Since Daniel Hannan, a formerly obscure MEP, has emerged as the anointed intellectual of the Brexit elite, The Staggers is charting his ascendancy…
Daniel Hannan, as I\u2019ve noted in the past, has an awkward habit of deleting his tweets. Often, by a strange coincidence, it\u2019s the more embarrassing proclamations that vanish into the ether \u2013 no explanation, no, \u201cApologies, friends, I buggered that up didn\u2019t I?\u201d The tweet simply vanishes as if it had never been tweeted.
I\u2019ve taken, then, to screenshot-ing some of the best morsels, just in case they\u2019re not there the next time I look. Here\u2019s one now:
Funny thing about that tweet is that Danny Boy has not, at time of writing, deleted it. Despite the fact he was tricked into embarrassing himself by a mean-spirited Remoaner, it\u2019s still sitting there on the internet looking for all the world like its author is not crippled with embarrassment at the fact he could have been such a dunderhead as to write it. Two things are wrong with it, one relatively small, the other so huge as to be all encompassing.
The small one lies in the choice of monarchs. Not all of them are unreasonable: Henry VIII famously broke with the Catholic Church in his search for a divorce, an heir, and a quick bonk with Anne Boleyn. Since that meant an end to the period in which the English crown was answerable to a higher authority in the form of the Pope, we\u2019ve already been treated to umpteen \u201cBritain\u2019s first Brexit\u201d articles, and they\u2019re not soon likely to stop \u2013 all this, despite the fact the big man liked to go around telling people he was also the King of France.
Similarly England spent much of the reign of his daughter trying to avoid being swallowed by the Spanish Empire, so it\u2019s probably fair to suggest that Elizabeth I wasn\u2019t a big fan of European integration either. George V, though, was closely related to \u2013 indeed, shared a face with \u2013 half the other head of states in Europe during his time on the planet, so what he\u2019s doing there is anybody\u2019s guess.
The truly vexing inclusion, though, is Edward V. Is Daniel Hannan really saying that a boy king who reigned for 79 days and was murdered by a wicked uncle at the age of 12 had serious concerns about the European project? Was it the damage that the Combined Agricultural Policy wrought on developing world farmers that Edward was brooding about in his tower? The money wasted on repeatedly moving the European Parliament between Brussels and Strasbourg? What?
@JonnElledge To be fair, if you’d ask the Princes in the Tower if they wanted to leave or remain, I’d bet they’d vote leave.
\u2014 Chris Cook (@xtophercook) December 29, 2016
Okay let\u2019s be charitable and assume it\u2019s a typo, presumably for another of Henry\u2019s kids Edward VI. (It certainly wasn\u2019t Edward III who spent much of his reign trying to get into Europe, by kicking off an endless war with France.) But the bigger problem here lies not in the specifics of Daniel\u2019s answer, but in the fact he bothered to answer at all. The entire exercise is entirely ludicrous. It\u2019s like asking for Theresa May\u2019s position on the dissolution of the monasteries, or Jeremy Hunt\u2019s proposals for tackling the Black Death.
The question is an ahistorical nonsense \u2013 not just because the European Union was invented in the late 20th century to deal with problems specific to a particular time, but because it misunderstands how England\u2019s role in Europe has evolved over the centuries.
For the first five hundred years or so after the Conquest, the nations of the British Isles were a key part of a western European political system that included France and the Low countries. Until it lost Calais in 1558, indeed, the English Crown generally held territory in France.
The idea that the United Kingdom, as the state became, was with Europe but not of it \u2013 that its destiny lay on the high seas, not the continent \u2013 is a notion that\u2019s core to Eurosceptic mythology, but one which didn\u2019t emerge until the imperial era. Exactly when I\u2019m not sure (unlike certain Conservative MEPs I\u2019m not afraid to admit my ignorance, which is what makes us better than the animals and egg avatars). However you count it, though, the period between then and 1973 must make up a minority of England\u2019s history as a nation. For most of its history, the idea that the England was somehow not properly \u201cEuropean\u201d would have seemed crazy.
