\nArticle\n155.3 of the 1985 Act of Accession of Spain and Portugal was the\nTreaty law sub article that was supposed to guarantee that MEPs from\nthe sub states of Scotland and Northern Ireland would never have to\nstart doing too much defensive work for the fish that actually swam\nand insufficient work for our peoples in the political mainstream. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt\nwas the Treaty law that recognised the simple fact that our sub\nstates didn\u2019t have, and could never get, enough MEPs to do the two\njobs of representing our peoples and defending our fishing interests\nin a Parliiament full of MEPs from landlocked places, from lesser\nfishing regions and from Mediterranean and other zones that didn\u2019t\nparticipate in the common fisheries policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt\nrecognised that there was an ugly risk that if critical decision\nmaking on fisheries were ever to be taken into the biased and\nincompetent Community system, Scottish and Northern Irish MEPs might\nbe miraculously transformed into something that they don\u2019t have the\ngenetics to be or to become: part time representatives of our people\nand part time defenders of the beast!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIts\npurpose was to ensure that none of Europe\u2019s other nations would be\nable to outvote Scottish MEPs on fisheries provisions that had to\nremain sacrosanct for representational reasons..<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThat\u2019s\nwhy it is a thundering disgrace that the Brits and the Spanish have\nspent the last 30 years conspiring within the Community system to try\nto subvert, corrupt, circumvent and abandon this essential Treaty\nlaw.. As a result of their malevolence, MEPs from Scotland and\nNorthern Ireland can\u2019t outvote MEPs from any other European nation\non fisheries provisions that weren\u2019t supposed to be open to\nnegotiation within the biased and incompetent Community system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nArticle\n155.3 was \u201cring fenced\u201d and protected in a very special way. It\nwas presented in a \u201cgolden ring\u201d of Treaty law in the most\nimportant first section of the most important first fish(eries\nchapter) to be caught in this Act and it was deliberately intended to\nput Scottish constitutional lawyers in mind of the ancient Glasgow\nmiracle of \u201cthe fish that never swam\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIf\nGlasgow\u2019s most famous fish that never swam and the new Queen of\nStrathclyde were to investigate what became of this golden ring of\nTreaty law, Nicola Sturgeon would find that Commissioner Bruce Milan,\nan ancient Labour King of the Gorbals, and Sir Malcolm Rifkind\u2019s\ncousin, Sir Leon Britan, chucked it in the River Clyde in 1989 and\nthat Scottish MEPs have been expected to do too much defensive work\nfor the common fish and insufficient work for the city of the fish\nthat never swam ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nMs\nFerguson Sturgeon was born in Burns Country and her favourite tune is\nmy love is like a red red rose. If she probed further, she would find\nthat the fundamental founding principle of the Common Fisheries\nPolicy was born on a Burns Night in 1983 and that it wasn\u2019t open to\namendment, suspension or repeal within the Community system which was\nacknowledged to be dangerously anti.Celtic in the field of the\ncontrol and management of fisheries resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nShe\nwould find that John Major illegally extended majority voting in the\nfisheries sector in 1992 and that he and his successors illegally\ntook us out of the Burns Night Policy and into a series of new fish\npolicies with England and Spain that proved to be very low trust and\nvery high maintenance for MEPs from Scotland and and Northern Ireland\nif not elsewhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nWe\nended up with a fish Policy that might work for me if only all of\nScotland\u2019s seas had gone dry and the continent\u2019s rocks had melted\nwi\u2019 the sun: if only Common fish lived where MEPs lived and not in\nthe North Sea and Eastern Atlantic or if only common fish could vote\nin Scotland and Northern Ireland! If only Scotland and Northern\nIreland were normal European Nations, with their own seats in the\nCouncil and the Commission and with more than twice as many MEPs per\ncapita as we got as sub states in two unions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nMs\nSturgeon went to Glasgow University, If she studied the golden ring\nsome more she might find that the crest and motto of her alma mater\nprovides an ideal \u201cskeleton key\u201d to unlock all of the dark\nmysteries of the past of old European fish law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nShe\nwould find a tree that never grew in the Burns Night policy that was\nillegally hacked down in its prime<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nShe\nwould find a bird that never flew in the guise of the Canary that got\nthe Canary Islands\u2019 opt out from the CFP in 1985. That little\nbirdie sang out for attention. For essential democratic reasons\nScotland and Northern Ireland ought to have been opted out of the\nsame CFP as England and Spain when John Major illegally extended\nmajority voting in 1992.