Tag Archives: richard cobbett

Edward Robinson

The inspiration for European integration is part of British history too

By Edward Robinson | Thu 28th June 2018 - 9:54 am

Two years on from the EU referendum and Walter Benjamin’s haunting observation that “the very past itself is at stake” seems appropriate.

What sort of future Britain will have depends, to a large extent, on how a working majority of voters and politicians understand her past. For, as the UK’s former judge on the European Court of Justice, Sir Konrad Schiemann, noted in a 2012 lecture on the EU as a Source of Inspiration, “what you find inspiring depends to a degree on where you come from and what you’re looking for”. Born in 1937, Schiemann was probably the last CJEU judge to have experienced the Second World War. Growing up in Berlin hiding from British bombs and then, via Poland and the Lancashire Fusiliers, landing up as a law student in Cambridge, Schiemann is clear where his generation were coming from and what they were looking for. His generation of Brits (and many of those that followed) understood the preamble to the European Coal and Steel Community as being part of their history too, despite Britain not having been a signatory to it.

Continue reading »
Posted in Books | Also tagged and | 7 Comments
Advert

Recent Comments

  • Roland
    But what are "low taxes" other than just a sound-bite? With hindsight we can see focusing on "low-taxes" - like the tories have for many decades, has only re...
  • nigel hunter
    We cannot fund the needs of the people and country if we are a low tax party....
  • Jonathan Calder
    Do we want to be a low-tax party? It seems the leadership wants to fight the next election on that basis, but I detect no great enthusiasm for the idea among th...
  • Nick Baird
    @Alex @Rees - I was referring to the quoted surveys by VPZ and E-Cigarette Direct, who have a vested interest in selling vapes and are effectively claiming that...
  • Rees Southern
    Hi David. Further to my earlier response, I forwarded your concerns to someone who has worked with tobacco harm reduction organisations. This was their response...