HUGH SYKES: EUROSCEPTICS = RATS

Commenting on the proposed EU referendum, senior BBC foreign correspondent Hugh Sykes makes known his views of the better-off-out brigade. A taste of things to come from the BBC?

Update. Twitter has just changed the way tweets can be embedded meaning that things don’t work as before. Therefore here’s a good old-fashioned screengrab for the full exchange between Sykes and me.

Update 2. “scrupulously objective” :

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86 Responses to HUGH SYKES: EUROSCEPTICS = RATS

  1. Ian Rushlow says:

    People who don’t want to drown leave sinking ships. Interesting that he quotes Churchill. Churchill supported the creation of a Jewish homeland; don’t suppose they’ll be using that in their anti-Israel coverage. Maybe Mosley is more to the Beeb’s liking. “Europe: a Nation!” was his quote (presumably a nation with one leader, one people and one broadcaster).

       48 likes

    • Span Ows says:

      They all quote Churchill but never add all of it:

      “I wish to speak to you today about the tragedy of Europe. (…) Yet all the while there is a remedy which, if it were generally and spontaneously adopted by the great majority of people in many lands, would as if by a miracle transform the whole scene, and would in a few years make all Europe, or the greater part of it, as free and as happy as Switzerland is today. What is this sovereign remedy? It is to recreate the European Family, or as much of it as we can, and to provide it with a structure under which it can dwell in peace, in safety and in freedom. We must build a kind of United States of Europe. (…) The first step in the recreation of the European Family must be a partnership between France and Germany.”

      In the final paragraphs of the same speech Churchill is very clear that the United State of Europe would be without the participation of Britain:

      “We see nothing but good and hope in a richer, freer, more contented European commonality. But we have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not compromised. We are interested and associated but not absorbed.”

         37 likes

      • Span Ows says:

        Mixing speeches, the rest of the 1946 speech is here:

        http://assembly.coe.int/Main.asp?link=/AboutUs/zurich_e.htm

        He wanted a USE plus other world powers: Great Britain, The British Commonwealth of Nations, mighty America and I trust Soviet Russia

           13 likes

        • hippiepooter says:

          The BBC are always misleading the public about Churchill’s views on Europe. Somewhere on B-BBC there’s a piece on how Naughtie selectively quoted Churchill to deceive listeners as to his views on British involvement with Europe.

          Still, if Jimmy Saville can get away with noncing decades on end at the BBC, what chance of anything happening to the likes of Naughtie who nonce the truth?

             5 likes

  2. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Another one for the list. I don’t suppose Sykes used that rats metaphor because he sees the EU ship as sinking, does he? Yet another fascist who uses the war canard.

       41 likes

  3. wallygreeninker says:

    Perhaps a straw in the wind – or more likely tucked away on a programme hardly anybody listens to – on R3 Nightwaves last Thursday, 24th Jan, there was a fifteen minute discussion between two Eurosceptics:

    “Described as a book that could change the course of history, Anne McElvoy discusses the new updated version of The Rotten Heart of Europe. It’s a book that caused outrage and delight on its first publication in 1995, with its prophetic account of the pitfalls of European Monetary Union. Its author Bernard Connolly, a former European Commission employee, joins economist Anatole Kaletsky to discuss the situation today.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0147f5p

       29 likes

  4. Wild says:

    Hugh Sykes said on Radio 5 Live’s Drive programme that some people blamed Thatcher, along with the first President Bush, for failing to protect Iraq’s Kurdish people at the end of 1991 Gulf War. Needless to add he didn’t let a little thing like the fact that she was no longer in office in 1991 prevent him from making that jibe.

       59 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Anyone who blames Bush 41 for not protecting the Kurds enough will have to then defend his decision to give up and leave Sadaam in power. If we had taken him out at the time, none of the rest of it would have happened. And please nobody bother me about any BS about illegal regime change when Sadaam was invading another country and threatening to do more, since the Nobel Peace Laureate-in-Chief has done it to Ghadaffi and is helping to do it to Assad, neither of whom invaded anyone or threatened to do so.

