GEORGE VII REX ANGLORUM DEFENDER OF THE CONSTITUTION

Am I surely not the only person to be wondering what the Hell is going on in our Country ?

Just over a year ago the public were at the politicians throats over the Expenses scandal, Government, Ministers and MP’s actually quaked before the outrage of the electorate. Everyday the public were questioning why were the political elite getting away with this, and more importantly how dare they.

Since then the Political classes have carried out a major crisis management exercise to erase the public’s mind of the excesses of the ‘Rotten Parliament’. A few of the grotesques in Parliament have been thrown to the wolves, and are still appealing to the Supreme Court over their theft and debauching of the public purse. My bet is that they are going to succeed with this, because unlike the majority of the population, the public purse is paying for this through legal aid, because of the importance of ‘Parliamentary privilege’ being tested in the Courts. Mere mortals are usual bankrupted by costs before it reaches Crown Court.

So its back to business as usual with a nod towards Constitutional Reform with a Referendum on AV, a big so what from me there I am afraid.

The last Labour Government that brought in some of the most repressive legislation in modern times, certainly not since the ‘Six Acts’, enjoyed about a 35% share of those that actually voted, less than seventy per cent of the available vote.

So lets cut the chase here the last Government had no legitimacy from the overwhelming majority of the Country’s electorate.

Yesterdays farrago of whooping Labour supporters in Manchester, showed to me at least the ‘awwwwwwwwwww Right’ Kinnock Left is in the ascendancy. How was this breathtaking piece of Democracy achieved ? Ed Miliband did not carry his party’s membership, he did not carry the PLP, he carried the Union block vote which was manipulated by kingmakers like Derek Simpson. Even then Mr Ed barely scraped past 50% in the election. He has huge legitimacy problems within his own party, yet by the appalling rickety ‘ Parliamentary Democracy’, he is likely to be the next Prime Minister, because I don’t think that the Social Democrats actually like or understand being in power with the left of the Conservative party. They would much rather be snuggled up with the Labour Party, it was just that Gordon Brown was the most unpopular and unhinged PM of recent years.

So unless there is a clamour from the grass roots of what ever party for Constitutional Reform, we are going to have another future Government that has significant legitimacy problems in carrying through legislation.

It also means that we will always be denied a say in our own sovereignty, as Clegg/Miliband/Cameron are committed to a Federal Europe that hands down directives with zero legitimacy from the electorate. Miliband (failed) will shortly be off to Brussels to lick his wounds and fill his bank balance, as his political career in Britain is over. As far as I am concerned until the electorate has a referendum on the EU, the EU is illegitimate. UKIP do a great disservice to themselves and the country, by actually taking their seats in Brussels and confering legitimacy on the EU. They would have been far better to have followed the Irish Nationalist example and not take their seats.

We do not have a Constitution is this Country beyond ‘ Parliament is Sovereign’. Therefore whatever lunatic gets the support of the majority of the House of Commons can rule the country virtually unchecked. He/She can launch wars with impunity and without fear of attainer by the House of Commons, dispense largesse and patronage on the scale of a Medieval Monarch, can sell honours. (See Blair T) Then retire in utter splendour and wealth.

There are no checks and balances against the use of arbitrary power. The Swiss Constitution actually has a clause that guarantees that the Citizen will be treated by the State in a fair and unarbitrary way. To do so otherwise is unconstitutional. In the United Kingdom the guarantee is that you will be treated unfairly and in an arbitrary manner by the public servants you pay for.

I will always argue for Cantonal/County government because it is minimalist, far more capable of being responsive to local needs on taxation, welfare and infrastructure. If parts of the North East wish to have a socialist form of Cantonal Government that is fine if that is what the electorate want. However if the South West wish to have a Liberal/Conservative/Green/ UKIP/ Libertarian Cantonal Government, the taxes raised in the South West Canton should not be used to subsidise the Socialist fiefdoms dependency culture. Just see how long it takes for business and individuals to move from one high tax canton to another low tax canton.

Equally if London votes for having the Olympic Games and benefits from the environmental clean up and infrastructure spending in the East of the City, fine, but do not ask Nottingham and the East Midlands to contribute to the cost.

The United Kingdom will inevitably shift to being a Federal Country, and it is about time we recognised that we have not been an Imperial country since 1960.

As a Libertarian, I am naturally a Republican, because no man or woman by accident of birth is superior to any other citizen. However I know that the British are hopelessly wedded to the idea of ‘Constitutional Monarchy’. So lets complete the phrase and actually have a Constitution that protects the Individual along the lines of the Swiss 1999 Constitution. At present we have a Monarchy that is silent on the excesses of Oligarchic Government.

The Monarch can, in my reluctant opinion, continue to have a role as unelected Head of State, but the Armed Forces and Courts must swear allegiance to the Constitution that protects us all from Arbitrary power that is our current Parliamentary ‘Democracy’, which consists of less than 700 people who actually count.

Its a question of Legitimacy.

….governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whatever form of government becomes destructive of these ends; it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it.

Thomas Jefferson

We need to change before the House of Miliband supplants the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha with about as much legitimacy.

Andrew P Withers.