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

On April 24 right across Europe, progressives and activists from the Party of European Socialists (PES) will be participating in a day of action to call for an international financial transaction tax. Play your part in the London event of this Pan-European Campaign Day.

We’ll meet at 10am at 11 Market Way, E14 6AH next to Chrisp Street Market.
[It's close to All Saints and Langdon Park DLR stations - the Bus Number 15 also goes there.]
The financial crisis has already cost 7 million Europeans their jobs. The cost of the bail outs and intervention measures has been estimated by the PES to have cost each European €6,000 in extra public debt by the end of 2011.
Over the last 15 years, the number of financial transactions has increased by 450%. We are therefore calling for a financial transaction tax, (sometimes known as a ‘Robin Hood’ or ‘Tobin’ tax) of 0.05%, so that this massive flow of money, produces more social good.
A small tax on these transactions could help fund public services and help the world meet the UN Millennium Development Goals, to ensure that as we re-build our economy, we all benefit from this growth.

You can find further information on the European campaign is at: http://europeansforfinancialreform.org/

Please watch ‘The Vandal Banker’ and see where else in Europe FTT activities will take place. http://www.pes.org/en/financial-transaction-tax/pes-european-day-of-action

10:30 – 11:30 Event:

leaf letting passersby, taking pictures and recording short clips to upload to the PES Action Day website. Play your local part in a Pan-Eurpean event with a global goal.
We will be joined by Jim Fitzpatrick MP and Claude Moraes MEP and are expecting considerable media interest in the event.

To RSVP and to request further information on the social, environmental and macro-economic benefits of a financial transaction tax please email lme.lse@hotmail.co.uk or call David Schoibl on 07976 252 768.

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.

Please forward this message to all progressive non-British EU-citizens you know who live in the UK.

Non-British EU-citizens living in the UK can not vote in General Elections yet their outcome will have an impact on their lives. Take a long hard look at the Tories and be afraid, be very afraid , or do something about it. Support Labour in any way you can – it matters!

If you live in London you can register to vote in the upcoming Council Elections. The registration deadline is April 20. http://www.aboutmyvote.co.uk/

Lord Ashcroft, who until recently kept his tax status secret, has put millions of pounds (some of the money he avoided paying in tax in the UK) into key marginal seats to support Conservative Candidates. This new group of Tories is particularly euro-sceptic (according to polling by Conservative Home, the conservative’s own online community website).

Help Labour level the playing field in some of the key marginals – we need your support!

And please continue reading to see why this matters so much.

In the European Parliament the Tories have left the mainstream centre-right parties which form the EPP (European People’s Party). After the 2009 European elections they formed a new group, called the European Conservatives and Reformists ECR. Their new allies are now parties on the extreme right. As Leader of this ECR group, the Tories helped to elect Michael Kaminski, who has ben accused of homophobia and anti-semitism and of having been a member of a neo-Nazi skinhead group in Poland in the past. Their Latvian partner party supports annual marches for SS veterans. The kind of partners they have chosen to ally themselves with in Europe, tells us what kind of party the Conservatives still are.

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

Tory MEPs consistently vote against equality and anti-discrimination legislation and motions :

• On 10 February 2010 most Tory MEPs voted against or abstained on 7 measures in an report on equality for women, including measures for equal pay for women.
• On the same day not a single Tory MEP voted to support a motion calling on Croatia to crack down on homophobic attacks in the country. 16 abstained and one even voted against.
• On 25 February 2010 the European Parliament debated a resolution about signing the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women. 22 Tory MEPs voted against, and the other 3 abstained.
• In 2006 Tory MEPs voted against a report on combating violence against women, including provisions criminalising rape in marriage and female genital mutilation. Even last year they abstained on a call for EU member states to increase protection for women against violence

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

The Tories haven’t supported family friendly policies either. Tory MEPs did not back EU employment guidelines that included targets for flexible working and access to childcare. They opposed calls for EU-wide rights to paternity leave and have twice opposed proposals to link maternity and paternity leave so that fathers can also take time off.

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

And we all know about the mad comments of Daniel Hannan, although he is not alone in his outrageous views:

• Daniel Hannan on the NHS – “I wouldn’t wish it on anybody.” “We have lived through this mistake for 60 years.” “It’s made people iller.”
• Roger Helmer, Tory MEP, on the NHS – “If the Americans came to me and said, ‘Would you recommend us taking up a system just like the British NHS?’, I think I would have to say ‘No’.”

• Roger Helmer MEP on climate change – “This whole issue has got completely out of hand. It has become a new religion. You have to believe it. If you do not believe it, you are a heretic. They would like to burn us at the stake – using recycled faggots!” “It is not the planet that is in danger. It is freedom… Don’t worry about global warming – it’s a myth.”

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

George Osborne called for a crackdown on tax-dodging, but Tory MEPs voted this year against proposals supporting the automatic exchange of information to crack down on those seeking to dodge taxes by hiding their money across borders.

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

What’s really worrying is that the Conservatives are so blinkered by their ideological euro-scepticism that they would veto, vote against and opt out of measures that would actually be of benefit to British people. One example: There is a whole host of Justice and Home Affairs measures designed to combat organised cross border crime and to make everybody in Europe safer. These measures will require the opt-in of the next UK Government. Wouldn’t it be ironic if the party of law and order would refuse to opt in because their euro-sceptic ideology dictates that Justice and Home Affairs are matters for member-states only?

Don’t let the Tories get away with it.

Given the recent Chris Grayling faux-pas one must wonder how gay friendly the Tories have become and how far they still have to go on this. Be that as it may, let’s take Cameron by his own word. Challenged in a recent interview by the Gay Times why no Tory MEP supported a motion in the European Parliament criticising Lithuania’s ‘Section 28′, Cameron let the cat out of the bag. As long as parties agree with the Tories on their Euro-scepticism all other considerations seem to become secondary.

Don’t let Cameron get away with it. Help level the playing field in some of the key marginals.

This is a transcript of part of Cameron’s answer. “…Uh, and generally, just looking at the the whole issue of European alliances which all this is, is getting to, you know the reason for having alliances, and of leaving the EEP and joining and forming this new party, is not because we, ah, approve of every dot and comma of the social policies of these parties. It’s about Europe, this alliance, not about social policy. It’s an alliance about parties that want a more flexible, more open Europe uh rather than Europe as a super state. And of course we would never ally, um, with parties who we thought, you know, who, who’s views stepped, um, beyond the pale. …”

And you can find a full transcript as well as a link to the video on

http://www.thefword.org.uk/blog/2010/03/david_cameron_o

Please forward this message to all progressive non-British EU-citizens you know who live in the UK.

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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!