         37 likes

  5. Richard Pinder says:

    Where Titanic survivors rats, or for that matter, anyone leaving a ship after it docks? Both Hitler and Napoleon had a European dream. Churchill’s dream was for Europe not Britain. Churchill fought and won the peace, but for freedom and democracy, not for an Orwellian financially corrupt autocratic super-state, no different to what we would have got from a moderating European National Socialist regime after Hitler’s death in the 1960’s or 1970’s.

       47 likes

  6. George R says:

    Is this why BBC-NUJ wants TURKEY in the E.U?

    “Greeks intercept Turkish ship loaded with weapons”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/01/greeks-intercept-turkish-ship-loaded-with-weapons.html

       27 likes

    • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

      Dont forget dopey dave wants turkey in as well!
      Oh the enrichment we will get.

         24 likes

      • Aerfen says:

        This is probably one factor in his decision to go down the referendum route, that is, to see off the anti EU majority before Turkey’s highly controversial admission, almost certain to be followed by other North African countries.

           13 likes

        • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

          Good grief, can you imagine the kind of cesspit this country will become?
          Or will we find ourselves culturally enriched?

             20 likes

        • NotaSheep says:

          If you think this is not planned to happen then Read ‘Eurabia – The Euro-Arab Axis’ by Bat Ye’or.

             12 likes

  7. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Investors will suddenly flee a safer haven than the Euro because, why? More fearmongering from a fascist.

       27 likes

  8. uncle bup says:

    Go on Hugh, you know you’re mentioned on here.

    Funny how they all dig out their arguments from 15 years ago, delete the word ‘Euro’ and insert the words ‘the EU’.

    And of course pretend that immigration plays no part whatsoever in the argument.

    C’mon Hugh, son, have a go if you think you’re hard enough.

       49 likes

  9. George R says:

    Yes, SYKES is a typical Beeboid in being ready to cede British national sovereignty to E.U, as quick as Brussels wants.

    George Orwell was aware of this political mentality in the BBC.

    Roger Scruton explains this anti-patriotic attitude:-

    .”…the disposition, in any
    conflict, to side with ‘them’ against ‘us’, and the felt need to
    denigrate the customs, culture and institutions that are
    identifiably ‘ours’. Being the opposite of xenophobia I
    propose to call this state of mind oikophobia, by which I
    mean (stretching the Greek a little) the repudiation of
    inheritance and home. Oikophobia is a stage through which
    the adolescent mind normally passes. But it is a stage in
    which some people—intellectuals especially—tend to
    become arrested. As George Orwell pointed out, intellectuals on the Left are especially prone to it, and this has often
    made them willing agents of foreign powers.

    “The Cambridge spies offer a telling illustration of what oikophobia
    has meant for our country. And it is interesting to note that
    a recent BBC ‘docudrama’ constructed around that deplorable episode neither examined the realities of their treason
    nor addressed the suffering of the millions of their East
    European victims, but merely endorsed the oikophobia that
    had caused the spies to act as they did. The resulting
    portrait of English society, culture, nationhood and loyalty
    as both morally reprehensible and politically laughable is
    standard BBC fare—prolefeed, as Orwell described it in
    Nineteen Eighty-Four.”

    Click to access cs49-8.pdf

    and

    http://www.civitas.org.uk/pubs/Scruton_cs49.php

       56 likes

    • Aerfen says:

      It’s a good point, except that referring to them as ‘intellectuals’ is a misnomer. What they are more likely to be is people who have simply risen above the educational level of their parents, normally by going to university, (although in previous generations perhaps simply by going to grammar school) and have then gained a sense of their own superiority which has encouraged them to reject all the values on which they were raised and to sneer at those they see as intellectually beneath them, unless of course they are people from beyond our shores against whom they feel no urge to rebel, on the contrary they view them as allies against the ‘establishment’.

