'PROGRESSIVES' ARE JUST DECEITFUL SOCIALISTS

I frequently hear left wing politicians claiming to be 'progressive' and to want to pursue 'progressive' policies, though they rarely define what 'progressive' actually means. Interestingly, the politicians who express themselves in this way are invariably left wing, which gives a clue as to what they really mean.

In order to avoid being called 'socialist', the left wing of politics has, in recent times, redefined itself as 'progressive' as a way of hiding its true nature from potential supporters. Instead of being seen as socialist and, therefore, by definition on the same side of the coin as the likes of Lenin, Stalin, Mao Tse-tung and many other nasty left wing dictators, not to mention Adolf Hitler's National Socialists - the NAZIs - 'progressive' has been adopted as an ill-defined and largely meaningless description of their beliefs.

However, those who claim to be 'progressive' have certain things in common which mark them out as unremittingly Socialist. They believe in higher taxation, higher public borrowing and higher public spending; they believe in ever increasing state control of education, health, transport, industry and much more. They believe in huge state hand-outs, and in squeezing 'the rich', another ill-defined term and a group into which more and more moderately comfortable people are falling.

These 'progressives' believe in a soft approach to real crime while inventing new 'social' crimes with which to beat the people into submission. They believe in micro-managing the lives of people with ever more control over what is considered 'acceptable' and more and more laws designed to restrict free speech and free expression. They promote the creation of huge numbers of local wardens who follow us around in our everyday lives, issuing fines for parking, littering, smoking, and any number of other perceived transgressions.

'Progressives' are nothing of the sort. They are a throwback to a time when the common people were subjugated by the landed gentry and other wealthy citizens; the only difference is that the 'progressives' want the controlling influence to be themselves rather than the hated 'rich'. Don't be conned by their crafty and deceitful use of language.

FOR LABOUR, READ 'DISASTER' !

As a major plank in its manifesto, Labour is now promising higher pay for NHS staff, no tuition fees for student nurses and midwives, as well as an assortment of other pledges regarding increased public spending, more public holidays and so on. They have also said that they will maintain the so-called 'triple lock' on state pensions, regardless of cost.

None of this has been costed and the best that they've said about funding for all of the additional spending is that it will come from reversing changes to corporation tax and increasing taxes on 'the rich', whomever they are. Basically, everyone who has anything would be poorer while loungers and scroungers will be molly-coddled.

Additionally, Jeremy Corbyn has been less than coherent about Labour's position in regard to terrorism, defence and the nuclear deterrent, the European Union, immigration and much more. He is in favour of banning all grammar schools and would undoubtedly like to destroy our excellent fee paying schools.

The latest opinion polls suggest that Mr Corbyn's policies are not very appealing and Labour is on course for one of its worst electoral performances in modern times. However, polls can be wrong and one never knows what's just round the corner, so we all need to beware; It's the Conservatives or total disaster.

LE PEN OR MACRON - NEITHER IS GOOD.

It seems that the French have as little love for their traditional political parties and the elites that lead them as do the British and Americans.

Last weekend's first round of voting in the French Presidential election ended with the people rejecting candidates of both main parties in favour of the National Front's Marine Le Pen, and Emmanuel Macron, who has his own newly invented party but very little political experience. The hopeless Presidency of Francois Hollande caused a total collapse in the vote for the Socialist candidate and the French will make their final choice between Macron and Le Pen on May 7th.

Neither choice will be a good one but it's highly likely that it will be Macron who comes out on top. The French establishment will put it's combined force behind the candidate seen to be the least divisive, that is, the one who threatens it the least, and that means that a Le Pen victory is virtually impossible. Macron is a fervent supporter of the European Union, or so he says, and that may not be good news for the UK as it negotiates its exit from this meddlesome and corrupt organisation. That said, Macron may well have difficulties of his own as he simply does not have the organisational infrastructure to be sure of being able to govern effectively. Should Le Pen achieve the near-impossible and win, it would be all change, with the French being offered a referendum on continued EU membership and the French government pursuing strongly anti-immigration and anti-free trade policies. Commentators reckon that this would also be bad news for the UK.

