The referendum on Europe

[Dottie1943]

I sat last night and watched the Dimbleby Show and was just amazed to hear these politicians of all parties saying or not saying that their leaders were all against having a referendum!

Why, if we have this new tool at our disposal after 100,000 people have voted for it to be discussed, are the likes of David Cameron, Ed Milliband and that waste of space Liberal leader now telling the MP's they are to vote against it?

Have they not noticed its the PEOPLE of this country, those same people of this country who voted them in, who want it!!!!! When it comes to the next general election I will have a list a mile long to speak to my MP about in an open forum if he votes no on Monday!!!!

[Papaumau]

Of course you are dead right, Dottie, as if 100,000 people want a full discussion on ANY subject in the commons, ( incuding a referendum on any important subject ), they - the politicos - have no right to veto this suggestion.

Having said that I am always a bit wary of referenda as while they are a democratic "tool" just as you describe they can often produce very skewed results because of the flaws built into the thought-processes of certain for or against or uneducated people that might vote out of instinct rather than out of conscious knowledge.

This subject in particular is an extremely complex one that even many experts in the European Union don't understand enough of to make an informed vote on.

If this is the case and even IF many of the people that are going to choose to vote in any such referendum DO actually know what they are going to vote accurately for or against, then  in the main, most of the voters are going to vote because of their traditional political stances of old.

In referendas I have found that most of the people who do want to vote are either activists, who are politically opposed to, or are in favour of, some idea without actually really understanding what the depth of the question is all about.

That is why we engage politicans to examine such complex subjects as they are in a much better position to find out about and to debate about all of the intricacies attached to such referenda BEFORE they might be put to the people. That also aside, they too might eventually vote in the commons just because of political bias rather than any real consideration for or against the subject.

Yes Dottie, I feel that referenda on complex subjects like Europe are a minefield and might not actually produce the correct outcome for us all if it is left to us to vote for or against it.

[caminito]

Papa
I am sorry that you feel that the British electorate is either uneducated or maybe too thick to vote in an EU referendum 
Using your logic then the same must apply at a general election  So why have  democracy ...the Plebs don't understand politics ...so much better left to our intellectual masters to decide for us .

Do we install another dictatorship in Lybia OR help them to democracy ( warts and all)

Incidentally , where do you place yourself . Pleb or intellectual master  ?

My comments are not meant to be provocative !
What is the correct outcome . Surely what the people want . Right OR Wrong ! That's democracy !
quote...
 "might not actually produce the correct outcome for us all if it is left to us to vote for or against it."

AN OVERWHELMING 75 per cent of Britons would vote in a referendum to quit the EU or renegotiate the terms, a poll published exclusively by the Daily Express reveals today.

Given a choice to stay in or get out – without the option to renegotiate – 52 per cent would quit, 31 per cent would stay in, while the rest are “don’t knows”.

[Dottie1943]

Caminito

I am so pleased your comments are not meant to be provocative because that could cause no end of problems

As an intellectual personally I don't know any plebs and so therefore I believe that the voting would be somewhat higher than 52% 

Dottie

[caminito]

dottie
I really wasn't trying to be provocative but felt that papa's statement was way off the mark.
In a democracy , there is no written or oral test to take to prove who has the subject knowledge to cast a vote !
One man , one vote is the only rule.
 Our MPs are supposed to represent US ,  not follow the leader ?
I think that some ,  if not all of our MPs ,  are incapable of  an honest  ( or informed ) vote. What's in it for them seems to be the norm.
Don't upset their leaders , think of their careers & promotions   
“The British public want their MPs to vote with their conscience and represent their views and not slavishly follow David Cameron’s or Ed Miliband’s whips. Cameron talks about the big society. Perhaps he should listen to them on this big issue?
There must be no hiding place for MPs who put their career prospects above their country and refuse to support a referendum on the EU.

