It’s déjà vu all over again. Post #163 of this blog (d.d. Aug 5, 2007) dealt with a secretive plan by the European Union to carve up the United Kingdom into several transnational zones, linking parts of the UK with parts of the Continent and wiping out the British state in the process.

The plan was ‘revealed’ by the europhobic Daily Mail. This time around, it’s the equally populist newspaper The Sun that has ‘discovered’ the same plan, albeit with a slightly different map. It must be that the europhobic segment of the Great British Public love a good EU horror story and don’t mind being scared twice by the same one. I don’t know if the deliberatlely misleading article, oozing paranoia and xenophobia, should make me laugh or cry:

“Secret plans reveal the South of England will be renamed TRANSMANCHE – and governed in part by bureaucrats in France.”

“Two more ‘Transnational’ zones are also being set up to ‘promote the territorial agenda’ of t he EU. The ATLANTIC REGION – stretching thousands of miles from the northern tip of Scotland to southern Spain – will take in western England and Wales, along with parts of Portugal and France.”

“And the NORTH SEA REGION will cover chunks of eastern England and eastern Scotland, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Holland, and the Flemish part of Belgium. The Atlantic will have its headquarters in Portugal, the North Sea in Denmark.”

“Ironically, news of the carve-up comes on St George’s Day – England’s national day. Critics, including the Tories, claim the new regions ‘ignore thousands of years of history and wipe England off the map’.”

The Sun only obliquely refers to the responsibilities with which these consultative bodies will be tasked: tourism, town-twinning, the environment, shipping and transport – which hardly amounts to “reshaping national boundaries”.

Thanks to James Cribbs for pointing me to the article and the map in The Sun.