Whatever happens, France will have a period of potential instability. In the UK we have our own General Election in June and the Germans go to the polls later in the year to elect their Chancellor. Oh what a great time we're all in for !

VOTE CORBYN - WE'LL HAVE MORE HOLIDAYS !

What a wonderful wheeze !

In a desperate effort to attract voters, Jeremy Corbyn has said that Labour, if elected, would give us all 4 new Bank Holidays. These would fall, he says, on the Patron Saint days of 1st March, 17th March 23rd, April and 30th November, and he's also admitted that there have been no calculations of the potential impact on the national economy.

If this isn't a gimmick, and a really stupid one, I don't know what is. Easter Sunday traditionally comes somewhere between March 22nd and April 25th, meaning that 3 of Corbyn's proposed new holidays would often come within a few days of an already extant holiday period. The disruption to many lives would be considerable and what it would do to school timetables, with children and teachers pretty much doing the 'Hokey - Cokey' - being in, out, in, out - is anyone's guess.

More ill-thought out public holidays would damage industrial production and have a seriously disruptive effect on other public services such as transport and health. The period from 1st March to the first Monday in May would see 6 Bank Holidays, with another on the last Monday in May; the country would be in a state of utter confusion. Neither is this is a period renowned for good weather and  it's unlikely that these extra holidays would be of much use to the recipients.

That Corbyn is simply not fit to be Prime Minister is understood by many already; this truly silly suggestion will undoubtedly convince a few more of his incompetence. I have no objection to an additional Bank Holiday or 2, but let's have them at sensible times and for sensible reasons, not just as a political, vote chasing gimmick.

CORBYN OR MAY : I KNOW WHERE MY 'X' IS GOING.

As the General Election campaigns get underway, an assortment of disinformation and downright lies is already being disseminated. Media reporting, particularly by elements of the BBC, is subtly skewed against the evil right wingers and in favour of anything vaguely left wing. However, voters should ignore all of this and remember a few basic facts.

The principal difference between the 2 major parties, Labour and Conservative, is very basic; Labour believes in state control while the Conservatives favour more private enterprise. What this means in practice is that Labour favours higher taxes, more state hand-outs, more state controlled services and industries and, generally, more state interference in the lives of ordinary people. The Conservatives favour lower taxes, less in the way of state hand-outs, less state controlled services and industries and, generally, less interference in the lives of ordinary people. It must be said that, in recent years, these differences have been minimised as both parties have sought the much lauded 'centre ground', whatever that is, and, at times, it has been difficult to tell the parties apart.

However, under Jeremy Corbyn the Labour Party has taken a huge lurch to the left and there are now significant differences between Labour and the Tories. Corbyn has raised the long dead spectre of Keir Hardy, the effective founder of the Labour Party and a man whose principles were forged well over a century ago, in an attempt to reignite a class war that has no place in the modern world. As Prime Minister, Corbyn would reduce the United Kingdom to utter poverty through vast increases in taxation, a massive increase in the size of the state and a huge program of nationalisation that would result in a disastrous collapse in industrial productivity. He would ensure that educational choices are virtually abolished and would destroy innovation; there would be little incentive for anyone to work hard or achieve anything as the state would provide all, until it goes bankrupt. Corbyn lives in an idealised socialist world that doesn't, and never has, existed, though he would make every effort to impose it on us.

In contrast, the Conservatives are more realistic. They know that we still have some way to go to fully recover from the financial crisis of 2008 but they are getting there. They are reducing government borrowing and the UK's economy is in far better shape than most; indeed, only the United States is performing better at present. The Conservatives will continue to support business and will tend to minimize the size of the state. They will provide opportunities for children to achieve their potential through a range of educational routes and they will encourage entrepreneurship. They will allow individuals to keep more of their own money and make their own decisions as to how to spend it. Above all, they will take us out of the European Union and allow the UK to trade freely with the rest of the world.

