The EU - Referendum - 23rd of June 2016 - in or out?
 

Do you believe that we should come out of the EU or do you believe that we should stay in?

Please answer and give your reasons.

I think the EU is one of the best things to ever happen to europe. It's more than just trade and unchecked travel. It gives the impression, that even though we might speak different languages and have very different histories, we're on the same side. What benefits our neighbor might also help us.

So I feel that Britain would be walking away from that. Instead of having a group of other countries as friends and allies, there would be a rivalry there.

Leaving the EU would be an absolute disaster for many businesses, Farage's claims that he would fund certain things with the money "saved" by not being in the EU are utterly naive. That money would be swallowed up fivefold in lost trade. The immigration issue is a complete red herring, too, EU migration is not the huge drain on the economy that it is made out to be. Even for the anti-immigration squad... It's not a solution. The immigrants that most people have a problem with are the effniks and the Evilmooslims and relatively very few of those migrate from within the EU.

There are, evidently, massive flaws with the way the EU works but the focus should be on identifying and fixing the worst of those problems before abandoning the idea completely. Don't throw the baby out with the EU bathwater just because David Cameron has been exceptionally weak in Europe.

I am for being in the EU, as are all my family too.

I believe we are there and need to be there as a full member,All govts; have signed treaties and that is the fact, they are signed.
We just should get on with it now and do all we can to reform the EU from the inside,since outside we would have no influence.

This govt; put in place legislation that if any new treaty comes forward from now, then the voters will be asked in a referendum if the govt; should sign such treaty.

I support Labours plan which is exactly that legislation I posted above but in addition, they have said if a treaty came forward that now involved any transference of legislative power from the UK to the EU then that would trigger from them an in/out referendum.

I have never seen the point of Cameron saying this needed to be settled but waiting 2 and a half years until the election to even start any re-negotiations, and then take another 2+ years to do that and hold a referendum by the end of the 3rd year of his govt;
All conditional on 'if' he got an overall majority

I think it would be an economic disaster and also a status disaster for the UK to leave the EU and to have cofusion and uncertainty running for nearly 5 years from this PM is plain ridiculous.
So I would never in fact support leaving the EU and clearly would never vote in a referendum to do so.

That to me would be dangerous politics and dangerous for the UK as a whole too.
I also believe the voters would never be able to get an informed debate or relevant information from the media we have, as to the EU, in order to make a fully clear minded and balanced decision as to the EU.

Any new tranfers of powers would be a possible step too far now and in those circumstances,I would agree a referendum could be held.
I would still myself vote to stay in however.

Leaving the EU does not mean we leave europe we are in europe, we seem to trade fine with USA China and India.

My business trades world wide and if you were to ask me now who are the nightmares to deal with I would say France Italy and Spain. The best would be US and Canada and surprisingly Russia.

I look forward to a referendum and the debate that ensues

In

In.
With changes to the benefit system.

In, without a doubt.

Agree with these two. I'm a bit of a Europhile really and don't even like the idea of a referendum on the EU never mind leaving it

I don't know, if we stay, we need to start accepting help offered aswell as paying in tbh

For example

http://rt.com/news/uk-refuses-eu-help-467/

What possible reason...

That says more about the tories than Europe... they wanted to help and our govt won't let them instead of receiving 22M in specific food aid they would rather have 2M cash to create 'imaginary' jobs.
They won't want to be seen in a negative light our rich nation with our begging bowl out to Europe.

'The government has been accused of putting "anti-European ideology" before the needs of the most deprived people in society after Britain rejected help from a European Union fund to help subsidise the costs of food banks.

David Cameron, who was heavily criticised recently after Michael Gove blamed the rise in food banks on financial mismanagement by families, faced pressure to embark on a U-turn to allow EU funds to be spent on feeding the poor.

The government came under fire after British officials in Brussels said that the UK did not want to use money from a new £2.5bn fund – European Aid to the Most Deprived – to be used to help with the costs of running food banks. The use of food banks has increased dramatically in recent months, prompting Sir John Major to warn that the poor face a stark choice between paying for heating or food.'

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2...ing-food-banks

I believe we should have a referendum, although in which case if I were eligible I would vote to stay in. I do believe in reform leading to more decentralised power though.

