Anyone else baffled by this portrayal of the EU as progressive and liberal

[Roonerspism]

It struck me today watching the march that the EU is now being protrayed as this liberal force across European states promoting fair standards for all.

From the moment I knew I no longer believed in the EU, about five years ago, it was because I saw it as the exact opposite.

And it was this that underpinned my vote to Leave.

I'm essentially left leaning and feel increasingly lost in this sea of protests!

The EU has never meant "Europe" to me and is rather the desire for a distant superstate with power in the most powerful few countries. Indeed, the current austerity placed on the Southern European countries, to the benefit of the north seems to go unnoticed to the devastated UK youth who seem not to consider the hugely unemployed youth in south Europe.

This is a capitalist project and not a humanitarian one. The reason for free movement of people as a core concept is not because it's nice to travel but solely to ensure corporations have access to a mobile and cheap workforce this encouraging greater integration. Never mind if this decimates the country of origin.

The misery of the infliction of a single currency on countries as disparate as Germany and Greece and the subsequent power held by Germany will cause untold suffering for at least a generation.

The talks to promote TTIP have largely been held in secret and further underlines the utterly undemocratic nature of this regime.

Yet here we all are. Waving our EU flags.

I'm utterly bemused. Am I mad?!?!?!

It's great for people that want cheap cleaners, gardeners and plumbers. Not so good if that is your job and you're being constantly undercut by people that sleep in their vans or overcrowded flats

Sadly it wasn't the EU that undermined the Unions, combined with Thatcher, they did that themselves.

If they had opted for "in Place of Strife" in the 1960's there would be no need for Thatcher as the 1970's issues wouldn't have arisen. However it limited some Union powers so they didn't want to. Now Trade Union membership is at a post war low and unions have even less power.

Employees claim that Eastern Europeans have a much better work ethic but neglect to mention the reasons that someone from a low waged country would be willing to work hard for a wage that is meagre by British standards

Yes and pay British living costs.

So not that great eh?

Sits and awaits the 5 to a bedroom crap....

figment I've not commented on this thread for a few days, even though I started it.

Interesting points, the crux of which is that you think the EU is not great, but we should stick with it as people will be even worse off under right wing Tory rule?

When or not I agree with that (and I don't!), it's missing the point that outside the EU we at least have a government that we elect ourselves, call to account ourselves and is democratically elected.

Call me an optimist, but removing ourselves from the EU and tackling our right wing government is preferable to the distant bloated EU which is simply not remotely democratic and over which we have less and less control.

Multioccupancy exists! And on site caravans. Why is that crap?

it's missing the point that outside the EU we at least have a government that we elect ourselves,

All the more reason to vote remain given the current trend of domestic voting (and our media) going increasingly further towards the right

I'm going to turn this around.

Can you please explain, fox, why you think the fundamental notion of Free Movement of People in the EU is a good thing for workers and, in particular, the low paid?

Yes British living costs, but working for a low wage here still offers a better standard of living all things considered than an unskilled worker could expect iin the Eastern European country of origin

As said multi occupancy does exist

Im very interested to hear the answer to Rooners question...

fox, why you think the fundamental notion of Free Movement of People in the EU is a good thing for workers and, in particular, the low paid?

Take care work. The least glamourous kind. The kind with the most vulnerable service users.

WITH free EU movement, care agencies and homes still struggle to recruit.

But there are a lot of dediated EU staff working in these jobs. Staff who enjoy care, who may have had higher ranking care jobs in their own countries (some were registerd nurses etc in their own countries).

What will we do now? Care workers will not qualify under any sort of points system

So who will we get to do it when we don't have willing EU care workers who are glad to have these car jobs?

The answer will be something akin to jobfayre - i.e. British unemployed people who don't want to be there and that is going to put our most vulnerable people in society at risk!

There are of course very dedicated British care workers too, but not enough. And with this kind of job it has to be people who are GLAD of having this kind of job, even if it's low paid

Care contracts and employment conditions will not improve either to attract more British workers, that's not going to happen. Nursing homes aren't suddenly going to have a load of extra money to pour into staff perks and more generous contracts.

IMO the free movement of people is good because it raises the standard of living for the poorest countries in the EU. Those communities in England which have suffered should have been massively supported by our government in terms of funding and investment, but they were ignored. Unscrupulous employers should be forced to comply with wage, health and safety and other regulations so that local people are not undercut.

Added to which the free movement of people also means that we are able to live and work in 27 other countries.

I think free movement opens opportunities to the low paid, if there is unemployment in your country you don't have to be stuck on the scrap heap, you can move to where there is work.

