Time for some positivity - great stuff about the EU

[nearlyhellokitty]

Getting tired of the constant wrestling around in the mud. So here's some positives about the EU. Let it be stated that this is not just about economic security!

- Gruff Rhys I Love EU

vimeo.com/157411550 - What has the EU ever done for us?

weareeurope.org.uk/ - see the picture.

[nearlyhellokitty]

Also like this one:

[nearlyhellokitty]

Why the EU is good for our NHS: www.independent.co.uk/voices/nhs-bosses-remain-in-the-eu-reasons-you-might-expect-a7048906.html

"None of our respondents believed that leaving the EU would be positive for research and innovation. Indeed, 80 per cent felt that it would have some or very negative impact....Likewise, 80 per cent believed that Brexit would impact negatively on the recruitment of health and care staff. Not entirely surprising when you consider just how dependent the NHS is on EU staff. We’re struck, for example, by just how many hospital trusts we’ve visited over the last two years who have mounted successful and much needed nursing recruitment campaigns in Portugal, Greece, Ireland and Spain.

Nearly two thirds of our leaders feared for what Brexit would mean in terms of sharing learning and knowledge, which is fundamental to clinical outcomes and providing the best possible care to patients. Many of our senior doctors depend on European networks not just for funding research but for testing and developing their learning and knowledge. Medical innovation is, patently, a global activity and our trust leaders felt that being part of a wider community in the EU was profoundly beneficial.

And the response to the big question was clear cut. A substantial majority – 75 per cent of leaders – felt that leaving the EU would have a very negative impact or some negative impact on the NHS as a whole. Of course, this is not an exit poll nor is it extensive research of the whole NHS. It is a survey of trust leaders. But it does show the strength of feeling on what could be a generation defining decision.
As we have told the Commons Health Select Committee, their overwhelming conclusion is that Britain should remain in the EU."

[purits]

I was going to post some sarcastic remark about loving the EU's position on fluffy kittens: but then I noticed your username ...

Who the heck is the guy in the firstvideo - gruff rhys - who wants to thank the EU for the Seine and the Severn. Did these things not exist before the EU was invented? Or is it a joke that I don't understand.

[nearlyhellokitty]

He's from the Super Furry Animals and he's talking about improving water quality (I think).

Actually there's a good animal welfare argument for staying in the EU, beyond pet passports. see the pros and cons from the RSPCA - blogs.rspca.org.uk/insights/2016/04/13/the-eu-referendum-and-animal-welfare/#.V1kjy7t97cs

Here's a #pussiesforEU cat for you

[nearlyhellokitty]

Stephan Hawking, Lord Sugar etc.

[Chalalala]

Erasmus!!!

[purits]

Erasmus? You would put up with all the bad things in the EU just so that students can have a jolly for a year? You'll start quoting roaming charges and fluffy kittens next!

FYI, DS's girlfriend did a year-exchange at foreign University last year. In a non-EU country!!!!!! OMG how did that happen. How on earth do these non-EU people manage to do anything ever because surely the script is that only the EU is capable of doing enlightened stuff.
Someone should tell the Commission.

[Moonatic]

The Erasmus scheme isn't limited to countries in the EU.

[purits]

The Erasmus scheme isn't limited to countries in the EU.

So it doesn't matter if we leave then, we can still be part of it?

[Moonatic]

With regard to animal welfare, the EU indirectly subsidises bullfighting through the Common AGricultural Policy.

British animal welfare standards are well in excess of those of other EU members. Arguably, it is better for animals in other EU member states that there are rules and regulations that protect their welfare, but farm animals are better off in the UK and I don't see that changing following a Leave vote.

[nearlyhellokitty]

moon that is true but would need to be part of any agreement - see what happened in Switzerland: infacts.org/dont-envy-switzerland/

A survey in April and May by a Swiss political and social research organisation, GfS.Bern, found that if the 2014 referendum were repeated now, only 36% would vote to restrict free movement from the EU. Fully 47% would now be against restricting immigration, with 17% undecided.

Support for immigration quotas “has been dropping slowly but steadily since 2014,” says Lukas Golder, spokesman at gfs.bern. The poll was funded by the Pharmaceutical industry body, InterPharma.

“It’s not because warm feelings towards the EU have increased, that is certainly not the case. But there is a more realistic view now on what all of this means,” says Christa Tobler, a law professor at the University of Basel and an expert on Switzerland’s agreements with the EU. “Swiss people have seen very unpleasant consequences (of the referendum outcome).”

