to still not know how to vote in the referendum?

[princessconsuelabannahammock]

To my shame i have never voted but i really want to on this issue, its about time i actively participated.

I have done a lot of reading on the subject however i am still unsure. The basic problem is that i dont trust any of the politicians to do what they say.

I am not too bothered by immigration - i live in an area where it hasnt had a massive effect and i think that a certain level of immigration is needed.

I can see (and have worked with EU funding) some of the benefits of EU funding. I think some of the red tape has improved workers rights, environmental issues etc.

I think some of the economic guess work of brexit is purely that and is possibly looking too short term, yes there maybe bumps but what about further down the line.

I think that the EU gets blamed by the government for things that they want to deflect from their actions. Yes i have problems with getting a drs app but i think that is due to under funding not immigration.

I have concerns with the way the EU is run and the lack of accountability. I dont believe our government have the power to put our interests first in the face of EU demands.

I have watched the debates and read up but i am still so unsure.

If we want to trade in the single market, we need to work within eu regulations. We just won't have any influence on them anymore if we leave the EU. So what's the point in leaving?

"Just to correct ifherbum, the European Commission president Jean Claude Juncker has said Out is out. There is no second referendum. He also said there would be no further concessions to the UK if they stay in. No further renegotiations. Cameron has been given the maximum concessions possible. So whether you vote Remain or Leave, the EU president says it is final. "

This may be a lie. Don't forget that the EU doesn't take no for an answer, and has repeatedly ignored the results of referendums in the past.

I don't think remain is the safe option - it may be this year, but over the next 20 years? look how much has changed in the EU since we joined - but very slowly, so we don't notice.
In trade terms, our trading position with countries outside the EU (market of 6.5bn, 13 times the size of the EU) can only improve, ie unchanged to begin with and then better with deals agreed.
A lot of food will be cheaper as we can remove duties on imports from Africa and the Caribean. We will also help improve the lives of third world peoples by trading with them rather than the EU. For example sugar prices in the EU are around 20-25% higher than they would be without production quotas and subsidies. EU duty on sugar is £35/100kg or about 100%.

It all seems so crooked. Not usually a conspiracy theorist but i am vwry cynical about the experts znd shat they have to gain. Would the US really put the UK at the back of the queue? If we really are the fifth biggest economy they would surely not want to lose trade with us? I have smelt more than one rat and it is not just Nigel Garage.

Really good debate on channel 4, much better than what we have seen on the other chanels and with a fresh panel every round.

Black Labour voter writer ROCKING it for leave, saying its shameful what she has heard from people in her town.

We simply have no idea what kind of trade agreements we will get. Anyone who asserts it will be better is frankly lying. We just DONT KNOW.

Saw this today
Was voting Remain anyway but EU membership means that women from the UK can flee domestic abuse within the EU, or after moving to another EU country, and receive protection and support. And we owe the same duty to survivors who find themselves in the UK.

MILLION - Thanks for the link i am just ploughing my way through it and listening to the debate. One point that seems to come up again and again is that everyone acknowledges that changes to the EU are required. What changes are needed and are they likely to ever actually happen, in a way that suits us?

Regarding the issue of Trade, and the impact of having to make new trading agreements with countries with a Leave vote, i fail to believe the UK can’t successfully go it alone.

I mean if New Zealand can stand on it’s own two feet, then the UK surely can. Up until the 1960’s New Zealand had close trading ties with the UK, with the UK taking 63% of exports. When the UK joined the European Economic community (now the EU) in 1973, the share of exports dropped to 6.2% by 2000. New Zealand had to quickly establish trading ties with other countries in the Asia-Pacific region. And they managed it, and are currently an economic success story. So if tiny isolated little NZ can do it, then i’m sure the UK can.

And that example also goes to show how being part of the EU reduces the level of trade done outside, and is therefore in fact quite isolationist and inward looking (in my humble opinion).

so are scant resources have more women to help from across the eu?

what about the trafficked women? what about them The trafficked people?

Op Andrea Leadsome

"For me, I spent a lot the last Parliament setting up and running the" Fresh Start project" with a group of other MPs. Our hope was that if analysed how the EU affects the UK we could propose serious reforms to make it work better for all members. I thought we would stay in a profoundly different EU. And it was only when the PM came back with clear evidence that the EU is unreformable, that I decided we are far better off by leaving. (Most of my Fresh Start colleagues concluded the same.)

I have a concern about the future of the EU and its future direction. This is likely to be our only chance in my lifetime to get an out. I think i need to find out more about the EU and how it has and is evolving.

I realise it will be a change from the status quo and there will be a bumpy time but i am sure we can ride it out eventually - as in the NZ example.