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nShe\nmay find a bell that never rang for the human souls who live within\nearshot of Glasgow in the legal opinion on Article 155 provided by\nthe Scots fish minister, Ross Finnie in 2002. It rang out in error\nfor lemon soles off Lanzarote!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nVia\nveritas vita should remind her of the resurrection and help her to\nsee that it is the job of Scotland\u2019s disciples in the European\nParliament to serve as fishers of humankind and not fishers of fish.\nThey all ought to have felt free not to have to serve in the\npolitical backwaters of biased and incompetent fish committees to\nservice the needs of the 1% of the Scots who are fishermen. But up to\n4\/7ths of our MEPs felt it necessary to serve in this Committee to\nfend off predatory attacks on our \u201cnon negotiable \u201c and\n\u201cun-amendable\u201d fishing interests. This left us woefully\nunderrepresented in the other 19 more important mainstream\ncommittees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nWith\nthe best will in the world, the SNPs MEPs couldn\u2019t serve as stand\nins for \u201cuk\u201d Ministers and \u201cuk\u201d Commissioners who were guilty\nof gross negligence and derelictions of their duties in the Council\nand the Commission and they could never win in a Parliament full of\nMEPs from landlocked places, from lesser fishing regions, from\nMediterranean and other zones that didn\u2019t participate in the policy\nand of British politicians who steadfastly refused to uphold and\nrespect the primary and Treaty law guarantees that permitted Scotland\nand Northern Ireland to be in the CFP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIf\nshe asked me, I could tell her that I had a \u201cTam o\u2019Shanter\nnightmare of a ride\u201d working in the European Parliament and\nwitnessing the grotesquely perverse and ridiculous consequences for\nScottish voters of the implosion of the Burns Night Policy within the\nbiased and incompetent Community system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nI\nknow that Nicola Sturgeon\u2019s mum, Joan, is not a mermaid, that Ruth\nDavidson\u2019s son Finn was not born with a fin, that Richard Leonard\nshouldn\u2019t be permitted to feel more fishy living and voting in\nScotland than he did in his native Yorkshire, that Willie Rennie\ndidn\u2019t learn in his biology classes in Paisley that humans could be\ncrossed with common fish and that Patrick Harvie would be deemed to\nbe daft if he went deep sea diving to canvas support for the Greens.\nI know that my equals in England and Europe don\u2019t wear fins, gills,\nscales and fish tails. I know that all of my ancestors and all of\ntheir descendants including Fergus, the first king of Scots, Robert\nthe Bruce, Ms Sturgeon and the Queen weren\u2019t and aren\u2019t\nmermaids and mermen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThere\nwould have to be mermaids and mermen hiding in many castles and\npalaces and humble abodes around Europe to justify my current\ncondition!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThat\u2019s\nwhy I know the Lisbon Treaty, its infamous Article 50 and its bizarre\nfisheries provisions<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\ncan\u2019t\nbe binding on the peoples of Scotland and Northern Ireland and why\nArticle 155.3 of the 1985 Act of Accession provides a more\nappropriate legal basis for the SEXIT and NIEXIT strands of the\nBREXIT negotiations than article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty which only\nprovides an adequate legal basis for EEXIT..<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt\nreads as follows:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Council, acting unanimously on a proposal from the Commission shall determine, where appropriate. the possibilities and conditions of mutual access to respective fishing zones and to the resources thereof\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt\nwas never legal, ethical, moral or acceptable far less \u201cappropriate\u201d\nwithin the meaning of this text for Brits in the Community system to\npermit Europe to rely on qualified majority voting and backdoor\nmachinations to take Scotland out of the original.Burns.night policy\nor into a series of new fish policies that proved to be very low\ntrust and very high maintenance for MEPs from Scotland and Northern\nIreland if not elsewhere. