A Place to Stand

    The approved media have been heavily reporting that the Japanese government have called on Britain to stay in the EU. Richard North on the admirable EU Referendum explains how we are going to be subjected to a long line of approved types pushing scares about quitting the EU. Also how most of the "industry leaders" wheeled out are turning out to be former civil servants and the like given a seat on the board of whichever company was their department's main supplier when they were still civil servants, or industrialists who have invested a lot in lobbying for helpful EU regulations.

    However the most disgraceful bit appears to be being admitted in this, not so much the government statement as the explanation for how it came about, from the Japanese embassy:

The UK, as a champion of free trade, is a reliable partner for Japan. More than 1,300 Japanese companies have invested in the UK, as part of the single market of the EU, and have created 130,000 jobs, more than anywhere else in Europe. This fact demonstrates that the advantage of the UK as a gateway to the European market has attracted Japanese investment.

In a statement to the Sunday Times the Japanese embassy in London explained the intervention, saying: "We know some countries decided not to submit comments but as a non-EU nation and major investor in the UK we thought it was appropriate".

    So they, and a large number of other countries were specifically asked to submit comments telling the British people what to do. Who asked them. It could only be the British Foreign Office.

And so:

Dear Foreign Office,
                                   I note that the Japanese embassy, on releasing a statement telling the British people we should stay in the EU, stated that a large number of countries had been asked to submit comments on these lines, a number of whom had refused, presumably because they thought it wrong to try and scare the British people into remaining in the recession zone as the rest of the world grows at 6%.

           Clearly the only organisation in Britain with the authority to ask all these diplomats to so undermine Britain is the Foreign Office.

          I would therefore like to know, under the Freedom of information Act exactly which civil servants and indeed ministers were involved in asking foreign governments to submit such comments, which governments were asked, how many did, how many refused and how many submitted comments that were not sufficiently fear inducing to be used.