Actually, there was one major European project which a king of both England and Scotland kept us out of, a policy decision confirmed by his successors. That project was a key plank of French foreign policy, grew to encompass more far flung countries like Sweden, and was launched largely to prevent the Germans from getting above themselves. It was the Thirty Years War.
But is James I & VI on Hannan\u2019s list? Is he b*llocks.
At the Conservative party conference, the Home secretary, Amber Rudd, made a controversial speech , in which she said employers should be subjected to tougher tests before recruiting workers from abroad. During conference, she also suggested companies should have to disclose what proportion of their workforce was non-British.
There was an immediate backlash. But one Oxford University professor went further than most — he complained to the police.
The West Midlands Police have now confirmed that they treated his complaint seriously and assessed Rudd’s speech as a «hate incident» — although the force concluded no crime had been committed.
The Home Office said it was not a hate crime, and added: «She’s made countering hate one of her key priorities. »
The complainant himself admitted he hadn’t actually listened to Rudd’s speech.
But was there ever any question of Rudd’s speech falling into the hate crime category? And if you did hear a politician spreading hate, can you report it?
What counts as hate?
The UK does have laws designed to prevent hate speech, but there is a fairly narrow definition of what hate crime is.
Section 4 of the Public Order Act 1986 prohibits us from acting in a way that is likely to cause another person harassment, alarm or distress. The act has been amended several times to include stirring up hatred against someone based on their religion, gender or race.
But the definition has deliberately been kept narrow, to prevent an attack on freedom of speech. Whether or not someone is prosecuted depends not only on the abusive nature of their words, but whether they intended to stir up hatred against another.
It is hard to see the grounds on which Rudd could be accused of a hate crime, however much you dislike her policy ideas. She did not mention a specific race or religion. She also said she believed «immigration has brought many benefits to the nation».
And consider this — if Rudd couldn’t talk about monitoring companies recruiting foreign workers, lefty Londoners couldn’t complain about monitoring non-British buy-to-let landlords. Which Labour mayor Sadiq Khan is doing right now. And perhaps former Labour leader Ed Miliband would have thought twice about floating his own idea about listing companies with a high proportion of foreign workers.
Will politicians even be charged?
There is no doubt, however, that hate crime exists and should be taken seriously. In the wake of Brexit, there were reports of a surge in hate crime, with specific groups such as Poles and Muslims being targeted. But is it ever worth reporting politicians for hate?
While it was shocking to hear such a negative portrayal of immigration from a government minister, Rudd is small fry in the inflammatory rhetoric stakes. In September, the Crown Prosecution Service said it was examining claims that Ukip’s Nigel Farage incited racial and religious hatred during the EU referendum campaign. Farage, you may remember, unveiled a poster showing refugees with the caption «Breaking Point».
The politically-charged atmosphere of the referendum had consequences. That same day, a far-right nationalist murdered the MP Jo Cox , while shouting «Make Britain independent».
But when it comes to politicians, courts have tended to side with the right to free speech. Nick Griffin, the former leader of the British National Party (remember him) was secretly filmed saying it was important to stand up to Muslims or «will do for someone in your family». He was charged with inciting racial hatred — and acquitted. In 2016, police confiscated the English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson’s passport, after he photographed himself with a «F*ck Isis» flag. He won the court case, and got his passport back.
In other words, if your game plan for defeating far-right politicians is to land them all in jail, you’ll be waiting a long time. Unlike many everyday haters, extremist politicians know the law. They are generally careful about what they say in public. Reporting politicians can also be counterproductive — the Rudd incident has provided ammunition for those who oppose the idea of criminalising hate speech altogether.
This isn’t to say that nobody is found guilty of hate crime — they are, and thousands plead guilty every year. If you do come across hate crime, you can report it here.<\/p>\n

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