Forget the headlines and the hype. These are the real differences and this is what voters' choices should be based on. I know where my 'X' is going.

CORBYN : A MAN TRAPPED IN THE PAST.

Hearing Jeremy Corbyn speak this morning was like listening into a broadcast from the past. This silly man is still intent on fighting a class war from the 1930s and doesn't seem to have any understanding that the world has actually moved on.

Corbyn's views and policy aims are not just socialist or 'left wing' they border on out-and-out Communism; Marx and Lenin would have been proud of him, but they've both been dead for a very long time. That Corbyn has been deserted by almost all of the senior figures in the Labour party does not worry him as he steams ahead. He merrily talks of vast increases in tax and vast new borrowings. He promises huge increases in public sector pay and general expenditure and threatens to clobber those that he considers to be 'the rich'. Perversely, he has defined 'the rich' as those earning £70 - £80,000 per annum or more, but seems to have forgotten that the basic pay of Members of Parliament puts them in this bracket, while the additional pay of cabinet ministers places them well above it. Are these really 'the rich' ?

Corbyn lives in a dream world in which government knows best about everything and can run everything. Businessmen and parents know nothing and must surrender their organisations and families to the care and direction of the state. Prime Minister Corbyn would do away with nuclear power and our nuclear deterrent; he would ban all manor of things that he considers 'bad' but that most people find essential and there would be 'Green' policies that would cripple the nation. Industrial (and public sector) productivity would collapse, inflation would soar and the national deficit would rise to monumental proportions. The UK would be back to the mid-1970s when the Labour government of the day was forced to go cap-in-hand to the IMF in order to avoid bankruptcy.

When Corbyn speaks of a 'fairer society' what he really means is robbing those who have anything to support the indigent; he means taking away all incentives from entrepreneurs and micro-managing the economy. Corbyn's approach to the world would destroy us so completely that we would never recover. Compared with any possible downside from 'Brexit', a Corbyn Premiership would be truly and frighteningly catastrophic.

No one in their right mind can possibly vote for Corbyn.

LET'S ALL GO TO THE POLLS --- AGAIN !

Following months of argy bargy over the 'type' of Brexit that Theresa May's government is going to negotiate, Mrs May has made the decision to dissolve parliament and to hold a General Election. Good for her.

Ever since the referendum in June of last year those who didn't like the outcome have made it clear that they will do anything they can to frustrate the process of leaving the European Union. Ghoulish figures from the past, such as Tony Blair, Paddy Ashdown, Nick Clegg and others, have popped up to try to create mayhem; Nicola Sturgeon has used the situation to demand yet another Scottish independence referendum and there have been calls for a reappraisal of the division of Ireland. An utterly spurious notion of there being options of 'hard Brexit' or 'soft Brexit' has been invented, a notion which is nothing more than a political mechanism contrived to create confusion and division.

When Mrs May said "Brexit means Brexit" she was stating the obvious and trying to make clear that there was no 'hard' or 'soft' option; when one leaves a club, one leaves and that's that. What happens thereafter is a matter for negotiation and, again, Mrs May has made it abundantly clear that she wants to seek the best possible post-Brexit arrangement for both the UK and EU. Unfortunately, Mrs May's clarity has failed to halt the march of those determined to try to prevent the UK from leaving the club and she has been left with only one option, that of attempting to strengthen her position in Parliament by seeking a new mandate from the British people.

Mrs May has said that she did not plan or want to take this course of action but, after careful consideration, she decided that it was the only real option open to her. Some are saying that she has made a 'u-turn' and shown that she is dishonest, untrustworthy and simply taking advantage of the disarray of other parties. While there can be no doubt about the shambles in which the Labour Party finds  itself, I don't believe that Mrs May has been anything other than honest in her words and actions. In as far as any politician can be trusted, I believe that Mrs May is one of the better ones; compared with the self-serving, arrogant, deceitful and downright slimy behaviour of some of her predecessors, she is undoubtedly one of the 'good guys'.

