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Spot the difference A weekend co-optition. Here are two BBC stories about politicians promising to reduce regulation. Let’s see how many differences in presentation we collectively can spot.
May 24, 2005: Brown pledges law to cut red tape
August 12, 2007: Tory plan for business ‘tax cut
Let me start:
1. Headline: the first is personal; the second is treated as the collective decision of a party.
2. Comparing standfirsts, the first talks about cutting “the burden of red tape on business'” as if an altruistic act, in the second the cutting is “radical” and “for UK businesses” hinting that this is a dangerous scheme undertaken on behalf of business.
3. In the second story, there is a direct quote from a political opponent; in the first, no criticism of the proposal appears.
4. Indeed, in the second story the boxed quote is ad hominem party-political criticism, whereas in the first it is a press-release quote about the policy from its proponent.
Over to you.
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So the rascals want to cut regulations again.
It’s time someone told them that nearly all regulations are subject to EU directives, which in turn emanate from EU treaties.
EU law states that any member state wishing to opt out of an EU treaty must first take its case to a intergovernmental conferance of all 27 member states. Unanimity is required.
The chances of this happening are ZERO.
AS long Britain remains a member of the EU proposals like these are fantasy.
Guy,
Sorry to be a pedant, but when you wrote
3. In the second story, there is a direct quote from a political opponent; in the second, no criticism of the proposal appears.
did you mean, in the first, no criticism appears?
Cheers
GH – Yes. Thank-you. Fixed.
Richard Beddall,
You have not only entirely missed the point, but you have that irritating tic of the EU-obsessed of an arrantly simpleminded way of laying down your conception of “EU law”. (You might try to bear in mind that EU directives and EU regulations are distinct forms of legislation and that the manner of domestic regulation is not determined by directives. You might also stop fetishising, in the same way that EU institutions do, the idea that to amend a treaty (as any other agreement) requires the parties to the treaty to agree to the amendment.)
On the whole I think leaving the EU would be a good thing. But that is irrelevant here. Nor am I interested in the desirability or possibility of degregulation here. I am asking people to look at BBC online’s attiutude to nominal deregulation proposals from different sources.
Perhaps the first is personal because we are told that under the Blair regime the government of the UK was a personal matter. Therefore Labour leaders have single ideas and consequently there may be no doubt in the Beeb’s mind that Brown wants to enjoy having his very own single ideas.
As for the second story, by labeling it a party issue it gives the journo a chance to ask other politicians their opinions and garner comments suggesting the figures don’t add up and “these plans are as spurious as the last.”
The first story is a report of an article in the press so it lappears a hacked out form of copying what another news source has run. Something of a filler, though naturally with a left-leaning desire not to disturb the joy of a socialist statement.
I should have clarified the date issue in my post just now. I shoud have said that back in 2005 Brown was no doubt looking forward to having his very own leadership ideas for a better Britain, just like his friend and ally, Mr Blair.
Oh the BBC website is truly awful. Compared to the website, the BBC’s radio and television coverage is positively impartial. Unfortunately I have a feeling that the people who write for the website today will be the content editors and managers of tomorrow.
Yes. It occurs to me that this may be because the charter obligations of impartility apply to broadcasting, but not to their net content, so they don’t have the same oversight in place. But I don’t have any direct evidence that that’s the case.
But that’s the way BBC hacks actually think. They genuinely believe they have presented The Truth as it really is. In fact, all tax-financed broadcasters have this same world-view: NPR in the US, the ABC in Australia, etc.
I liked the way the first one is phrased; it sounds like he’s introducing a new regulation to ban excessive regulations. Hmmm…
It’s interesting in the second one that John Redwood is immediately singled out as a right-winger, and how quickly the phrase “lurching back to the right” gets in there. In fact, the large majority of the story’s text is covering critical reactions to it.
Most extraordinary, however, is the way the TUC spokeman is quoted directly saying “if these reports are true”. Well, it wouldn’t be hard to check, would it? Why don’t they know? Surely they aren’t just reating blind to the journalist’s own interpretation are they?
You are quite correct Guy, the way the B.B.C. presented the stories shows (yet again) its bias.
