I am aware that this blog post treads on contentious ground. But I think it only fair to say that I could not answer European's questions as to what Brexiters want, put to me last week.
I can answer why we got Brexit. Austerity and the attitudes of indifference that led to it can answer almost all aspects of that question in some way or other. If an elite does not care eventually the majority find a way to bite back. And they did. So I am not saying I do not understand why a majority voted as they did. I think I do. I am instead saying I do not know what Leavers want now.
It's clear that the government wants to pursue radical de-regulation on everything from worker to environmental, social and financial protections. Their goal is Singapore-on-Thames where they can show contempt for international norms and standards on every imaginable issue, and depart from previously hallowed ground on matters such as the NHS. Their desired outcome is a country with a more powerful and relatively richer elite, and they are indifferent as to whether that reduces the income of all else in the country. They, at least, can be understood.
But why do so many still support Leave when it is so apparent that this agenda is so harmful to them? And I mean harmful in the sense of very obviously imposing restrictions on their well-being? What is the trade off? Where is the gain? What advantage does the pursuit of English nationalism provide that makes it worthwhile having despite it making most worse off within the country, and by international comparison?
I know I am told, time and again, that I must seek to understand the Leaver. And I have tried. And no Leaver I have met has ever come close to being able to answer the simple question ‘how will your life be better by leaving given that you know there are costs from doing so?' The best most do is deny the cost. But they still can't explain the gain.
I could not help those who asked me this question last week.
Does anyone really know?
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The same applies to Scotland in the UK, but in reverse. When I ask unionists what Scotland gains from being in the UK they can’t provide a coherent answer. And the mantras from 2014 about strength in union, only way to stay in the EU, economically better off, protect your pension etc. have all gone.
In a word – Sovereignty.
And I didn’t vote Leave.
But if the UK wants to enhance workers rights, or environmental protections or make food cheaper or stop subsidising agricultural land by area ( which is an implicit subsidy to meat production ), then it’s up to us. We could go the other way on those things. Whichever way we go, it’s up to us.
I appreciate the current government are likely to run things backwards and not forwards, but it’s not about who the current government is.
But well me what we cannot do about these things in the EU?
Yes, I know the CAP is bad: I agree
But, seriously, you’d trash all regulation for a chance to maybe change the CAP which is more likely to happen within the EU than out?
Is that what people really think?
I didn’t suggest trashing all regulations. I have no idea how you got that idea.
I’m saying that the decision to improve regulations or remove regulations is up to us. We could even copy them from the EU if we want to, but once again that would be up to us.
I’m no fan of the tories, but I have to reject your assertion that we must have a Common Agricultural Policy ( seriously – one set of principles for 28 countries that applies to over half the land area of Europe – and you implicitly endorse that because you just endorsed having a common policy which albeit reformed would still be centralised ). We can have a local agricultural policy, and Scotland could too if becomes independent.
Sovereignty means that you get to keep or kick out the people who oversee these things.
I didn’t say we must have a CAP
I said it is deeply flawed
As flawed as the logic that we can have our own regulation independent of that of others
And what you have not noted is the fact that we can and do all these things now
Why ignore that?
Yep. That’s the root of it for the leavers in my family.
Forty years of the media framing everything in Europe as “them” telling “us” what to do has led them to that point.
They want the right for their country to make it’s own mistakes.
Their mistake of course is that Europe isn’t really some entity we have no control over bossing us around, it’s our peoples and our neighbour’s peoples getting together to agree some common minimum standards.
There is no economical argument which would win them around, and I’ve failed to get them to see the rest of Europe as “us” rather than “them”.
I think that’s a good summary
It is what I gather from conversations
Your reply is confusing Richard – you appear to be saying that the agricultural policy can indeed be decentralised to member states who can reform it as they believe best, as you are not now claiming that you insist on a common or centralised policy.
Sovereignty is always relative. You’re always going to give up something to get along with you neighbours on a sharing basis. The question is how much, and through what organisations. There are many world bodies. The EU is a supra-national one, but not a continent-wide one of course.
I wonder if you believe in something that is quaint and rather romantic which is that all human beings are born equal with the same potential if only they were put in the right environment. And that cultural differences are due to environment only, and can be evened out if we all cooperate on living under similar laws.
When I look around Europe though I notice that the Brits have a reputation for being a nation of animal lovers, while the southern countries are more family oriented in how they care for their elderly relatives at home. The people using the sovereignty argument don’t want the UK to have a 9% say in the laws of Italy on social care (that should be up to the Italians to decide), and we don’t want Italians to have an 8% say on what support we give to agricultural land-owners here.
I’m under no illusion about the Tories – the agri-businesses are their mates, and they will likely support them and their landholdings and their mainly meat and meat-inputs production. But the nation as a whole might support something that is more wildlife friendly.
It’s up to us. And to insist on devolving policies that don’t impose a cost on others to the lowest practical level. That’s up to us too.
Well, I admit you’ve lost me
And all I said was the CAP needs reform. It does. And I have no doubt at all it will be
You’ve got me confused now Richard. And as the centralisation of subsidies to landowners is the biggest insistence of the EU in money terms then I would expect supporters of EU membership (over and above EEA for example) to have formed a view as to whether agricultural policy should be devolved to member states, or whether it should remain centralised on Brussels.
That’s the question.
It’s not really question about whether it should be reformed. I haven’t met anyone who thinks it should not be.
It’s about sovereignty, which is about who gets to decide what the reforms are.
Should the UK , or the devolved regions, decide it for themselves? Or should the UK have it decided for it by Brussels in which it has a 9% say based on QMV despite that net contribution and 12% of the population?
Based on your last response you support a centralised policy. Am I right, please clarify, because this argument could do with being left behind.
You know we need to have a voice on this, don’t you?
We are dependent on EWU food
You know that, I presume?
Rather than Singapore-on-Thames the aim surely, is Bangladesh minus minus.
John Day
I am always slightly bemused by the term “Singapore-on-Thames”. Often, if asked to give an example of a successful socialist country I will answer “Singapore”…. and people will think I am joking! But I am not.
80% of the population live in Government built housing, the Government owns large chunks of key industries, and taxation is higher and more progressive than one might think – income tax is low but there is CPF…. also try buying a car and tell me tax is low.
The hallmark of Singaporean Government is competence (and that is why the Right refuses to believe it is socialist) – which is what we are lacking in this country.
PS Singapore is not perfect (lack of real political choice etc.) but it ain’t bad.