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nHaving\nillegally forced us to effectively share our MEPs with cold blooded\ncritters, Westminster Governments have forfeited the right to pretend\nthat they can be trusted to safely negotiate our fisheries or other\ninterests on behalf of the Scottish people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nBoris\nwill simply have to grant the Scottish Government and Parliament a\ngreater say on SEXIT than Mrs May has been prepared to grant them\nhitherto. He won\u2019t be able to give us 7 additional seats in the\nEuropean Parliament for the fish that never voted in Scotland, but\nmaybe the European Parliament could do that in transforming our\nexisting MEPs into applicant state observers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIt\nshould be noted that there is no time limit for the completion of\nnegotiations under Article 155.3 and that the scope for the debate on\nthe possibilities and conditions of mutual access to respective\nfishing zones is wide open. Article 155.3 could provide Europe with\nan excellent Treaty law basis to fast track a Scottish application\nfor continued EU membership. This could give us more time to reflect\non whether we wished to SEXIT from Europe, to SEXIT from the UK which\ntreated us like common fish Or to SEXIT from both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nI\u2019m\nquite satisfied that we could have survived quite happily in Europe,\nand even in the CFP if we had our own seats in the Council and the\nCommission and with more than twice as many MEPs\/capita as we got as\nsub states in two unions. Denmark and Ireland did. That\u2019s why I was\nhappy to cast my vote on 25 years of British corruption in the\nrunning of the CFP by voting for Scottish independence in Europe in\n2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nIf\nI voted with heavy heart for Remain it wasn\u2019t because I\u2019d given\nup hope in the European dream or in Europe\u2019s capacity to solve\ngenuine political problems. It was because I knew I\u2019d have to push\nmy grotesquely perverse and ridiculous and miraculously sublime story\ninto the public domain. I didn\u2019t think my compatriots could\nbelieve such a bi polar story!.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nMeantime,\nBoris will simply have to devolve complete authority for all\ndecisions concerning the control and management of our fisheries\nresources to the Scottish Parliament without any further delay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nI\nthink that the Scottish Government could best respect its obligations\nunder the CFP by imposing a moratorium on all English and continental\nfishing in our fishing zones pending a unanimous vote in the Council\non the possibilities and conditions of future access to our fishing\nzones and to the resources thereof that meets with the Scottish\nParliament\u2019s approval.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nWe\ncan never be adequately compensated for the way our will to fully\nengage in the European Project was thwarted by monumental British\nincompetence and deplorable bad faith in the running of the CFP.\nHowever we ought to be able to claim damages from Westminster for the\nmillions of tonnes of fish that have been illegally caught in our\nfishing zones since the prejudice commenced in 1989, including the\n6,000 square miles of Scottish sea that weren\u2019t legally annexed by\nEngland with a unanimous vote in Europe n 1999.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nBurns\ntaught us to celebrate our national weaknesses and not to dwell on\nthem. But the story of how the Brits circumvented the fish that never\nswam Treaty law guarantee to abandon the Burns night policy that was\ndesigned to prevent us from sharing our MEPs with a lower life form\nthan man deserves to be the talk of the steamie for generations to\ncome. Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThe\nprejudice was so significant that I do think we\u2019ll need some poetic\njustice and a miracle solution at the end of this sorry Burns Night\ntale! Ms Sturgeon leads the only Scottish Party that seriously tried\nto defend \u201crelative stability\u201d. She owns Article 155.3. She\nshould trigger it before Boris humiliates Scottish voters any\nfurther!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Article 155.3 of the 1985 Act of Accession of Spain and Portugal was the Treaty law sub article that was supposed to guarantee that MEPs from the sub states of Scotland and Northern Ireland would never have to start doing too much defensive work for the fish that actually swam and insufficient work for our peoples in the political mainstream. It was the Treaty law that recognised the simple fact that our sub states didn\u2019t have, and could never get, enough MEPs to do the two jobs of representing our peoples and defending our fishing interests in a Parliiament full of MEPs from landlocked places,Read More →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2592"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2592"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2592\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2594,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2592\/revisions\/2594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scotsindependent.scot\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}