When we the Conservative party leadership understand that the B.B.C. can not be “reformed” still less be “made friends with”, the T.V. tax must be ended (and no other tax money be put in its place).
If people really want to keep the vile B.B.C, going they can do so by subscription and voluntary donation.
However, on the E.U.
Either a party must say “we are going to get out of the E.U.” or it must say “we are going to declare certain SPECIFIC powers are returned to this country, and we DO NOT CARE what the E.U. says about the matter, let them try to enforce the judgements of their court – we will instruct the courts of this realm to take no notice of such supposed judgements”.
If the E.U. is allowed to keep all of its present powers then talk of “deregulation” (either by Mr Brown or Mr Redwood) is meaningless waffle.
By the way Guy, the E.U. does not agree with you that “domestic regulation” is not determined by E.U. directives.
The E.U.s “court” believes it can demand that domestic law be in accord with E.U. directives.
It is true that members of the E.E.A. (such as Iceland or Norway) can use the defence that their agreements with the E.U. only apply to exports to the E.U. (not to exports to other lands – or to live within their own borders), but the United Kingdom is a member of the E.U.
Either we must leave the E.U. – or we must declare that in this or that SPECIFIC area its writ no longer runs (whatever its “court” or other institutions may choose to claim).
Otherwise, as I have already stated above, talk of “deregulation” is meaningless waffle.
Paul,
I was trying to draw the distinction between an EU directive, which is an outline of statement of the required effect, not determining the manner in which it is reached, and an EU regulation, which has direct effect as law in every member state. Regulation to implement a directive is a requirement, and states can be taken to the European court to obtain the ‘benefit’ of a directive if it isn’t implemented. However the institutions don’t determine those changes in domestic law in pursuit of the directive, which is what Richard Beddall implied, and how directives appear to bear much more heavily in some places than others. Each EU directive is the occasion of considerably more UK regulation than it compels.
Finally the Tories are making some vaguely libertarian noises about reducing red tape and subjecting bloated Whitehall empires to annual rounds of ‘deregulation’.
It remains to be seen if such a thing could ever actually really happen.
Needless to say the Socialists in the form of Nu-Lab’s John Hutton are trying to talk it up as a lurch to the right and a fatal mistake. Well they would wouldn’t they, it is one of their areas of weakness.
Now whist it is clear Nu-Lab love regulation for regulation’s sake and would really prefer that citizens had to ask their permission (and preferably have to pay to do so) to do anything – why is reducing regulation suddenly ‘right wing’? Given that Broon has been making noises claiming to be about to do exactly that for ages.
Presumably Nu-Lab’s response would be: “It means what we say it means”.
Guy I do not care about the details.
What I care about is “can they order you about – for example, destroying your buiness and messing up your life”.
And (as Christopher Booker, amongst others, has been pointing out for decades – and he is a details man so that solves your problem there) the answer is “yes they can”. And the “they” are normally (although not always) British people acting under some E.U. order or other (whatever words are used).
Either we pull out of the E.U. – or we say that in X, Y, Z areas its writ no longer runs (whatever the E.U. or its “court” says).
Otherwise talk of “deregulation” (by Mr Brown or Mr Redwood) is meaningless waffle.
“buiness” should be “business”.
However, I do not accept the E.U. (whether directly or indirectly) telling people what they can do in their own homes either.
On the matter of “they do not do it that way, they do it this way”.
That is much the same as “we do not have red tape here, we use yellow tape”.
British civil servants (and so on) must be instructed to ignore E.U. directives (or whatever other word is used).
As for “meetings” I see no reason to go to these meetings. As I see no reason why the government should ask permission about things in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
After all a treaty is just a piece of paper. No Parliament may bind future Paliaments – so if Parliament decided that past treaties are in all or part no longer valid, that is the end of the matter.
Last comment (I promise – unless there is some reply).
A good place to start would be fishing (which the Conservative party used to be committed to taking back from the E.U.).
One would just politely inform the E.U. that the United Kingdom was taking back its waters.
If they replied “let us talk about it” the response should be “there is nothing to talk about”.
And if their “court” made a ruling against us it rulings should be formally rejected, and the Royal Navy instructed to act accordingly.
“But they would impose trade sanctions” I rather doubt it.
