I had a lecture today from the former foreign minister of the Netherlands, Bernard Bot. He’s a Christian democrat, so obviously to the centre-right of politics, and far from an insignificant figure. He was talking on the topic of the widening and deepening of Europe, but touched on energy policy, especially regarding our relations with our eastern neighbours. He seemed genuinely convinced that it won’t be possible to expand renewable generating capacity to a significant level; in short, he seemed to advocate the continued development of oil, gas, and nuclear generating capacity.

Being someone who is immersed in politics, I naturally have good friends in most parties across the political spectrum, and when it comes to matters such as this, they all seem—much as I am—firm in their convictions on renewables and energy policy, with the general consensus being that it isn’t enough and we need to develop nuclear and strengthen links to oil and gas producing regions (ie. Russia). Of course, greens can come up with a dozen arguments as to why this is the wrong approach, but seeing as we like to believe our views are firmly rooted in fact and the rigours of science, what possesses those of other political colours to hold firm to the views they advocate? More importantly, what does this mean for the chances of being able to tackle energy supply and demand issues, and of course, climate change? Unfortunately this question was a little too off topic for me to ask in the Q&A session at the end of his lecture, but it’d be interesting to hear if anyone has any thoughts on the matter.

So this isn’t the freshest story, but it doesn’t make it any less acceptable. I’m referring to the NY Times report on a British woman who was spied on by her local council. Why is it so hard to realise that if you give people in local government the ability to pretend to be James Bond, then naturally, they will get a bit excited and start mounting covert operations on targets, or to translate into normal English, spy on people who, in most cases, at worst are committing minor crimes.

Any level of government that has these capacities to observe must remember that there needs to be an element of trust between people and their government. Sure, bad people can take advantage of the space that the element of trust gives to do bad things; this is simply something that has to be put up with though. In the case of the woman in the article, there are myriad possibilities to investigate whether she was breaching rules on school admission that wouldn’t have involved a report with the words, “target vehicle”. There is a time and a place for surveillance, but it must be limited, obvious, and most importantly, it must allow for a private space, beyond the reaches of most of the state. Without it, we may have better security and fewer crimes, but we will lose more than we gain.

Do we never learn?! By ‘we’, I’m referring to anyone who is opposed to fascism rearing its head any higher than it already is in Europe. This post was prompted by both the recent appearance on the BBC’s Question Time of British chief-facist, Nick Griffin, and also his Dutch opposite number, Geert Wilder’s publicity and ego-trip to the House of Lords in London (at the behest of UKIP—talk about BNP-light!).

The problem is that, while we politicos like to think that any sane, decent, and moderate person finds the views of the BNP and the PVV vile and disgusting, the truth is that the people who are being targeted by these parties, and who form their electoral base, are not tuned into politics on the same frequency as the mondeo-man voter that Blair, Brown, Cameron, and Clegg, not to mention the leaders of the major parties here in the Netherlands, and across most of Europe, have identified as their ideal voter.

Most of the people who vote for the BNP and PVV are not racist. Some are, but most aren’t. They’re simply in communities that are ignored by most other parties (including, to an extent, my own party, with it’s ultra-middle-class culture), but which get attention from this different party that says it is full of decent, down to earth people; people who are like them. The BNP uses the easiest and most effective campaign tactics: playing on fears, having its candidates act as shadow-councillors before the election. With the anti-politics feeling that is present throughout Britain, it is only natural that these tactics work, and produce councillors and MEPs.

Instead of physically fighting the BNP—seriously guys, do we have to side with a bunch of angry-young-men?—we should be actively participating in the communities that we have neglected for too long. It shouldn’t be a case of sending missionary politicos into the communities either; Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberals, and of course, the Greens should truly be a part of, and stand up for, all communities, not just those which statistical software tells them will gain them the most votes.

Unfortunately my schedule meant that I couldn’t take part in Blog Action Day yesterday (exam revision and travelling), but I’ll try to make up for it once my mid-term exams are over next week. Before that though, I have to get through the rest of the European Green Party’s council meeting in Malmö. There is quite a lot of discussion of our performance in the European Parliament elections earlier this year, and hopefully I can make some of it into an interesting post later on. I’m tweeting stuff as I go along under @tredford01, with the #EGP hashtag that a few others here are using.

I often have a problem when writing this blog that I can’t get worked up enough about issues, but when I got home from my evening out tonight and had a read of Twitter, only one feeling came to mind: shock. The Guardian has been gagged from reporting a Parliamentary question (it’s question 61) on Trafigura’s activities in Africa.

I’m sorry, but at what point did private persons gain the right to block the press from reporting the proceedings of our Parliament?!

One of the jobs of the press is to be the conduit between the people, politics, and society; it should be free to report the public activities of our elected representatives, and it should be free to hold them, and powerful persons and organisations to account for their actions. What the lawyers for Trafigura have done here is break that function.

So, let’s help out the good old Guardian by saying, loudly, what they cannot say. Head over to Twitter and retweet the parliamentary question, spread links to the story, and write about it on your own blogs.

Klaus cannot be serious! After the struggle to get every member state to ratify Lisbon, with just Poland (though it seems like it is soon to ratify) and the Czech Republic still to do so, and with his own Parliament supporting ratification, he has the gall to suggest an amendment that might require another ratification round!

This can be nothing but obstruction for obstruction’s sake; even if there was some substance to his request for a footnote, it’s unlikely to be compatible with the spirit of the Treaty. All I can see from the European Voice and BBC articles on this is that Klaus wants something vague on the Charter of Fundamental Rights, which in his political context likely means a weakening of it—and yes, I know the UK has an opt-out on the Charter, which I disagree with, but at least we negotiated it at the right time, and in the right way.

So, what are the chances of full ratification before the Tories figure out a way to withdraw the British ratification?

Image by Bertelsmann Stiftung on Flickr, used under a Creative Commons licence.

You’d think I’d be writing something on the Irish ‘yes’ to Lisbon, what with this being a European politics blog after all, but I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until Wednesday evening, by which point I will have been enlightened by a panel discussion on the outcome of the referendum with an Irish barrister, and some professors from the Law Department of my university. It’ll also be interesting to see what is being said in the European Parliament on the matter.

Anyway, what I did want to briefly post about tonight is related to Lisbon: specifically, the presidency of the EU. I keep hearing a lot about how ratification of Lisbon will open the door for Tony Blair to become the first new-style President. Now I can’t imagine he’d turn down the job, but the feeling I’m getting from people I’ve talked to about this, and media I’ve read about it, suggests that he’s not really the shoe-in that the British press claim. Anyone have any ideas?