When the election results are known on 9th June, we will hopefully have banished the powers of darkness once and for all, and Mrs May will be able to carry out the Will of the people, as expressed in last year's referendum, without further manufactured confusion, interference and delay.

NORTH KOREA : A SERIOUS DANGER TO THE WORLD.

In the 1930s, there was an attempt to appease Adolf Hitler and his NAZI party. Poor, naïve Neville Chamberlain famously returned from a meeting with 'Herr Hitler' clutching a piece of paper which he believed meant that there would be no war. In pursuit of appeasement, the assorted governments of many countries did nothing as German forces Austria and Czechoslovakia, and Hitler simply kept on pushing the boundaries; the final result was a terrible war.

Today the problem is slightly different but the response of western governments has been the same; appeasement. North Korea is strange place invented after the Second World War when the Korean peninsula was divided along the 38th parallel, the North being occupied by the old Soviet Union and the South by the United States. Negotiations about reuniting the 2 halves failed and, in 1948, 2 independent countries were created, Kim Il-sung becoming Premier of the newly established North Korea. A couple of years later, forces from the North invaded the South, strongly supported by the Soviet Union, and the Korean War began. The conflict lasted for 3 years, drew in the Chinese as well and ended in stalemate, with little change to anything except for the appalling damage done and more than 1 million lives lost.

Ever since, North Korea has made strenuous efforts to emphasise its independence and, for a quarter of a century, rebuilt its economy while also distancing itself from its communist allies, China and the Soviet Union. However, economic decline ensued and, with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, China became North Korea's only ally and support. Kim Il-sung died in 1994 to be succeeded by his son, Kim Jong-Il, who, in due course died and gave way to his son and the present dictator, Kim Jong-un. Throughout, the rest of the world stood back and adopted an effective policy of appeasement, allowing the North Koreans to do whatever they liked.

Occasional border skirmishes, assassination attempts and other assaults upon the South have maintained an atmosphere of extreme hostility between the 2 countries and, more recently, the country has becoming increasingly belligerent while also imposing an ever more tyrannical approach towards its own people. Today, the country is on the point of economic collapse, supported only by China, while also investing in the development of ballistic missiles and even a nuclear capability.

Led by a megalomaniacal and paranoid dictator, North Korea is now becoming a genuine threat to the rest of the world. Its belligerent attitude towards the United States at a time when the US has a President who is more likely than his predecessor to react, and China's increasing frustration with its errant neighbour, is forcing it into a corner. Clearly, any conflict with the United States could only result in defeat for North Korea although it could also lead to the Chinese becoming actively involved, and that could mean a very dangerous escalation.

So much for allowing dictators in tin-pot countries to get away with murder.

EASTER IS ABOUT EGGS, NOT GOD.

With Easter upon us, I wonder just how much truth there is in the traditional Christian story; I suspect, very little.

Almost 1800 years ago, representatives of the relatively young Christian church met at the First Council of Nicaea and established some very basic rules for determining the date of Easter for, even at that time, there was no consensus on this simple fact. Ever since, there has been debate and refinement and yet no one has ever produced a smidgeon of evidence for an actual date of the events being commemorated. As an aside, it's also the case that Christmas has nothing whatsoever to do with the birth of Jesus but is associated with the timing of ancient pagan festivals which seem to have been adapted for the purposes of the early Christian church.,

There is, of course, evidence of the existence of a Jewish preacher whose name was Latinised into 'Jesus', though what his real name is remains unclear. Possibly he was Yeshua, which equates to Joshua in English. While there is much made of the assorted stories in the Christian Bible, very little is really known about the life of this man and, indeed, even the various branches of Christianity are unable to agree on the right interpretation of his life, status, and works.

Much of what is considered to be 'known' is based on apocryphal writings many hundreds of years after the events. The mental images of the 'Last Supper' are based entirely on wholly imagined paintings from the early Renaissance period. Stories of 'Holy Grails' and miraculous happenings are no more than fables made up by believers.