Am I the only one who came away from that article the first time thinking that what Redwood was proposing would reduce tax revenue? Passages such as:
“But this directly undermines the spending pledges Cameron has been making.”
and
“The Tories once again claim to be able to cut taxes while pretending that no-one will have to pay”
don’t make any sense whatsoever. Nothing that is being proposed will reduce the exchequer’s income. Admittedly both of these are quotes of other people, but why does the BBC leave these incorrect statements completely unclarified? When you combine this with their decision to actually describe the deregulations plans as a “tax cut” in the title, one is forced to conclude that whoever wrote the article is either completely incompetent or deliberately biased.
_________________________
“And if their “court” made a ruling against us it rulings should be formally rejected, and the Royal Navy instructed to act accordingly.
“But they would impose trade sanctions” I rather doubt it.” [And other comments like this]
The EU wouldn’t impose trade sanctions, it would declare us in violation of the treaties. If we continued to refuse to back down, we would be kicked out. I personally would rather like this outcome, but for the “extreme centrist” lot we have at the moment this is a total no-go area.
The United Kingdom has thee basic options: 1) Leave the EU 2) Stay in the EU and obey its current laws but veto every expansion of power it attempts, which will either result in us being kicked out or a “two speed” EU with the western continent going faster 3) Go along with European integration wholeheartedly and expect Britain to disappear around 2035-ish.
There really is no middle ground between options 1) and 2).
MDC,
Nothing that is being proposed will reduce the exchequer’s income.
It may be too much like a detail, but the burden of government is not the same thing as government income. If compliance with a particular regulation costs a business £10,000 a year, then removing that regulation is equivalent to a £10,000 cut in the taxes the firm pays. And would probably be more welcome, since it is one less thing to worry about.
Paul,
And if their “court” made a ruling against us it rulings should be formally rejected, and the Royal Navy instructed to act accordingly.
I know this is fantasy politics, so the objection counts for nothing, but before one does that one needs a change in foreign policy so that there are some ships available and some rebuilding of the Royal Navy for a tactically different role.
Dear Guy Herbert.
You demean yourself when you make personal attacks.
I don’t have an irritating tic, I am not EU obsessed, and I don’t think I am arrantly simple minded.
I plead guilty to being a naughty boy, I just stated the facts as they are, I’m sorry you don’t like them.
Perhaps you could give us a credible strategy for deregulation.
To learn more about the EU and how it works I recommend you read ” the great deception” by Richard North and Christopher Booker.
I really don’t think the beeboids can help themselves. They probably think they are being impartial, but they see everything through a left-liberal lens. They are a liberal urban workforce recruited through the Guardian, and as has been noted, they simply cannot be reformed. I don’t think the BBC should be destroyed, I simply argue that it should have to stand on its own two feet in a commercial marketplace. Only when the BBC has to exist outside its taxpayer funded left wing fantasy bubble might things start to change.
Mr Beddall,
Maybe I have rather too many correspondents who are convinced the EU is behind everything that’s wrong with the UK and your sally, being in similar form, mislead me. I know rather more than I’d like to about the EU.
Yes, I think it is high time the EU were told to get knotted but we would need not just the Navy but energy to be reviewed and catered for plus a large purchase of gold an Swiss Franc once the National Debt is delt with. Fortress Britain, unless the French would be so duplicitous as to turn on the EU and supply us with energy on the side. I doubt even Sarko is game for that one unless he does it temporarily to squeeze even more out of the EU.
“MDC,
Nothing that is being proposed will reduce the exchequer’s income.
It may be too much like a detail, but the burden of government is not the same thing as government income. If compliance with a particular regulation costs a business £10,000 a year, then removing that regulation is equivalent to a £10,000 cut in the taxes the firm pays. And would probably be more welcome, since it is one less thing to worry about.”
Reducing costs through reducing regulaiton is no more a tax cut than it is a labour costs cut, or a raw materials cost cut. I am aware that for the business the advantages are similar, but the quotes I included in my last post were clearly said on the assumption that money lost by business through regulation somehow goes into the exchequer’s purse, which it simply does not.
So it is “fantasy politics” to expect the Royal Navy to protect British waters.
