EU Referendum: Brexit-proof facts

I have been a committed European Unionist for over 35 years and could once quote the Treaty of Rome as a party piece until the invitations dried up. This referendum is critical to all of us and I have been robust in criticising those aspects of the Remain campaign that I feel undermine the credibility of the real arguments. It was Brexit that kicked off with misleading numbers and daft claims. They were ridiculed quite rightly and we should not follow their lead. The referendum will be won on the credibility of our arguments, which must be Brexit-proof. I accept it is tedious to see someone like me criticising those who have tried to put forward constructive points. So I’m setting out my own view of the major Brexit-proof points I believe we should be promoting on the doorstep, with friends, family and colleagues.

According to the CBI, the economic benefits of EU membership amount to £4,000 net per family.

According to the CBI our net contribution is £116 per person: we get £8 back for every £1 we put in.

Migration from outside the EU is higher than from inside. We can control non-EU migration but are not doing so. That’s our fault, not the EU’s. Under the deal struck by Cameron EU migrants do not get benefits until they have contributed. 

Agriculture is dependent on EU migrants who form 65% of the workforce and our NHS is reliant on EU professionals from dentists to neurologists. EU migrants contribute hugely to our society not only by providing essential services but by paying taxes. But we can and must grow our own expertise through more apprenticeships and access to bursaries and scholarships.

We can all choose to live, work, start a business, retire or just buy a home anywhere in the 28 member states. We get the same access to healthcare and other state services as locals.

We are protected by two borders, a recently strengthened EU outer border that includes 600 Italian and 40 French patrol boats, and our own inner border that would need huge investment to bring up to scratch. We benefit from the huge French, Italian, Greek and other EU resources, protecting us as well as their own citizens.

If we leave, the financial centre of Europe will move from London to Frankfurt. No-one can predict the exact consequences but it won’t be in our favour in terms of taxes and jobs.

If we leave the EU we will survive; we’re British after all. There won’t be a war, air fares won’t go up, beach sewage won’t return, but we will all be worse off according to the Treasury and CBI. We will lose influence globally once we are excluded from EU decision making.

There are some “advantages” to Leaving, though. We can do away with those mandatory 20 minute breaks every 6 hours for nurses, making the NHS much more efficient. We can choose to get rid of other namby-pamby obstacles to maximum productivity like maternity leave. We can return to £1 being 20 shillings each of 12 pennies, and 1 ton being 20 cwt of 8 stones of 14 lb of 16 oz. Only by leaving can we ban the confusing decimal and metric systems. And we can free our businesses from European restrictions on profiteering so they can make up lost revenue by raising prices for British customers.

Please criticise, even ridicule, every comment is helpful.

* Stevan Rose first joined the Liberal Party in 1980. Having flirted with the SDP and then New Labour, he switched voting allegiance back to the Lib Dems after Iraq and re-joined the party in 2014.

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34 Comments

  • Graham Martin-Royle 8th Jun '16 - 10:42am

    I don’t think decimalisation was forced on us by the EU. I was taught both systems at school because the then government had decided that going decimal was the way to go. That was in the 1950s, way before we ever joined. 🙂

  • I think the problem with your intention for your piece being seen as Brexit proof is using either the CBI or the Treasury as sources. Both organisations have a horse in the race so to speak and can therefore be challenged.

  • David Evershed 8th Jun '16 - 11:36am

    Stevan Rose refers to Brexit proof facts.

    The REMAIN/LEAVE arguments are about what will happen in the future under either outcome. We can’t have facts about the future – just assumptions and opinions.

    That is why some people find the debate so frustrating.

    For Liberals a judgement has to be made whether being outside the EU will result in a more internationalist attitude and more open free trading across the world or not.

  • Lorenzo Cherin 8th Jun '16 - 1:26pm

    Stevan

    Often you talk sense, here , no exception!

    I am not a EUenthusiast, but sensible reasons convince me , those such as you ague , or Guy V , our ALDE leader, but what a lousy campaign!

