Many well meaning people, recognising that international problems, such as pollution of the seas or the air, can only be dealt with by nations acting together, have come to believe that the EU, as a supranational entity, works for progress in the fight against pollution and therefore deserves the support of campaigners on these environmental issues
They could not be more cruelly deceived, for the real truth about the EU is that its use of regulations and ill conceived policies is a major cause of pollution. Indeed, it is supported by multi-national companies precisely because it responds to their lobbying and uses its regulatory powers to ensure that nothing stands in the way of their profits
The EU uses the Common Agricultural Policy to destroy efficient and sustainable farming within its borders and undermines Third World producers, who are unable to compete in closed European markets, yet see their own markets undercut by large scale dumping from heavily subsidised EU farmers.
The Common Fisheries Policy has not merely destroyed the British fishing industry, but ensures that more fish are now being thrown back dead in discards, or landed illegally, than are landed legitimately. The EU fishing fleets have all but wiped out fish stocks in the North Sea and now the EU is turning its attention to African coastal waters, where its activities threaten economic calamity for nations reliant upon fishing. That landlocked countries such as Austria should be deemed to be entitled to their share of fishing quotas is an illustration of how incompetent bureaucrats and gutless politicians can distort economic reality. These people have also connived at the watering down of recommendations by scientists which would have saved thousands of dolphins and porpoises from dying in industrial fishing nets.
On the sensitive issue of Genetically Modified crops the guidance issued to member states means that, as the Soil Association states: "almost one in every hundred mouthfuls of organic food will actually be GM food"
Brussels bureaucrats have used complex rules under EU regulation 178/2005 to drive Kenya’s small flower growers out of business, leaving the market open for the multi-nationals, yet although the EU’s insistence on endless paperwork makes it impossible for the small growers to comply, Brussels now does nothing to prevent dangerous pesticides being used, which have cost many of the work force their health, including loss of eyesight.
Green issues mean nothing to the bureaucratic dictators of Brussels. The democratic deficit within the EU ensures that the money of the multi-nationals and the desire of bankers to see vast profits made at the expense of the Third World, determines policy. Only democratic bodies will give Green issues the priority they deserve and the EU is institutionally corrupt and undemocratic in both its structures and its intent. This ensures that political lobbyists, paid for by large companies, can persuade bureaucrats to support environmentally damaging schemes. No one who believes in Green policies should support the continuing existence of the EU.