What it is for then Guy – to give the opportunity for people to cry when they have their “eyepods” taken away? O.K. that was unfair – and yes we do need ships of the correct sort.
As for the above being, in general, “fantasy politics” have a look at the front page of today’s (Monday, 13th of August) “Financial Times” it seems that even the Conservative party shadow Chancellor (and David Cameron supporter) Mr Osborne understands that for there to be any real “deregulation” there will have to be a “fight with the E.U.”.
Sadly Mr Osborne still thinks that this means going to talks and othersuch (of course once one has accepted that the E.U. has a veto, i.e. that one can only proceed with overall deregulation with their permission, one has already lost), but it does indicate that at least the Cameron people understand the basic point (however much they will rat in practice).
It is not “fantasy poltitics” to say that there can be no overall deregulation without taking powers back from the E.U. (otherwise they will simply continue to pile on new regulations – some 80% of new regulations come, in one way or another, from the E.U.) – and if you knew as much about the E.U. as you claim to, you would know that.
To talk of overall “deregulation” without taking back powers from the E.U. is to talk nonsense.
Fact – not “fantasy politics”.
Paul
“To talk of overall “deregulation” without taking back powers from the E.U. is to talk nonsense.
Fact – not “fantasy politics”.”
To be honest, I’m with Guy here: whilst what you say is true, it’s not the point of this particular post.
Now, had one of the pre-empted ZaNu-Labour objections been “this is crazy talk because it would require an EU treaty renegotiation” then this might have been a relevant point, but it wasn’t so it isn’t. (in this post at least)
Worse still, a good chunk of the reason that renegotiation is crazy talk is because the BBC never shows the EU in its true light. It’s the BBC we have to fight as much as anyone else. And I think that is what Guy was hinting at…
Can’t we comment on the subject matter of the post as well as the specific point made by the post itself? I don’t see why discussing the efficacy of the policies under discussion is being interpretted as an attack on Guy given that, as we already know, Guy was not defending the proposals.
MDC made a point above about how the E.U. people would kick us out if we did not obey its rules – I doubt MDC will be astonished to learn that I would be delighted if they did that.
As for the general point:
The fact remains – to talk about general deregulation without getting powers back from the E.U. is to talk nonsense.
Indeed the B.B.C. made this very point to John Redwood on B.B.C. Radio 4’s “The World Tonight” last night.
So I am in the rather unright wing company of the Financial Times and the B.B.C.
Of course the F.T. and the B.B.C. do not really care about deregulation (let alone getting powers back from the E.U.) they are just trying to make life difficult for Conservatives – but their argument is valid (however dishonest it may be for them to use it).
However, I think Cleanthes is making the point that Guy Herbert’s post was NOT about “deregulation” at all – it was just a “we should get rid of the biased B.B.C.” post.
O.K. – I would agree with doing that.
Since I don’t yetknow what Mr Redwood’s proposals are (the Conservative Party website being rather coy on the subject) I’m in a poor position either to defend or support them, and I really have no idea whether or not they imply derogation from any EU treaties. It would be possible to deregulate quite a lot (if unsystematically) merely by getting rid of things the current UK government and previous ones have done on their own recognizances.
Such as? Almost all regulation passed by our Parliament or introduced as secondary legislation by the Government has its roots in EU directives. The EU doesnt directly impose directives on memberstates (yet), it simply obliges them to introduce the directives through their national parliaments if they want to remain in the Union.
So until we can get enough public support to actually leave the EU (which is not an impossible task by any means given that, although the BBC, Grauniad, Etc. likes to pretend to the contrary, many more people are EUsceptics than EUphiles in this country), we cannot fix our economic system. Thatcher wasn’t just making it up when she warned against the reimposition of statism by the EU.
If BBC Radio 4 spoke with ersatz American accents, it would sound exactly the same as the World Service of Radio Moscow.
Anybody remember what that was like?
Ah, the bad old days.
There is no point taking off a few regulations here and there (assuming we are allowed to), whilst the E.U. (in various ways) is piling on more and more.
It would be like trying to bale out a row boat with a cup – after the bottom of the boat has been torn off.
As for method.
The latest “treaty” (of course that is not quite what it is – but there we go) produces (or supports) an intersting one. The “Union” will now have a legal personality that will allow it to sign treaties with other powers that are binding on the member States.