  • Lorenzo Cherin 8th Jun '16 - 1:27pm

    Steven
    Argue , not ague !

  • Rightsaidfredfan 8th Jun '16 - 2:28pm

    What will net migration be if turkey joins the EU? Those in favour of the EU have made it clear that they want to do everything possible to help turkey get entry, if we vote to remain, those in power have made it clear they will do everything they can to help turkey get in. So the question has to be asked and answered.

  • Rightsaidfredfan wrote:

    “Those in favour of the EU have made it clear that they want to do everything possible to help turkey get entry,”

    Who has made this clear? I have not, nor has any Remain campaigner, as far as I am aware. Some citations, please? Turkey is a very long way from meeting the criteria for accession, and that is unlikely to change for many years to come.

    Do you also maintain that those in favour of Britain remaining in the EU want a United States of Europe? Presumably, having Turkey in the EU makes a United States of Europe easier to achieve? Just wondering.

  • David Allen 8th Jun '16 - 3:07pm

    Back in the distant past, people now campaigning for Remain thought Turkish entry woudl be a good idea and said so, Cameron included. More recent events have convinced them that this was wrong, and they have quietly dropped the idea. We should not pillory Cameron for changing his mind when the facts change. We should pillory Leave for resurrecting speeches from the distant past which they know perfectly well the speechmaker no longer believes.

  • Peter Watson 8th Jun '16 - 3:10pm

    @Sesenco “Sesenco 8th Jun ’16 – 2:45pm
    Rightsaidfredfan wrote:“Those in favour of the EU have made it clear that they want to do everything possible to help turkey get entry,”
    Who has made this clear? I have not, nor has any Remain campaigner, as far as I am aware. ”
    In 2012 Nick Clegg said, ” I have long seen the case for Turkish entry into the EU as a strategic necessity.” (https://www.libdemvoice.org/nick-clegg-turkish-entry-into-the-eu-is-a-strategic-necessity-30574.html).
    And in 2010 David Cameron said, “I’m here to make the case for Turkey’s membership of the EU. And to fight for it.” (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-10767768)

  • Peter Watson:

    Do you believe that Greece and Cyprus will agree to Turkey’s accession?

  • Bill le Breton 8th Jun '16 - 4:10pm

    Stevan, you have nothing to fear but your fear. Even if Britain votes to leave the EU it remains a member of the European Economic Area – in fact this is an advantage. Members of the EEA have full access to the single market and its four freedoms of movement, so no downside about the advantages of migration.

    Although the Treasury in its first review of the impact of Brexit looked at the consequences of being part of the EEA, it left this important option out of the scenarios it examined in its second report. Had it not done so it could not have predicted a recession. Life in the EEA will not bring about nearly as much disruption. Any fall off in GDP growth will be small and if short duration.

    Membership costs for EU? I think they are nearer £150 per person. Norway’s membership fees for access to the single marlet are £120 per person. So a saving here from using the EEA approach, if that is what floats your boat. EEA membership means we have control of our fisheries and agricultural policies. And more power to accept or reject EU regulations and laws.

    There is no fear of retaliation by the EU-its Lisbon Charter commits its members by legal sanction to free trade. So does the membership of the G7 and G20. On leaving the Uk for apply to the UN for rights of continuity of trade, as did the former countries of Yugoslavia and the two countries produced out of the division of Czechoslovakia.

    Will we be alone? No, there will be a queue of others probably including France which will take the EEA route. That is of course why the EU elite is so frantically keen for the UK to ‘remain’. It knows that a UK move to the EEA option will see the end of ‘ever closer union’ and a return of the European project to its economic rather than its political vision.

    It is a far more Liberal route to take. It is also the route that is being drawn up as a contingency plan by Conservative politicians, labour politicians (see Stephen Kinnock’s recent statement and by the civil service. Why even the bank of England can live with it.