ANf you are well aware that this social policy – deeply rigid and profoundly controlling as well as anti-democratic as it is – is not what is being talked about
The desire is to emulate low taxes, not charged on income arising outside the jurisdiction, and to have tax haven secrecy
Brexit for leavers has always been based on a sense of faith and almost mysticism and like all religions is very difficult to defeat by any form of logic or argument. They believe it will be for the best simply because they believe fostered by a naive historical view of Britain’s former greatness and advanced by the high priests of Brexit in Farage, Rees-Mogg, Tice and others. No amount of argument against will change that view.
A good question and one I have been wondering about too.
It’s generally accepted in Psychology that people have a “confirmation bias.” Their beliefs become fixed even when the evidence clearly demonstrates their belief is wrong. Possibly the best example is climate but I think the same principal applies to Brexit. After the initial referendum campaign, the reasons people voted leave have not changed, rather they become entrenched, thereafter they look for evidence that supports their view rather than accepting any of the alternatives. Only after they experience what will become the new post brexit reality will they regret at leisure, but that then only serves to confirm that those in charge cannot be trusted.
I had it said to me by a leave voter:- “why do you continue to argue for remain, you should leave it up to the people who run the country to sort the brexit problem out. After all you have no power to change it”
So it follows then that many others will also be disengaged from genuine involvement in democracy beyond the limited democratic vote which they believe is the beginning and end of their personal responsibility .
There are those who really do expect to gain – the hedgers and Randians who are the real elite in all this. For the rest the only explanation I can see is a combination of continuing profound ignorance, and a refusal to accept that they might have been wrong. Just as when that second hand car you bought turns out to be a complete dog, you continue to insist that it was a great deal.
Mis/disinformation is of course a big factor in the ignorance with both social media and the MSM playing their role.
I believe that it’s all about notional headline stuff for them – notions of sovereignty, the impact of immigration, the source of law – plus ignorance – that of our own government agreeing to European law rather than supposedly having it imposed on us (most Leavers are actually against their own Government co-operating with the EU). Mix in a healthy dollop of backward looking wishful thinking – ‘make the UK great again’ in splendid isolation – because we have not come to terms with the loss of our Empire
The Tories in an effort to stay in power have gone native with the Leavers (since May was PM anyway).
I say again that many people are misled – but they are misled because they are unhappy with their lot – they have seen changes that they cannot explain that make them mistrustful of the world and easy prey for people like Cummings and Farage. They trust no-one except those who pander to their worst fears and prejudices. They are being played by the part of the Establishment which itself never came to terms with sharing power and want Britain to be great but stupidly think it can only be via incoming investment.
This Establishment cadre wants Britain to be great but unlike their forefathers are not prepared to pay for it themselves.
Leavers are programmed by the media to accept the Establishment’s view on the EU and therefore ignore the reality of the consequences for their real lives. They are just being used.
The Left in this country is associated with the weak. Those who vote Tory and Leave are Thatcher’s children and are drawn to the idea of standing on their own feet and making their way in the world come what may. To accept Corbyn is to admit defeat and shame.
This what Thatcher has done to us – created a bunch of people who are hardened to the point of not believing there is a better way to run a society.
The softening of the Left under Blair and its borrowing of US style welfarism has not helped the Left either – it’s a system that consciously makes people self conscious about needing help – no wonder many want to go no where near it or feel that it is their fault that they need help – not the stupid way the economy works.
The “Elite” are made up of various different factions and it cannot be assumed that they are all pursuing the Brexit agenda.
https://newspunch.com/lord-rothschild-demands-britain-say-in-europe/
Leavers and Remainers come from all walks of life in almost equal numbers.
I have mentioned that the Establishment has its own cadres – some for exit, others not, some this, some that. Of course they are a very heterogenous group whose only commonality is where they are in the social order.
All I would say R John Palmer is that I would suggest you read ‘This Blessed Plot’ by Hugo Young (1998) because it will lay out quite plainly that Britain’s attitude to the EU has always been shall we say rather confused, sceptical and reluctant – grudging almost – and all of those attributes have been owned by Tories and Labour politicians alike (i.e. those destined to govern us) at some point.
In Young’s account it is the Tories who did most to get us to go in – no doubt about that. The biggest fear amongst the population at the time of the vote to become a member was that retail prices might rise as high as 16%.
What actually happened was that prices went down when we went in – not up.
This seems to have been forgotten by most Leave voters whom have been successfully re-programmed by all media outlets that the concerns of those in the Establishment (any form of subsidiarity to bigger political programme is not acceptable, but also the attraction of the absolute rampant free-marketism of the U.S. model) are now the common man’s concerns. This is the biggest underlying success of the Leave campaign.
And yes – as John D says there is also an element of Neo-liberalism about in it too. As usual, the Neo-libs have portrayed the 2008 crash as the EU’s fault because of ‘over-regulation’ and ‘rules’ and that the NHS is under pressure not because of intentional underfunding but because of immigration. They have heartlessly used people’s worst perceptions against the very people who perceive there is problem. And it effects us all. There are a lot of angry people out here just waiting to be abused.
To my mind it is just the total manipulation of the information networks that surround us – the Leave proponents have mastered how to use these very quickly indeed.
PSR, I was not replying to your comment timed at 11:20 because it had not appeared at that time. Incidentally, I am familiar with the works and life of Hugo Young, thanks. I too was born in Sheffield but that was because my mother was there at the time!
I do not know who you are because you use a nom de plume but I believe you have an MBA to your name, as do I, so we should both be capable of analytical thinking.
I have worked in and enjoyed living in Switzerland, Austria, Germany and Gibraltar but I am well aware of some of the problems within the EU structure as indeed are many of our fellow Europeans.
R John Palmer says:
“Leavers and Remainers come from all walks of life in almost equal numbers.”
I haven’t figures to ‘prove’it, but it’s been my impression that all socio-economic classes are divided on the issue.
I find that curious and remarkable. It confirms by belief (expressed elsewhere here) that it is a combination of emotion and sentiment that is the main issue for a great many people. It’s a sales pitch, so that is not really surprising, I suppose, but we are well past the fourteen days cooling-off period and sanity should have been prevailing for a long time, whereas we are seeing attitudes hardening.
Small wonder our continental neighbours look on bemused. They were a-mused, but not, I think, any longer.
The only conceivable advantage to Brexit that I’m aware of is easier Capital Controls in order to prevent the sloshing around of all the footloose ‘global’ money. But Controls are certainly not impossible in the EU (see Cyprus during the Euro crisis) and in any case I very much doubt the OECD would be too keen on renewed Capital Controls either.
Ironically the subject seems never mentioned by Leavers since they seem either to be far too wealthy to want them, or too poor to think they have any relevance….
