UK government releases report on brexit; 'would affect the lives of millions'

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/...uk-report-says

Just an open question to those who want out and see the EU as this fascist monster vampire squid sucking out UK sovereignty - if the EU was such a threat to the government why would it publish a report that is pro-EU?

Cameron doesn't matter, he doesn't have any power. He's just a PR man and a mediator for the people who put him there. The out crowd speak of sovereignty and power as though more than a semblance of democracy exists in the UK. Just look at the smear campaign against Milliband or Corbyn or the two or so million voters for UKIP who got one MP. Thinking that leaving the EU will change this is absurd, it will only make it worse.

The referendum is the product of a decade or two of negative press and EU bashing by the personal press corps of Murdoch, Barcley, Desmond and Rothermere. You think these lot want what's best for the British people or the future of our country?

It's tempting to vote to stay out just to see who the Tory Press corps blame next for immigration, rising cost of living and sharp decline in wages, inequality and all the other evils they've left at the door of the EU, which are in fact just the logical conclusion of pure free market fundamentalism.

Personally I wonder what's the use of a referendum when public opinion is shaped and framed by a handful of people? Will the UK's problems go away by walking away from Europe? Do you really trust men like Boris Johnson, Murdoch or Gove to speak for you? For me the out campaign is about fear and lies not hope.

Well you're obviously angry, but some of what you write doesn't follow through. Cameron got where he is firstly by being elected as an MP by his constituents, and secondly being elected as PM by the Conservative MPs. Does he have power? Well a good chairman gets action by pulling a board of directors together and any PM who went and did his own thing without the backing of the cabinet wouldn't last very long.

Yes, UKIP and SNP got about the same number of votes yet the SNP got 50 MPs and UKIP got one. It's the way our rather flawed 'first past the post' system works, however in 2011 the UK population decided to continue with that system rather than the 'alternative vote' method. Deciding things in this manner is democracy even though you may not agree with the outcome.

Many in the Conservative Party have been lukewarm about Europe for decades, the decision to put the referendum in the Conservative manifesto was to placate those MPs, not because of some press pressure.

I agree with your first sentence. Most voters haven't bothered to do any research of their own and yes, their opinion will be shaped by a handful of people. This worries me.

On the other hand, do you really trust Cameron, Osborne, et al to portray the facts? For me the IN campaign is about FUD.

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"For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)

Good points, I would agree on several of them. I certainly don't trust Cameron or Osbourne, they're micromanagers who were groomed for leadership. I believe they couldn't care less about the UK.

The FPTP vote was deeply regrettable indeed. I don't believe you can have a functioning democracy when half the citizenry are told what to think by a crinkled Australian with US residency and the non-dom tax dodger 'Lord' Rothermere who lives in Monaco.

You're no doubt right about the referendum coming about to assuage the old Tory backbenchers rather than the media corps vilifying and scapegoating the EU. It bears a resemblance to the success of Trump in the US. The chickens coming home so to speak.

And the three big "IN" campaigns are all funded by Goldman sachs and JP morgan......who of course would have the best interests of the British people at heart and not that little city within a city full of fraudsters !!!

All this chit chat about in or out. Is it only me who can see. No matter what way the vote goes', we will be in. What the PM is asking. With the in or out vote is. If out. It give's the Prime Minister a mandate to get a better deal to re join. If we leave, as some one said. We will be back.
John933

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To buy petrol in Europe. Pull up at station. Wait. Get out a 20 Euro note, then ask someone to fill up the bike. Give person money. Ride away. Simple.

Could you provide evidence for that? And if so, I would agree - Goldman Sachs apparently cooked the books so Greece qualified for EU membership, a disaster and they cooked the books so Osbourne et al could flog off our Royal Mail and cost us billions. They are elitist institutions that have zero accountability or morality. (Though remember it was the UK gov that opposed the 'Robin Hood' bank levy which the EU tried to bring about).

One has to decide for herself, I've looked at EU policies (and provided examples here) and along with my general ideas about the world I think we're better off remaining in and working with our European partners to improve the EU. It's no good looking at what Goldman Sachs or Murdoch want, they're only out for their own interests.

