| Topic: | This is not a case of History repeating itself | |
| Posted by: | David Giles | |
| Date/Time: | 14/12/11 14:15:00 |
| I think that David Cameron made the right decision last Friday and that he will be vindicated by history. I am surprised that Sam Hearn, who is a Conservative Councillor, does not agree wholeheartedly and without reservation. This is not a case of history repeating itself. The current situation is far more serious than any of the situations faced under the premierships of Margaret Thatcher, John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. This is a totally new situation which can only be compared with the Great Crash of 1929 and the ongoing financial crises that affected Europe, America and indeed the whole world throughout the nineteen-thirties until the Second World War started in 1939. A large number of European banks are insolvent and are only being kept afloat by government guarantees (private or public)and by scrambling about for short term loans from whoever is will to lend them a hundred million or two. Partially because Governments have guaranteed the banks, the banking crisis has become a sovereign debt crisis. A large number of European Governments (in many cases the same Governments that are guaranteeing the banks) are also insolvent because they are unable to meet their current expenditures out of current revenues and are finding it increasingly difficult and expensive to borrow to fund their deficits. Ireland, Greece and Pourtugal have gone bust, Spain and Italy are in crisis and France is also in very serious trouble. Even Germany has failed to raise all the money it wished to raise in a recent bond issue. Because the Eurozone shares a single currency and the European Central Bank, the international financial markets and potential investors such as the Chinese, the Gulf Arabs, the Singaporeans etc see the Eurozone as being effectively one country.However that one country until now has lacked the single Government, Fiscal, Taxation and Budgetary Union that normal countries have. Merkozy recognises this and now is trying the shut the stable doar long after the horse has bolted. But Merkozy lacks a democratic mandate. Everyone who looks at the Eurozone objectively knows this. Everyone knows that the present Merkozy proposals are too little too late (about 10 years too late)and will do very little to solve the current crisis. The markets will decide the current crisis. Politicians will not and if anything will make it worse. Instead of nit-picking and trying to find fault with what David Cameron has done, people like Nick Clegg and the increasingly irrelevant and bizarre Ed Milliband should unite behind David Cameron and do what Nick Clegg did initially last Friday- which was to support what David Cameron had done - and unite not only in the national interest but also in the long term interest of Europe. Ordinary Europeans simply do not want to be ruled and dictated to by the unelected bureaucrats of the European Commission or by the Chancellor of Germany or the President of France. Hitler tried that in 1939. Britain and its Commonwealth stood alone in 1940. This may yet be David Cameron's finest hour. |