As you say, never mentioned by Leavers…
It’s a frustrating question when trying to apply logic. However, I think for many there are perceived, intangible psychological values (hence REAL values in the world of marketing) related simply to being unfettered from the EU. This C4 clip from Barnsley gives offers some insights – https://www.channel4.com/news/what-do-voters-in-leave-leaning-barnsley-make-of-johnsons-election-plan. One cannot discount the emotional fever whipped up by the known MSM culprits.
The Remain campaign was completely ill-advised and only fed into the anti-EU narrative. Once the story of a ‘promised land of milk & honey’ had been implanted in potentially receptive minds (pre-conditioned for decades by Farrage & UKIP) it’s been impossible to replace with factual reality. It can probably only be re-assessed accurately after a period of time, say 5 years minimum. But even then, it will depend on who spins the history.
Something else that I find weird is why so many millions would accept the words of, and place their trust in the hands of, a very small clique of independently wealthy millionaires, typified by Richard Tice.
All the evidence suggests that Brexit is in fact a well-planned Neo-liberal coup, skillfully dressed up in a variety of disguises that have successfully conned unsuspecting tiers of English society, including politicians. In an Age of Complexity the majority want simple answers, irrespective of their validity, viz. ‘Let’s just get Brexit done’.
(Apologies if anything I’ve said has already been posted – not up to speed with the latest).
Thanks
And logical
The error here is the assumption that wealth maximization should be the only goal of a rational voter.
For many voters in this debate wealth maximization is not their goal.
During the 2016 debate a citizen in Belgium commented “whatever you choose be happy”.
It is clear that, as a nation, the UK has not been comfortable with its membership of the EU for the last 40 years.
Maybe it would be better to be slightly poorer but happier as a nation outside of the EU.
Leave voters want sovereignty and democratic accountability.
Whilst it is true, as Stephen Fry points out, that most law is currently made in the UK, Leave voters have seen the direction of travel of the European project, and they don’t like it.
The official position of previous UK governments has been that the UK would join the Euro “when the time is right”.
Any country that loses control of its monetary policy and its currency can no longer be called an “independent nation”.
Leave voters know that, given time, the UK will end up adopting the Euro, just as all countries in the Eurozone eventually will.
Leave voters want to know that those making the laws that affect them are directly accountable to them, and only them, and that, if they don’t like what the lawmakers are doing, they can kick them out of office.
Leave voters want democracy to be local, accountable, and visible, and to know who is making the decisions that affect their lives.
Unless the Remain supporters can successfully address these concerns they will not win a decisive victory. Economic arguments alone will not do it.
But what will be better?
And how will they know?
After all, almost all their law is made locally now. Do they nitr who is doing it? Do they hold them to account? If not, why not? And what will change then?
Richard,
“After all, almost all their law is made locally now. Do they nitr who is doing it? Do they hold them to account? If not, why not? And what will change then?”
So there it is in black and white – patronising remainer snobbery.
How you square this attitude with your attacks on the neoliberal stitch-up that has blighted our politics for 40 years I have no idea.
What the heck is patronising about that?
The vast majority of law is made locally now
Poeple are demanding to know who makes their law
But if they do not find out now why will they when we have Brexited? What will change?
And how will they know the difference when the same types of people (politicians) will be elected from the broadly same parties before and after the event?
Stop being snide and abusive – which I have ignored once before, and to which you are inclined – and instead assume my question is genuine
How will they know the difference if they don’t ask now? It’s a genuine question
Try answering it, please. Or at least have the honesty to admit you don’t know
Richard
I think you’ve not taken into account (or responded to) the two critical points in Chaser’s post as I see it:
– the UK has been uncomfortable with EU membership for a long time
– Leave voters did not like the ‘direction of travel’ of the EU (eg Euro)
Quantifying these issues in terms of numbers is impossible, but I think the point that ‘remainers’ should address them is well made. I suggest that the opinion polls – for all their faults – reflect that.
How do I address someones ‘discomfort’
Tell me what it is that makes them uncomfortable and I could start a discussion, but discomfort is hard to address without knowing where to start
The same could be said of the direction of travel – but if that’s the euro, well we need never be in it so that’s not an issue
What next need I address? Seriously, please tell me. Then I know what to talk about
But I can’t address vague fellings and false claims
Probably very little will change in any tangible sense.
But psychology is what matters, and not the underlying reality.
Voters need to clearly feel that they have control over the politicians who make the rules that affect their lives, and that those politicians that they have elected are the people who run the country.
“Taking back control” may be largely an illusion, but economies work on psychological effects, regardless of whether they’re real or illusory.
The real problem with Brexit is that the country is disunited. If we were united around one course of action, be it Leave or Remain, then those positive psychological effects could be realised, but these bitter divisions are instead tearing the country apart.
So some people feel that they are not in control
I agree: but they they want to vote for the Tories who want to make that worse, and anyway delivered the austerity they are angry with
How is that ‘taking back control’?
Isn’t it ‘handing control to the bastards who’re grinding us down’?
And sure we’re disunited
But do those who think they have some idea what they want have no say?
Why not?
You know exactly what I mean and no your questions are not genuine. Your original post is not genuine since you have made clear at length previously that there can be no reasoned logical argument for leaving the EU.
You want leavers to come here and attempt to reason with you so you and your like minded fans can shoot them down so as to bolster your confidence in your own righteousness.
I’m not snide and abusive; I’m openly angry and fed up at your and other remaniacs’ relentless uncompromising attitude and the damage it is doing to the cohesion of this country. I can’t say this openly to remaniacs’ among my friends and family because I don’t want to cause a rift but I don’t know any of you guys, I’m not a part of your in-group and I don’t care what you think of me so I can tell it to you straight: you guys are fucking this up badly and I wish you’d just stop.
Ban me, I’m done here anyway.
Adam
My question was completely genuine
There was no trap
If you can’t explain the problem is all yours
Yours and 17.4 million others
I’m still waiting
And for the record, you’re just rude.
And we’re not, and you might need to open your eyes to notice this, the ones fucking things up. That’s all Leaver’s doing
I suggest you go and get angry elsewhere and learn how to argue, and even what you think, before coming back here
Mr Sawyer,
“I’m openly angry and fed up at your [Richard’s] and other remaniacs’ relentless uncompromising attitude and the damage it is doing to the cohesion of this country. I can’t say this openly to remaniacs’ among my friends and family because I don’t want to cause a rift”.