         25 likes

      • Demon says:

        These “intellectuals” have been students for longer than they probably should have, and like good students of a certain type are, no doubt, able to quote lengthy passages from books almost verbatim and use this to pass their exams with flying colours. It doesn’t mean that they necessarily fully understand what they are regurgitating, but it is enough for them to achieve degrees. Good luck to them for that.

        However, this also means they are able to learn and quote from all the lefty-gobbledigook and half-baked theories, but probably means they don’t actually understand it. If they were able to work it out for themselves, any analytical mind, or genuine intelligence, would pull most of it apart with ease.

           14 likes

        • Joshaw says:

          “Intellectual” is a stange noun in English. Its use seems to be restricted to a certain type of academic who, as you say, is able to peform certain tricks with theories and books.

          A highly intelligent engineer or scientist is not generally credited as an “intellectual” (apart from the odd exception like, perhaps, Stephen Hawking).

             14 likes

    • chrisH says:

      Oikophobia eh?…very good!
      As for the “intellectuals getting arrested with an idea”-it`s safe to say that a Rachel Bull will be getting arrested way before a Mary Beard… the “treason of the class of clerks” who think themselves so liberated, enlightened and so civilised continues in a way that Orwell or Enoch would have recognised, despised and then set their guns for.
      Let me leave you with a poem from George Canning…a great Tory of old, whose name is mud I`d guess-seeing as the pub they named after him in Brixton was renamed during the Livingston Years…Year Zero in London terms.

      Though th`extended globe, his feelings run
      As broad and general as th`unbounded sun.
      No narrow bigot he, his reasoned view
      Thy interests ,England; ranks with thine:Peru!
      France at our doors, he sees no danger nigh
      But heaves for Turkey`s woes, the impartial sigh.
      A steady patriot of the world alone,
      The friend of every country…but his own!
      (from New Morality…George Canning..200 years ago!)

         17 likes

  10. Richard D says:

    “But I am scrupulously objective when reporting – unlike some of my tweets……” So this pillock, in essence, can’t be relied upon to be objective. Sort of says it all about the BBC, doesn’t it ? Now, I wonder what might happen if, oh, let’s say a BBC reporter harboured and tweeted (and I know this is impossible, but imagine the reaction regarding his job at the BBC) even the slightest support for anything to the right of the LibDems, far less the BNP or EDL…. “Yeah, it’s OK to ‘let it all hang out on Twitter – doesn’t really count when you’re a BBC employee… we all know where we really stand, don’t we…. wink, wink…. nod nod.”

       46 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      Indeed.
      ‘“But I am scrupulously objective when reporting – unlike some of my tweets……”’
      Is this a case of taking the Beeboid disclaimer to its ultimate bizarre conclusion and he is saying ‘My views are not my own’?
      As it stands, it is this:
      BBC correspondent and presenter since 1974. Views my own not of my newsagent.
      Whatever the hell that means. We’ve got every Beeboid sticking BBC in their bio and often BBC URLs, but such as this clown and Vine seem to find it funny to allude to all sorts of folk they can’t quite admit to speaking for, from brothers to newsagents, as mystery proxies.
      And all the while very much punting out skewed opinions from pulpits they surely do not deserve.
      Yet their employer seems powerless or disinclined to suggest that they are dragging an already holed reputation for media objectivity under further, faster than any Kraken could.

         30 likes

      • It's all too much says:

        Reminds me of a long joke (shotrened to the punchline)

        A communist is applying for a job and at the interview he gives perfect politically orthodox answers straight from the party handbook. The Interviewing manager asks,
        “Your replies are excellent comrade, but have you any suggestions of your own on the matter of managing the collective farm?”

        Stumped the interviewee pauses and finally answers,

        “Of course comrade like all good communists I have my own views and opinions – but I disagree with them.”