The enduring nature of Christianity strongly suggests that there is a basis to the faith but that doesn't mean that all of the ritual, mysticism, regalia and flummery have any basis in fact. The truth is that there have been hundreds of religions in human history and most have failed the test of time or been absorbed into others; Judaism, Christianity and Islam now dominate and are integrally linked while also having huge, and sometimes violent, disagreements, but they are no more valid than any of those that have vanished. Why should anyone believe in one any more than in any other ?

Religions are beliefs, faiths based on flimsy evidence that has been exploited by unscrupulous people for their own ends. In the past, religions were used to control the population by terrifying them with stories of the horrors to come after death unless they worshipped a chosen deity or deities, and accepted the sometimes gruesome rituals that were demanded; today, much the same remains true though, thankfully, many people now resist this nonsense.

Whatever the truth about Jesus Christ, Easter and the rest, the fact is that there is very little to support the nonsense of Christianity nor of any other religious faith. Indeed, for most in this country, and many others, Easter is about eggs every bit as much as Christmas is about presents, and neither has much, if anything, to do with any religion.

GRAMMAR SCHOOLS TO MAKE A COMEBACK.

When I was a child, a Grammar School place was the aspiration for very many parents of under 11s. Today, such an attainment is not even a possibility as successive governments first did away with the vast majority of these bastions of learning and then actually outlawed the creation of any new ones.

Now, Theresa May's government is attempting to breathe life into the corpse, but with so many caveats and provisos that any rapid expansion seems highly unlikely. Additionally, it seems that the Department of Education has carried out some highly dubious research that has demonstrated that the few remaining Grammar Schools attract children from only the more affluent families while the most 'disadvantaged' are left behind. Perhaps the goons at the DoE who conducted this research should, themselves, have gone to Grammar School, where they would have learnt how to carry out proper research.

Given that there are very few Grammar Schools remaining and that those that do exist are primarily located in affluent areas, the research findings are hardly a surprise. Add in the fact that educated parents are far more likely to want to have educated children and the findings become simply a 'statement of the bleedin' obvious'. Sadly, the DoE's proposed solution to this perceived problem is to hedge Grammar Schools around with all manner of ludicrous rules and restrictions rather than to properly understand and accept the underlying issue.

It is a simple fact that we are all different and that what is right for some is not necessarily right for others. When I went to Grammar School in the 1960s, it was under the 11 plus system and even then there was a vast difference between the best and worst in the school. Some at the top went on to achieve great things while I have no doubt that some at the bottom ended up on the wrong side of the criminal justice system. However, what all had access to was excellent education, whether they took advantage of it, or not, was another matter.

Of course there are barriers to education which may be more of a problem for some than for others. Having uneducated, disinterested and unambitious parents must be the biggest hurdle for many to jump, much more so than the DoE's manufactured financial measures of disadvantage, which are largely illusory, secondary and irrelevant. What is most important is the nature and quality of the teaching delivered at Primary School level and the degree to which children are stretched and their parents involved. Children need to be encouraged to do the best that they can and those who are not academically inclined should be supported to follow avenues which best suit their abilities; none should be seen to be failures simply because they aren't brilliant mathematicians, linguists or whatever, but those that are academically superior should, and must, be allowed to flourish in an environment which develops them to their full potential.

The problem with the old '11 plus' system was that those who didn't pass were seen to be failures, not that Grammar Schools were elitist. Whatever the whining voices of the socially inclusive Left say, dumbing down is no answer to anything; the lowest common denominator is just that - the lowest - and it serves no one well. Bringing back Grammar Schools is the right thing to do, allied with a proper system which ensures that those who do not gain a place are not forgotten nor seen as failures, but they must be free to attract the brightest and best, not hamstrung by reams of red tape dreamt up by those who are scared of accepting that some really are academically cleverer than others.

WHO NOW WOULD FLY UNITED AIRLINES ?