The financial crisis of 2008 has had implications for this, but over all it has been beneficial to most.

It certainly worked for the UK in the 1980s when our workers moved around the EU working. It works for around half a million to 800,000 UK nationals working in the EU.

It works for our retired in Spain and other countries.

Over all its beneficial to the exchequer too because immigrants tend to pay in more that they take out, we get workers that we haven't paid to train, and a large number go home after a period of time having contributed to the economy.

The impact on the low paid is that a 10% increase in immigration in your area causes a 1.9% drop in wages, but this is only applicable to the bottom 5% of earners. For everyone else it pushes up wages.

But there are a lot of dediated EU staff working in these jobs. Staff who enjoy care, who may have had higher ranking care jobs in their own countries (some were registerd nurses etc in their own countries)

why are migrant workers happy to do care work when british people dont want to?
are they inherantly more caring and kinder than british people?
surely not?
It just comes down to money and what you are prepared to do given the options open to you.
There must be as many EU workers who dislike it as much as the putative british 'workfare' workers would, and who are probably just as likely to mistreat the vulnerable people.

If we are taking the EU workers with the greatest aptitude for care work then we are depriving the countries of origin of the care workers they need for their own elderly people.

We need to get our own house in order when it comes to pay rather than externalizing the costs

And going back to care, yes it's low paid, always was low paid, and always will be low paid for the forseeable future in or out of Europe

But what migrant workers have brought to care is a raise in standards for everyone, if they are there with a sense of pride in what they're doing, that cultivates a better culture of working and care for everyone working in or availing of care.

When care is just "the job you get when you can't get any other job" post Brexit, it'll be a HORRIBLE awful depressing sector to work in

why are migrant workers happy to do care work when british people dont want to? are they inherantly more caring and kinder than british people?
surely not?

No. But you work differently when youre glad to be in your job than when you're not

There are Brits who like having care work, but not enough.

If we are taking the EU workers with the greatest aptitude for care work then we are depriving the countries of origin of the care workers they need for their own elderly people again, no. A lot of those countries do not have the outsourced care structure that we have

Im curious as to why it is free movements fault for wages and not the employers fault.

And, if you're British, and working alongside people who are glad to come to work, it rubs off and you feel happier at work too

If you are (as I predict) surrounded by jobfayre type colleagues, your own moral goes down and your ability to care goes down with that

it's not that brits are any more or less caring than europeans

The problem is one of trying to unite countries which are too different economically and culturally to form a cohesive and integrated whole

Importing cheap labour to do our unpleasant and unpopular jobs means that companies can get their dirty work done without payinh a fair and reasonable rate for it

More profits for the people at the top

Because that is the idea right?

tackle British unemployment by taking away the ease of which employers can use EU migrants

Care sector uses A LOT of EU migrants

I'm not saying that British people aren't caring, I'm saying that British people who don't want to work in care but are forced to in whatever upcomming jobfayre-esque regime we have in store to make our unemployed take the jobs they previously wouldn't take… will be less caring than someone who chose, or even moved countries, for that job

Because they WON'T raise standards to make these jobs more appealing, they'll just force the unemployed, or youth not attaining at schools, to do these jobs instead. And the won't want to be there so they will care less about the service users

Importing cheap labour to do our unpleasant and unpopular jobs means that companies can get their dirty work done without payinh a fair and reasonable rate for it

Jobfayre also served companies the same way, and "modern apprenticeships" get rid of the pesky minimum wage issue nicely

No EU migrants won't raise the standards of these jobs, there's other (shittier) ways these companies can get work done cheap

so we're going to go from filling the less desirable jobs with people who chose to apply for them, and even moved countries to do them

to filling these jobs with people who are forced to apply, and who can't leave if their employer treats them badly, because they have to show up under job fayre or because they're under 18 and the job counts as "education" because they're learning to use a cash register for £3.50/hr

Is that really a better britain?

As it stands, if a low wage employer is an asshole, an EU migrant can quit and apply elsewhere, so the jobs may be low paid, but they still have to have a level of decency towards their employees

If we end up with employer-linked visas, more job-fayre etc.. employers can treat people much much worse. Because they can't quit

Standards for workers will DROP not raise

IDK what fantasy you've got about care workers being dedicated saints. We've had hundreds of home care workers and the vast vast majority were people who were doing it because they couldn't get any other job. Unemployed people are already forced into zero hours care work. 16 year old semiliterate girls are already sent to do complex care after watching a DVD on washing their hands.

Even the best agencies regularly break working time directives and (due to travelling call to call) all carers come out with less than their wage; the ones on minimum wage never actually get that in their pocket.

All of these consequences you outline are things that have already happened.