  • Matt (Bristol) 8th Jun '16 - 4:38pm

    Bill, I would accept what you outline as a fall-back position, not as a preference.

    But do you feel, and if you do, please explain why, that remaining in the EEA will enable the ‘full control’ over immigration law that the Leave campaign is offering to many of its supporters?

    I appreciate you feel the EEA is a preferable option to ‘full’ EU membership, and offers an unexplored possibility of a European free trade area without some of the other EU structures.

    But given this option is not – as you have pointed out elsewhere – on the ballot paper, how can we be certain that this is an outcome that will happen, or indeed one that is desired by the majority of those voting for out?

    Will they – particularly the more protectionist among them – not just feel cheated in not gaining the full measure of control they felt they were voting for, and see it as just another political con-trick degrading faith in politics?

  • Stevan Rose 8th Jun '16 - 4:55pm

    Simon / Graham, that last leave “advantages” point was a little tongue in cheek, in mockery of Leave tactics. But nevertheless they cannot disprove. The restrictions on profiteering refers to those rules illustrated most recently by the forced reduction in roaming charges. Decimalisation was not forced on us and we could revert to £sd if we leave. Or if we stay I guess. Similar to if we leave we can control our own borders. We’re in and control our own borders, we remain and we still control our own borders. Leave have several such points.

    David, my first 6 points are facts in that they refer to the present and are demonstrable through reference to credible sources. The financial centre point is based on the documented statement of the head of JP Morgan. In response to Steve any source can be challenged particularly if their findings don’t fit your beliefs. A substantial proportion of Americans dismiss evolution and believe in Creationism. It is near impossible to combat deep beliefs and faith with rational logic. In this case the Treasury and CBI and Bank of England and JP Morgan are highly credible experts who deserve respect.

    Rightsaidfredfan makes a good point that deserves a considered response. Some politicians on the Remain side have said in the past that they wanted to fast-track Turkish entry into the EU, and now Gove and Johnson are beating them with that. But it was always nonsense – Turkey cannot meet the conditions for membership and in 30 years have managed to pass only 1 of 30+ chapters of conditions. You need 28 countries to agree, Greece and Cyprus would veto, France and others would have referendums, and our own Parliament would have to endorse and it wouldn’t. I would rather vote UKIP myself than let Turkey in and so would millions of others so no government would ever consider it (now). So probably said as a political and diplomatic sop to obtain a concession from Turkey, never realistic. Turks would need a vote to join too and many commentators believe they would vote not to join and accept the social liberalism that goes with entry. It’s a scare story, a powerful one, but a work of fiction not helped by Cameron’s past statements.

  • Stevan Rose 8th Jun '16 - 5:11pm

    Bill, as I said, if the vote is for Leave we will survive. The EEA route is fine as a Plan B but doesn’t give us a seat at the table; the UK would be excluded from the key European decision making forums though we could hold Alternative HoG meetings with Serbia, Albania and Belarus. And it doesn’t give us totally free access to the single market, there are some tariffs still. The Leave campaign is fixated on stopping free movement and that excludes us from the EEA, so as Matt says, that option isn’t on the ballot paper.

  • Mick Taylor 8th Jun '16 - 5:20pm

    What planet is Bill Le Breton on? Fullers? The EU and the EU alone decides on what terms non EU countries trade with it. Does he really believe that the remaining 27 EU members following Brexit will want to give the UK anything? No. Like a messy divorce they will want to make an example of the UK ‘pour decourager les austres’ if for no other reason. The 27 will hold meetings where the UK will not be present and then tell us what terms they want for access to the single market and other EU benefits and what we will pay for that. Read the treaties if you don’t think this is the case. The UK government will have no choice in the matter anymore than Norway, Switzerland or Iceland have. Rules will still be made in Brussels only the UK will have no influence on them, but will have to follow them if they want single market access. So free movement will continue, the costs to the UK will continue but the rebate will be gone along with regional development money. Doesn’t sound like a good deal to me. Vote remain. I already have.