Yes the debate is good and its giving me some things to think about

sorry not supposed to be a grin after the trafficked people

How about thinking of it this way:

If you're not sure, it's probably your responsibility to vote REMAIN. It leaves all options open. If we want to leave, that can be done at any time, by an Act of Parliament.

A vote to leave is a one-way ticket. THere's no coming back if it's a mistake. It would take all other 27 countries to agree to let us in again, and we'd have to take on the Euro and a load of other things, which we have the power to veto at the moment.

If you're not absolutely convinced of the leave argument, and really knowledgeable about the risks, and prepared to take them, then you should vote Remain.

If it makes it easier for you, think about it as "Remain for now."

The Remain argument is stronger on the economy and trade.

The Leave argument is stronger on immigration and Sovereignty.

For me immigration and Sovereignty are the highest priorities. I am more concerned about unlimited immigration forever than I am a recession. I am more concerned about us being a self governing nation than I am about us getting great trade deals. So I will be voting Leave.

There's no right answer here. You have to ask yourself what matters most to you. You say you're not particularly concerned by uncontrolled immigration so perhaps you should vote Remain?

The leave argument is not stronger on immigration nor sovereignty. It is based on a lot of lies about both.

scatter - i am concerned about immigration both for us and the immigrants, i think the government has let us all down on that issue. For it to be successful it needs investment, care and time to make it work - this doesnt seem to have been done.

Switzerland and Norway have had to take a massive amount of immigrants in order to get good trade deals so i dont believe that immigration would be slashed massively should we leave, the difference being that we wont have a seat at the decision table.

Good idea about picking which topics are most important to me.

I personally don't worry about immigration, it's not an issue that worries, although I know it does worry others. My concern is the real financial picture of the EU. That 350 million number that so many point out is inaccurate, which is more accurately around 250 million after rebates, could change and likely will change in the very near future. The EU is hugely over budget right now, partially as a consequence of unanticipated events - the refugee crisis. Apparently Brussels would be already discussing budget issues by this point in the year but they are holding off until... yes after the referendum. That rebate is not in our control, Brussels decides whether to grant it or not and I expect in the next 12 months we won't be getting as much back, if any at all given the state of the EU budget.

To be honest, I have come to conclude that the UK leaving the EU will place the EU in a precarious position (and I don't write this as a reason to stay in). Too many EU nations are in economic trouble and only a few (crucially, that includes us) are arguably "thriving" economies currently. I believe that when countries like the USA urge us to stay in the EU, the prime reason is because like the banking industry in 2008, they feel the EU is too big to fail and we should stay in to help shore it up - in other words they want us to be financial guarantors.

i do wonder what will happen to the EU should we leave. If we are such a big and intergral part of the EU, surely our leaving will have a large impact. I do also wonder what other countries within the EU think about the EU. Greece aside -i think we all know what they think.

WidowWadman - I suppose Leave isn't stronger on immigration if you think uncontrolled immigration is a good thing. Remain definitely have the position for never-ending limitless immigration sewn up.

Similarly if you think outsourcing decision making to an unelected Commission and a Parliament where only 10% are British MEPs is a great example of Sovereignty then yes I suppose Remain is stronger there too.

Leave the bastard.

If the EU was a bloke he'd be taking your wages, giving you a bit of spending money back whilst going out with mates and drinking away the rest. He wouldn't be happy about you mixing with your old friends either.

You'd be left in a nice house, with most of the bills being met and worried about what would happen if you left.

We've settled in a half arsed relationship for too long now.

I've been remain from day 1. The arguments on here for leaving make me more sure remain is the right decision.

OP, I think the difficulty is that neither option is perfect. If we remain, we are stuck with the democratic deficits of the EU. If we leave, we are faced with huge economic uncertainty and risk.

My gut instinct tells me that Remain is the best option. Fundamentally, I believe in international cooperation and working in partnership with our closest neighbours, and I also think that the vast majority of experts in a wide range of fields support the campaign to stay in. I have not been at all convinced by the leave campaign, which I feel has focused on whipping up anti-immigrant prejudice while deliberately misrepresenting some of the facts. Having said that, some in the remain campaign haven't exactly covered themselves in glory either.

That's just my point of view. I hope you will vote Remein too, but obviously, others will see things differently. If you want a reasonably unbiased assessment of the facts and the validity of the claims made in either side, I think there is quite a lot on the BBC news website.

I am going to vote stay.

My decision isn't based on anything great, I am going for the safer option.

I keep to-ing and fro-ing. The Bremain lot being all "Oh bless you, you silly billies" to the Brexiters is swaying me toward out.