How will you vote in the EU referendum-Leave or Stay?

[BritBrit]

How will you be voting? Can admin add a poll?

In any case, the migrant crisis is a classic example of a European-wide problem that Britain will have to deal with whether in or out of the EU.

Better be a voice inside the EU and try and influence the migrant policy, than be outside the EU and be sure to have zero influence (and all of the consequences anyway).

The migrant crisis is an example of the exit side clutching at straws to try and justify their views, and from many of them it reveals their real feelings regarding immigration.

Economic migration is completely separate to the refugee crisis.

I am firmly in favour of leaving the EU, I welcome a points based immigration system for all but refugees are different for obvious reasons.

Please don't tar 'brexit' supporters with being anti humanitarian, it's lazy.

I'm afraid your co supporters do that for you, the number of points that are made that conflate EU migrants with refugees are immense.

How comes there's only like 4 of us on this thread, where is everyone else?

Extra missionary work required today Whiskey, calming down the troubled masses who've been wound up by Cameron's 'war', 'conflict' 'genocide', peak Project Fear nonsense. Agreeing with them when they say their Prime Minister is attempting to treat them like fools.

Very rewarding.

Those of you who want to keep open your children’s options for living/working in the EU, what about those of us whose children want to live/work here? I know two local teenagers who are out of work, they’ve both been recently beaten to jobs by better qualified multi-lingual EU applicants. No point in scoffing at how useless the UK education system is, or how crap these two youngsters must be, to lose out – it’s happened, and it happens regularly. The UK taxpayer now has to support these two, and all the others who are in the same boat.

Free movement gets massively skewed when the constituent countries have such differing standards of living. The UK NMW is getting on for ten times more than the equivalent in the poorest EU countries, the UK’s education/welfare systems and NHS are far better than the poorest countries’ systems/services. Huge numbers from the poorest countries therefore want to move to the richest countries, but the reverse isn’t true. So when that movement happens, the richest countries have to deal with not only supporting an increasing number of immigrants, but also supporting their own citizens. The UK fares particularly badly, because many migrants speak English so the UK is a very popular choice, but hardly any UK citizens speak even basic French/German, let alone any of the rarer EU languages.

You can spout all the statistics you like, “only 4%” – but 4% is getting on for 1 in 20 of the UK population, that’s millions of new arrivals over the last ten years, with no way of controlling the influx. EU migrants claim less in benefits than the locals – so what? The UK taxpayer still has to provide for the locals, they aren’t going anywhere.

Well said Limer I couldn't agree more

A lot of Merkel's guests were half-way though their studies in architecture, brain surgery etc too when they had to flee. Europe is going to need a lot of University places for these new arrivals. With our standard of education in the UK as poor as the OECD says it is, our children will not be able to compete successfully.

But you can already see that on many courses in UK universities - 2 British students within cohort of 42 at the last graduation ceremony I went to. The British students are saddled with so much debt from their first degree they cannot afford to remain to study for a Masters.

We have a generation of young, saddled with debt, unable to afford suitable accommodation in which to live and start and family and discovering that their degrees have not secured them a graduate-level job.

They want the country to have a good shake up. More of the same is not filling them with hope.

Until our government is willing to invest in better education and training for our own children, they won't be able to compete with their better-educated, better-qualified competitors. Doesn't that make you feel slightly ashamed to be British? I'm not sure why people like to go on about how we're the best at everything, because it's clearly not true. We should be equipping our own children with the skills they need to compete, not removing the competition. That's hardly going to help a post-Brexit UK be the success story you all seem to think it will.

The answer to everything - throw more money at it. It isn't.

Funny how the children in village schools years ago, 40 to a class, without interactive white boards, internet access and with a minimum of materials managed to learn complex mathematics, grammar, foreign languages, and an appreciation of literature - on what today would be considered a shoe-string.

Our education system today fails our children.

Our teachers today fail our children.

" I know two local teenagers who are out of work, they’ve both been recently beaten to jobs by better qualified multi-lingual EU applicants."

Yet most studies show that EU immigration doesn't cause unemployment. Lets be honest though, if your two teenagers had tried a bit harder at school they woudln't be in this position. The employer took on the best candidates for the job. For what its worth, I a fair number of new graduates who are in very ordinary jobs because they haven't decided what they want to do, or are saving up for their next stage. The lower qualified are being pushed out of the jobs market.

"The UK NMW is getting on for ten times more than the equivalent in the poorest EU countries, the UK’s education/welfare systems and NHS are far better than the poorest countries’ systems/services. Huge numbers from the poorest countries therefore want to move to the richest countries, but the reverse isn’t true"

People don't come here and live for free, they have to pay rent and costs etc. You can get a higher standard of living in other countries cheaper. If you come and get the NMW here you're going to spend an awful lot on living costs.

As repeatedly said the UK's wonderful education and welfare system aren't the reason that people come here from the EU. In fact the vast majority of EU immigrants don't use these because they tend to be young and single.

You also state this like you think other EU countries are LEDCs, they most certainly are not, medical care in Poland is just as good as it is here for example, education systems are just as good.

