The best argument in favour of continued UK membership of the EU is to look at agenda of the people who want us to leave. The vast majority of them are ideologues of the hard right, with a few hard-leftists and a rather larger group of borderline racist swivel-eyed xenophobes.
What they all have in common is a vision of Britain that is not the sort of country I want to live in. They’re all people for whom any form of social democracy is anathema.
The Tory right tend to keep quiet about their future Britain without all those pesky EU regulations and nonsense about worker’s rights. As quoted in Jonathan Calder’s blog:
Kwasi Kwarteng, Priti Patel, Dominic Raab, Chris Skidmore and Elizabeth Truss, who are all seen as rising stars on the right of the party, describe British workers as among the “worst idlers” in the world, and urge David Cameron to reform work places along the lines of the Asian, rather than the European model.
Yes, they look forward to a nation in which people work far longer hours in much poorer conditions in order to be competitive with the sweatshops of the far-east.
Yes, the Barclay Brothers, the Rothermere family and the pornographer who owns the Daily Express churn out anti-EU propaganda in the newspapers they own, like Britain’s very own version of America’s Koch brothers, and people fall for their simplistic populism.
But read the above quote and ask yourself: Is the Britain they want really the sort of country you want to live in?
On the one hand I have problems with the EU. For example, the wastefulness of spending on the fishery & agricuture policies, shipping the whole circus between Brussels and Strasbourg every few months and supporting bizarre niche subjects like UFO research. The Eurozone has exposed the problems of reconciling the different demands of the various nations. A federal Europe will have the same problems only more so. Especially given the apparent inequality in which rules are enforced. French farmers blockading UK exports go unpunished despite the rules on free trade. So I think there are many things that are broken.
On the other hand, life outside the UK will be frostier than anyone can imagine and we can’t understate that too much. The UK is a valuable gateway for the rest of the world into the EU and without that, what’s the point of coming here? The only political reason to talk to us will be because we’ve got a seat on the UN security council. Big deal.
So, the EU badly needs fixing and I don’t want to be any more integrated than we already are. But the alternative is equally unpalatable. I guess I’ll have to see what the next few years turn up.
Of course, if the Eurozone crisis causes the whole structure to go tits up then heading for the exit will look like a smart move. But if it turns around then we’ll look stupid if we’ve already got our coat on and called a taxi.
Interesting times ahead.
I really hope David Cameron can cut a reasonable deal over our continued membership of something like the original EEC. The really big problem I have is the line “an ever closer union” change that to “an ever loser union”. The only things which need to be agreed at the EEC level are standards, which are key to free trade, and environmental matters which have to cross borders by their very nature. Nothing else is necessary.
I would rather like to vote UKIP, but I have big problems with their energy policy. We need renewable energy: we could afford more of it if we were not having to subsidise the EU bureaucracy.
I do not like the idea of ever larger constituencies for Westminster. The fewer the number of voters, the more value each vote has. How many voters for each MEP? For that matter, who is my MEP? I don’t seem to have one. There are several who claim to represent my part of the country, but who represents me?
And for that matter, the EU does not seem to recognise England as a country in its own right. Scotland and Wales exist for EU purposes, but are woefully under represented considering their size.
Other countries may want a USE, but I want as much as possible decided as close to me as possible and that means Westminster should be actively moving real power from Brussels to Harrow Civic Centre. It may be that Harrow Council pass the same rules as Brussels, but that is not the point. The point is I see a local councillor every fortnight or so. I have never met the local MP, and see above for MEPs.