Democracy is alive and kicking in Brussels. Well, that's before they really put the boot in and stamp it out once and for all with the ultimate vote on the EU budget being held by secret ballot.
Then we have a silly Lib Dem MEP objecting to the use of the word ' indigenous'. Both of these stories are unbelievable. But sadly, they are true.
As our political leaders strut their stuff on their home turf about how successful they were in Brussels last week, you'll never know the truth on who voted to increase, stagnate or decrease the EU's decision on plans to cut the EU budget because it will never be published.
In a staggering move by the President of the European Parliament, MEPs will be given a secret ballot on the newly negotiated EU budget.
The socialist Martin Schulz, who has openly opposed the conclusions from the EU Council summit of European leaders, even threatening to veto the final decision, announced the plan with Joseph Daul, leader of the centre-right European People's Party (EPP) the largest group in the European Parliament - the group that nearly all British Conservative MPs had to be dragged kicking and screaming from.
It is now up to MEPs to pass the measures decided at the summit in Brussels, with many fearing a majority of MEPs would oppose a cut to the EU budget.
Speaking in Brussels, Nigel Farage MEP, leader of Ukip, said: "This is a dark, dark day for democracy. It's utterly staggering. Making this a secret ballot removes all accountability from the feckless MEPs who will wilfully vote down the plans to cut the EU budget, despite the widely held belief that cuts to EU spending is essential.
"It is disgusting that in order to guarantee more votes to reject the budget cut, Mr Schulz is providing MEPs with a cloak of deception which means the very people who voted them in will not be able to challenge them over their position. The man is a disgrace to his office.
"It flies in the face of political liberty and once again shows the EU up to be the biased and corrupt anti-democratic organisation that it is.
"Most people in the UK fail to understand the fanaticism of the European institutions for creating a federal union, whatever the process. For people like Schulz, the means justify the end.
"I call upon all MEPs whatever their leaning to reject this call and defend the right to democracy that the peoples of Europe have shed so much blood to create."
Hear hear Nigel, but not many will listen. Few MEPs see themselves as defenders of democracy, but defenders of their way of life. That their way is the righteous and only way, the way to full political integration.
They couldn't get an increase by the front door, so they will block it by the back.
Also on Friday of last week, my friend MEP Godfrey Bloom who, when debating with Lib Dem MEP Rebecca Taylor at Hull University, had the temerity to utter the word 'indigenous' Ms Taylor objected to the word being used.
Do these politically correct types really object to English language usage?
The Oxford Dictionary definition of indigenous is 'originating or occurring naturally in a particular place; for example, native: the indigenous peoples of Siberia'.
Why can't we have indigenous peoples too? Funny, on her website she states she is 'standing up for the Yorkshire and Humber region'. Having stood in a Yorkshire seat the peoples of that area are some of the most proudly indigenous regional people in the UK. I used to joke with them that I would never be called a Yorkshire lass because my family hadn't lived there for two hundred years and some would still declare UDI on the rest of Britain. Silly woman.