Nick Clegg: Demand for EU Referendum is "Navel Gazing"

 On coming to power last year the Tory-Liberal Democrat coalition promised a national referendum on any proposal to change Britain’s relationship with the European Union.

Indeed so clear was this stance that it was even written into law in the European Union Act of 2011.
Interviewed by the BBC’s Andrew Marr yesterday about the Merkel-Sarkozy drive for fiscal union, the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg descended into the weasel words so typical of his party.

“I don’t think there needs to be a referendum,” he proclaimed, arguing that fiscal union amounted to little more than “strengthening the rules” for membership of the euro.

Clegg then went even further, dismissing the very idea of a referendum as “a navel-gazing exercise”.

What Europe really needed, he said, was to achieve these changes “with the minimum amount of institutional fuss”.

So there we have it.

In Clegg’s view, anyone in Europe wanting to defend their national heritage, their sovereignty and their right to self-governance is indulging in nothing more than pointless “navel gazing”.

At a stroke, Clegg showed his contempt for democracy and his disdain for patriotism.

His outlook is exactly in tune with that of our unaccountable EU masters who have always despised the will of the people and the existence of the inde- pendent European nations.

Source Leo Mckinstry