Among them was being swiftly and unceremoniously kicked out of the EU’s Erasmus Plus student exchange programme, and the EU’s science research programme known as Horizon2020, of which Switzerland had been a substantial beneficiary. As a world leader in research and innovation, expulsion was a blow to Swiss pride. The government scrambled to fund the student and science grants out of the national budget.

In an illustration of the perils of Britain’s EU referendum, most Swiss voters failed to see this coming. Student exchanges and scientific research were barely mentioned during the campaign, but have since shot to the forefront of Swiss consciousness. The public failed to anticipate that the EU could and would play hardball in ways anti-immigration campaigners had failed to spell out. “It was a shock, people are quite aware this is not good for Switzerland,” says Golder.

[nearlyhellokitty]

moon the point is that the UK has been able to lead better animal welfare EU wide by driving EU animal welfare legislation, also better for UK farmers because more of a level playing field

[nearlyhellokitty]

purits scale is a bit different - 200,000 have done Erasmus. It's a network already set up. Other universities will have their own specific exchange programmes linked to courses/ interests whatevers.

[Moonatic]

I don't see why we couldn't be members of the Erasmus scheme if we left the EU. Iceland, Norway, Leichtenstein and TUrkey are members of Erasmus but not the EU. I think there will always be a demand for overseas students o study at UK universities, not least to improve their English language skills so I cannot see the UK being excluded from the scheme.
And, of course, there are more UK universities ranked in the world's top universities than there are from the rest of the EU member states combined.i

[nearlyhellokitty]

purits ah yes, great! Killing roaming charges! I am pro that :-)

[MrsBlackthorn]

Holidays and weekends away all across our amazing, fascinating and beautiful continent.

Rights at work protected.

But the biggest one for me is a peaceful continent of nations working together.

[nearlyhellokitty]

moonatic I agree we could still remain a member of the Erasmus scheme - BUT that it would be a part of any agreement, and that's the point of the Switzerland story, it's linked to other agreements/ funding etc. So the UK would have to probably agree some concessions or funding in order to remain part of the scheme.

[purits]

So the EU has pissed off Switzerland. We have an ally there. It only needs a few other countries and we can create an alternative to the EU.

[nearlyhellokitty]

Erasmus is still a positive !

[nearlyhellokitty]

purits that's a weird reading of that news story - the point of that story is that people in Switzerland voted against immigration but realised too late all the other great stuff they would lose because it wasn't part of the debate....

[Moonatic]

"Holidays and weekends away all across our amazing, fascinating and beautiful continent."

Yes, because it is impossible to travel outside the EU for holidays, just as it was impossible to travel to continental Europe before we joined the common market...

"Rights at work protected."
Even though UK workers have substantially better working rights than do workers in most other EU states and many of the rights (e.g. equal pay) predate our accession to the EU.

"But the biggest one for me is a peaceful continent of nations working together."
A continent that seeks to form its own army and thereby undermine NATO which has been the main guarantor of peace in Europe since the war? A continent which has seen war and genocide in recent years in the former Yugoslavia and where the EU failed to intervene? An EU which has seen Greeks burning German flags in recent memory because of the economic pain and damage caused by the Euro?

[Moonatic]

Erasmus is a nice thing for young people. It is not synonymous with the EU.

[nearlyhellokitty]

moonatic please don't repeat the EU army myth. www.politico.eu/article/waging-war-on-the-myth-of-an-eu-army-referendum-britain-brexit-debate/
"Collective defense of European territory is still NATO’s mandate. These days the Alliance’s problem is not that Europeans might take too much in their own hands, but rather that Americans may tire of European “free riders.” Washington has repeatedly signaled that it wants Europeans to take their own defense more seriously."

Here's some veterans on peace in the EU: www.theguardian.com/politics/video/2016/may/09/second-world-war-veterans-urge-britain-stay-in-eu-video

on the rights at work - did you see the stuff about how Out politicians like Priti Patel have stated that they can't wait to leave the EU so they can deregulate? She was talking about halving regulations at the Institute of Directors dinner.
touchstoneblog.org.uk/2016/05/let-cats-priti-patel-suggests-lose-half-eu-work-rights-brexit/

[MrsBlackthorn]

"Yes, because it is impossible to travel outside the EU for holidays, just as it was impossible to travel to continental Europe before we joined the common market..."

Smoother customs, immigration, collaboration on landing rights, breaking down of national airline monopolies and elimination of trade tarrifs have all made it possible for us to visit the rest of the continent more than our grandparents generation ever thought possible.

Did our grandparents go for weekends in Vienna or Lisbon? Pop on the Eurostar to Paris for a few days? Send their kids on school trips in France? They did not.

[ForHarry]

Junker is a genius of physical comedy.