LME has been busy making the case why progressives in the UK need to engage better with policy making and governance on the EU level to Compass Conference delegates on June 12. Supporting PES, PES activists and Europeans for Financial Reform’s campaign to REGULATE GLOBAL FINANCE and introduce a FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX (if not globally then at least within the Single European Market.)
www.pes.org
www.europeansforfinancialreform.org

I had a really enjoyable day of campaigning in Hammersmith.  I even managed to get sunburnt in the process for the first time this year. It was great to catch up with German and US American comrades I met the Saturday before when we were out for the campaign launch of Sadiq Khan in Tooting. It was also great to see French, Italian and Portugues friends again, who were also out in Tooting and or in Islington on March 20. And to meet so many new PES sister party activists. As on the Saturdays before parliamentary and local candidates as well as everybody in the local Labour party made us feel welcome and at home right from the start.

Hammersmith can really do with 4-5 more years of Andy Slaughter MP and a Labour Government. Having seen the effects  of the socially divisive policies this Tory run Council has been advancing, you can only wish for all the local citizens that Labour will be able to wrestle back control locally as well on May 6.

I am just worried about this  new tribal confidence I have detected amongst Lib-Dem voters. Clegg’s perfomance in the leaders’ debate on ITV and subsequent polling results seem to have made them immune to the Tory squeeze message (As in “this is a Labour-Tory marginal, by voting Lib-Dem you let the Tories in”) So is Clegg’s success this Thursday a blessing in disguise for Cameron? Let’s hope not. Because we all know what the Tories stand for and not only in terms of their position on Europe.

Don’t Let the Tories Get Away with it!

On Saturday April 17th the Labour Movement for Europe together with the UK Branches of PES sister parties (German SPD, French & Portuguese Socialists, to name but a few) & Labour Friends of Italy are going to Hammersmith, the newly formed constituency which is a model for integrated living: more than 50 different first languages are spoken there and there are more than 75 minority communities.
Since almost every country and continent is represented in Hammersmith, we decided it was the right kind of constituency for our third European day of action in key marginal seats in London.

The Labour candidate Andy Slaughter is a dedicated local MP and a committed pro-European with a clear record in supporting diversity of communities, equality and integration.

Come on Saturday and help electing him and making Britain a fairer, greener, safer and more pro-European country.

Don’t let the Tory get away with it!

Join us for a morning of campaigning – lunch – another afternoon session till 4pm – and a well deserved drink or two thereafter.
Please feel free to also join us for either the morning or afternoon, should you not be able to make the whole day.

We will start at 10:30 at the Hammersmith Labour Party HQ, in Greyhound Road number 28 – W6 8NX

To RSVP please email lme.lse@hotmail.co.uk or call David Schoibl on 07976 252 768

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April 24 - PES ACTION DAY on FINANCIAL TRANSACTION TAX & EUROPEAN
CAMPAIGN DAY IN POPLAR & LIMEHOUSE FOR JIM FITZPATRICK MEP

Please also put April 24 in your diary for the PES Action Day on the
Financial Transaction Tax with Claude Moraes MEP, followed by a
campaign session for Jim Fitzpatrick MP in Poplar and Limehouse.

Below are the unofficial results from the European parliament elections in the Netherlands. Officially, member states are not supposed to release results until the last polling station closes on Sunday evening, but the Dutch government says transparency is equally important. The Netherlands narrowly escaped a lawsuit after releasing unofficial results during the 2004 EU elections. Read the full nrc.nl article by following this link.

http://www.nrc.nl/international/europe/article2262660.ece/EU_election_results_from_the_Netherlands

PvdA (Dutch PES member party) looses 4 seats down from 7 to 3.

Geert Wilders’  far-right Freedom Party gains 4 seats.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jun/05/european-elections-the-netherlands-far-right

It does not feel like it in the UK, but these European elections are actually about something. The European Parliament is the only directly elected institution of the EU. Whichever political group holds a relative majority within it matters in more then one way. Which potential cross party majorities are possible after the elections will have an impact on the next 5 years of policy making on the European level.

In the last 5 years the conservative EPP-ED was the largest group in the European Parliament. 21 out of 27 member-state governments are run/dominated by conservatives. A majority of Commissioners are Conservative as is the President of the European Commission.

Conservatives in Europe have been driving a neo-liberal agenda, liberalising markets and doing nothing to prevent the economic crisis or at least attempting to engineer a softer landing. The Party of European Socialists PES (of which the Labour Party is a member) has been calling for years for better regulation of financial markets, and decisive action against tax havens and tax fraud.

It is of particular irony – if latest opinion polls are to be trusted – that voters in the UK are flocking to the Tories who have been part of the European conservatives who have been responsible for those policies coming out of Brussels which voters do not like. 

UK voters are moving to the Conservatives and UKIP, if polls are right. Both parties are advocating less Social Europe – especially for workers in Britain- and some Tories are trying in Westminster to effectively do away with the minimum wage. UKIP and Tories alike have voted against the ending of the UK opt out on the Working Time Directive. They want a Europe of free trade only, with as little human rights, as little welfare state and as little protection of the environment as possible.

A land slide victory for the Tories/UKIP in these elections will do irreparable damage to Britain’s long term national interest and in particular the interest of a vast majority of her citizens. Low and middle income earners in the UK need more Social Europe not less, need more effective European and global regulation of financial markets.

UKIP leader Nigel Farage MEP holds the view that too much EU regulation is responsible for the economic crisis. I am sure Poul Nyrop Rasmussen MEP (PES president) did not know whether to laugh or cry standing next to Nigel on “Record Europe” (the BBC EU news show). Farage pointing to his expertise on the subject – “I have worked as an investment banker in the City of London” is therefore attempting too steal the mantle from the Tories for UKIP to be the new political wing of the banking sector.

Economic crisis, banker bonuses, tax havens, tax evasion and tax avoidance, that’s yesterday’s news.

The British electorate is going to make a momentous decision on the future of Britain and the future of Europe without realising it, being too distracted by MP expenses.

Keep fighting for Britain’s future! – Vote Labour on June 4!