The EU Referendum is nearly upon us.........23rd June.

[Daisyonthegreen]

I have been invited by other posters to start a new EU Referendum Thread as the EU thread "In out shake it all about what to vote in the EU referendum "is now closed.
Anyhow this vote is is pretty crucial for the good of the country and your family.
I make no secret of the fact I feel to vote to Leave is the best option.
On the "In out shake it all about,what to vote in the EU Referendum " Thread I posted many links and gave views on why I feel that way.
I feel we would flourish free of the beaucratic ,undemocratic organisation it has turned into.
A Trading block initially started up with 9 countries in the 1970s has become out of control,mammoth and unwieldy and frankly rather dangerous.
We need to wrest back control of our own country,our borders and our ability to broker our own Trade deals which the EU insists on doing for us.
Plus our own Judicial decisions.
We on leaving would still Trade with the EU,they need us more than we need them actually but the beauty of it we could be free to broker our own deals with the rest of the world on our terms.
In short we would flourish.
We can love/ like Europe but not be in the EU.

Chalala - Every generation retires at some stage. But when this happened before, there were enough people working and contributing. This is the 9 to 5 backbone of any society where regular tax contributions are made.

The cycle of work-retirement-aged support has been affected by public purse having to take care of a large population explosion from a number of sources. 1. Refugees (who tend to have 4 children per couple), 2. supporting a growing number of young British girls who have decided to 'go it alone' as parents but have never made a net contribution, 3. People from EU countries with good work ethic who come to work here but subsequently have an impact on municipal housing when they start having children. They are not likely to remain in a shared house are they if they can apply to council, or at least apply for housing benefit for private rented.

Far more going out of the public purse than ever comes in.

Cutthewaffle you're waffling a lot about people taking more than they contribute and claiming benefits, but have nothing to support your xenophobic claims.

Having children doesn't automatically result in applying for council housing nor housing benefit. Independent of where you were born.

But that's not how demographics work, Waffle. More doctors than "normal" are retiring or will retire soon for the same reason population is ageing, because the baby boom generation is larger than the others. I don't have specific numbers right now but something like a third of GPs is thinking about retiring in the next 5 years. That was absolutely predictable, but the governments have refused to act preventively to counter the effects.

With all this migration panic, how is it actually counted? E.g. I've taken British citizenship in 2014, but retained my German citizenship at the same time - do I now get double-counted as Brit and as German and cancelling myself out for net-migration purposes?

Chalalala

If we accept migrants on an as needed basis ie when we cannot fill jobs with natives, then there need not be a quota for immigration. Governments that keep saying we'll keep immigration to x hundred thousands are spouting nonsense because the numbers depend on demand though at the moment, there is no way to curb immigration while in the EU anyway so they are all liars.

When it comes to cheap labour you are correct and of course the people that benefit from cheap labour are the middle classes up to the elite. So why any unskilled worker or low paid worker where there is competition for their job (in some cases 100 to 1 or more), voting to stay in the EU is like a turkey voting for Christmas.

I have addressed the trade agreement argument in one of my other posts.

Threedays

We keep hearing we'll be offered a deal like Norway as a way of steering the outcome of a Brexit to mean we'll still have uncontrolled immigration.

The UK will negotiate an agreement that suits the UK.
The EU has 5 million jobs that rely in exports to the UK and we have 3 million jobs that rely on exports to the EU. Who is holding the stronger card?

The UK contributes about £110 million net to the EU ( £350m less £240m rebates). Who has the stronger hand?
The UK accounts for more income to the EU than the EU represents to us. Who has the stronger hand?

If the EU prevents the UK from freely trading with the EU, irrespective of any other concessions like free movement etc, the EU will be cutting off its nose to spite its face. The leaders of the other 27 nations (not to mention the bosses of large firms like BMW, Mercedes Benz, Audi, The French farmers etc) of the EU will be up in arms if they think the EU is willfully damaging their economies just to prove a point about flexing its muscles when dealing with the UK Government.

Because the EU is only a bureaucratic layer and produces nothing, it is an entity that can disappear overnight and no one will be any worse off, except of course about 25,000 Eurocrats who can then be retrained to become useful and productive members of their receptive countries.

We have dealt with the rest of the world in the past and for the same reasons I mentioned about negotiating trade agreements with the US and other counties, it is in everyone's interest to do so.

The European council is not democratically elected by our MEPs. And once in they cannot be unseated. Very different to our system. I take your point about the House of Lords but they don't dream up laws and put them on the statue books without referringa vote in the commons. The European council can.

CutTheWaffle

Canada has a trade agreement with the EU but it does not include the free moment of people.

Just because Norway's agreement included the free movement of labour does nor mean ours will.

See my previous post as to why this is. We are in a much stronger bargaining position than Norway.

So basically your argument is that the UK will negotiate a deal that means it totally benefits from the single market without any of the costs?

Wishful thinking which has and it had said by Germany and France that it won't happen.

The rest of your argument is equally fanciful too!

Mothers on here must be told facts,it affects THEIR children here in the UK
The EU Judges have said that we in the UK must loosen !our borders,source of report the Sun newspaper (15th April)
Also: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3542860/80-000-children-miss-choice-primary-school-Crisis-intensifies-following-baby-boom-fuelled-migration.html
We must be able to control our borders.
Hence I shall vote to Leave.

