Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2016-04-13-Speech-3-030-000"
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"en.20160413.5.3-030-000"2
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"Mr President, I am very surprised. We are here in what I have been told repeatedly is the home of European democracy, so surely we could have taken the opportunity this morning to celebrate the Dutch referendum last week, in which the people said ‘no’ to EU enlargement, ‘no’ to the deal with the Ukraine, and no doubt had it been Turkey, an even bigger number of people would have said ‘no’ to Turkish accession. It was a victory for democracy but, in particular, it was a victory for a little organisation called GeenStijl, a group of young bloggers who managed to get together 427 000 signatures. So it was also a victory for direct democracy, in the week when we remember that Gianroberto Casaleggio, the genius behind the Five Star Movement in Italy, has died. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the new politics.
We were told by Mr Juncker that if the Dutch voted ‘no’ it would be a disaster, but he has not mentioned it today at all. Indeed, his predecessor, Mr Van Rompuy, my old mate, says we should just ignore the Dutch and carry on blithely. So, what we are seeing is the big battalions of vested self-interest doing their best to completely ignore the will of the Dutch people.
I think things are changing. I do not believe these institutions can survive 21st-century technology. I think the will of the people is changing politics in a way that makes all of you in this room deeply fearful, and so you should be. As we, in the United Kingdom, enter the final countdown of our referendum, all eyes are on this Turkish deal. What we see is the bosses of the EU bowing and scraping before Mr Erdoğan, who gleefully walks all over them and tramples over human rights at every level.
Mr Juncker tells us this morning that we are making progress. Let us just examine that. 1.8 million people have come to the EU in the last 18 months and we have sent back 300. It does not sound like it is going very well to me.
The one group that will be pleased, though, are ISIS. They have now managed to put 5 000 of their operatives into the European continent, according to the boss of Europol: something that should send a shiver down our collective spines. I have to say that, in the end, I think it is what the British referendum will turn on. I think we will vote for Brexit, and the reason is we will vote to put our own safety first. It is going to be as it was in the Netherlands last week – a battle of people versus the politicians. You may have the big money, the big businesses and Goldman Sachs, but we have got our armies of bloggers. In the end the people’s will is going to prevail. This place will not survive."@en1
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