So who wants to remain in the EU?

[alfie2244]

///ajd said:

UK in EU = totally stupid. No need to go on - just that alone is totally idiotic.

FTFY no need to thank me.

[///ajd]

Funkycoldribena said:

///ajd said:

Is it stupid to vote to put people into the EU who have no interest in making it work, only interested in attacking it and undermining it whilst we do contribute all that money anyway?

It's bloody great.Quicker the whole rotten lot collapses the better.

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

Playground tantrums. They always end well, don't they?

[Funkycoldribena]

///ajd said:

If your plumber only did 68% of a job, I suspect you'd be getting angry.

If your plumber hadn't submitted any accounts for 20 years I reckon a few people would be angry.

[Funkycoldribena]

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

Playground tantrums. They always end well, don't they?

Maybe others will follow suit.

[///ajd]

Funkycoldribena said:

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

Playground tantrums. They always end well, don't they?

Maybe others will follow suit.

That's not much of a risk mitigation strategy is it?

[s2art]

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

How could they without falling foul of the WTO? Anyway, we dont have to buy from Germany and France, we can take our huge trade deficit elsewhere. I am sure Japan would love to sell more cars here.

[don4l]

///ajd said:

Funkycoldribena said:

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

Playground tantrums. They always end well, don't they?

Maybe others will follow suit.

That's not much of a risk mitigation strategy is it?

What risk?

Honestly, why don't you tell us what you think will happen if we leave the EU.

Try to do it without leaving yourself open to being labelled stupid... I bet that you cannot do this.

[///ajd]

s2art said:

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

How could they without falling foul of the WTO? Anyway, we dont have to buy from Germany and France, we can take our huge trade deficit elsewhere. I am sure Japan would love to sell more cars here.

one example

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/cac376c8-97e2-11e3-8dc3-...

I'm sure you can find someone to say it won't matter, but who is right?

Big risk to assume the lady in the link above is wrong.

On balance I think the FT article exposes a real issue.

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were outside the EU.

Why wouldn't they do that? Because they are nice?

[technodup]

///ajd said:

In my view and experience of working in several countries in Europe - we should definately stay in and not leave.

I believe this because:

1 - whilst many bemoan a perceived lack of influence in Europe, we are still at the table and can influence - we are a major player in Europe despite not making the song and dance of control like DE and FR
2 - we can't afford to have our trade with the EU harmed - it is very important to us all & our economy
3 - we can't afford to take the risk of losing the influence in 1 as players like DE/FR (for example) simply do not care about 2 for the UK.

1. we simply don't influence anything afaics. Cameron (or whoever) makes a noise abut going in hard for a negotiation, gets booted around by 20odd others, earns a concession big enough for him to crow about, then quietly reneges on it later on.
2. who's going to harm it? You think we're going to stop wanting French or Italian wine, German cars or Spanish holidays? Why would they risk us spending that money elsewhere by being difficult?
3. name me something significant within the EU the UK has had significant 'influence' over. Genuine question btw.

The whole trade thing is complete bks. Individuals, tribes, countries and companies have been trading with each other forever. Why do we need a completely unaccountable body to tell us how, when and with whom we can?

As someone else said earlier, imagine it was the other way around. We're on the outside like Norway and Switzerland. The EU is facing various economic failures, currency meltdown and immigrant chaos. Would we want to join? Do they?

[TEKNOPUG]

Mario149 said:

TEKNOPUG said:

Mario149 said:

8) I think the anti democracy argument is not very strong. People seem to confuse not being democratic with not getting the result we want. Firstly, we can remove our commissioner by voting, you just have to vote for a gov here who would replace him if they were in power. Secondly, commissioners only come up with laws, the EU parliament MEPs have to vote them through, and we can all vote for our MEPs. Finally, given that about 1/3 of people can't be added to vote in our GEs, it's a little rich for any of them to complain about lack of democratic accountability.

This is where a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Democratically elected MEPs can only vote on laws proposed by unelected Commissioners. They cannot propose new laws. MEPs can propose changes to current or new legislation but those proposals only become law if the Commissioners agree. Many of the technical decisions of new legislation are decided by unelected civil servants.

It's about as democratic as Dad asking the kids whether they want to go to Butlins on holiday, having already booked it...

It's not a little knowledge, it's how it works. Note that I never said that MEPs can create law, I said they have to vote on it and they can vote it down continually until the commissioners come up with something that MEPs approve. To my knowledge there is no time when commissioners can enact a law that MEPs have voted down. Commissioners may have to approve a law, but it means diddly squat if they can't get MEPs on board. And I know you can't vote directly for commissioners, but if you feel strongly enough you can vote for a gov here that will replace our commissioner.

And while it's great that you and I can have this discussion and debate the finer nuances of it, what proportion of "leavers" do you think actually know how the EU parliament works? I may be pessimistic, but I suspect it's not a large percentage.

