Links to in/out pros and cons please?

[Wordsaremything]

Thanks. I am in a huge quandary over this and haven't been able to source anything reputable that looks at the issue dispassionately. Most articles I've seen simply make assertions. I am beginning to wonder whether everyone is simply stabbing in the dark from an entrenched position.

It's relatively easy to get info on the pros and cons of staying in, though you have to judge for yourself how biased it is.

The bigger issue is how you assess the pros and cons of leaving, because no one is discussing what our future relationship with the EU will look like. A future inside the EEA, like Norway, would look very different from a future outside all existing EU treaties and agreements.

Well... if you've not found it already here's the BBC summary www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-32793642
Acts as a placemarker for me too, if anyone's got better ideas. I am generally pro-EU, but wish I had a crystal ball right now. Someone mentioned fullfact for checking on claims.

Don't forget that the BBC, as a recipient of EU funding inter alia, is not precisely an unbiased source, no matter that it presents itself as one.

The biggest issue really is that there hasn't been a discussion, as Misti says, on what "being out of the EU" would entail for the UK. That said, it doesn't really matter - as I've said on other threads, UK voters are inherently conservative, and though it might be a close run thing, sadly (imo) the UK will vote to remain.

That's what I mean. I don't know what being 'out' would mean. Would we join the EEA ? And if so what would that entail? So many very arcane issues which the general voter won't be interested in. So heart versus head. I think it will be a very very close run thing, with a tiny minority voting for status quo.

I'm a natural left of centre euorophile but I am not keen an unfettered economic immigration, and absolutely not sold that this is universally a good thing and our economy would collapse without these people. Bur I am also not really clear on whether in or out would make a difference ( given the le touquet agreement to hold the current MENA migrants at Calais is independent of eu.)

On the other hand I care passionately about our northern uplands, whose farmers are kept going by eu environmental subsidies- which have done a great deal to re establish native birds for example.

I am conflicted.

I think if the UK joins the EEA the implications are pretty clear - it would have to sign up to free labour movement, comply with the main tenets of European legislation on issues such as working conditions, the environment and consumer safety, and would be required to pay for access to the free market (but without having any say in the making of future European laws).

What really bothers me is that most eurosceptics seem to think that some sort of alternative deal can be done with the EU, without considering how and why this might happen, and at what cost. In order to reduce the risk of more exits, there will be a faction in favour of imposing punitive conditions (I suspect Belgium and probably France will be in this camp, as well as most of Eastern Europe). This is what concerns me most, as an EU-based employee of a large British manufacturer which does a lot of business in Europe.

Ultimately, we don't know and no one seems to be talking about it. When you think about all the shit that the SNP got for not having firm plans regarding its future currency, it's hard to understand why people aren't criticising the "leave" side for not even wanting to discuss their post-referendum strategy (I don't count hand waving about how we can trade with the commonwealth and China - there is literally nothing stopping us doing that now, it's a non-argument).

Agree Misti, DH and I were discussing and came to the conclusion that it might be pretty chaotic for a number of years if the 'leave' campaign does suceed. I am quite nervous about what it will mean for us as a EU/Brit family.

Ironically we are on holiday while referendum takes place so I will have to arrange postal voting.

Mistigris we can - and indeed do - already trade with the Commonwealth and China. However, EU legislation prevents us from offering favourable trade deals to, say, Commonwealth countries at the expense of the EU: so taffifs are higher for non-EU members, which helps (and is intended to) stimulate intra-EU trade. It's not about trade in the abstract, per se, but the trade deals we actually negotiate, that are affected by EU membership. We can't choose to treat any nation differently from the way the EU has decided that they will be treated - whether that's favourable or unfavourably.

hefzi and depending on the UK's future relationship with the EU, that may still be the case (eg an agreement to join the EEA). The problem is that the leave campaign doesn't have a plan, so we can't evaluate it.

I'm quite prepared to consider the arguments of the brexiteers, but they have to actually tell us what they plan to do and how they plan to achieve it, and what their contingency plans look like should they not get what they want.

I don't see how one can have a sensible conversation about pros and cons without knowing where we are headed.

We don't know where we're headed with the EU either.

Many people who voted back in 1975 on EEC membership said where we are now is never what they voted for back then.

Same applies now no less than then.

I voted in 1975 and I don't regret voting to stay in.

Ironically, one of the greatest speeches in favour of staying in what was then the Common Market, was made by the newly elected leader of the Conservative Party, who knew very well was she was saying:

www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102675

typo - 'what' not 'was' in last line

Here is a link to an article that I have found which appears to be the most incisive on the issues

Palebluedotty, If the UK votes to leave now, we won't get back in. We can't go grovelling in a few years and beg to be let back in, if we make a mistake. We could, however, have another referendum. Other countries (especially France) isn't that desperate to have us. It's often forgotten that the UK tried to join the Common Market before 1972, but France (De Gaulle) blocked us.

As misti says, the No campaigners don't actually know what they want to replace the EU and until they come up with some kind of coherent agenda, everything else is wishful thinking.

One thing that is at the centre of ,y thinking is that the EU wants to become a single political block...a sort of united States of Europe.

We, and particularly the PM don't want to be part of the USE. As Eukrope does become more integrated we will become more isolated from the rest of it.

Which does raise the basic question, why do we stay as part of something we don't want to be part of?

If the vote goes to Out, then I personally may campaign strongly against joining the EEA. That's completely wrong when so many UK people have voted Out specifically as an anti-immigrant gesture. Need a free-trade without free movement of people agreement like what Canada has or Morocco is working towards. They said on Radio4 that Canada needed 7 yrs to set up its FT agreement with EU.

All this stress & cost of Referendum only to get EEA-status would be huge ultimate insult to British voters.

daphne i see what you're saying. In practice, though, it's been 40 years between EEC and this referendum. If it's 'remain' this time I don't think 'we the people' will be offered a referendum regular as clockwork if we don't like developments (and there will be developments). I think we are talking commitment for another generation. Voting 'remain' will give EU leaders a mandate to press on full steam ahead with whatever plans they have and if we don't like it we'll be forever told, 'well you voted to stay in so lump it'.

A lot of people are voting 'leave' not because they have a crystal ball and know what will happen, but because they see how things are in the EU and know what they don't want.

And yet one of the areas of negotiation on which Cameron was successful was on the opt out from ever closer union.

In any case the increase in isolationism in Europe has basically knocked "ever closer Union" on the head for a political generation. I can't think of any country apart from Belgium which would still wholeheartedly support this as an aim.

No side has a crystal ball, we don't know what the EU will become and we don't know what life outside will be like.

I am normally risk averse and I want to leave.

No one is expected to have a crystal ball, but they do need a plan, and a strategy for achieving it.

Even being honest about whether an EEA type arrangement is on the cards would at least make it easier to make a rational decision. Surely those voting to leave need to know that they are not voting in favour of an EEA type relationship involving reduced influence but continued free labour movement?

Remember you only get a vote to leave or stay in - you will not get any say on subsequent negotiations (except at the ballot box).