Trading with the EU left us with a £865 Billion deficit, trade with the rest of the world gave us a £310 Billion surplus
Labour MP Natascha Engel, who chairs the committee, said: ‘The EU today is completely different from the one the British people voted to join in the 1975 referendum. It is time to examine the position again.

[Dottie1943]

Caminito

I quiet agree with you, the MP's are so bloody wishy washy they can't even have a f..t without asking permission these days, sorry if I have upset anybody with the language but they would make a saint swear the whole lot of them!! 

I don't even know why we have different parties because they are all singing the same song these days and it comes from loony tunes!!!

These people are suppose to be working for us, we put them there in parliament, and they forget about that for four years until the next election then they start crawling back to us and hope that we forget the previous four years.

My blood is boiling at the moment!!!

[caminito]

Being a member of the European Union has been a one-way street for Britain. Contributions from Britain to the EU budget have outstripped the benefits received in every single year  of membership.

In total since 1979, Britain has paid in about €260 billion (£228 billion). It has received back  in benefits just €163 billion (£143 billion). The difference of €97 billion (£85 billion at today’s exchange rate) has been Britain’s subsidy to the European project.

Each nation’s contribution is based mainly on its Gross National Income, a measure of its economic output and earnings from overseas. The budget is spent on a range of projects to do with agriculture, fisheries, social projects and other Brussels subsidies.

Britain’s contribution figure would have been even higher had it not been for Margaret Thatcher’s tough stance in 1984, when she famously negotiated a rebate on the basis  that the vast bulk of EU spending went on agricultural subsidies and Britain received a far lower proportion of this than other nations.

Under the terms of the rebate, Britain’s contributions were cut while other countries which benefited most from agricultural subsidies (mainly France) paid more.

Since 1985 Britain’s rebate has been worth a total of almost €90 billion (£79 billion at today’s exchange rate). Though as our graph shows, Britain’s contributions have still consistently far outstripped the benefits it receives.

The rebate would have been higher in recent years had not Tony Blair given up part of it under pressure from EU leaders. He agreed to cut it by about 20 per cent from 2007 until the next round of budget negotiations in 2013. So far, his concession has cost Britain about £4 billion.

[Dottie1943]

Another fine mess you got us into Tony and there is you and your awful wife raking it in, he is another of Britains Millionairs who no doubt has the best accountants working for him and has a bank account somewhere abroad.

Caminito thanks for those figures it really brings it home where the money is going.

And whilst I am on the subject of money going somewhere, did anybody else pick up on the point the Nick Clegg this week was in Egypt this week giving away another five million of our money!!Egypt I ask you!?,!!!!!

[Papaumau]

Papa
I am sorry that you feel that the British electorate is either uneducated or maybe too thick to vote in an EU referendum 
Using your logic then the same must apply at a general election  So why have  democracy ...the Plebs don't understand politics ...so much better left to our intellectual masters to decide for us .

Do we install another dictatorship in Lybia OR help them to democracy ( warts and all)

Incidentally , where do you place yourself . Pleb or intellectual master  ?

My comments are not meant to be provocative !
What is the correct outcome . Surely what the people want . Right OR Wrong ! That's democracy !
quote...
 "might not actually produce the correct outcome for us all if it is left to us to vote for or against it."

AN OVERWHELMING 75 per cent of Britons would vote in a referendum to quit the EU or renegotiate the terms, a poll published exclusively by the Daily Express reveals today.

Given a choice to stay in or get out – without the option to renegotiate – 52 per cent would quit, 31 per cent would stay in, while the rest are “don’t knows”.

I didn't actually say that even if I will agree that it may have sounded that way.

What I mean is that even if we are clever and well-educated in general life and interested in the actual subject, ( which a lot are not ), we are often NOT well enough educated to be able to make such a momentous decision without a lot of good and open debate first.

As we are very seldom privvy to such debate even the brightest of us might simply not be well enough aware of the full facts to make a fully-informed choice.

