in international associations.”



Despite the lack of acknowledgement, I am very glad to see that the message is getting through. At the end of the day I am quite unimportant. It is the message, that we are on the cusp of losing a thousand years of independence at a stroke of Vanity Blair’s pen, that is important.

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