        It’s called cognitive dissonance

           19 likes

  11. David Brims says:

    I don’t want a referendum, nah. I’m just a country bumpkin, who’s family history only goes back a thousand years in this nation. So how the hell am I suppose to know about things like ” the euro, tax, sovereignty ? ”

    I’d rather have my betters who are my superior in every way, the London metropolitan, dinner party set elites, like Peter Mandelson and Dennis McShane who know much more about it than I ever could, after all, they’ve given us mass Third World immigration and bankrupted the nation.

    And that’s worked out well, hasn’t it ?

       82 likes

    • scoobywho says:

      Would a person who’s family had only lived in a country for a generation or two really have the indigenous population’s interests at heart on all manner of issues when it comes to their country ?

      Is it to be expected that some people will feel resentful about being governed by such a person, people who consider themselves as part of the indigenous population or who’s family’s go back much further than the person governing them ?

      Is it morally right that they can make decisions on behalf of these people ?

      Seems to me it would be like letting the next door neighbour’s spotty, nasally teenage son telling you how to run your household.

         18 likes

  12. Frank Words says:

    Churchill had a European vision but interestingly he didn’t want Britain to be part of a United States of Europe – “We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not compromised. We are interested and associated but not absorbed”

    Sound policy. From 1946 to 2013 it still holds true.

       56 likes

    • Richard Pinder says:

      Outside of Europe, the left call white people, indigenous to Europe. So we are not indigenous to Britain but indigenous to Europe. So SNP, ENP, WNP(PC) or BNP bad. ENP(EU) good.

         22 likes

      • Ian Hills says:

        SNP good, because of the moslem block vote which they bought with grant aid.

        Och allah the noo!

           17 likes

        • Albaman says:

          As http://jihadinscotland.blogspot.co.uk/2011_05_01_archive.html itself points out “The ethnic minority population of Scotland is generally stated to be around 2% of the whole.” To get an overall majority in the Scottish Parliament the SNP secured the support of voters from all political and ethnic backgrounds.

          Then again, how seriously can you take comments from an individual who regularly depicts Salmond as a Scottish “Hitler”.
          http://britain-today.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/great-european-liars.html

             7 likes

          • Ian Hills says:

            Al-baman, may I take it you that you condone Salmond’s racism because it’s directed against the English? Anyway, thanks for the link to my site, and to another site which lists SNP vote buying with English taxpayers’ money. And here’s a link to islamic infiltration of the SNP –

            http://britain-today.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/scots-denied-right-to-march.html

               7 likes

            • Albaman says:

              Not content with comparing Salmond to Hitler you now claim he is a racist – based on exactly what?

              As for courting the “Islamic” vote this seems to contradict your own writing regarding the SNP’s position on gay marriage.
              http://britain-today.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/islam-and-gay-marriage.html

              Perhaps you can also explain why you have now twice hyphenated my screen name to read Al-Baman?

                 4 likes

              • Guest Who says:

                ‘Perhaps you can also explain why you have now twice hyphenated my screen name’
                In case any poster on this blog forum pulls a BBC and either ignores you or answers any question but the one posed, what are the chances of another poster soliciting from you the thinking behind versions of their names by you on this merry site?
                Author: Albaman
                Comment:
                Where “Guset Who” goes “johnnythefish” dutifully follows.
                If you are going to get on high horses, it’s perhaps best to make sure they are not already made of glue, because once hypocrisy sticks, it’s hard to shift.

                   6 likes

                • Albaman says:

                  I had not noticed that I mis-typed your name. For that I apologise. However, Ian has twice hyphenated my name – that would appear to indicate more that a simple mis-spelling.

                     5 likes

                  • Guest Who says:

                    You didn’t apologise at the time, though, did you? Even when pointed out.
                    So the sincerity of such an apology is somewhat still in doubt.
                    Especially from one who seems to have a history of straying into ‘robust’ critical areas when it suits, yet still tries to appeal to hall monitors at other times when the the spotlight turns back.
                    Nah… not accepted. Your mission here is clear and you just shot yourself in the foot again.
                    I’ll let you wear that one still.

                       4 likes

                    • Albaman says:

                      That is your prerogative. However the “appeal to hall monitors” does baffle a little.