There was a recent report which said that EU migrants have a net contribution which is into the billions which we would obviously lose if we left. Also I believe that more european integration is a really good thing and the EU is a good way for countries to stick together. The european convention on human rights is also a good safety precaution I believe, should an extremist party ever rise to power.

The only reason I could see a reason to want to leave is the "free-flow of migrants" farage refers to every 2 seconds, although I would not necessarily want immigration reduced and I would much prefer reform and not an exit.

The EU is not my area of expertise but I do believe it is a good thing to stay in. Kinda hard to learn about when 99% of the media is anti-EU.

Great post

you may not want immigration reduced but you may do if you ran a business or lived in an area of very high immigration or perhaps were at this minute looking for a job?

If you ran a business, surely more immigration would be great because you can have more selection.

With the second point that is understandable in theory, however I do not see that there are a huge lack of jobs. It says it all when the main person claiming such a thing, Nigel, when presented with the actual statistics the 'stats man' claims that they are not that important.

If you are running a legit business and the guy down the road is undercutting every bid you make for new business because he is using illegals or paying well below the min wage to recent immigrants its going to hurt.

It also hurts if your school is spending lots of class time dealing with pupils that cannot speak english at the expense of teaching your child.

This is one of the reasons the NUT is thinking of strikes

Definitely out.

First point - surely that is not an argument of immigration but one of businesses and the minimum wage.

Second point - that is understandable, perhaps there could be more investment into english language classes for children.

I used the "they're all taken by immigrants!!" excuse when I was supposed to be looking for a job while I was at Uni. Even I knew it was bull****.

The other two points - can you explain why running a business or living in an area with very high immigration is necessarily a bad thing? When it comes to cultural erosion most people's concerns are about "creeping evilmooslimification" or even simply along racial lines - and the vast majority of those immigrants are not European?

OUT

I don't know enough about it to comment fairly BUT,I don't like the way they interfere with our judicial system,those who know some of my background will know it was the European court of justice that interfered in the James Bulger case and it led to the two boys going from 15 years to 8,for such a heinous crime was pathetic imo,so for that reason alone I'de say OUT,but as I said I am not too well versed on it,but I am learning,so I 'll sit on the fence just for now.

That absolutely beggars belief the tories would have been terrified that accepting help would have a negative impact on their image of doing well in goverment and the false image that their austerity measures were working.
You never saw the snakes complain or have a bad word to say when the EU had the UK include drugs and prostitution sales in the Countrys GDP because that boosted the UK economy by £11 billion and gave the false impression that things were better than they were previously and that their attacks on the working class were justified.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/bu...n-9764998.html

Excellent point! Our wonderful, moral, god fearing tories are claiming recovery on the back of crime, exploitation and addiction.

That's about 0.06% of the total economy, over the time period covered.

That's not really the issue is it? For me it's more newsworthy than the constant attacks on the poor such as welfare fraudsters who's crimes equate to 0.00000000000001% of those of big business or the banks.

and how many jobs and how much wealth is created by the poor?

out of the EUSSR please, next thing they will make a eu army and force us in pointless wars with russia,

Another absolutely excellent post and the last part in bold, is 100% right.

The people of the UK could never get a balanced and impartially informed assessment pf the positives and negatives of being in the EU due to a ridiculously biased media against the EU.

Really well said.

Almost goes without saying, sadly! The people of the UK never get a balanced or impartially informed assessment of the positives and negatives of ANYTHING due to a ridiculously biased media.

I don't know if it's getting worse, or if I'm just noticing it more... But it really is completely ridiculous. Printed and televised news sources are all but completely useless. This election campaign is a farce already and it's barely started.

What is the point of this statement? I don't understand the connection to my post.

I'm all for negotiating a better europe, but if that fails, I think we should be out.

There is way to much bureaucracy with unelected people in charge. Its all just jobs for the boys.

Too much legislation coming down that erodes our own sovereignty, and that aspect is only going to get worse unless we kick back.

The problem with europe is that it is not balanced enough to be sustainable. Too many different cultures on different levels of wealth. We are only 1 step away from communism with the principle that the wealthy countries contribute to sustain the poor ones. It provides zero incentive for them to get of their asses and help themselves while the net contributors plough money hand over fist into their pockets.