You may wish to consider whether your anger at those who disagree with you, whom you immediately vilify wholesale as “remainiacs”, and your implicit acknowledgement that anger will cause a “rift” is not in fact your own problem, and not that of your opponents. It is Brexit itself, a product first of deep division in the Conservative Party, that has damaged the country’s cohesion. Do Brexit with all the ills it brings, if you must; but at least take responsibility for what it is you do: damage to our cohesion. Physician, heal thyself.
For myself, I am a Remainer. I believe in the EU first because it is, in Donald Tusk’s words (significant here not least because he is a Pole with cause to remember the Warsaw Pact), the EU is primarily a “Peace Project”. The rest is secondary.
For the avoidance of doubt the argument that Britain joined a Common Market, which treacherously and only subsequently determined to become a Federal SuperState is simply false. “Ever closer Union” is written into the opening purposes of the EU’s founding Treaty of Rome (1957). Britain entered this Union in 1973 in full knowledge of this fundamental fact. Britain deceived only itself, quite deliberately, when it joined; probably because it thought it could unpick the EU from the inside. I have been insisting on this proposition, that is quite obvious, yet unseen in British political commentary, for a long time. Imagine my surprise when at last a senior Conservative (the Party that took us in) finally admitted it. The senior Conservative-Thatcherite politician, and Provost of Eton College, Lord Waldegrave made the point in his recent book ‘Three Circles into One’. It is a short book; read it, or at least Ch.3 and Ch.4, on the Third Circle – Europe. It provides valuable information.
Now, it seems Britain has chosen – instead of membership of the EU and deconstructing it from the inside – to attempt to destroy the EU from the outside, and replace it with classical, long-discredited British ‘Balance of Power’ European politics; play off one state against another, with Britain profiting from the consequent rich pickings of internal division and confusion, from the sidelines. We have already seen the outline of what will happen – with Theresa May and Boris Johnson running round every European Capital they can find, trying to influence Government’s whose policies they think they can exploit, to divide and split the 27 over Brexit. Fortunately, they have failed; but we haven’t left yet.
I do not doubt that there are a large number of people in Britain who wish to leave the EU. I am a Scot, and I wish to Remain, but if England wishes to Leave, so be it. If however Britain (England) chooses to leave come what may; and cannot find a way to allow Scotland effectively to Remain in the EU in some form (including at least Single Market or Customs Union) then I would wish Scotland’s immediate independence. There is an undeniable substantial majority in Scotland who wish to Remain in the EU. Test it by all means. Be my guest. For those Brexiters who claim they do not understand why Scots want independence, yet also remain in the European Union (as if this was a contradiction), I would say this: in 1707 Scotland voluntarily joined the British Union of Parliaments (by the established electoral standards of the day the Scottish Parliament voted for it). Joining Unions that are seen to be in our broader independent interest is therefore what we do in Scotland. They just have to be the right Union in Scotland’s long term interests, and preferably not ideological. In England it seems you wish to march to the beat of a different drum. It isn’t ours. So be it.
See above: “…. there are a large number of people …..”; is – number; are – numbers. Over hasty writing, under-cooked editing. Apologies.
We all do it
Usually when editing what we have already written
“Any country that loses control of its monetary policy and its currency can no longer be called an “independent nation”.”
A perfect description of Scotland?
And at no time has this ever applied in any way to the UK
So it is not an argument of any relevance here
Chaser, well Scotland appears to be very comfortable with EU membership, also NI is comfortable with it, so I am not sure what the ‘UK nation’ is you refer to that is not comfortable with it.
The U.K. usually refers to The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom formed when an agreement was struck between the kingdoms of Scotland and England (the only two in existence at the time). So either Scotland is a country in its own right with its own opinions on any matter, and the uk exists, or you believe Scotland should put up and shut up because it was defeated and colonised, in which case the uk does not exist. That is, if you accept the UK is an entity, then you accept Scotland is too, and should get a say in proceedings. Otherwise, only England exists, and UK is a false term for the ‘family of nations’.
Apart from that I have no arguments against Leaver’s high ideals. It’s not nice having another country or countries controlling your own. Unfortunately, the problems are with internal uk politics, not the EU, and the UK even commanded a lot of power and respect in the EU (bizarrely) – there is no threat of having to join the euro and never would have been for the uk – unless our MPs chose to do so -, that is myth. There are upsides and downsides to EU membership, but we rarely hear of the upsides in this country. That the Remain politicians during the referendum debate could not articulate those is a huge failing, and a failing of our whole political system.
I doubt brexit is on track to fix politics, and is more likely doing the opposite, as indeed it seems to be compelling politicians to blatantly act more unlawfully than before. The whole debacle seems to have shown up British politics as powerless and weak, and has put us in the position of choosing between EU or US control, and certainly does not seem to have the prospect to return any kind of imagined sovereignty. But, this is not the fault of any voters, Leave or Remain, it is the fault of our politicians. If local government doesn’t work now, I cannot imagine how brexit in any form will somehow make it start to work. It will take a more coherent vision to achieve these things, of which leaving the EU might be a part, but cannot be the whole.
Over a million Scots did vote to leave the EU, which is not an insignificant number, and 44% in Northern Ireland voted to leave.
Voters in Northern Ireland were motivated by their concern for the preservation of the Good Friday Agreement, so the Remain result in Northern Ireland says very little about their satisfaction or otherwise with the European project.
Scots voted to Remain because they believe that membership of the EU improves the case for Scottish independence (with both Scotland and the UK remaining in the EU’s customs union and single market). As a consequence of the erosion of national identity, the EU project has seen regional separatist movements flourish, such as in Catalonia. This is why staying in the EU is more likely to lead to Scottish independence.
Plus I have a feeling that Scots would vote for anything as long as it was opposite to the way that England voted. If England voted for Heaven Scots would vote for Hell.
However, we voted as a United Kingdom, we did not vote as England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
The fact that certain parts of the UK voted to remain is irrelevant. We voted as a whole, not as separate parts.
On your logic every part of any country that voted differently to the final referendum result would have to have its wishes separately prioritised. That makes a nonsense of any referendum.
I disagree that the UK will never join the Euro. It was the stated policy of the Blair government, and the only reason it wasn’t pursued was because the 5 economic tests could not be met.
Had they been met then the Blair government would have taken us into the Euro. Thank god that never happened!
We were told that the 2016 referendum was a “once in a generation” vote and so, whilst I agree that there are no immediate plans for the UK to join the Euro, it is quite conceivable that a future UK government could (following a Remain vote in 2016) have chosen to take us in at some point in the future.
I agree with you that the Remain campaign in 2016 was abysmal.