But some of my reasons are selfish too - I like being an EU citizen, I like the idea I can move, work, travel and if needed, collect welfare in other EU countries. I like the idea my kids could escape the £9'000k p/a tuition fees. I think more choice is better. I think the UK has done very well from free movement within the EU.

For me no one has been able to point out just why we ought to leave the EU or what is fundamentally wrong with it - honestly I'd like to know, maybe I'm just uninformed!

For me the Brexit argument goes like this; "don't worry we'll have all the benefits of EU membership, free movement, access to the common market, etc but we won't have to pay for it", which makes me question why leave the EU and if this is really a realistic proposition. I think the EU are going to be pretty unforgiving If we leave. Why should we have all the benefits without the costs?

What's more I'm not convinced in the slightest that leaving the EU will solve immigration, or save the NHS (seriously as if men like Gove, Lansely et al give a **** about the NHS) or dampen the looming trans-atlantic trade deal, etc. Things will only get worse, climate change, mass migration, resource wars and middle eastern instability, unprecedented inequality and corporate unaccountability, these won't pass over the UK simply because we back out and walk away from Europe. If anything, I feel we'll be in less of a position to influence them. We're no longer an island.

It was certainly Goldman Sachs that signed off the accounts that were used to justify the entry of Greece to the Euro currency; much has been written about that in financial commentary.

Many of the current governors of the central banks have Goldman Sachs in their career/CV.

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Dave

How so?
Please refer to my post of a few hours ago for 33 pages of positive plans.

Meanwhile, here is something to cheer you:
The International Rescue Committee: A Trojan Horse of the Globalists? | UK Column
David M has appeared on UK TV by video link from his international HQ to speak about the referendum.
There are no prizes for deducing his POV.

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Dave

A somewhat interesting insight into how to negotiate like the EEAS do it (yes, I haven't heard of this EEAS before, but we all see them on the world stage):
Empire Building Under The Radar: How Europe Uses Its External Action Service | UK Column

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Dave

For a minute I thought you were going to let rip and really tell it how it is.

The post in here of 4 march is worth your consideration.
Vote to Leave the EU
the earlier posts in that blog are also relevant to your distress.
e.g.

“We should be bloody angry about the way Cameron on the one hand, and ignorant Parliamentary bench stuffers on the other, are stealing our people’s referendum away from ordinary voters. There is nothing grassroots about the campaigns to date. They are all by politicians, for politicians, with the grassroots asked to clap and cheer them in the right places, and get out and do the donkey work with clipboards and leaflets, while the political star turns waltz in and out of TV and radio studios parading their stupidity.”

There is common ground and I will come back to the matter - I've been reading other places, again.

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Dave

You're so heavy on the brexit stuff- but why do you believe we should leave? What are your personal reasons for wanting to go? For every pro-brexit article I could shoot back five pro-remain articles. For me there are many facets of the eu, and while I'm pretty disgusted at the treatment of Greece and little doubt corporations, especially the banks, hold way too much influence over it, seems to me that our press, media and political establishment are so far right, anything which is going to counter balance this is for me, a good thing. As I've said already I believe most of the problems laid at the door of the EU are actually problems inherent within neo-liberal economics which has been dogmatically pursued by successive governments since the 1970's and the EU has made a very useful scapegoat.

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Paul "Every county of England, every country of Europe and every (part of every inhabited) continent of the Earth" 94% done! What's left? Central America, East, Central and West Africa, Australia & New Zealand

I can see that you haven't read the 100+ page report that I posted a few days ago, nor the 33 page report posted more recently.

Right wing, left wing, any old wing means nothing to me personally.

Sure there are many facets to the EU but it is only a part of Europe*, a trading bloc with increasing centralist plans to form it's own single government.
Where the concept of the common market has come from over the past 40 years is not an indication of where it is going in the next 40 years.

I prefer the world wide view of where the UK will stand in the future, rather than the single government of 28, no doubt more in the future, diverse societies.

*A sub-regional entity

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Dave

Richard North writes succinctly and quite eloquently in reviewing the current build up to the referendum campaign, including aspects of current media output and the various players who have made their pronouncements.
EU Referendum

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Dave