Stillovingmysleep
You are still peddling this story on your posts when you have never bothered to become naturalised even though you have already claimed to have been here decades (in one of your very early posts on this thread.)
You also along with others made fun of our "stupid tests "for applying for nationality.That is insulting us and does you no favours.
Plus you claimed you couldn't afford £1,000 to be naturalised,if you had applied years ago it would not have cost that much.
You say you have a stake in this country but you ridicule the tests and haven't ever in decades bothered to become British.
Something "fishy there".

why any unskilled worker or low paid worker where there is competition for their job (in some cases 100 to 1 or more), voting to stay in the EU is like a turkey voting for Christmas.

I think it's the other way round. The EU is a relatively protected zone for workers, in terms of rights and in terms of pay even for the poorer country (compared to the rest of the world). If the UK leaves this protected zone it it will have to "liberalise" to be competitive globally, and we all know what that means: lower pay and fewer rights for workers.

*poorer countries

Oh for goodness sake Daisy. Many EU citizens have not gone through the citizenship process because they have had equal rights in terms of staying etc. I have told you I have no particular sympathy to any nationalism of any country and the citizenship was never a priority for me. I'm not sure what conspiracy theories you imagine when talking about something 'fishy'

Lurked

"Except most economic sources say that an exit from the EU would most likely cause a recession"

The same organisations said the same about the UK not adopting the Euro. Thank goodness we did not. Have a look the value of the pound to the Euro over the last 20 years. We'd have been pickled had we not been able to have a free floating exchange rate against the Euro. Why do you think Greece, Span and Italy are in such dire straits? It is because they cannot devalue their currencies to match the performance of their economies. There people have been wrong in the past about major issues and they can be wrong again.

"Europe's smaller share of world output is because of the rise of other economies especially the BRICS countries."

Which proves my point. If the EU has not expanded at the same rate as the rest of the world, then its proportion of global output percentage wise is smaller and therefore it has by comparison contracted.

"But we have a larger wieghting on our vote at the EU than many of these small countries. As said before in EU votes the UK is on the winning side 90% of the time. "

We have 9.7% of of the vote. Please tell me how that is going to give a significant weight to the outcome of a vote. All our MEPs could vote forever and not win a single resolution. Your math is statically impossible. It would not be possible for a 9.7% contingent of any organization to have a 90% chance of swaying a vote in their favour.

Show evidence. I've seen stats that show that 84% of votes in the EU pass resolutions that are not to the benefit of the UK. This makes statistical sense to me.

"Also Cameron won an agreement that we would not have to be involved in ever closer political union."
That has not been ratified and the European Commission/Supreme Court can overturn it. It is not set in stone. Given Cameron had to bow and scrape to 27 other leaders to get tax reduced on tampons, how much else do you honesly think he will ever be able to negotiate. He is and we are an insignificant voice in the EU when Turkey and all the other counties join, we'll have even less representation percentage wise.

.

Stillovingmysleep
Why make fun of tests for this country you claim to have a stake in,it's doesn't add up.
Odd
We must agree to differ.

Can you provide a link to that 87% stathe I'm genuinely interested to see it

The EU has 5 million jobs that rely in exports to the UK and we have 3 million jobs that rely on exports to the EU. Who is holding the stronger card?

Numbers mean little if you don't take into account the respective sizes of the economies.

what your figures actually mean is that the EU has 2% of its jobs relying on exports to the UK, while the UK has 10% of its jobs relying on exports to the EU. So there's a good argument to be made that it is in fact the EU holding the (much) stronger card.

It would not be possible for a 9.7% contingent of any organization to have a 90% chance of swaying a vote in their favour.

No but it's perfectly possible for a 9.7% contingent to agree with the rest of the contingent 90% of the time. It's not always a case of "what is good for other countries is bad for the UK". There is such a thing as having interests in common.

Cutthewaffle you're waffling a lot about people taking more than they contribute and claiming benefits, but have nothing to support your xenophobic claims.

Have you seen how high rents are now? What do you think couples are going to do when they want to start a family? If they are not successful in getting council flat, then they apply for housing benefit to pay a private landlord.

Xenophobic, me? My father is Pakistani, and I spend most of my days analysing DH figures. There is a significant shortfall between £ going out in the form of benefits and tax being received from individuals.

Daisy why making fun of the Life in the UK test? Because it's contents have fuck all to do with life in the UK , other than that the passing of it depends on a rote learning exercise of what the corresponding book deems to be the correct answer.

Why does it bother you so much if someone has a particular piece of paperwork? Am I less of a drain on UK resources in your view since I obtained it? Hasn't changed anything about my tax contributions.

I don't know why your father's origin would make your claims about migrants any less unfounded and xenophobic.

Xenophobic, me? My father is Pakistani

I have to say, this is a poor argument - the classic "but I have black friends" response. And it's also well known that being part of a minority does not necessarily make you any less intolerant.

To be clear I am not accusing you of xenophobia, but it is your words that make you either xenophobic or not, not who your family is.

sorry just saw Widow got there first

to go back to the 9.7% point, actually I take it back - of course it's possible for a smaller contingent to sway votes. In fact it's a well-recognised issue with Proportional Representation, the fact that:

"very small parties can act as "king-makers", holding larger parties to ransom during coalition discussions" (that's right, I'm quoting wikipedia )