And yes, I do agree that many people who vote in general elections often do so out of historical bias rather than actually looking at what the parties they are voting for actually stand for. AGAIN it is usually biased activists that are the very first into the voting booths and the rest of us either vote instinctively or for some group that have offered us the most in their manifestos, Strangely, the much maligned "floating voters" are probably the ones that think the most clearly before they vote for any person or party that is looking for election.

After all that is said, you are dead right that democracy is the best we can expect when we either vote in referenda or in general elections, but I have always felt that even the best kind of democracy is open to being fiddled and coerced and pressurised into making us do what THEY want us to do.

Cynical ? Yes !, but I also feel that if it is fallable human-beings that are being asked to form up the questions and to also give the answers we are often going to get democratic answers that we don't in fact want.

And to finish.....Of course, even if democracy is terribly flawed and it sometimes produces, ( for reasons stated above ), results that we do not want, it has to be better than dictatorship or oligarchy or autocracy or even the plenipotentiary power in the hands of emperors or kings or religions.

That should not stop us from trying to improve the flaws in such democracies !

[caminito]

Direct and Indirect Costs of the EU

Estimates of the true cost of the EU are difficult to come by. MPs have called many times for a cost-benefit analysis, to prove or disprove the benefits of membership. Successive Governments, both Labour and Conservative, have refused, on the grounds that the "benefits" are self-evident. In truth they are afraid of what such a study would show. The Bruges Group have finally produced an authoritative study.

The total gross cost to the UK of EU membership in 2008 they estimate at around £65,000,000,000* - including:

    £28 billion for business to comply with EU regulations,
    £17 billion of additional food costs resulting from the Common Agricultural Policy
    £3.3 billion - the value of the catch lost when the Common Fisheries Policy let other countries fish in our territorial waters
    £14.6 billion gross paid into the EU budget and other EU funds.

It gets worse each year. Used better, this sum could transform the UK - increase pensions, recruit more doctors, nurses, teachers and police, build advanced transport systems and start paying off the national debt.   

[granny bee]

When EU accounts have not been verified for so many years how can any accurate figures be produced?

[caminito]

Statement from the source of the calculations
quote..
The cost of EU membership is inexorably rising and Britain will bear an ever-increasing
burden of direct and indirect costs – for no discernable benefits. This pamphlet is one of the
few serious attempts to quantify the cost of EU membership to Britain and I have made every
effort to keep its contents fair and accurate.
If anything I have erred on the side of caution and quoted only those figures which are
quantifiable and verifiable from official or respected sources. The real cost of EU membership
is in all likelihood much higher than my estimates.


The Common Fisheries Policy
The Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) did not exist until Britain sought to join the European
Economic Community in 1972. Britain’s negotiating position was weak and as a result a
cynical price for joining was extracted in the form of giving all the other EEC countries access
to Britain’s rich fish stocks in our territorial waters. As we now know the Conservative
Government lied to the House of Commons about what this would mean for the fishing
industry.
The CFP has crippled Britain’s fishing industry and resulted in thousands of jobs being
destroyed. In 1970 there were 21,443 fishermen in the UK. By 2007 that figure had dropped
to 12,729: a decrease of 40.64%.28
The obscenity of the quota system means that thousands of tons of fish are thrown back
dead into the sea because while it is unavoidable to catch them they are not allowed to be
landed and sold under EU regulations.
The Marine and Fishing Authority confirmed in 2007 that they have carried out
no studies of the CFP on the UK economy; and they stated that, “we cannot identify UK
waters: they are now indentified as being part of EC waters”. HM Government does not have
the foggiest notion of what the CFP cost Britain and do not even bother to identify UK waters
in relation to the statistics they do keep: and why should they want to when to do so would
only show up the insanity of the CFP
About 70% of the total EU catch comes what were formerly UK territorial waters before the
creation of the CFP. Therefore the total value of the EU catch of £5.6 billion, minus 30%
equals £3.92 billion. If we then subtract the actual value of the UK catch of £645 million we
are left with a figure of £3.275 billion.
In the absence of any official figures, the cost to Britain of the CFP purely in lost catch alone
is at least £3.275 billion per annum.
This figure takes no account of the historic losses to the British economy which must run into
many billions, represented by lost catches, lost jobs, lost boat building and maintenance, and
lost jobs in ancillary industries.

