Yesterday my Private Member’s Bill "Analysis of Cost and Benefits [NAFTA Membership] Bill" was introduced in the Commons. This was not intended to be a Valentine’s Day message to the United States, but an invitation to Parliament and the British public to think seriously about U.S. – U.K. economic relations. In 1999, British institutions invested […]
Economic Agenda by Bill Jamieson True EU cost MICHAEL FABRICANT’S Bill for a Parliamentary Commission to probe the costs and benefits of joining the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) gets its first reading tomorrow. Well done, that man. Fabricant’s argument is that there should be an open-minded examination of the pros and cons before […]
First thing this morning (Saturday 6th November) an Australian friend called me from Tanawha in Queensland to tell me with some glee that Australia had just rejected the republic. "Strange to think that we in Oz have just voted to keep the Queen when you’ve just ditched the House of Lords" he remarked. Even stranger, […]
Whether the French Government eventually accepts British beef imports or not (reports, October 23 and 25; letter, October 23), it is clear that the Government’s policy of detente with the European Union has achieved nothing. All the rhetoric about co-operating with the EU rather than confronting our partners is meaningless. This current episode, and past […]
Government’s announced ‘change of gear’ on euro The Prime Minister stated today (23rd February): "Britain should join a successful single currency, provided the economic conditions are met" [reports and leading article, February 24]. He is right. Arguments surrounding a thousand years of British history pale into insignificance compared with the future wealth and prosperity of […]
No British policy has ever been set in stone.?? Times change, allegiances change.?? As we leave the 20th century, much British political energy is being taken up by all parties on debating whether or not we enter the European single currency, the euro.?? I believe that in not many decades from now,? historians will view […]
Brighton has become seedy. I was born in Brighton and went to St Margaret’s Church of England school in Queensbury Mews. The school’s playground was where the Metropole Hotel car park is now sited. I then went on to the Technical High School (also no longer) and the Brighton, Hove and Sussex Grammar School. After […]
The Telegraph leader, "The Case for Nafta" Monday July 27, is telling. Last year, Gordon Brown announced the five main criteria by which it should be judged whether we should adopt the Euro. Later that year, in one of those rare debates designed to make Parliament think, I introduced a Bill that required all currencies […]