                         4 likes

                  • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

                    So albaman lives in yr alban?
                    Celtic links?

                       1 likes

              • Ian Hills says:

                Have you seriously never noticed Salmond’s rants against the English? He built his career on them.

                And yes, SNP money to islamic causes IS buying the moslem vote. The fact that he’s after the gay vote too just means he’s greedy.

                Livingstone did the same as London mayor.

                How about Al’Baman?

                   4 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        “ENP”. I like that, and am so stealing it.

           10 likes

    • Tomfiglio says:

      Thanks Frank. Worth quoting more of it.
      “We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not comprised. We are associated but not absorbed. And should European statesmen address us and say, ‘Shall we speak for thee?’ we should reply, ‘Nay Sir, for we dwell among our own people’.”

         25 likes

    • Span Ows says:

      Thanks Frank, didn’t see this before posting the same thing above.

         6 likes

  13. David Brims says:

    The Left doesn’t believe in nations or frontiers, they want one big happy clappy world.They’ve even got a highly irritating slogan ” One Race, the Human Race.”

    This goes back to HG Wells, a fabian socialist, who wanted one world government to prevent future wars. That’s a good reason, but the law of unintended consequences tells us, it will turn into a dystopian nightmare like the Soviet Union

       41 likes

    • Richard Pinder says:

      The insane left-wing dream of a world of identical clones, all celebrating diversity.

         56 likes

      • london calling says:

        Perhaps the infantile utopia imagined by John Lennon, hippy Liverpudlian millionaire singing “Imagine all the People..” when he meant “…all the People (like us)”, and not the adultress-shooting Taliban, the Saudi morality police, Shining Path guerillas, rival-slaughtering mexican drug cartels, or the rocket-firing Palestinians.
        Why can’t we all live as one? Because we are not all one.

        Imagine all the People..

           55 likes

        • chrisH says:

          Not forgetting his wife-beating tendency, and his dereliction of his son when the multi-talented fifth Beatle showed up with a grapefruit.
          “Worraprik”…to quote Gregorys Girl.
          Just the 24 carat hypocrite that DOES get airports named after him…and the BBC/Guardian ciphers slavering after his artistry.
          Crippled Inside alright-and occasionally honest enough to say so, unlike the ever-virtuous BBC

             13 likes

      • Ian Rushlow says:

        Diversity in everything. Except thought and opinion of course…

           35 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        And don’t forget what Barroso said in his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize (on behalf of all of us, presumably) – about Europe being the model for a future world government.

        The Left know there is a lot more than Europe at stake if the EU and/or the AGW theory go tits up.

           8 likes

    • wallygreeninker says:

      re H. G. Wells, you can buy the poster to put on your wall:

      http://www.allposters.co.uk/-sp/Outline-of-History-by-H-G-Wells-No-24-The-Next-Stage-Posters_i2886213_.htm

         7 likes

  14. Alan says:

    Odd that Sykes suggests Churchill supported Britain in a European State…giving up sovereignty….

    Either he is unaware that Churchill had no intention of suggesting Britain join such a State, in which case what sort of journalist is he?, or he is lying…sorry, glossing over the facts?…..in which case he might be considered a standard issue BBC journalist when it comes to reporting European issues.

    Churchill said in 1930….
    ‘We see nothing but good and hope in a richer, freer, more contented European commonality. But we have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not compromised. We are interested and associated but not absorbed.’

    Those were to remain Churchill’s views, and the basis for his European policy, for the rest of his life.’

    (from : European Integration and Disintegration: East and West By Robert Bideleux)

       29 likes

  15. This talk about Churchill, WW2 under Winston, we British stood our ground and gave our all to the last man to keep us free of the tyranny of the invading German forces! How dare Cameron, Millipede and little pillock Clegg just give away our hard earned independence to the Invading EU forces with Germany once more in the forefront? I believe they are all traitors and should be shot!