  • As was discussed in another thread last week, the UK’s own maternity rights are substantially better than the EU’s minimum, and always have been, so you can’t offer that as a Brexit-proof argument.

    “We can do away with those mandatory 20 minute breaks every 6 hours for nurses, making the NHS much more efficient.”

    As an aside, those “mandatory” 20 minute breaks may exist on a piece of EU paper somewhere, but the reality is often different. The EU regulations never stopped my wife from having to work 12-hour shifts without a single drink or sit down – which is a major reason why she is now an ex-nurse. This was in a hospital which not so long ago David Cameron visited and lauded as a beacon of excellence and good practise.

  • Bill le Breton 8th Jun '16 - 8:19pm

    Mick, as far as I know I am on the same planet as you. Why do you think someone who doesn’t share your idea is ‘mad’?

    A fact: Norway’s latest report on the subject which I linked to elsewhere shows it has adopted just 1,349 of the 7,720 EU regulations in force, and 1,369 out of 1,965 EU directives. That ought to be the crown jewels for us …

    Stevan, The UK is of course a massive player in the European economy and as part of the EEA would remain so … in such real politik those countries that remain will be keen to sound out the UK before making decisions. But if it does leave and uses the EEA route others will follow. It would be the first step in building a truly Europe wide free market.

    Leaving the EEA is not on the ballot paper either. If we leave the EU we remain a member of the EEA. It requires no legislation. It would require legislation to leave the EEA and that won’t happen in this Parliament with its present make up. On Ref Day 1 the four freedoms of movement would still exist as they are a condition of EEA membership.

    The leave campaign may appear fixated on stopping free movement of people – they have to be to win the vote. But on Ref Day + 1 it is perfectly feasible that Gove, Johnson et al in the Tory Party coalesce with Cameron and Osborne around the EEA option. It keeps the Tory Party together and achieves their main object which is repatriating sovereignty to Westminster. On Ref Day +1 they don’t need Farage and they don’t need UKIP. Gove and Johnson may well both calculate that getting power back to Westminster (see Norway’s freedom of action above) will make them darlings of the Tory Party and future leaders.

    Matt, Tories in the Leave campaign are not protectionists. Also EEA does NOT give control over migration from the EU. On the single market nothing changes. They know that. They also know that if they did not relent on free movement of people they’d create chaos. They wouldn’t have a majority in the House of Commons. They would if they accepted the EEA route. As I have said elsewhere, we saw Cameron’s reaction to both the 2010 ‘hung’ parliament with the ‘big open offer to the LDs and the ‘I get it’ reaction to the vote on Syria. Don’t count out the chance that Cameron Osborne Gove and Johnson will be in the Rose Garden holding a piece of paper on which the civil servants have already laid out the immediate action plan for the EEA solution.

  • Peter Watson 8th Jun '16 - 11:31pm

    @Sesenco “Do you believe that Greece and Cyprus will agree to Turkey’s accession?”
    I’ve no idea and no strong feelings either way.
    It simply strikes me as absurd that Cameron, Clegg and others can claim that Turkey joining the EU is a “necessity” that they will “fight for”, and then turnaround to dismiss the notion without being challenged by Lib Dems simply because it suits their side of this particular debate. Perhaps we are simply used to disbelieving politicians in general, and these two in particular, but this all fuels the cynical view of politicians that in turn fuels the Brexit campaign.
    In or Out after 23 June, it looks like a lot of damage will have been done, and it is not at all clear who will be the real political winner(s) whatever the result.

  • Bill le Breton 9th Jun '16 - 6:30am

    Anyone who doubts that Turkey is on track to enter the EU needs to read the latest November 2015 progress report from the Commission here: http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/pdf/key_documents/2015/20151110_report_turkey.pdf summary of report starts page 4.

