The EU corruption scandal shows why we are better off out

The European Union always protests that it is bound by rules that it cannot operate outside. It has never been particularly true, as the EU has always been willing to ignore its own rules when it suits, but the recent corruption scandal shows that this claim is institutionally false. This is not because of the alleged corruption itself.

It is because it has revealed the extraordinary immunity given to members of the European Parliament. MEPs are immune from detention and legal proceedings except when caught red-handed. This is entirely different from how British MPs are treated.

It goes to the heart of each system and the relationship between the governed and the governing. Parliamentary privilege in the United Kingdom is for the benefit of Parliament in carrying out its work and for that of the people represented. Excluding the collective privileges, it has two important aspects for individual parliamentarians.

These are freedom of speech in parliamentary proceedings and unmolested access to the Palace of Westminster. Freedom of speech in Parliament allows MPs to speak up fearlessly for constituents without any external consequences. This has become important in recent years as the rich and powerful, both domestic and foreign, have resorted to both libel laws and the court-invented right to privacy to stop disobliging stories being printed about them.

This can be overridden by parliamentary privilege and allows scandals to be exposed. It is a personal privilege held by MPs but it is normally used for the public good. It is hard to see how it could provide a specific, personal benefit.

The other privilege is unmolested access to the parliamentary estate. This is not by regulation or by pass, but by the mandate of 70,000 voters. As a right it dates back to 1340 and has been upheld when monarchs might have wanted to keep out tiresome members.

It ensures that an MP cannot be excluded from proceedings by the whim of a bureaucrat. In the European Parliament the situation is different. The privileges MEPs enjoy are personal and to the individual's advantage.

Avoiding arrest and detention for criminal matters has never been an accepted privilege in the United Kingdom, but it is one for the Europeans. This reveals two things about the state of the EU. First, it is the triumph of the elite over the people; it is not a democracy but a bureaucracy where the functionaries outrank the voters and get given special perks.

Historically, many small European states gave extraordinary rights to their nobles and these have been preserved in the constitutional structure of the EU for its lackeys. Such important personages cannot be expected to follow the same laws as those they rule. It also shows that the EU is nothing more than a supranational body.

It has not achieved the unity that its propagandists want. Edmund Burke said: "Parliament is not a Congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests; which interest each must maintain, as an agent or advocate, against other agents and advocates; Parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation with one interest, that of the whole." Once again the undemocratic EU project is exposed.

It is not a union but a collection of states seeking an advantage, so it needs the immunity of ambassadors.

It is rottenly corrupted, seeking out and receiving bribes from other nations to project their interest.

Thank heavens for Brexit.