Vaccine fiasco has exposed EU’s multiple failings – Bernard Ingham

At any rate, I am now thoroughly “nobbled”.

It would be over-dramatic to suggest that I feel as though a sentence of death has been lifted. We who suffer from chronic pulmonary disease live permanently at risk from lung infections.

Still, I feel safer, given the protection annual ‘flu vaccinations have given me.

Let all of us now inoculated against coronavirus spare a thought for the millions of vulnerable souls the world over – and even in Europe – who remain unprotected.

Another thought inescapably follows: whither the EU in view of its abject, counter-productive “performance” over access to Covid-19 vaccines?

Its threats to Britain if we do not surrender millions of doses were but the latest entry in its black book.

Over the last 48 years I have amassed a formidable charge sheet against it.

Try this one for size:

It is undoubtedly undemocratic, with a tame Parliament and Euro-Court complicit in extending integration towards a federal United States of 
Europe.

A “great project” of national suppression not yet put to the people.

It follows it is bureaucratic. It is effectively run by unelected officials in a red tape factory with an insatiable urge to legislate.

It is expensive. The bureaucracy cossets its officials, even giving them immunity from prosecution for official actions for life, and its Parliamentarians do themselves well by any standards.

If it isn’t entirely corrupt, it is very cavalier with money. Starting in 1994, its auditors felt obliged to give an adverse report on its accounts for 22 years. Only in 2016 did it feel able to deliver a qualified report. Things may be improving – but from a low base.

It is a Franco-German hegemony. 
They have traditionally decided what gives. They are also deaf to reason. 
Not even the UK has been able to persuade them to drop their federal ambitions, even though the single currency – the euro – has severely damaged the southern member-states. You could argue that the whole rickety structure is held together by fear 
of crossing the Franco-German 
masters.

It is pretentious. It pretends to be a nation state of, at peak, some 500m people, and clamours to be represented on every global institution, even though it cannot deliver because it has no democratic legitimacy. This pretentiousness is now at the heart 
of whether the EU should, as an association rather than a state, have ambassadorial status in an independent UK.

It is protectionist – that, said President Mitterrrand, is the purpose of the Common Agricultural Policy.

It is chronically unreliable on 
defence and foreign affairs. It pretends the EU has preserved the peace in 
Europe for 75 years when its saviour 
has been the US-backed Nato. And just when Vladimir Putin is trying to 
de-stabilise the West what does 
Germany do? Why, invest in a gas pipeline from Russia while at the same time closing nuclear power stations. Ye gods!

It is vindictive. It has proved that time and again in the Brexit negotiations. We must also suspect that, quite apart from confiscating a lorry driver’s ham sandwich, not all the current problems of cross-Channel trade are due to adjusting to UK independence.

It is petty beyond words as evidenced by its arrogant threat to trade if we do not hand over anti-Covid jabs.

That list may not be exhaustive.

Who therefore in their right mind would want to preserve an institution that is manifestly failing its own citizens?

How could it do otherwise when member-states elect their own Parliaments to look after their welfare?

And so Covid-19 has exposed EU pretence and divisions. This means it is just as much an obstacle to the health of the Western Alliance as it is to fighting Covid.

So, whither the EU? Because of 
the disparate power of France and Germany – and the weakness of states impoverished by the euro – it is unlikely to break up soon.

But in a dangerous world menaced 
by the Communism so many EU 
member-states escaped from 30 years 
ago, the EU must not be allowed much longer to damage the cause of true freedom with its irresponsible behaviour.

Boris Johnson and Joe Biden 
should get together and set out their ambition for a Europe of nation states co-operating and trading freely with each other.

Let’s work for a realistic, viable – and Covid-protected – Europe.