I do actually agree with you that there are positive aspects to the EU.
The real question for me is not “Leave” or “Remain”, but “what sort of EU membership would the UK be comfortable with?”
I know what I want: a Europe of independent nations trading freely with each other, and working together in friendship and cooperation.
I do not want “ever closer union”
I do not want a “United States of Europe”
I do not want the Euro
We will never have the Euro
We can veto any move to ever closer union, not that it exists
And absolutely no one is calling for a United Stares of Europe
Whilst as a matter of fact the U.K. is made up of four countries
And we never came close to joining the Euro, thank Gordon Brown for that.
Whilst in this site xenophobia about Scots is unacceptable.
So you are fighting myths with fantasies
That’s not a basis for political thinking, I suggest
Chaser says:
I mostly agree with your estimation of ‘Leavers’ desires. I think. But are they going to get them ?
“Leave voters want sovereignty and democratic accountability.”
If Boris Johnson’s withdrawal bill goes without substantial amendment they aren’t going to get that. They are going to get an executive which parliament has little or no influence over. We don’t just elect a government we elect a whole Parliament which is instrumental in interrogating and modifying the whim of government.
This is very dangerous territory: “A Minister of the Crown may by regulations make such provision as the Minister considers appropriate”. Not a lot of Parliamentary scrutiny there is there. ?
Nope…..
With all due respect Richard if you talk to leavers in real life the way you write to them and of them here is be very surprised if many of them would want to hang around and have a conversation with you. Personally I wouldn’t even broach the subject face to face with such an adamant remainer as in fact I don’t in my personal life.
I mean look at the replies here!
Apart from Stephen and John they all take the opportunity to postulate “reasoning” on the part of leavers that makes leavers seem stupid.
This isn’t an attempt to understand anyone – just more of the same propping up your own narrow remainer echo chamber in a time of increasing anxiety for you all.
Stephen gives it a try with both the general case and a specific example but, unsurprisingly, just gets shot down by a quick retreat on the specific and a request for more specifics (which you obviously hope to be able to shoot down one by one).
It’s almost like you want to deploy a weird kind of reverse gish gallop!
The sovereignty issue is real. Bill Mitchell’s mmt based criticisms of the EU are real, British workers losing out to European workers is real, government support for industries is a real issue, fear over the future direction of the EU is a real issue, believing UK can forge it’s own destiny is not delusional.
Just come to terms with the fact a lot of people in this country disagree with you for perfectly good reasons and they’re not all stupid, misled or evil.
MMT’s criticism is ideological, not real
Where are British workers losing out?
What support can’t we actually provide to business?
What future direction is the EU taking which is worse than that the UK is headed for?
Please give me real answers
It’s not an unfair question
That’s all I’m saying and so far you have answered nothing
What we do know is we’re worse off, all our protections are lower, and the Right can have a field day – and there is no chance of Bill’s hoped for socialist nirvana any time I can see
Those are well evidenced claims. But I keep being told I must understand. And people like you cannot give me any anwswers
So why not try? Why not stop being abusive and just try? Is that too much to ask?
The leavers argument is that retaining sovereignty. our currency, control of our borders and laws are compelling arguments to leave the EU.
On sovereignty we are increasingly living in a globalised world where we have to compromise and accept that others who live on this planet have a different view.
On currency, we issue our own, have a reserve currency that others wish to own and we have not joined the euro.
We were not ever part of the Schengen agreement, we could exclude those who did not find work within three months and that the vast majority of immigration has come from outside the EU.
Laws introduced, including the bedroom tax and the rape clause in relation to entitlement to child benefit, hardly the imposts of those dastardly brutes in Brussels.
Had the EU been that overbearing, overweening and self important ‘guardian’ of their subservient ‘little people’ they would have intervened in the crass economic policies of this tory government over the last ten years and would be dealing with the issues in Spain and the current disruption in Catalonia.
I have to say I find Brexit and all the issues around it so silly. We can only survive as a country if we have a commonality of interest with geographic approximation being the main driver, climate change and all that.
I agree with you
But that’s why I’m trying to understand why some do not
I have spoken with two people who have read this today. They are also baffled – and perplexed by why those responding for leave have no apparent arguments
One was told today ‘Its about democracy’
But we vote for the EU parliament and other EU officials are appointed by our government, as are ambassadors, senior civil servants and so on, or the Governor of the Bank of England
It’s not perfect but candidly our own FPTP is much worse
I am still not getting it
Where is the killer leave argument? One side of A4 would do
To be honest I don’t think “leavers” are biting.. there has to be compelling arguments… Roger Bootle wrote a book on it !!
I’ve read non-compelling books by Roiger Bootle
“Where is the killer leave argument? One side of A4 would do”
It’s the same jingoistic spirit that drove many of my grandfathers’ generation to volunteer to fight for King and country in the early days of WW1 (before the draft was necessary to shore up the losses).
I put it down to patriotism. Misguided, as I feel it is, it’s the only explanation that makes sense to me. In the Edwardian era it was considered impossible, by many who thought themselves ‘in the know’ that a major European war could happen, because economic and trade factors would make it deeply foolish. Never the less war was what we got.
In the same way economic sense dictates that we remain in the EU but emotion is driving us out.
I think it’s deeply sad.
Adam
You need to calm down right now, this very minute. I’ve had just about enough of prattling on about ‘Remain bias’ and once more being told that I am some sort of unquestioning Richard Murphy Fanboy (sorry Richard).
I have spent a lot of time with Leavers – I’m surrounded by them at work, on the train, at the dentist or in the doctor’s surgery, on the radio and on my TV. I am heartily sick to the back teeth of people quoting the Daily Mail at me as The Word of God. So many I have heard speak absolute tosh (and boy, they love to talk believe you me) – from those who honestly think that immigration has caused their NHS to slow down and are oblivious to nearly 10 years of domestic austerity, to those who frankly are just jealous of the Germans for example but instead of wanting to learn from them just want to be as far away from them as possible for whatever petty little reasons they have. They seem to think by not being in the same club, we can be magically better than the Germans without even considering the structural differences in the way each country is set up and seeking improvements here in the UK using similar German models!! There’s no discussion about that at all. There is no how we can be better – it’s all just about ‘ We’ve just got to get out – we just go. Hah!’. It’s all emotion and no logic.
Remain bias? All I see from you Mr Sawyer is Leave Bias.
If you read my comment above, you will see me laying claim (not an unspurious claim either) to the fact that many Leavers are misled. I have on occasion berated Leave voters more strongly but I just see them as manipulated. OK – cue calls of ‘condescension’ and all that – but really how can the awful conduct of the referendum be separated from the result? There is no condescension on my part – I don’t feel sorry for the Leave voters – I feel sorry for me and all the others who know what is to come but are told about there being only one will of the people – those who voted to leave.