The appalling incident on board a United Airline flight a couple of days ago was a shocking indictment of a major company. The pictures of a passenger being dragged off of a flight by a gang of thugs in uniform are frightening in their barbarity and make one wonder just what the world is coming to.

Even worse, the Chief Executive of the airline has now implied that the passenger brought violence upon himself by being "disruptive and belligerent"; who wouldn't be pretty annoyed at being singled out for removal from a seat for which one had paid in good faith and with every expectation that the implied contract would be honoured ?

This incident was akin to a customer being dragged from a restaurant table or a patient being tipped out of a hospital bed. It was an appalling act and for the CEO of United, Oscar Munoz, to be trying to lay the blame at the door of the passenger defies belief. He must go, as must the thugs involved, and one can only hope that the as yet unnamed passenger sues the company, Munoz and the guards for absolutely everything they've got.

NHS PRIORITIES ARE ALL WRONG.

With costs rising and money short, the NHS has, in recent years, instituted many cost saving measures. These include being less than welcoming to patients with what it considers to be lifestyle related conditions. That this approach is open to question is obvious but it's also highly subjective.

Those who are considered obese, a straightforwardly subjective decision, are now routinely told to lose weight before being sent for certain treatments. 'Alcoholics', another subjective judgement, will find themselves at the end of the queue, and may be denied treatment altogether, should they be so unfortunate as to need a liver transplant. Patients considered 'elderly' may be denied treatments due to an arbitrary decision regarding the extent of the benefit to be derived by them. Many other patients whose lifestyles are considered, subjectively and arbitrarily, to be a contributory factor in their conditions may be subjected to pressure to change before being offered treatment or medication.

However, at the other end of the scale, some want to hand out statins prophylactically to all even though the benefit is unclear. Women can obtain 'the pill' and other contraceptive aids free of charge even though there is no obvious health benefit and can be risks. Now, the Scottish NHS, with the English set to follow before long, is to begin prescribing a drug known as 'PrEP' as a preventative measure for those at risk of contracting HIV; are there not a huge contradictions in all of this ?

Using 'the pill' or other contraception, is a lifestyle choice and yet the NHS makes no subjective judgement; in fact, it actively supports this choice which has very little, if anything, to do with health. Regarding HIV, the routes for infection are few - anal intercourse and intravenous injection provide the vast majority of cases; both of these are a consequence of 'lifestyle' choices. Homosexuals and others who engage in the former can take suitable precautions, but often can't be bothered, while those engaging in the latter are usually drug addicts who could make a choice to be cured of their addiction, but, again, can't be bothered.

'PrEP' apparently costs somewhere around £300 per month for each patient, and the NHS is all set to provide this as a preventative treatment for people whose lifestyle choice is to put themselves at serious risk. Why is it that a lifestyle choice of being fat is vilified while a lifestyle choice of not taking one's own protective measures against pregnancy or HIV infection is condoned and even

supported ? This is highly subjective and highly politicised healthcare, and it stinks.

WHAT DOES 'ATTENDING SCHOOL REGULARLY' MEAN ?

In what must be one of the most ridiculous judgements ever made by any British court, the Supreme Court yesterday overturned a High Court ruling about children and school.

Continuing an argument that's been going on for some time, the Supreme Court effectively ruled that schools know better than parents when it comes to their children and also ruled that the definition of the word 'regular' is a matter for individual schools to determine.

When I was at school, the meaning of words was fairly fixed and, in order to find out what a particular word meant, I would consult a dictionary. This is no longer the way to do it, or so says the Court. Although the law states that children are expected to attend school 'regularly', it does not define what 'regularly' means; consequently, schools have made what are essentially arbitrary rules and then sought to enforce these upon the parents of children whom they consider to be in the wrong by imposing fines on them. The High Court ruled that this was not in accordance with the law, but the Supreme Court believes otherwise.