    Visaless entry is already up and running. Two years ago I witnessed a Turkish wedding party enjoying the delights of a Greek bay on the Island of Patmos. The master of ceremonies brought a rib in close to the shore and handed our fizz to bathers there but ‘could not step ashore’. Two nights ago two Turkish yachts in the same bay and both crews inside the Taverna ‘enjoying their visaless access’.

    Local Greeks may view them very circumspectly as they do their German and Italian guests with due respect for history, but … ‘it’s business’.

  • Paul Murray 9th Jun '16 - 8:15am

    There is a very interesting document on the Parliament website with a description of the 1975 EEC referendum campaign. It includes summaries of the arguments presented by both sides and 40 years of hindsight allows us to see how the predictions (which, unlike these days are not described as “facts”) have played out.

    In the context of the EEA suggestion, this quote from the “NO” summary is relevant:

    If we withdraw from the Market, we could and should remain members
    of the wider Free Trade Area which now exists between the
    Common Market and the countries of the European Free Trade
    Association (EFTA) – Norway, Sweden, Finland, Austria,
    Switzerland, Portugal and Iceland. These countries are now to
    enjoy free entry for their industrial exports into the Common
    Market without having to carry the burden of the Market’s dear
    food policy or suffer rule from Brussels. Britain already enjoys
    industrial free trade with these countries. If we withdrew from the
    Common Market, we should remain members of the wider group
    and enjoy, as the EFTA countries do, free or low-tariff entry into
    the Common Market countries without the burden of dear food
    or the loss of the British people’s democratic rights.

    http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7253/CBP-7253.pdf

  • Until now I had always regarded Bill Le Breton’s pronouncements as gospel. So I am disappointed. My reasons for remain are based on jobs. I don’t think the CBI’s economists are stupid because their judgements affect jobs.
    I am a 76 year old who cares about the future of my grandchildren. Unfortunately this has been borne out by the position of one of my granddaughters who worked her socks off to get a job at JP Morgan in Bournemouth. Mr Dimon, the head of the company stated that, in the event of Brexit, JP Morgan will leave. How many other old codgers will have this experience Bill?

  • @ Bill le Breton

    And did you find the presence of a Turkish wedding and two Turkish yachts during your Greek sojourn objectionable – and if you did – why ?

  • @Bill le Breton – Re: Turkey

    I find your stance on this issue at odds with LibDem ideals. Because what you are effectively saying is that we, including the other EU members if the UK is to remain, should renege on our long standing commitments to Turkey, because Turkey took them seriously and embarked on a long journey of reform…

    Currently the UK gets a big say (and a veto) on the terms under which Turkey may join the EU and when that may actually happen. By leaving the EU we turn our back on this and hence would cease to have any say or control over how Turkey becomes a member of the single market, with which we would wish to trade with in the future. Additionally, we should not lose sight of the other world Turkey inhabits and hence through the EU negotiations we gain influence over these matters, like the reestablishment of Kurdistan.

    Yes, as I’ve spoken of in the past when we’ve discussed a tiered EU, the EU does need to start thinking differently about countries such as Turkey and Ukraine, who effectively have feet in two cultures and trading areas and hence don’t sit comfortably in the northern European centred trading block. Remain enables us to have some influence over how this might be achieved; Leave and we are effectively saying we don’t care, but we will live with whatever is decided…

  • Graham Jones 9th Jun '16 - 10:48am

    Said before but worth repeating: Norway, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Iceland… all small countries happy to give away sovereignty (i.e. happy to accept externally-imposed constraints over which they have no say) in return for protection of locally important economic interests. An EEA solution might be great for Tory unity, but it does nothing to passport UK financial services into the rest of the EU, for example, while at the same time diminishing our international clout and standing.

    As for Turkey, as long as that country is engaged in the process of qualifying for membership, the spotlight continues to be on its human rights performance and other areas in which it needs to catch up with the criteria expected of a liberal democracy. That is the beauty of the requirement to work through all 35 chapters. However long it takes, and if the goal of membership is never reached, the process is good for Turks and good for the world.