Those who voted to stay are denied a better way of leaving because an anti-EU sect in the Tory party called the ERG (the European Rejection Group) want a hard BREXIT with no deal which makes the Remainers really angry and even less listened too in what should be a democracy. So as a result we bang on about it because we too are pissed off – just like the Leavers are and we end like we are on this blog this evening. This is all the result of bad politics by the way – I think that the wage bill for 650 MPs is something like £52 million a year assuming basic pay. £52 million for this? A divided country? People at each other’s throats? No way! £52 million too much.
Parliament is a disgrace – not the EU – our own politicians have failed us.
I accept Leave voters as they are – misled; badly informed; prone to having issues shall we say with Europe that one could call er…. let me see now – how about xenophobic for a start?
I think many Leavers have an inferiority complex with Europe too – the weather’s better, so is the food and the culture and the beer as well as much of the infrastructure. I also think many Leavers are in love with the USA. If so, I wish more of you would simply leave the UK instead and go and live there? Please?!
The basic fact as far as I am concerned is that BREXIT is totally unnecessary. None of our woes as a country are because of Europe; they are because of poor domestic politicians and their stupid policies aimed at looking after those at the top.
The events of 2008 were caused by the United States who let their mortgage industry sell loans to anyone in their country without equity, and then let their financial sector sell the loans that were sold illegally (on teaser rates that would become more expensive over time and with no income verification) to investors who bought them as long term bonds called CDO’s across the world – the Euro zone too. When the teaser rates stopped – bingo! Collapse! The US is the same country that Boris wants us to trade with after BREXIT btw. Wow!
I come here with the truth of the matter OK Adam? If you are to leave a trading treaty (and I do not think you should), you don’t do it during austerity or whilst a country and its economy is still struggling with the after effects of the 2008 crash when wages are still not up to their pre-crash levels. Most Leavers don’t even consider this. If you are going to leave, leave during the good times. Not the so-so times. But even better, don’t leave at all. Or leave with the single market intact.
But oh no. Financiers behind the scenes and who fund the Leave brigade lay down CDS bets on the poor performance of companies vulnerable to BREXIT and no Leaver bats a bloody eyelid at such manipulation. Which is weird because you want control don’t you? Of your laws? Hmmm.
So, we Remainers who – you are right – are Remoaners actually – because we have a lot to complain about Adam because we are expected to simply shut up and be quiet and watch a bunch of Leavers cut their noses off (and ours) to spite their faces and thank for them for their sagacity and bravery afterwards.
Well we are not going to shut up Adam. I don’t want Richard to shut up about this either. Be cannon fodder with the Leave brigade by all means. But please – go somewhere else – there’s loads of places where you can top up on anti EU rhetoric – make yourself feel good, self justify, delude yourself even.
Go on – off you go. Go!
I understand your frustration
Adam asked for a second chance here when I got fed up with him before
I admit I presumed he’d stop the abuse second time around
Beautifully put PSR. As a remainer who’s spent a fair amount of own money and time trying to oppose this fraudulently obtained Brexit, I’m sick and tired of whining Leaver hypocrites having a go at us.
Being fed up with the fact that many Leavers don’t seem to give a damn about how much damage this will do, even when the evidence is right in front of them, isn’t condescending or arrogant or elistist, it’s entirely justified anger, especially when you know how this hard right coup will hurt just about everybody except the scheming bastards behind it.
As I’ve said before, I long ago got to the stage of not giving a damn if Leavers suffer as a result of their vote; I’m trying to stop this to protect myself, non voters and remain voters, and also because, however cynical and despairing I get, I stiil think we should fight something if its based on lies and fraud, as Brexit is.
So Mr Sawyer, if you’re reading this, get lost. Do as PSR says, and emigrate to the wonderful right wing paradise called the USA that the Leaveliars want to make the UK into.
Can I say this pushes to the limits fo the moderation policy?
Can we keep it calm please?
It seems the right-wing business interests that are driving Brexit are so powerfull and repetitive that they now are actually believing in their own rhetoric and no amount of reasoning with contrary facts and arguments have any effect at all. Any “debate” on Brexit in the last 4 years has been dominated by the underlying racism of the “immigration problem” that has been exaggerated out of all proportion, resulting in the demonising of all “foreigners” and the EU. Thus the desire to restrict freedom of movement despite being contrary to human rights.
The psychological state that Leavers are now in is akin to the the cult in the US in 1954 who believed that the world was going to end on 20th December and that flying saucers would come down to rescue the true believers. When this did not’happen they still believed their prophesy was right despite the evidence to the contrary . (Festinger: When Prophecy Fails 1956.
I found this
http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/why_vote_leave.html
Is that still the best that can be said when most are very obviously completely untrue?
We could control our migration, for example
We do not bail out the euro
We do control our laws
We do not have open borders
etc
etc
etc
Well here’s the link https://www.amazon.co.uk/Making-Success-Brexit-Reforming-EU/dp/1473668476
And here’s the reviews..
I recommend our diplomats and ministers read this book: it will provide them with an intellectual backbone. This will be the essential vade mecum if and when a referendum campaign takes place. The part of Bootle’s book in which he analyses the pros and cons of British exit from the EU will be the most influential. (The Sunday Times)
Maps out a fresh start for UK-EU relations. Bootle writes with energetic prose and makes some good points. His discussion of European monetary union is cogent. (Financial Times)
Bootle is right on every count. (Guardian)
Roger Bootle perceptively analyses what is wrong with the European Union as presently constituted, both politically and economically; what reforms are needed to make it wise for the UK to remain a member; and how we can most sensibly conduct ourselves outside the EU, should those reforms not be undertaken. It is essential background read- ing for any future in/out referendum. (Rt. Hon. Nigel Lawson, former Chancellor of the Exchequer)
An outstanding, grown-up account of the failures of the European Union. Bootle is certainly no little Englander, but his argument is calm, conversational, rigorous and – quite remarkably for an economist – entirely free of bafflegab. Engaging and absorbing, here is an eye-opening book that will inspire you to I
I think through the issues clearly – with- out starting a saloon-bar brawl. (Daily Telegraph)
As I have come to expect from Roger Bootle, he gets to the heart of the matter with crystal-clear analysis and punchy comment. It’s the best book yet on the European Union’s dysfunctionality. (Jeff Randall, Sky News business presenter)
Brilliant, albeit radical solutions. One of the most thoughtful accounts that I have yet read about the European question. (Independent on Sunday)
This is a credible plan for life outside Europe and deserves to be widely read. (The Week — Business Books of the Year)
A well-informed and rigorously-argued book. (David Marsh, co-chairman of OMFIF, and author of ‘Europe’s Deadlock’)
So if you are looking to a proper counter to your current thinking you will probably find it here as opposed to goading on your blog!