       53 likes

  16. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Hey, DB, send this link to the PDF file of the BBC’s rules about Twitter and social media:

    Click to access 14_07_11_news_social_media_guidance.pdf

    Tell him his line manager might be particularly interested in this bit:

    d. You shouldn’t state your political preferences or say anything that compromises your impartiality. Don’t sound off about things in an openly partisan way. Don’t be seduced by the informality of social media into bringing the BBC into disrepute. Don’t criticise your colleagues. Don’t reveal confidential BBC information. Don’t surreptitiously sanitise Wikipedia pages about the BBC.

    If you don’t mind, this seems like a good time to remind everyone of the problem the BBC has with Twitter.

    By Their Tweets Shall Ye Know Them

    By Their Tweets Shall Ye Know Them – The Tweets

       29 likes

    • DB says:

      Thanks for the tip. Done.

         10 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        I see Sykes has responded, and completely ignored the issue of the BBC rules. Opinions may not necessarily preclude balance, but when they all have the same opinions, there’s precious little chance for it.

           9 likes

        • Guest Who says:

          HughSykes ‏@HughSykes
          @DanHannanMEP I also enjoy being contrarian/provocative – which makes Twitter fun, and seems to have worked here.

          Given the BBC feels twitter is its main source of news gathering and broadcast now, I’m not sure he has helped calm the waters he has already troubled with that little selection. Since when was it their job to crank up the heat… for fun?
          As to light…
          ‘ responded, and completely ignored the issue’
          As a new career beckons, a sideways move into a CECUTT Directorship or even Trust oversight committee membership is suggested on this basis alone.

             9 likes

          • David Preiser (USA) says:

            Caught out, now it was all a wind-up? Only a joke to get a reaction? Scum.

               9 likes

            • Guest Who says:

              The ‘only joking’ backtrack is tried (by the BBC’s finest) and mistrusted (by any upon whom it has been misused once too often).
              He’ll get away with it, but one senses a sense of consternation in the dark side.

                 8 likes

              • David Preiser (USA) says:

                It’s revealing of the mindset we already know is there: they truly believe that they’re impartial, unimpeachably so, no matter how many times they get caught. Sykes violated two house rules on Twitter, and simply doesn’t care. I blame the management system – seriously this time. As Mark Mardell admitted in his infamous BBC College of Journalism appearance, the Beeboids really feel that Twitter is outside the regular rules of impartial journalism, and they can say what they like. And they all have the same Left-wing ideology, so there’s no chance of balance from the start.

                   4 likes

  17. George R says:

    This is the centralising E.U political control of media which BBC-NUJ apparently approves:-

    “The Proposed Regulation of the Media in the EU”

    http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/01/the-proposed-regulation-of-the-media-in-the-eu/#more-25290

       12 likes

  18. George R says:

    Christopher Booker points to the Geneva-based quangos which politically shape E.U directives.

    (These are the sort of supra-national ruling bodies which BBC-NUJ prefers to democratic British ones.)

    “Forget Brussels: now we are ruled by the giants of Geneva”

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/9828433/Forget-Brussels-now-we-are-ruled-by-the-giants-of-Geneva.html

       15 likes

  19. pedro says:

    the biased bbc.com,yes i repeat the biased bbc.com.what does that mean to the ordinary bloke or woman on the street who is forced to pay this £145.50 poll tax with the threat of imprisonment in some state gulag including the poorest in soceity if we dont pay up to you lot for your totally stalinist type of propaganda that you spew out with no recourse from the silent majority,we all know that the bbc monitor this site.why is it when you say sent us an e mail, 50p text,or twitter or facebook comment that does not agree with your leftist agenda by your presenters on 5 live or radio 4 and you never read them out,why does the ordinary man and women on the street never have any say on your left wing love ins at your totally biased organisation,, why dont you.employ more working class people on the bbc like peter hitchens and richard littlejohn as presenters to redress the balance,why dont you bbc.not to much to ask is it.