I get that people would ideally want a more transparent process, and more directly accountable. I am one of them. But you'd think the way people talk about it that there was some lifetime junta in place who could do exactly what they wanted and no-one had any say whatsoever.

I think that your idea of democratic accountability and my idea of it, are very, very different. If history tells us anything, it's that unelected, unaccountable EU Commissioners can and have done exactly what they wanted and no-one had any say whatsoever. You only have to reference the Greek bailouts for clear evidence.

[don4l]

///ajd said:

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were outside the EU.

That question contains a lot of "stupid".

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were inside the EU.

Now, do you see how stupid your question is?

Our membership of the EU has sod all to do with the fact that Germany will always put her interests first.

[powerstroke]

Cameron is on a bus with 28 people he vaugely knows, its booked to go to london but he wants to go to Blackpool and make vauge threats the others go along with his idea for a while just to shut him up , where do we think the bus will end up????

Edited by powerstroke on Saturday 6th February 17:39

[Murph7355]

powerstroke said:

Cameron is on a bus with 28 people he vaugely knows its booked to go to london , he wants to go to Blackpool the others go along with his idea for a while just to shut him up , where do we think the bus will end up????

Brussels?

Or the nearest benefits office?

[powerstroke]

Murph7355 said:

powerstroke said:

Cameron is on a bus with 28 people he vaugely knows its booked to go to london , he wants to go to Blackpool the others go along with his idea for a while just to shut him up , where do we think the bus will end up????

Brussels?

Or the nearest benefits office?

My guess he hopes its the forma...

[citizensm1th]

I hope we stay in Europe just so half of the posters in N,P and E implode with rage

It would be like a massive deer cull

[TEKNOPUG]

don4l said:

///ajd said:

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were outside the EU.

That question contains a lot of "stupid".

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were inside the EU.

Now, do you see how stupid your question is?

Our membership of the EU has sod all to do with the fact that Germany will always put her interests first.

The main problem with the assertion that Germany could introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre, is that Germany would remain part of the EU and therefore would have to deal with all the other EU members, with regards to new banking regulations. The UK, post BREXIT, could do whatever it damn well likes; be that reducing corporation tax to make investment more attractive, de-regulating the banking industry, ensuring that UK becomes a safe haven for businesses, banks and investors, away from the financial chaos of the EU & € away from financial transaction taxes. The UK would be able to react far quicker and be dynamic when it comes to any threat that EU would attempt to impose.

Ulitmately it's pure speculation and first you have to assert that the EU is interested in further harming it's own fragile economy (growth still well less than 2%) by getting into a trade war with the UK and trying to further disenfranchise foreign investment into Europe.

[///ajd]

don4l said:

///ajd said:

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were outside the EU.

That question contains a lot of "stupid".

Ask yourself, would Germany introduce legislation that helped its own financial centre more than the London financial centre if it were inside the EU.

Now, do you see how stupid your question is?

Our membership of the EU has sod all to do with the fact that Germany will always put her interests first.

Not sure you are following Don.

1. If the UK is in the EU, it gets a veto and has used this in relation to some banking regulation in the EU.

2. If the UK is outside the EU, it cannot influence regulation in the EU, and our banks - if they want to do business with the EU - would have to follow regulation they could not influence through the UK government (who have a vested interest in protecting our financial services industry due to it massive contribtuion to GDP and hence tax intake).

Now, which bit of this in/out thing are you struggling with?

Or do you just think we can't influence regulation so it doesn't matter - in which case you don't seem to have been following recent EU regulatory history.

If you think we can't influence when we're in, just wait until we're out!

[Beati Dogu]

citizensm1th said:

I hope we stay in Europe just so half of the posters in N,P and E implode with rage

I'm sure there's no plans to physically move the UK from that sticky out bit of Asia commonly referred to as "Europe".

[///ajd]

don4l said:

///ajd said:

Funkycoldribena said:

///ajd said:

But it won't all collapse. We might limp out having spat our dummy with no real plan for what happens afterwards - only to see DE and FR gleefully legislate us into a backwater.

Playground tantrums. They always end well, don't they?

Maybe others will follow suit.

That's not much of a risk mitigation strategy is it?

What risk?

Honestly, why don't you tell us what you think will happen if we leave the EU.

Try to do it without leaving yourself open to being labelled stupid... I bet that you cannot do this.

I can't predict exactly what will happen - no-one can. I only flag up some likely risks. Risks that don't exist staying in.

The fact is you can't predict what will happen either. And you can't articulate any benefits other than some base "get away from them lot in brussels" ranting. Just like the SNP & independence. Oil never lower than $113 a barrel. Hmm, they had a good plan for that risk didn't they?

So why make a big jump into the unknown with no tangible plan? That, Don, would be stupid.

PS are you agitated because you voted for a UKIP MEP? You didn't did you?

[grumbledoak]

Forgetting the "Be very afraid (of the unknown)" angle for a moment, am I right in thinking that Neil Kinnock would be out of a job?

"Well, alright!"