EU - In or Out + Poll.

I'm undecided - so lets hear other real peoples thoughts on the subject, but be nice about it!

I have been fascinated to learn what people actually think we are voting in and out of ... What is the EU?
As far as I am aware, the EU is just a list of treaties, and therefore, we are voting out of one, some or all of them, but I have not seen any MP clearly state which ones we are voting on. I appreciate most people appear to be most concerned about immigration, and that is where every discussion seems to head, but that is such a pointless part of the debate .... If the referendum results in a "Leave" result, at some point a statement needs to be made as to which treaties we are leaving, and to me, it looks like that statement is only going to be made after the referendum has taken place.
My concern is everyone is being asked to vote, but no-one actually knows what we are voting for ... I certainly don't!

I want to see Cameron stop trying to scare me with fabricated guesses at how much more a holiday will cost etc, and stand in front of a graphic as below, and explain where we will sit if we actually vote to "Leave".

The BBC has a Referendum section for those who are interested to read more:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32810887

There are links to further information there, and, of course, both the Leave and Remain sides have their own sites.

paulliljeros said:

I want to see Cameron stop trying to scare me with fabricated guesses at how much more a holiday will cost etc, and stand in front of a graphic as below, and explain where we will sit if we actually vote to "Leave".

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As no country has left the EU previously, I understand that the UK would need to renegotiate things like particular treaties and deals it would want to be a part of. So, if we left, our position would depend on the results of those renegotiations.

You can look at non-EU countries in your graphic as a basic starting point, but it's possible we could negotiate into something like a trade deal, etc How that would work - what we'd gain and lose - is something dependent on any future negotiations if we were to leave. That is, dependent on our wishes and the response from remaining members of the EU to those wishes.

paulliljeros said:

I want to see Cameron stop trying to scare me with fabricated guesses at how much more a holiday will cost etc, and stand in front of a graphic as below, and explain where we will sit if we actually vote to "Leave".

Click to expand...

According to the Leave campaign, "Leaving the EU" has been put forward as remaining part of the "European Free Trade Zone". This really means "Signing up to the European Economic Area Agreement" like Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland have done alongside full EU countries. To my mind this is the worst possible outcome as while you are able to trade with the EU, you still have to pay an entry fee and have no ability to direct any of the terms to which you must sign up.

So which ever way you look at it we're going to loose out! We stay, we are bound by the EU and as some perceive the country carries on down the toilet - we vote out, we could be ostracised and find our selves out in the cold all alone and we have to re-join with less favourable treaties?

In the short term neither side knows, they just go with what they hope.
but I'll never vote for something Boris/Rupert thinks is a good idea and he is a complete......

Catlady19 said:

Thing is I am not convinced about how much ability we have to direct terms anyway. Norway and Switzerland are not in and they are 2 of the richest countries in Europe.

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Make no mistake, we have next to no power to direct terms if we elect to leave.

hankjam said:

In the short term neither side knows, they just go with what they hope.
but I'll never vote for something Boris/Rupert thinks is a good idea and he is a complete......

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Absolutely my point ... the people driving the campaign have no idea, and so the campaigning is boiling down to spurious facts and figures, targeting our greatest fears in terms of finance, and there is not one piece of evidence that can back any of the statements up ... yet we are being asked to vote on it. There was no credibility to the debate before hand, but when Cameron stated a leave vote would cause a war in Europe, the whole debate crumbled in my mind.

I've been watching.... I'm in Australia. I'm not living there so I couldn't speak from the pros and cons of it. But from my perspective it seems you would loose out either way in some form or another. Although I'm a strong believer in a country standing on it's own feet with support from allies. I don't like the idea of external control over everything under one government. If I was living there myself I'd vote out I think.

I am unquestionably an IN:

1. Bank of England's caution if out

2. Independent think tank cautioning economic negative adjustment should we leave.

3. Likely financial correction from the markets

4. Time taken to renegotiate new trade deals including with the USA, where they have confirmed we would have to stand in line - could take 10 years.

5. We would still want to be part of or at least have access to the Single a Market , such as Norway, thus,,fees would involved as would compliance with the continued Free Movement of people.

I've thought carefully read widely especially by independent non-political observers.

So in short for the foregoing reasons and although I am not ideologically wedded to the European project in any meaningful sense, I have moved firmly and squarely from OUT to IN.


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No-one knows all the ins and outs but I remember in Maggies day there were seventeen categories identified in which we could take part. Things like agriculture, police, finance, security etc. and so on. We never joined in some of them anyway. We kept our border checks and didn't join the Euro. The discontent at the moment seems to be over the net contributions, the legal implications (them telling us what we can and can't do) and the fact that Federal Europe seems to be happening even if it was never the purpose.

So we didn't join the Euro, we didn't tear down our borders, we are not going to let the unelected European Commission make it up as they go along anymore but we are probably going to still buy their wine and they will probably still buy our cars and I won't have to learn French.

It's not so bad.

We managed perfectly well before, we can manage again. Europe doesn't want us to leave. Why? Because they need us more than we need them. I voted back in the day to join Europe when it was the Common Market. It is no longer just a common market. We are bound by the many, many laws Europe imposes on us, and this is getting worse. (so many of these laws are just crackers) Now they are thinking of a European army for goodness sake. Why?
Federalism has crept in.
We have friends all over the world with whom we can trade, all the Commonwealth countries for a start, and I doubt very much that Europe would refuse to trade with us, they are the ones that would lose out. Obama's threat that we would have to wait in line was nonsense. He's going soon, and has always been very anti-Brit.
Thank goodness we stayed out of the Euro, which was never a good idea in my mind unless all participating members had the same monetary controls and tax laws, and so it has proved.
Cameron's desperate scare tactics and refusal to have a televised debate with the Brexits says it all to me.
It may be a risk, but I believe we are more at risk if we remain.