       28 likes

    • scoobywho says:

      Just imagine!!! Richard Littlejohn given a job at the BBC, the average beeboid would have a fit of the vapours – I suspect one or two might even spontaneously combust.

         10 likes

  20. Louis Robinson says:

    Re Rats etc. Verse 2 of a Noel Coward song:

    There are bad times just around the corner
    The horizon is gloomy as can be
    There are black birds over
    The greyish cliffs of Dover
    And the rats are preparing to leave the BBC
    We’re unhappy breed and very bored indeed
    When reminded of something that Nelson said
    While the press and the politicians nag, nag, nag
    We’ll wait until we drop down dead

       11 likes

  21. stuart says:

    @pedro..not paid my tv license since 2001,how you do that one might say,no1=took my name of electoral register,very important..no2= no proof or name of who i am living in property,confuses tv licence gestapo..no 3= ignore threatening letters of court action,just a tactic to scare single parent familys..no 4=its up to the local tv licence gestapo to prove you have a tv in your property whether you have a tv or not..just dont answer door or let them in..no 5= of course i would not encourage anybody not to pay there tv licence would i…ummm prove it matey.

       9 likes

    • brett says:

      i’m 38 yrs old and ive never paid it and never will. like you say the threats are just to scare you into paying. how many “new arrivals” do you think bother with a license? suppose its like car insurance , just rely on the indiginous brits to pay up, then hassle them until they do, all the time backed by threats of severe punishment for non compliance. honest ,worried brits usually pay up.

         15 likes

    • scoobywho says:

      Nothing wrong with not having a TV license regardless of whether you own a telly. You only need to pay the telly tax if you watch (or record) TV as it is broadcast.

      You DON’T need a TV license to watch catch up TV ie Iplayer so it only requires a small adjustment in your viewing habits to allow you to not pay your telly tax and still remain completely legal.

      It’s still not advisable to allow the telly tax checker in your house as they have a number of tricks they can use to produce a picture on your telly such as putting their finger in the aerial socket to act as an antenna. It only requires a faint fuzzy picture to appear for them to bust you.

         8 likes

      • Roy Stirred-Oyster says:

        It shouldn’t get that far – you have no legal obligation to let the TV Licensing/BBC salesmen into your house, or even communicate with them.

        For further info visit:

        http://www.tvlicenceresistance.info/forum/index.php

        (The site in the above link does not condone licence fee evasion – it’s for genuinely TV-free people like me who are fed up with the harassment by TVL/BBC)

           2 likes

  22. George R says:

    Peter Hitchens:-

    “Will there be any serious rules to stop the promised referendum being rigged, as the last one was in 1975? No. The great bulk of the press, the entire BBC and the front benches of all three Establishment parties will campaign for us to stay in, cheered on by whoever is in the White House at the time.

    “So even if this dubious vote is held, is there a serious chance of a vote to leave? No.”

    {Excerpt from}-

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2268825/PETER-HITCHENS-Meet-weeks-biggest-fake–Beyonce.html

       16 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      The BBC’s solution to being on the wrong side of history seems not to be moving themselves to correct the imbalance, but to seek to move everything else relative to them to simply maintain the false appearance of a version they think will be about right if viewed in the correct way.
      £4Bpa may well see them succeed. For now.
      When the money runs out, it won’t be pretty.

         8 likes

  23. LeftyLoather says:

    Stuff the EU leg shagging likes of Sykes! The great British public voted donkeys years ago to be in the EEC, NOT the ever more clearly anti-democratic and power crazed hideous EU that now costs us £51 million EACH AND EVERY DAY!!! My town could build and equip a new hospital for that!
    The likes of Sykes can piddle in the wind and hilariously scare monger all they like. When the day comes i’ll be sticking firmly to my convictions and voting (yes/no) OUT!
    Stuff Brussels and Strasbourg!

       24 likes

  24. LeftyLoather says:

    Listening to the likes of Sykes, anyone could be forgiven for thinking that Britain never even existed before 1st of January 1973 and the damn EU! lol

       17 likes

  25. harryurz says:

    If Sykes likes to quote Churchill, maybe he ought to dig a bit deeper;
    “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”
    Or a particularly apt one for the BBC-
    “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.”