I’m goading no one
I am seeking opinion
Not much to ask, I’d say
Anyway why not skim read the book and you will find the answers and analysis you crave. Not saying I agree with him but it’s all there.,
Why not summarise it then?
Richard – you said
‘The same could be said of the direction of travel — but if that’s the euro, well we need never be in it so that’s not an issue
What next need I address? Seriously, please tell me. Then I know what to talk about
But I can’t address vague fellings and false claims’
We need never be in the Euro – but it IS an issue.’Leavers’ don’t believe that. Mocking it doesn’t cut it, frankly. The ‘direction of travel is clearly not just the Euro – people are suspicious of the EU ‘project’ A recent example is the proposal to include Albania in the EU – no one in their right mind would allow Albanian FOM across theEU.
You have to address feelings as (as has been explained in this thread) this is not all about ‘vague feelings & false claims’ but how people voted. You have to address the ‘feelings’ issues or – as is seemingly the current position –
You do know there are just 2.8 million Alnabanians, don’t you?
And you can be sure 90% would stay
And not many would come to the UK
I mean, you are aware of that, I presume?
How about the direction of travel being the euro? you haven’t addressed that?..unquestionably that is a fear and rightly so. In which case you can add Joseph Stiglitz alongside Roger Bootle..Stiglitz only endorses the EU if it becomes a federal state controlling monetary and fiscal policy (in which case the direction of travel looks pretty grim for those looking to control their destiny)..
Nothing requires us to join the euro
What else can I say built the simple truth
What the heck is the concern
I might as well worry about gravity ending – it’s as likely as us joining the euro
When I hear the phrase “take back control” I hear it as ‘control’ specifically for the MP or PM who use it, I don’t mistake it for a phrase where I am included or 99% of anyone else is included.
The arguments I see here for leaving seem to assume that they are included and use words such as ‘we’ and ‘us’. When a tory is speaking about ‘us’ I think 99% of the people in our nation can be pretty sure it’s used exclusively when discussing a benefit and inclusively when taking the blame.
Agreed
I’m not sure there’s another country in Europe, in the former Western Europe at least, which has the rabid press we have here.
This press has fed, or rather poisoned, its readers with imperial delusions, xenophobia, divisive lies, for decades now. Decades. It intensified when the UK joined the EU.
Some of ‘them’ never wanted to, and are now taking this austerity-stricken people hostage. Opportunism.
There’s a ‘Them and Us’ indeed. But not the ones we’ve been told exists.
This is all brainwashing, it works on the weakest and most vulnerable best, but also on financial and political gamblers…you might call them vulnerable too, in a way.
This, added to Tory engineered social and economic divisions between ordinary people and those in power, not only political power but information, business, financial, has been the soil on which the belief in this sovereignty nonsense has been able to grow.
Leavers all appear to have one message in common: let’s do “it” our way.
Truth alert: they won’t get ‘it’.
There isn’t any of ‘it’ available. Not to them, ordinary Leavers.
The world is interdependent, whether they like it or not.
They want a unicorn. They need to grow up. The whole country does.
It’s having a tantrum. Very unbecoming.
Last time some countries in Europe has such a tantrum, it didn’t end well.
Well, this is how I try to explain this madness to outsiders anyway.
But still… they ask why we swallow the poison if we get told it’s poison….No end…
[…] spent some time yesterday googling the reasons for Brexit. The question I had asked in my post yesterday was genuine, although Leavers did not seem to think it was. The realisation that no Leaver had ever […]
…” a desire to ring-fence Britain.”
There we have it.
Irrationality.
Thanks. There we have it again…” a desire to ring-fence Britain.”
Aka irrationality.
What a lot of pretentious tosh. Take the discussion above into any supermarket and ask the customers to read it, they will probably give up because they do not understand more than a sentence or two. None of the economic/political arguments aired above will have any meaning to more than a minute number – then they will all be customers in supermarkets in Islington and Westminster.
The answer to all the replies above with their ‘how many angels can dance on the head of a pin’ arguments is that they are all making the error of thinking that most of those who voted leave – or remain – had considered the subject deeply and voted the way they did because they clearly understood the issues and had made a considered judgment.
I can clearly remember a lot of vox pops at the time. One man gave as his reason for voting Leave as that his wife would not get her pension at 60 and would have to work until she was 65, nothing to do with the EU. Several other interviews gave similar reasons that, again had nothing to do with the EU.
Broadly those in the less economically thriving areas of the country blamed all their ills on the EU and voted out and older people in those areas looked back with rose-tinted spectacles to a world without immigrants and when jobs were plentiful and believed these times would return with Brexit.
Such people cling to Leaving because they voted Leave and expect it to happen. The constant back and forths about borders, customs unions etc mean nothing to them. They just think that once again they are being shafted by those in charge and in London and that just makes them more resentful and just want out.
I’m sorry that I write pretentious tosh
I guess that’s what comes from being a professor
But actually, I’m not sorry at all – because unless we really understand then we do n ot get out of the mess
And I am trying
The leavers you describe exist, I’ve met many in my various campaigns.
The arguments you say they give when asked why they voted leave, I’ve heard them.
They stem from ignorance. Ignorance exists, it needs to be erradicted, not stigmatised or reinforced.
I’m not being condescending by the way, I’ve spent most of my life working against it in other people, and in myself.
It’s not good to remain ignorant. We all start there, but along the way, we may decide to listen and learn. All of us need to learn, all the time, because ignorance is not bliss, it’s slavery.
They may not read Richard’s blog, these leavers you speak of, but it is not ‘pretentious tosh’, it is detailed, informed, and at times complex information.
Do you mean to say that because not everyone would ‘get’ what he writes immediately, he shouldn’t write it?
In that case, no one needs to bother teaching or lecturing any longer.
Let’s just all wallow in blissful but, hey, unpretentious ignorance, shall we?
Thinking is indeed often considered pretentious these days, as are ‘big words’.
Intellectuals and experts are not welcome in the simple world of populists.
Hence the almighty mess we’re in!
Why not be constructive and helpful? Why not, if you wish to, read and learn, then use what you’ve learnt, and in your own words, for various target audiences, share that learning? That’s how you free people from the slavery of ignorance and give them the tools to be curious, and to learn more.