  • Matt (Bristol) 9th Jun '16 - 11:36am

    Bill:
    “Leaving the EEA is not on the ballot paper either … to leave the EEA … won’t happen in this Parliament with its present make up … freedoms of movement would still exist … Don’t count out the chance that Cameron, Osborne, Gove and Johnson will be in the Rose Garden holding a piece of paper on which the civil servants have already laid out the immediate action plan for the EEA solution.”

    Everything you say here is perfectly feasible, although speculative, and it could well make sense from the point of view of pro-Remain campaigners seeking to preserve the best of what they can, in a ‘knife-edge’ situation (ie 52-48 in favour of exit), which gives leverage to the Hagues of this world in particular.

    The EEA solution is not what I personally want (I want a more open, democratic, collaborative EU with a common identity and shared institutions). But I would accept it as a fall-back, and it’s a continuation of the two-track Europe concept.

    However – and this will particularly be the issue if migration continues to be at the forefront of the Leave campaign and there is a large majority for Leave – pro-Brexit Tories who have harped on migration control but then suddenly switch to the EEA option will then be guilty of manipulating UKIP and its fellow-travellers.

    I have little doubt that Cameron may try to do what you say – but can the Farage (etc) genie be genuinely put back in the bottle in such a smooth, cost-free fashion?

    The act of Westminster sleight-of-hand you describe doesn’t feel like the basis for future democratic trust or political stability to me … we’d still get another form of ‘neverendum’ and an unquiet, alienated Right, with the risk of further ‘Trumpification’ of British politics in future.

    In that case the more uncertain future we have been warned about will come to pass, but in the context of a democratic crisis, not an economic one. The EEA might be a putative liberal solution, but it will have been achieved by an undemocratic and cynical (Conservative) politics.

    All this throws up the incoherence of the referendum campaign in general, and as I have said elsewhere, a vote ‘against’ an institution gives you no clarity about what you are voting ‘for’.

    Bah. What you say makes sense and the outcomes may be favourable, but the implications and the processes, for me, stink to high heaven.

  • An EEA solution might be great for Tory unity, but it does nothing to passport UK financial services into the rest of the EU, for example

    It is much worse than that. A UK outside of the EU is of no interest to foreign (ie. non-EU) companies wishing to do substantive business with the EU and hence currently are investing in the UK and seek to locate their EU HQ in the UK…

    Whilst a UK outside of the EU could sign up to the, now legally discredited, US ‘safeharbour’ arrangements, the UK would no longer be considered a “safe harbour” for EU data processing and hence cloud hosting. Which would mean that some of my clients would have to set up EU operations and transfer work that is currently being done in the UK to the EU…

  • Stevan Rose 9th Jun '16 - 8:56pm

    There is a big leap between visa-less travel and full free movement of people i.e. live and work. However, whatever the speculation, if Turkey pass all the conditions, if they exit from Northern Cyprus to gain Greek and Cypriot agreement to entry, if the Turks vote to accept the social liberalism that goes with membership, if the French and others have a referendum and vote to agree to Turkey joining, if our Government and Parliament agree, if all those ifs come true, we the people can all vote UKIP and other Euro-sceptics into power and at that point leave the EU. Voting Remain now does not prevent Leave at any point in the future, especially if the EU changes in a way that we cannot live with. And that is because the UK is sovereign. So the whole Turkey debate is a complete red herring. It can be dealt with if and when it becomes a reality not now on the basis of a fictional fear story.

  • Turkey is a handful of Parliamentary seats away from a formal denunciation of Atatürk and the imposition of a traditional Islamic state. It is a country where it is a crime punishable by imprisonment to criticise the President. It is a country where racial and religious minorities (Kurds and Alevi) are treated as second-class citizens and are under constant threat of state and vigilante violence. Turkey is not going to be admitted to the EU any time soon. END OF.