I'm not a UKIP supporter at all, Nigel wants to come out of Europe for all the wrong reasons and none of the right ones (in my opinion :laugh:)

get out of Europe is the best option imo the whole thing is infinitely too bloated too complex too expensive and way too many laws....the longer it goes on as it is the further we will fall into an almost communist style over controlling monstrosity
one glorious day when they will need to steal money directly from us all to pay for their waste and their existence there will be tachometers in everyones cars...then youll all give up

I remember the time before Britain became part of the EU and we never had a problem with trade in those days.
Also having borders was a big help in fighting drugs, illegal immigration etc.,
I do believe that we should have a referendum. Why is it that the government (all parties) are so reluctant to have one?
In Denmark, where I now live, the people were asked to vote to be part of the EU. There was a resounding NO, so the Danish government kept having a vote untiul they got the right /wrong in my view, answer.
I like the thought of Britain being an independant nation once more. Making our own decisions and just being responsible for ourselves.
However if a referendum was held and the majority did want to be in the EU I would have to accept it.
For me personally I think Britain being ruled by fat cat pen pushers in Brussels is the worst idea possible.

The EU or common market then was very small in relation to how it has progressed today,from before we joined.

However,a worthy fact of that tiems, iof we were doing so well as you say, why then did the UK under both Conservative and Labour govt;s deperately try and apply to become part of it.
From Harold Mcmillan right through to Edward heath.
With Edward Heath, the then Conservative PM in the early70s,who negotiated terms of entry to Europe and then took the UK into Europe too.

Never holding a referendum if the UK wanted to go in, just doing it.

If we were doing that well, why would we want to change and join, because we knew it would likely grow into a masisve trading block and to not be part of it wold be a disaster,even in the 70s and 80s,up top the present.

The UK did then eventually get asked if we should be in or out, in 1975 by Harold Wilson's Labour govt;
In fact Labour is the only party to ever hold any referendum on Europe, the Conservatives as I said, even took us in,in the first place, nevr asking the UK citizens at all.

So I cannot see any point, after all that time and all the funding we have given to and had back from the EU,plus that we have been a member for so long now,to even think of leaving now with all the massive uncertianty and bad feeling that would likely create for the UK.

Why should Europe overturn tariffs given by us for UK crimes,I don't like that sort of interference,what we do with our criminals is surely down to us.

That would be a viable argument but not without hypocrisy since our country gets involved in the criminal justice systems of other countries too.

I know this is due to a case that is very personal to you and it's a point that would leave anyone without a heart of stone shocked that the EU would become involved in this and reduce the sentence.
All I can think is that there was nothing in place and no rules in place with which to deal with such a crime at the time so the British courts had to sort of make it up as they went along?

Because govts; both Labour and Conservative have signed up to such possible interference by the signing of treaties and acts brought forward by the EU and no govt; Labour or Conservative have ever asked the voters to agree to same.

However, that is done now, our govts; and PMs from Edward Heath, Harold Wilson, Margaret Thatcher, John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, have all signed up to treaties brought forward, so our word as the UK has been given.

Both parties in govt; too have signed away powers from the UK to the EU, John Major and the Masstricht threaty being one of the biggest.
John Major would have been open to joining the Euro too, as was Tony Blair,who wanted to go for it but Gordon Brown said no way at all as to that as the then Chancellor.

I agree it seems wrong but there are what now, around 28 countries in the EU now and all of them are under that same directive just as we are.

So for me, and I agree with your strong point made.
In my view however,we need to try to reform things, if we can, from being fully inside the EU but not now, after agreeing to all these conditions and treaties,not to just pick our ball up and run off whining,because we cannot get our own way all or even most of the time.

Thank god for that. I haven't heard good things of Gordon but I guess this could be one of them.

Do we still have the European arrest warrant Joey?.... I can't work out if we do or not :/


'Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab): Today we have had a completely shambolic debate. The Home Secretary has given an excellent account of why we should support policies that are not on the Order Paper. She has given an excellent defence of the European arrest warrant, which is not on the Order Paper. I agree with her that the European arrest warrant is immensely important. It helps us to fight crime. It helps the police, in Britain and across Europe, to stop murderers, traffickers and sex offenders. It helps us to deport more than 1,000 suspected foreign criminals primarily to their own countries to face justice. Given that there is a majority in this House in favour of the European arrest warrant, why on earth are we not voting for it? Why the sophistry? Why the games? Why the dancing around? It is just baffling that the Home Secretary is playing games with something so important to criminal justice and to the fight against international crime and terrorism.'

http://www.publications.parliament.u...14111019000001