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.

The European Convention on Human Rights is a separate institution from the European Union (with a much wider membership - includes every European country besides Belarus). If we leave the EU we will remain a member of the ECHR - so we'll continue to be subject to rulings like the on on prisoner voting. The ECHR allows people across Europe to take action against governments and institutions - for example the Hillsborough families forced the second inquest using this.

BUT many Tories/UKIP also want out of the ECHR too. As I understand it we can't leave while we're in the EU (membership is a condition of EU membership). So a leave vote makes getting out of the ECHR more likely, but as with a lot of things in this debate no one really knows.

There are also other specific pieces of EU legislation like on equal pay, maternity etc.

• "When the UK Government made no attempt to amend the Equal Pay Act to take account of the 1975 Directive, the Commission issued proceedings in the European Court of Justice (ECJ), and in 1982 the ECJ ruled in favour of the Commission. The UK was then obliged to amend the Equal Pay Act to include an equal value claim. This greatly expanded the scope for women to use the Equal Pay Act, as establishing equal value is considerably easier than demonstrating “equal work”.

Thank you both. That was my understanding. I also seem to remember that it was relatively recently some Tories (Boris?) saying we had to get out of the ECHR. I'm glad, I was honestly beginning to doubt myself, and had thought I was pretty clear!

This thread looks really like the other ones created by political activists who have the "mumsnet demographic" on their to-do list. Because women are feeble minded sheep who will be swayed by jolly videos and not question any of the spurious claims about animal welfare or maternity rights.

In the UK, we have higher standards in pig farming than any other UK country. We have more generous maternity allowances than the EU rules give. It irks me when people post things from the project fear playbook, as not everyone will question them. Although, given this is mumsnet, most will.

kate i promise you I am not what you are implying. I've been around mumsnet for years and was just super depressed at all the mudwrestling on immigration. Obvs I'm using stuff I see around facebook etc.

kate on the second para missing the point - of course the UK has relatively good standards on those points, though being in the EU we have said that this means that the UK can (and has) lead and ensure that these are EU wide - benefits for pigs, benefits for women re. maternity leave etc. This means more of a level playing field for UK businesses as well.
If we leave the UK government would of course be able to get rid of these standards should they wish.

kitty I'm not actually in the remain or leave camp yet, and will probably end up voting for whichever side seems to be stretching the truth least.

In the interests of truth non-stretching I should probably point out that although it's true that the UK could rip up all sorts of rules on leaving the EU, we are a parliamentary democracy and there is no indication from any major party that animal welfare and maternity is under threat. For balance I should point out that the leave side are also coming up with a lot of bollocks

kate Good good. Like I said, they can get rid of them Should they wish . Though I'd like to point you to Priti Patel's little statement about reducing "social regulation" after Leaving in her speech the other day.

Plus the point is also that this thread is about positive things from the EU and I reckon Maternity rights and animal welfare fall in that category.

"What does the EU do for us? To rebuild Manchester after the 1996 bomb, UK gov pledged 450k. The EU 21.5 million!"
www.facebook.com/ILoveMCRdotcom/photos/a.218970484843162.53910.218595138214030/1109896739083861/?type=3&theater

What the EU did for Merseyside:
www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/17-things-european-funding-done-10925208

What Thatcher wanted to do for Liverpool:
www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/dec/30/thatcher-government-liverpool-riots-1981

There has been some awful redevelopment in Liverpool centre. If it's the EU's fault it's not a good news story!

As for the cathedral and St Georges hall.Really.. the contribution is not that vast. I well remember putting my pennies in the jar as a kid to help finish off t he cathedral. It's been a long haul as any such project is.

I don't want to just knock for knocking sake but these puff pieces go too far.

Of course eu investment had been valuable to help after the decline of trade through Liverpool as UK trade orientated towards Europe and favoured east coast ports.

apologies if its already been linked.

www.theguardian.com/society/2016/may/31/what-has-the-eu-ever-done-for-my-town

Be interesting to see how much money the Tories will put into deprived areas post Brexit

The thing is though, the money isn't free. We pay money into Europe and they pay some of it back and tell us how to use it. So it's not as if the EU is this lovely benevolent uncle that helps us rebuild deprived areas: for we were not part of it, we'd have more cash to invest in these sorts of projects.

we'd have more cash to invest in these sorts of projects.

You think the Tories will fund deprived (usually Labour supported) areas? Did austerity pass you by?

Well nothing is free. Again the point in thread is that nobody's really talking about some of the good projects! And stuff that has been done.
Anyways to respond the regions have a lot of power in choosing which projects and where
The idea is that the money is generally focused on the poorest regions Europe wide as part of the solidarity principle to try and bring up the poorest, to try and ensure a stable, connected Europe across the board. Some of them happen to be in the UK. Others are elsewhere. This type of funding has had a massive and positive impact in ireland, for example.
And this particular chunk of funding is a tiny tiny proportion of our UK GDP.
Also I don't see the UK government rushing to do these kinds of deep infrastructure funding in the North and Southwest...

The Guardian piece mentions St George's Hall again. The Echo quoted that the eu gave just 3m of the 20 odd million cost. Too misleading.

Free trade, jobs and tax receipts. Car manufacturers such as Nissan base some car assembly plants here so that they have tariff free access to the EU single market - a base of 500m consumers. These support lots of jobs in component manufacturers. If we are not in the EU, WTO rules are a 10% tariff on car manufacturing. Yes, we would have access to the free market in the EEA, but we would also need to have free movement and agree to EU rules so no real gain from Brexit.

Also financial services. Half the world's financial services firms have based their EU headquarters in the EU, generating huge tax receipts - over 10% of UK taxes are from financial services. In order to be in the single market for financial services, a firm needs to be regulated in an EU country - not EEA. Swiss banks such as UBS set up large offices in London so that they can access the single market. With Brexit, under any scenario they would have to move to another EU country. Active contingency plans are underway for this. Although bankers are hardly popular, tax receipts from the City are vital in supporting UK public spending, particularly given that the country is still running a large deficit.

Yup. The EU represents a market of 500 million customers! What business wouldn't want access?

On another note this economic history analysis highlights the economic benefits over the years - compared to pre EU membership voxeu.org/article/britain-s-eu-membership-new-insight-economic-history