"In his diaries for 1968, Tony Benn records the ugly scenes as workers marched past the Commons demanding that Labour adopt the anti-foreigner and ultra-nationalist rhetoric unleashed by Enoch Powell.
The simmering nationalist tensions stoked up by the Daily Mail's campaign against Polish workers or the VULGAR ANTI-EUROPEAN XENOPHOBIA of William Hague and cohorts among Tory and UKIP MPs has now come to life, as construction workers demonstrate against a handful of Italian workers on the cold Humber coastline.
Sadly it has been Labour MPs who have given voice to the NATIONALIST-PROTECTIONIST RHETORIC unleashed by the dispute.
There are 2 million Britons living and working in EU countries, and if they faced the kind of abuse the Italian workers have received there would be a national outcry in Britain, and rightly so.”I wonder how many of the '2 million Britons' are New Labour appointees? I wonder how many of them are EU apparatchiks? I wonder how many are Common Purpose types who’d sell the rest of their British kith and kin down the river for a comfortable seat on the EU gravy train?
I wonder how many are working out there because they couldn’t find a job back home?
MacShane continues:
“If the new rule is that British employees in Spain, France, Germany or wherever have to be fired to make way for nationals, then it is British families who will suffer most. Half the patients on GP lists are looked after by doctors who did not train in Britain."That’s because British parliamentarians have ensured that we don’t train up enough of our own. MacShane adds:
"A few years ago it was 'Pakis' taking jobs. More recently, Poles. Now it is Italians… The TV scenes of workers holding up placards insisting that British workers should get British jobs is A GIFT FOR RIGHT-WING NATIONALISTS.”It is a gift, Mr MacShane, because, pretty obviously, 'rightwing Nationalists' identify and sympathise rather more with the British working man, than you or New Labour do.
"This is a made-in-Europe problem and we need a European solution, not a Daily Mail response of HATE against non-Brits...
Our MEP and MEP candidates have come up with the answer to the oil refinery dispute. The manifesto of the Party of European Socialists, endorsed by Labour, contains clear pledges to deal with the problems thrown up both by the angry construction workers and other issues arising from the tensions of the right of workers to work anywhere in the EU and the right of unions to expect that national and local agreements will be honoured.
The Labour-PES manifesto says that there should be 'A SOCIAL PROGRESS CLAUSE IN EVERY PIECE OF EUROPEAN LEGISLATION'.
Labour MEP candidates will also fight for: a European pact on wages, guaranteeing equal pay for equal work and setting out the need for decent minimum wages in all EU member states, agreed either by law or through collective bargaining and applying both to citizens and migrant workers.
The manifesto insists that: ‘Social rights include the right to a fair level playing field for workers.’ And Labour MEPs – if elected – also commit themselves: to prevent the exploitation of workers and strengthen their rights to collective bargaining.
Recent European court judgments have created uncertainty about workers' rights and collective agreements. Together with the social partners we will examine the impact of the Viking, Laval and other judgments to ensure that rights are not undermined. A review of the EU Posting of Workers Directive is essential.
This is language that working people and their unions in Britain should support.”I don’t think it is, Denis. I think British“working people” would rather have what Gordon Brown said in September, 2007. I think they'd rather have 'British jobs for British workers.' I think if you asked them which they preferred, your pro-EU gobbledeygook or Gordon B’s unequivocal pledge, they’d choose that which The Dear Leader now finds embarrassing.
Oh, by the way, the 'rightwing Nationalists' you sneer at earlier in your piece? I wouldn’t imagine many of them would be at all critical of slogans like 'Italian jobs for Italian workers,' 'French jobs for French workers” or 'German jobs for German workers.' I think they'd be entirely happy with the foreigner sticking up for his own in his own land. In fact, most of the decent folks in this country would, I’m sure, be all for and Polish, Bulgarian and Rumanian jobs for their own folks as well.
As opposed to us going over there and taking them all, that is. Know what I mean, Denis?
MacShane continued:
"Instead of following the Daily Mail/Tory/Ukip line that Britain needs less Europe, we should be saying out loud that a vote for Labour in June can help deliver policies that will defend worker's interests."'Defend workers’ interests?' What like New Labour has defended our workers’ interests? Listen Denis, of all the British jobs created in the last decade, your lot have seen to it that 90 per cent of them have gone to foreigners! Perhaps you could tell me, and those Brits who want a job but don't have one, how such a state of affairs can possibly“defend workers’ interests”? It doesn’t.
