Our beloved leader, President McBrown, threw carbon footprint to the wind and jetted off to Europe at the weekend to decide on a common EU response to the economic problems but when push came to shove, national interest came first for our federalist colleagues over the water.

The Republic of Ireland announced it was guaranteeing ever last penny cent of savers’ deposits and the EU started flapping. Then Greece followed suit and announced that it, too, would guarantee all of savers’ money.

How very un-European of them not to adopt the common EU policy of doing bugger all.

Then it got interesting because the German Chancellor, Reichsführer Merkel, announced that Germany would also guarantee all deposits. Quiet panic spread round EU governments – the EU’s Minister for Propaganda has done something without telling them what they should do!

Now Austria and Denmark have guaranteed savings and the European Bundesbank Central Bank has said that it will give the European banking sector whatever liquidity it needs for as long as it needs.

None of this has helped though – stock markets around the world are taking massive hits. The FTSE has dropped well below the 5,000 mark for the first time in years and the UK economy is in recession. Major banks have failed and governments are still throwing billions of pounds at them in the vain hope that things will get better. They won’t, not for a year or two.

If the current economic troubles have shown us anything, it is just how weak the EU is. The federalists claim that we are stronger together, united in our aims, yada yada yada. But when it comes down to a straight choice between national interests and EUish interests, the whole thing falls apart. Eurosceptics should draw small comfort from the duff economy – money is going to be tight, some people are going to lose their homes and jobs; but the EU has been exposed for the sham that it is and our economic recovery will be a damn sight quicker without interference from our masters in Brussels.