According to the highest court in the land, consideration has to be given to all and sundry and what matters is the 'intention' of the lawmakers and the rules of individuals schools' neither of which are actually 'law'. In the first place, how does one know exactly what was the 'intention' of those who approved the law ? In the second, schools are not lawmakers and their arbitrary rules should not be sufficient to justify the imposition of what amount to legal sanctions.

The Supreme Court members who considered this case clearly had their own opinions on the matter and went to some lengths to find a way of supporting the government's side of the argument. However, their decision seems to be so flawed as to throw the law into total disrepute. No longer does it matter what the law actually says, it's what was intended; no matter what words really mean, it's what anyone says they do that's important. This is a world of insanity.

LIVINGSTONE'S TRUTH ISN'T POPULAR.

Ken Livingstone has never been a man to mince his words and, frankly, is someone I've never particularly liked. However, the ridiculous reaction to his comments about Jews and the support they received from the NAZI administration in 1930s Germany is uncalled for and demonstrates much more about the Labour Party and the fanatical pro-Jewish lobby than it does about Livingstone.

Sadly, anything which is considered vaguely 'anti-Semitic' is howled down, regardless of whether or not it is true. No one is permitted, under threat of legal sanction, to say or write anything which may be considered offensive by Jews or anyone supporting them. Basically, where Jews and Judaism are concerned, free speech has been outlawed.

Livingstone's comments centred on an agreement made in 1933 between the German NAZI government and German Zionist Jews which provided some assistance to Jews who wished to escape from the increasing persecution they were suffering in Germany and emigrate to Palestine. Over a period of 6 years, this agreement, the Haavara Agreement, helped to facilitate the migration of some 60,00 Jews from Germany.

While saying that Hitler supported Zionism may be a slight exaggeration, there can be no doubt that the NAZI government took steps which clearly helped and supported certain Zionist aims, while also helping individual Jews and their families. Livingstone has said little more than this and for him to have been vilified for it is ludicrous. For various Labour Party members and others to have made such a 'song and dance' about what is almost a non-event, shows just how scared they are of even the slightest possibility of causing offence, and how desperate they are to be seen to be on the side of the supposedly offended, whatever the issue and whatever the truth..

SPAIN MAKES A GRAB FOR GIBRALTAR

Spain has never given up the notion of reversing the part of the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht which ceded Gibraltar to the United Kingdom in perpetuity, but its latest effort, courtesy of the European Union, defies belief.

It seems that part of the EU's negotiating stance over the UK's departure form the Union is to make an issue of the status of Gibraltar as a British Overseas Territory, something which is way outwith the purview of the EU; it has no more to do with the EU than does the status of Martinique as a French overseas department or the assorted islands held by Spain and to which Morocco lays claim.

Does the European Union want the UK to start making loud noises about matters such as these or is it a simple negotiating ploy ? After all, Spanish fishermen could well lose vital rights to fish in British waters if the negotiations flounder, so what better than to find some issue which can be used as a bargaining chip : Spain will not pursue its demands regarding Gibraltar if the UK safeguards the rights of Spanish fishermen.

Frankly, I'd tell Spain and the EU to go to hell; Gibraltar is British and almost its entire population wishes to remain so. What the UK government should now do is to make it very clear to the EU and Spain that the position of Gibraltar is not on the table, full stop.

EU ABOUT TO COLLAPSE, SAYS FORMER OFFICIAL.

There seems to be a new and potentially most interesting twist to the little matter of the UK's exit from the European Union.


Olaf Proli, a minor official of the then European Economic Community way back when the UK joined it in 1973, has claimed that the UK's membership of this club never has been legal. Proli claims to have documentary proof that various 'fudges' and 'dodgy dealings' mean that the UK can, if it likes, walk away from the EU without having any liabilities whatsoever as it never has been a proper member.


Proli has gone on to say that several other countries could make similar cases and that the power of the Brussels' hegemony is largely illusory. He is of the view that the European Union is actually founded on such shaky legal foundations that it is in danger of imminent collapse.


Could he be right ? Watch out for more from Olaf Proli in the coming months to find out.