  • Bill le Breton 10th Jun '16 - 7:20am

    David Raw, I hope you are not falling into the error of equating EU-scepticism (not European scepticism) with zenophobia or even racism?

    Being able to share in the joy of the Turkish wedding along with a beachful of equally enthralled Greeks, Dutch, Germans etc etc is something I will remember with great fondness. Nor will I forgive the rudeness and bullying of one of the yacht crew to a young Greek waiter who was trying desperately to ask her to share her language with him so he could better communicate with her compatriots. That is people.

    There is no doubt in my mind that the people of Turkey will gain greater liberties if their governments now and in the future wish to have closer ties with Europe. I just think people are naive if they think that this process isn’t going to happen reasonably quickly, hence my reference to the latest progress report from the Commission.

    I actually think that there is or would have been more chance of this happening had the EU remained driven by its economic rather than its political aims, that it was in fact more willing to reform to meet the real changes of the geo-political situation now rather than reacting to a situation that has long gone.

    The two matters are related. If you value and celebrate the diversity of cultures you surely must oppose the homogenization process that the EU and especially the directors of the EMU are forcing through. Economies should be different if they are to be expressions of cultures. They should not be penalized for their differences.

    It is ironic to see how many people from Germany come to Greece because of its wonderful culture – by which I mean its modern culture of everyday relationships – yet its government and central bankers wish to change its economy to a neoliberal ideal which dismantles these relationships from those of community to individualism.

    The reformation could start with an exit vote … I believe it would; it will have to change mightily but if that happens later following a remain vote it will because of the rise of the right across Europe in the coming years because of the deflationary policies – the almost permanent depression – caused by the eurozone: the effects of which are not confined to members of the zone, but to their trading partners. The Euro is today what the gold standard was in the 1930s. Later would be worse for Liberty.

  • Stevan Rose 10th Jun '16 - 7:49pm

    Bill, your optimism for a Leave result is, unfortunately, misplaced in my view. The Germans have today confirmed that if we leave we will not be granted access to the free market or EEA status. You can cross that off the post-Brexit list of scenarios. Your assessment of the timeframe for Turkish entry is also badly flawed. There are so many hurdles to leap and hoops to jump through it is impossible for decades. Even if Merkel and others conspired to fudge are you seriously suggesting Cyprus and Greece would agree and the French, leaning towards Marine Le Pen, would vote for entry in a referendum?

    Diversity of culture is not in any danger in the EU! If I go to Greece I suddenly understand dyslexia, Italians will always be pasta and pesto loving Italians. The French will always be nothing but French, Swedes and Danes forever socially liberal Scandinavians. If anything we are more exposed to different cultures because of our membership.

    Bill, your EEA option has now been scuppered by the Germans. Your choice is clear – stay in and keep the things you obviously think are important including free trade and movement. Or out all the way, a UK completely on it’s own. Do you still choose Leave?

  • @Stevan Rose
    I assume you are talking about the comments from Herr Schäuble, perhaps from the very interesting interview he gave.
    For anyone who hasn’t read it, may I suggest that they go to:
    http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/spiegel-interview-with-wolfgang-schaeuble-on-brexit-a-1096999.html

  • Mick Taylor 10th Jun '16 - 8:23pm

    Bill. Actually I do think you’re mad, but not for disagreeing with me. What you wrote is utter fantasy. It’s hogwash to think that an EU that we have just kicked in the teeth will do us any favours. The EEA option will simply not be there and in any event why would we want restricted and tariff ridden access to the EU single with no say whatever in what it decides instead of the full unfettered access we now have and a seat at the table. Steven Rose is right. Stay in and have the benefits or leave and be entirely on our own. Iy would be utter madness to leave and you know it.

  • Richard Underhill 12th Jun '16 - 10:30pm

    Allegra Stratton, Peston on Sunday, ITV should know that there was a coalition government in 2010. Liam Byrne’s successor was a Lib Dem, David Laws. Liam Byrne’s intention were unclear, maybe he assumed his successor would be Labour.

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