At least, it doesn’t defend the interests of BRITISH WORKERS. And the folks protesting all over the country, as we speak, are aware of this.
The spin isn’t working any more, Denis. There’s just too much evidence of your anti-British treachery to kid us any more. By the way, ladies and gentlemen, if I was sharing a platform with a foam-flecked Brit-basher like Denis MacShane, he would, probably, call me a liar for having introduced the '90 per cent' stat. Well, a few days ago, Frank Field, a former New Labour Minister, said that Gordon Brown’s 'claim to have provided British jobs for British workers is as hollow as it could be' and added:
“OF THE THREE MILLION JOBS CREATED IN THE LAST DECADE, NINE OUT OF 10 HAVE GONE TO PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT BRITISH.”On 21 February 2004, PC Tracey Atkinson was attacked in Kimberworth, Rotherham.
In June, 2004, Richard Divers was jailed for just two years and nine months for the savage attack upon Tracey. Divers, who was drunk, had fled the scene of an accident when she cornered him. He struck her twice in the face with the palm of his hand, then grabbed her baton and hit her at least three times with it. She was hospitalised as a result.
Divers is the brother of gangland murder victim, Lester Divers, who was shot dead at the wheel of his car on New Year's Day, 2003. Kevin Smith and Michael Ullah were sentenced to life imprisonment for his murder. All of those mentioned above, with the exception of Tracey Atkinson, are black.
MacShane, New Labour MP for Rotherham, voted for criminal behaviour to be punished with more severity if that criminal behaviour was 'racially' or 'religiously' aggravated. He also voted to introduce another raft of racial and religious hatred legislation in January 2006. This legislation was intended to further protect the Muslim population of Britain.
Thus, at a time when Muslims were blowing people up in Britain and waving placards threatening to behead those who criticise the prophet, MacShane voted for yet another law intended to bear down upon the native, white population of these islands.
He also signed a good few Early Day Motions sympathising with asylum-seekers and refugees.
Between 197 and 2005, nine EDMs were introduced into Parliament that were concerned with the plight of indigenous Britons unjustly imprisoned overseas. MacShane signed none of them. However, he did sign several EDMs introduced during the same period concerned with the situation of foreigners in prison overseas.
He also signed an EDM criticising the decision to deport Nigerian immigrant, Sunday Ogunwobi, and his family. Ogunwobi is still here 15 years after the first EDM was introduced on his behalf. Since he was granted permission to stay, Ogunwobi became Councillor in Hackney and he is currently the Minister of the Dalston Baptist church.
He also signed two EDMs sympathising with Ademole Onibiyo, a Nigerian asylum-seeker, and his family.
MacShane also signed an EDM sympathising with the British Sikh community.
However, he never signed an EDM on behalf of his own constituent, Tracy Atkinson. Nor did he ever mention the attack upon her in parliament.
MacShane voted to go to war on every occasion in the 2002-2003 series of Commons divisions that led to the invasion of Iraq. He also voted for the military action which led to led to the widespread bombing of Iraq in 1998. However, he chose not vote for an amendment which sought to prevent the invasion of Afghanistan.
MacShane voted on several occasions to lower the homosexual age of consent to 16. He also voted to allow the adoption of children by homosexual couples.
He voted against the motion which opposed government plans to cut student funding and voted for a second reading of the government’s higher education bill which introduced 'top-up' fees for university students in England.
He voted for the establishment of Foundation hospitals (privatisation by the back door) in all four of the most important Commons divisions.
He voted to introduce legislation allowing government health agencies to force water companies in England and Wales to add fluoride to drinking water. (Fluoride is very toxic and is regarded as hazardous waste by many)
During the lifetime of the New Labour government many EDMs have been introduced into Parliament suspicious and/or critical of GM 'Frankenstein food' technology. MacShane signed none of them.
All of the above statistics were correct at the time of the 2005 General Election.
On 27 January 2004, MacShane said this in the House of Commons:
"We welcome the fact that our new friends and partners - the citizens of Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, the Baltic states and the others - will be able to come here."He has also said: 'Anti-Europeanism is dead-end politics.'