It is rather like section two of Article VI of the Constitution of the United States (although, as normal the E.U. folk use ten to a hundred words for every one word that the Founders did).
A treaty made by the Union trumps the law and Constitution of any State. Although of course Article VI does not say that a treaty trumps the Ninth or Tenth Amendments (or any other part) of the United States Constitution itself (that is just an “interpretation” made by judges who prefer a “living constitution” [i.e. their own political opinions] to the document that should be in front of them when they make their rulings).
In the E.U. context the wording (concerning what Americans would call “States rights”) is so long winded, vague and contradictory, that I do not think any dishonest “interpretation” will be needed.
I am sure that in any clash the E.U. court will find good reason to find in favour of the Union (which, after all, is its written function – to further the project), without any wild twisting of the words.
Also in future meetings of heads of the governments of the various States the Prime Ministers and Presidents will be officially (as opposed to just unofficially) under the obligation to further the Union.
Of course Prime Minister Brown (and so on) will try and tweak things his local way now and then (just as the Senior Senator for West Virginia tries to get lots of Federal cash for bridges and stuff to name after himself), but the basic relationship is clear.
“Then we should camp out in the capital (Brussels) and try and stop the regualtions at source – just as some free market intitutes are doing”.
Ho. Ho.
There is even less chance of this doing much good than the efforts fo the Cato institute (and others) in Washington D.C.
If you can get a few wild Senators or Congressmen on your side the powers-that-be will sometimes (just sometimes) back down – after all, in their hearts, they know that almost everything they do is unconstitutional (and that sometimes makes them weak – if one pushes hard enough).
Indeed once upon a time there was even a President who was vaguely intererted in deregulation (Ronald Reagan. for a few, not all, years under him the list of Fed regulations actually got shorter – there was also a hold up after the 1994 Congressional elections for a couple of years).
But the political structure of the E.U. is different.
And I am also not even sure that the flood of Euro regulations is unconstitutional (the constitutional documents of the E.U. are very long, vague and contradictory “treaties”, accept that they also not treaties).
Of course this does not mean that those people going off to the capital are wrong to go.
The point of free market “think tanks” is to give free market folk jobs (they are not going to change basic policy at the Union level) – I am not being sarcastic, I regard that as perfectly honourable objective.
It is certainly better than these young people ending up in my position.
Paul, I am reminded of the now legendary and oft repeated quote by some anonymous person at a march in Washington DC. All the leftists were out in force filling the streets and chanting slogans in unison.
The reporter asked a conservative youth were all ‘his people’ were. He replied “they all have jobs.”
I think giving freedom defending people the actual job of defending freedom is good. Most of us are too busy.
In the year 2005 the Prime Minister’s Better Regulation Task Force reported that regulations cost the UK economy £100 billion a year. It would be interesting to see what this figure is today.
It is fair to say that some of the damage is caused by British wealth destroyers gold plating EU directives.
Recently David Cameron instructed conservative MEPs to vote for the R.E.A.C.H. directive. The C.H. is for chemical, every combination of chemical will have to be tested by law. German experts claim that up to 40 million small animals will be used in these tests, the British figure is only 12 million.
Industry experts in Germany are claiming that this will force virtually the whole European chemical industry to relocate to the Far East .
The “trouble is” Midwesterner that the people given the job of defending freedom do not have the power to do so.
Take the example of the Cato Institute.
Now I have my problems with them. For example, their love of the fiat Dollar and their desire for other nations (for example in Latin America) to adopt it, and their blatent distorting of the cost of illegal immigration (pretending that the illegals paid more in taxes than they took in government spending – which was a flat out lie, and one should not give false information even if do so is “for the good of the cause”).
However, generally the Cato staff are good kids who try and defend freedom as best can.
The trouble is “as best they can” is very little. No attack on them – it is just the way things are.
With the E.U. (for various reasons) it is worse.
Anybody who takes a job in a free market institute at teh Union level should not pretend to anyone (or himself) that he is doing it to “defend freedom” – there is chance of doing that generally.
This does not mean that they should not take the money (after all, I would), but they should not pretend to themselves.