Rant over.
From a former teacher and deputy head of 33 years.
The physics of radiotherapy are not straightforward
99.8% of people who have radiotherapy would. Ot understand it, I suspect
I am not sure that is a reason for ending radiotherapy
It’s rather odd that Brexit is an exception – because some of the issues are complex (and they are) we should ignore them
Bizarrely, radiotherapy is one thing that may suffer from Brexit
Leavers want to Leave because it makes them feel important, virtuous, part of something noble and uplifting. The Tory propagandists have invoked an artificial hiraeth and the party are milking the suggestion via Brexit we can return to those imaginary times for all its worth. It’s all about feelings, not facts. Clearly some are more susceptible to propaganda than others, though that’s to be expected in a species where evolution continues.
Hiraeth
Such a good word for this moment
And I have tried to really understand it
I accept ‘pretentious tosh’ was over the top but the headline on this thread is: ‘Can anyone outside the Tory elite explain what they want from Brexit?’
The answer to that is that it is very doubtful whether any one beyond this elite know, assuming that they have any idea what they want, even now.
But the majority of Leavers are neither economists, financiers or politicians. They did not understand the issues when we had the referendum and they do not understand them now. They just know that they voted to leave the EU three years ago and it hasn’t happened. They feel betrayed and let down. Some thought we would be out of the EU immediately after the results of the referendum were announced.
Those in charge have painted themselves into a corner that there is no easy way out of. An election is unlikely to resolve the issue because the fractures in the two main parties on this issue will be carried into the next Parliament and the arguments will go on.
The biggest problem facing this country, which the success of the Leave vote shows, is the polarisation of the country between the old and poor, the poor and the disadvantaged predominantly in the north of the country and those of all ages living in the more affluent regions in the south. Much of the Leave vote had very little to do with the EU and much more to do with the disadvantaged protesting against governments of both persuasions, who have consistently marginalised them over the last 40 years.
So to answer your question ‘What do leavers want now?’ The answer is what most leavers want is a larger slice of the national cake and they see the large numbers of EU citizens who have come into this country in recent years as the reason that their slice of the cake is smaller than it should be
What we should be discussing is not what a very small group of Leavers want, but addressing the issues that led to the majority of Leave voters to vote that way and how what is now a socially and economically fractured country can be brought back together again.
I would like most Leavers to have a bigger slice of the national cake
The last people who will give it to them are those who promised Leave
The big issue is convincing them that they need to be very angry with Boris Johnson, who has continually failed them
Richard,
One of the reasons I am a member of the Green Party is because I want as much local production for local consumption as possible. I don’t want 10,000s of 44 ton lorries criss crossing Europe belching out diesel fumes and polluting Europe and further.
These lorries are the consequence of the Single Market and the reality is that all trade treaties accelerate global warming. There is more detail @ http://radicalsoapbox.com/trade-treaties-accelerate-global-warming/
I would also point out that being told that the EU protects workers rights is sickening as millions in the UK struggle to survive in the ‘gig economy’ with ‘zero hours contracts’.
The Green Party is overall heavily pro the EU
It is sadly true that people do things that are harmful to themselves all the time, and then rationalise reasons why they did it.
What do leavers think they will get? I will try to answer as I voted leave back in 2016 and though subsequently I’ve decided I was wrong my take on the most persuasive arguments at the time where:
1. Freedom from EU which to a lot of people seemed to be heading to a federal Europe which seemed likely to be less democratic and most people think it’s bad enough trying to influence the local council never mind parliament. Great emotional sale by leave campaign.
2. Immigration we have had lots of it and we seemed unable to control it leaving appeared to offer a solution.
3. More money to tackle health care the needs of the elderly. Many people I spoke to at the time spoke of this.
4. Negative effects of project fear people objected to being intimidated I think it was a mistake by Cameron and Osborne.
5. Corporate messaging to employees ‘re vote remain also backfired .
Despite this it was still a close run and I’ve spoken to a number of people who admit to being unsure of which way to go all the way up to entering the voting booth me included. The decision was tight to be frank and of course so much has turned out badly on the leave side that there is no longer any business case rationale but there is still for some a strong emotional one.
Thank you
Your honesty is appreciated
A vote for Leave was a spanner in the machine, a crie de coeur, a Luddite reaction, a plea to be heard, a rejection of otherness, the retreat of the defeated, a trickster joke, a turning of the back, a cynical belief in unbelief, a profession of the small and the local, a rejection of elites – a loss of faith.
Don’t look for a reason, it was a rejection of reason – of a logic, for which it was alleged there was no alternative, but which was perceived as failing to deliver.
I voted to leave to answer this question (a variation to Tony Benn’s 4 tests):
How do we change laws that affect us through democratic means?
EU law (which binds us) cannot be changed except through the Council and and the Commission. So we need the PM of Finland and the President of France among others to decide whether we can change X law. And we then need the permission of the Commission.
This has nothing to do with Little Englander. I don’t think a British PM should have a say on whether Portugal or Poland change their laws if they want to do so democratically.
What laws do you think have been contrary to British interests as a result?
It is an irrelevant question because it assumes future generations will be 100% happy with everything done to date. They won’t. If they were, why bother having any kind of democracy – just stick to the laws we have at a snapshot in time.
But here are a couple:
1. GDPR is a mess. Causing huge uncertainty. The only people who disagree are those who don’t know much about it. Happy to provide further examples.
2. Public procurement selection rules. Makes it unlawful to ask selection questions regarding use of tax havens for example. Can’t require bidders to use the Fair Tax Mark or equivalent – you have said yourself you want to change this EU law to allow this.
Also, in a public procurement you can’t take superior past experience (in most walks of life, the greatest predictor of success) into account in the contract award. A bit like ignoring past record when choosing between Ben Stokes and a Leicestershire journeyman for a place in the England team. You’d think it was madness in any other walk of life. But this is how procurement operates.
I agree with both to a degree – although the intention of GDPR is sound
But you say that’s enough to throw away all the up side. Really? When both will be reformed, inevitably. Why?
It is obviously the case that the EU, as a coalition of 28 countries, may well introduce laws that may well impact to a disadvantageous effect to the UK.
But surely those impacts are over emphasised. As part of a club it can only be the case that we have to compromise and not always get our way. It is this government that through their austerity programme that have damaged the wellbeing of the populace so much that they feel that the EU is at fault when the truth is that the reality is solely that this responsibility lies with own government. They make a majority of our laws, not the EU, and it is a lie to pretend otherwise.
True