"The UK fares particularly badly, because many migrants speak English"

What a load of clap trap! Maybe some of the ones who are here short term, to work on building sites with others from their own country ( much like many Brits did in the 1980s), but the vast majority can and do speak English.

I can spout data as much as I like? Oh thank you for permission, you evidently don't need permission to spout unfounded rubbish on here.

BTW 4% of 20 is 0.8 but the 3 million EU migrants in the UK make up about 4.6% of the populatiuon. See not the hoardes you have imagined, especially when you include Irish nationals in the number.

"The UK taxpayer still has to provide for the locals, they aren’t going anywhere"

EU immigration doesn't lead to unemployment :

www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/briefings/labour-market-effects-immigration

See I have data to prove that too.

*Lets be honest though, if your two teenagers had tried a bit harder at school they woudln't be in this position.

Victim blaming.

Perhaps they had a crap teacher?

I've seen many Brexit posters stating that they weren't anti-immigration, they just wanted Britain to be able to give preference to skilled immigrants over unskilled immigrants. But now apparently skilled immigrants don't pass muster either...

Attracting skilled migrants who come contribute to your country but that you don't have to pay to educate is win/win. As pointed out above they don't "steal" jobs, they're a net benefit.

See I have data to prove that too

Data proves nothing.

Data must be processed into meaningful information.

Information must be assessed to provide knowledge.

Knowledge is power.

"Funny how the children in village schools years ago, 40 to a class, without interactive white boards, internet access and with a minimum of materials managed to learn complex mathematics, grammar, foreign languages, and an appreciation of literature - on what today would be considered a shoe-string"

But they didn't did they? The bench mark of average which is now 5 A*-Cs C being the old O level pass) incuding maths and english was not achieved by many. In fact only abouy 35% of people took O levels at all, the rest were CSE. Oh and before you start on about the new qualifications being "easier", they aren't and the way they are marked is far fairer than the bell curve used for O level which meant that an A grade one year could be a C in another.

Ah your rose tinted sepia vision is tainted there a little isn't it?

Attracting skilled migrants who come contribute to your country but that you don't have to pay to educate is win/win.

Not for the country that educated and trained them. Draining other countries, especially poor countries, of the 'brains' they have educated and invested in, in order to save your own training budgets, in is actually morally reprehensible.

Attracting skilled migrants who come contribute to your country but that you don't have to pay to educate is win/win. As pointed out above they don't "steal" jobs, they're a net benefit.

Completely agree. So why can't we introduce a points-based system to achieve this, instead of having to provide for everyone who chooses to move here from the EU?

But I did use the data to make my point.

Your point about brain drain misses the importance of remittances on developing economies, but in reality EU populations moving here are not draining their own countries of their educated populations.

Of course they were better educated years ago - when teachers were a respected profession and knew how to teach.

I've had graduates working for me who didn't know the circumstances in which to employ 'there', their' or 'they're'.

They've probably been baby-sat through their education by some illiterate, innumerate, pink-haired weirdo with more metal in their face than a prize bull masquerading as a teacher.

Oh and not victim blaming at all spring? But I certainly do not have any sympathy with anyone who goes through the UK education system, with all of the opportunities that it offers and then whinges that foriegners took their job.

I'm sure they did have a crap teacher, in fact all their teachers were probably crap, I mean you said that we were failing our children through the education system so therefore it must be true.

Your point about brain drain misses the importance of remittances on developing economies, but in reality EU populations moving here are not draining their own countries of their educated populations.

The Polish Ambassador to the Uk disagrees with you. Poland is trying to get its well-educated to stay in the country and is trying to entice some back. Poland does not want to be a dormitory country for the poor, sick and elderly, kept afloat by the remittances of their young and talented.

Strange that on visits to Poland there seem to be lots of bright young things who are permanently libing there and making cities like Gdansk, Krakow and Warsaw really quite vibrant. That is seems to be doing pretty well as an economy.

The opportunity to live and work in another country is part of the attraction, and the fact that graduate unemployment is slightly higher in Poland than it is here.

But I certainly do not have any sympathy with anyone who goes through the UK education system,

Me too. No way can they compete wit countries that have superior teachers and well-disciplined classrooms and education-hungry children.

with all of the opportunities that it offers and then whinges that foriegners took their job.

No, the poor education that the State gave them leftthem unable to compete with foreigners.

I'm sure they did have a crap teacher, in fact all their teachers were probably crap,

True.

I mean you said that we were failing our children through the education system so therefore it must be true

Not just me saying it. The OECD said our children's education was poor - UK out performed by Finland and Estonia.

www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/global-school-rankings-interactive-map-shows-standards-of-education-across-the-world-10247405.html

Not for the country that educated and trained them. Draining other countries, especially poor countries, of the 'brains' they have educated and invested in, in order to save your own training budgets, in is actually morally reprehensible.

Not necessarily. My training in a very specific field was received in my home country and paid for by its taxpayers, with the formal obligation on my end to work in a public job to pay back my "debt". I then went to work in the UK with the blessing of my government, because they judged that working for another EU country's government-related institution benefited the broader EU public and therefore "counted" as repayment.

This is the sort of benefit you get from being in the EU that is not reflected by "we pay in X and receive Y in subsidies" bean-counting.