I only have to think back to the sixties and the threat of the cold war turning a Europe split down the middle of on one side the communist bloc and the capitalist bloc.
I was in Berlin just after the Airlift when most of the so called democracies were preparing for Armageddon!
We had air raid drills against atomic weapons!

For me, Europe is about security and the fact that modern and forward looking countries are about coming together and building a peaceful world together.

When I look at the leave group, I realised most of these people, most of them head or a part of self interest groups and very right wing politics and probably part of the power brokers that have tried to destroy working class rights and are opposed to the rights bill.

I think it all comes down to what is right for this country.
Economics don't come into it for me. If you haven't got any, you are no worse off.
How many food banks are in France, Germany, Holland etc?

Europe except for the UK is mostly for social justice and how our tax dollars are spent.
It also about the rights of normal people.

Trust of the politicians is paramount to me, who do I trust to lead the people, some British Tory MP or some German politician.
You only have to visit the continent and work there as I have to see the difference in attitude and workers rights. It is getting worse after years of stamping all over the working and unemployment and now attacking the disabled and elderly.
This country is great when you've got a few Bob, if you haven't and can't earn, well, you are left out in the cold.

Immigration and migration is a big talking point.
You are never going to stop it no matter how what the politicians say.
There will be more leaving these shores simply because better wages and living standards are better if you are say a trained nurse in most other countries.
The most insidious thing about the whole immigration debate is if your super rich and want to move to Britain, they put the red carpet out!
If your not, then you have to go through all sorts of ridiculous red tape.

Finally, I worked in a car plant under the threat of closure for most of my 35 years there. The plant builds cars for fun, working conditions are relatively bad. This plant would definitely have closed twenty years ago.
If we pull out of Europe, one of the first major industrial groups to be hit by tariffs and tax and trade agreements is the car industry, this country is great at building cars, we have the best production figures of all the plants in Europe and in the rest of the world. This country is a world leader in car production. It wouldn't be if we pull out.
I have worked in Germany, France, Spain, Belgium, and I would have been part of the British group going to Katowice and St Petersburg to be involved in their start up building cars. I know that without Europe, this industry would be looking to relocate and close plants in Britain, which would hit all of the dependent industries.
At one time, we imported most of the car parts for production, that changed during the last Labour government.
There is more riding on the vote than most people consider.
A politicians job is to look after all the people.
It has never seemed so in this country.

We have to stay in Europe, we have to be a part of the global coming together.
If we don't stay in, I can see Scotland calling for independence and that would mean Tory rule forever!
That's not a thought I want to live with, as the next prospective candidate for Tory PM is Boris! (OMG!)

I'm actually hearing more about the 'fors and againsts' from social media than the press. It's obvious where the 2 main channels want or dont want to be.

Our local news on ITV last night had 2 people - the for and against. They picked a very eloquent speaking man who decided he was on the side of remain and a less personable speaker for the leave side. Apparently our local news will now, until the vote, have a weekly spot for people like this so we can make our own decision.

Bluetit1802 said:

We managed perfectly well before, we can manage again. Europe doesn't want us to leave. Why? Because they need us more than we need them. I voted back in the day to join Europe when it was the Common Market. It is no longer just a common market. We are bound by the many, many laws Europe imposes on us, and this is getting worse. (so many of these laws are just crackers) Now they are thinking of a European army for goodness sake. Why?
Federalism has crept in.
We have friends all over the world with whom we can trade, all the Commonwealth countries for a start, and I doubt very much that Europe would refuse to trade with us, they are the ones that would lose out. Obama's threat that we would have to wait in line was nonsense. He's going soon, and has always been very anti-Brit.
Thank goodness we stayed out of the Euro, which was never a good idea in my mind unless all participating members had the same monetary controls and tax laws, and so it has proved.
Cameron's desperate scare tactics and refusal to have a televised debate with the Brexits says it all to me.
It may be a risk, but I believe we are more at risk if we remain.

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If we were in the fifties or early sixties, I would agree with you.
But we're not, we live in the 21st century and those things you talk as happening is just not so.
We are the United Kingdom, which even though it's a monarchy and capitalistic in politics, it is already a group of states, England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the islands off the coast or the tax havens! Which I think is already a federal sort of conglomeration.
Your post is similar to a party bulletin using scare tactics that you think is the remains tactics, both sides are trying to scare us.
If I had a preference to oversee the tax system, it wouldn't be the people in power in this country. We have one of the most disgusting tax practices in the world.
In Europe the tax system in most countries is fairer and goes to the benefit of all the people, not just for the very rich!
I still shake my head when I see what these politicians, especially in the leave campaign want for the ordinary Joe in the street and what the other Tories have done to the NHS, elderly, disabled and the very poor in this country and the disgusting plight of so many people that are running from the ideological wars going on in the world and the response from our leaders. Only European politicians forced ours to do something.
If you want a better world, not Britain, the whole world, we do not want to become nationalistic in our politics.
We need to come together.
We need to be better at collaborating with our neighbours and the rest of the world.
Isolationism doesn't work in the modern era!

Even though I think you are politically on the other side, I know you care and your advice is always brilliant. Take care!