       24 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.”
      Having a 24/7, £4Bpa broadcast network in most markets can’t hurt in getting the message out either.
      Especially if you tell it often enough.

         13 likes

  26. Herbert says:

    I find the best thing to do with lefty’s is to have nothing to do with them.
    Lefty’s are freaks and stupid jealous losers.
    You can’t reason with them they are always right never wrong.
    They always lose because they have nothing to offer but negativity.

       19 likes

  27. uncle bup says:

    Still credit to Ed he has at least given the pretrendy left a ‘position’ on Europe.

    1. No In/Out referendum although there is legislation on the statute book allowing for a referendum if there is any attempt by Europe to grab greater sovereignty and of course we have no plans to repeal this but you never say never in foreign affairs and we’re not going to write our manifesto two and a half years ahead of a general Election.

    2. Who knows what Europe will be like in 2017 so its ridiculous to promise a referendum now.

    3. This has created a lot of uncertainty and businesses will be reluctant to invest in Britain for the next five years.

    Anyway there’s the (sniggers) party line (sniggers again) don’t forget droids and fellow pretrendy lefties to reel it off as often as you can to as many people as you can while pretending to them (and yourselves) that it is original thought rather than good old fashioned parrotting.

       13 likes

    • chrisH says:

      A joy to see the liberal elite all paid up to go on a Magical Mystery Tour around Eds mind isn`t it?
      A circle of thought he`s currently playing with, until a grown-up with some original thoughts of his own manages to get back into the room.
      More a loop of corkscrews than a circle.
      Still-if Ed says it and seems sincere about it-for today that will be all the BBC and Guardian will be looking for.
      Basically-democracy for all but the EU Citizen…and the Brits( note the kind of people that call us this!) can just vote for congestion charges instead, if we`ve nothing else to discuss.
      Get out of Europe now…or face the assimilation into a blancmange as made by Dez…without his carer, and without rose-tinted Lennon specs too.
      D is for Desperate, remember that!

         12 likes

    • LeftyLoather says:

      I want that democratic referendum on our EU membership for us in my lifetime, thanks, Ed. By 2017 is better than nothing! Let’s face it, NO time is gonna be the right time for cowardly Liebour and the Limp Dems to trust in and offer the great British public the one democratic referendum they’ve so rightly demanded for so long.
      Cameron’s now offered us a deal that he’s shouted from the rooftops and he couldn’t possibly go back on without it totally destroying him. Meanwhile, your guts are still absolutely nowhere to be seen, Ed. You democratically offer fuck all but repeatedly banging on and on to us about where your bloody parents came to Britain from decades ago – when Britain wasn’t stuffed full!
      No, that referendum by 2017’s quite long enough, thanks, and is alone absolutely well worth voting for Cameron again for. It beats near bankruptcy under the useless Liebour likes of you again anyday of the week!
      So, understand democracy and who the real governers are!, Ed. You utter coward!

         7 likes

  28. Buggy says:

    “…faulty but only rats leave ships….”

    Poor Hugh, fancy being unable to get a simple, non-obscure phrase right.

    Pace the correct phrase, I always thought that leaving a sinking ship was a sign of intelligence from the rats, and an indication to non-rats that it was high time to go, too.

    After all, what kind of moron would think: “‘Ullo, the rats are leaving my sinking ship. It’s best I sit tight then” ?

    Well, obviously the good Mr Sykes for one.

       13 likes

  29. George R says:

    A non-Beeboid assessment of E.U ‘Single Market’:

    “The Single Market is just one ingredient to be put into the pot.
    ” ‘It is vital that we remain in the Single Market’ politicians of all hues regularly intone, like a mantra.”

    By Roger Bootle.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/rogerbootle/9830600/The-Single-Market-is-just-one-ingredient-to-be-put-into-the-pot.html

       1 likes