'
On 19 November 2007, MacShane withdrew from a meeting at the Oxford Union.
He was furious that the Union was giving David Irving and Nick Griffin a public platform. He wrote to the Union’s President objecting to 'two notorious anti-Semites (being) given a platform at the Oxford Union.' He added:
"To put four-star Jew-haters on to a prestigious platform like the Oxford Union is to validate modern anti-Semitism."On 4 September 2007, MacShane’s essay, 'The New Anti-Semitism,' was published by The Washington Post.
This is what it said:
"Last year I chaired a blue-ribbon committee of British parliamentarians, including former ministers and a party leader, that examined THE PROBLEM OF ANTI-SEMITISM IN BRITAIN… To express any support for Israel or any feeling for the right of a Jewish state to exist produces denunciation, even contempt…
Tony Blair called us in and told his staff to fan out throughout government departments and produce answers to the problems we outlined. To Britain's credit, the Blair administration produced a formal government response setting out tough new guidelines for… universities TO STOP ANTI-JEWISH IDEOLOGY FROM TAKING ROOT ON CAMPUSES…
Tony Blair's successor as British prime minister, Gordon Brown, recently said in London that HE STOOD WITH ISRAEL 'IN BAD TIMES AS WELL AS GOOD TIMES,' and one of the remarkable turnarounds of the new Labor leadership that governs Britain is A STRONG SUPPORT FOR ISRAEL AND ITS COMMITMENT TO COMBATING ANTI-SEMITISM…
The Polish politician, Maciej Marian Giertych, recently published a pamphlet under the auspices of the European Parliament that attacked Jews. No action has been taken against him…
Anti-Semitism today is officially sanctioned state ideology and is being turned into a mobilizing and organizing force to recruit thousands in a new crusade… to eradicate Jewishness from the region whence it came and to weaken and undermine all the humanist values of rule of law, tolerance and respect for core rights such as free expression that Jews have fought for over time…
Democracies always take their time, often too much time, to recognize and face a totalitarian threat… Today there is still denial about the universal ideology of the new anti-Semitism. It has power and reach, and it enters into THE SOFT UNDERBELLY OF THE WESTERN MIND-SET THAT DOES NOT LIKE JEWS OR WHAT ISRAEL DOES TO DEFEND ITS RIGHT TO EXIST."
"A COUNTERATTACK IS BEING ORGANIZED. MY OWN HOUSE OF COMMONS HAS LED THE WAY WITH ITS REPORT. The 47-nation Council of Europe, ON WHICH I SIT AS A BRITISH REPRESENTATIVE, has launched a lengthy inquiry into combating anti-Semitism in Europe. THE EUROPEAN UNION HAS PRODUCED A DIRECTIVE OUTLAWING INTERNET HATE SPEECH ORIGINATING WITHIN ITS JURISDICTION.
We are at the beginning of a long intellectual and ideological struggle. It is not about Jews or Israel. It is about everything democrats have long fought for: THE TRUTH WITHOUT FEAR, no matter one's religion or political beliefs. THE NEW ANTI-SEMITISM THREATENS ALL OF HUMANITY.The 'new-anti-Semitism' threatens those Jews who behave bestially towards 'all of humanity.' It also threatens the New World Order boys who encourage, profit by and give succour to their depredations. In other words, the 'new anti-Semitism' threatens Big Brother.
The Jew-haters must not pass."
'Truth without fear,' eh, Denis? So, if I tell a truth that might annoy your best pals, I wouldn't have to be afraid of anything? If, for example, one happened to mention that less than 6,000,000 Jewish folk died at the hands of the Nazis, would this be the kind of truth you think I should tell 'without fear?'
The truth without fear. This, out of the mouth of MacShane, is a thousand light years beyond ironic.
Denis MacShane was once the President of the National Union of Journalists.
He was also the director of the European Policy Institute from 1992 to 1994 and Tony Blair appointed him Minister of State for Europe after Keith Vaz's various improprieties became a liability. He is now a Privy Councillor.
MacShane, a Roman Catholic, is the son of an Irish mother and a Polish father.
His real name is Denis Matyjaszek.
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