[Papaumau]

Yes Caminito, there is no doubt that the EU and our half-baked membership of it has a lot of flaws in it, but as I always say at times like this: "It is not a good thing to do to throw the baby out with the bath-water", and when we remember that we should also remember that from the perifery all we can do is chuck stones but from the heart of this great and getting greater entity we can shape it to our own needs.

I say, let us get right in there like France and Germany and like them we can then start to sort out these obvious flaws so that the European Union can be made to work as efficiently as possible and no longer just be in the hands of Sarkozy and Merkel.

Single-issue groups like the UKIP and the BNP are at the core of this resistance to Europe but I have also always thought that working from a base of hatred or xenophobia  - as they do - is no way to do anything in politics.

[stevepas]

"It is not a good thing to do to throw the baby out with the bath-water",

Apologies for edit, It's not a baby its a cuckoo and its in a blue tits nest.

There was piece about how giscard d'estang apparently asked lawyers to re-write the treaty so nobody could understand it.
Farage mentioned it in one of his many verbal assassinations.

Any shortfall in UKIP's policies could be easily made right by use of common sense.

There isn't no real need for politicians they are like dinosaurs by the time they do something its normally waaaaaaaaaay too late.

'We are going to cap immigration', low and behold its as high as ever.
'We are going to have a referendum,' no were not, I'm not sure now' reality its too late.

Another dinosaur in action, Goldfinger Brown famous quote 'british jobs for british workers' followed by the opposite effect as listed here
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1131708/British-jobs-British-workers-Wildcat-strikes-spread-foreign-workers-shipped-UK.html

Swiss selling gold = small amounts on the quiet at the right price
Goldfinger Brown = large chunk, tells the markets and does it at a really low price against professional advice.

Looks like the Swiss are smarter, are they in the EU? you bet they ain't.

Brown's replacement, Darling was much better he managed to make a £700 'mistake' with his expenses, obviously well qualified for the chancellor of the exchequer.

The only 'lot' that make our 'lot' look good, which is practically impossible, are the eu 'lot'.

I don't think people realise that the EU bill/cost/damage is 10 times higher than the most pessimistic forecasts.

the eu didn't check greece's accounts properly, they didn't realise that the trojan horse had rampant woodworm that has a insatiable appetite for paper with the word euro printed on it.
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article28957.html

But, then it comes as no surprise that the EU missed the problem because they can't get their books past the auditors yet, 18 years and still trying.

I wonder how long it takes to train an innumerate person to become a great accountant, less than eighteen years I bet.

I'm just thinking if I know of anyone trying to get something right for eighteen years.......................eighteen years later , no I still haven't found someone, outside of government of course.

sarcasm intermission

[Papaumau]

Most amusing Stevepas !

While enjoying your sarcasm, I still have to say that even if the EU is going through a very hard time of it at the moment, basically the idea of such a union is a good one.

Yes, it has a lot of flaws but instead of running and hiding from these problems we should be standing beside Sarkozy and Merkel and helping the union through their problems. After all, are the Tories not called the Conservative and Unionist Party ?

A lot of the Eurosceptics that are running around at the moment like the proverbial chickens with their heads cut off are just not doing any serious thinking about Europe, they are instead just reacting with a supposedly protectionist instinct that is making them shake at the knees.

As The European Union is our greatest trading partner in the world we should really be starting to help it in as many ways as we can if we do not want to get drawn down by these problems. ( Remember Cameron's recent appeal to the faithful about the "house next door that is on fire" ).

The wee hiccup that Greece is having at the moment IS going to get sorted and once it is we are going to see a greater Europe that it would be much better having as a close friend than as a distant enemy.

Once all of the panic and craziness is over I am sure that Europe will fly high again and we better be sure that when it does that we are flying right alongside it.