I must admit I am shocked at the poor quality information provided by both sides in this Brexit campaign. Don’t just trust me on this – have a listen to a law professor (https://youtu.be/USTypBKEd8Y).
Like him I have worked with Europe for a few decades and find many of the statements, while not wrong, are likely to lead people to believe something is wrong. I have no fear of Europe, I know from experience that the UK has always been able to punch above its weight and more often than not gets Europe to do what we want. In my job I would get agreement from a UK government minister on what we wanted and then devise means to get Europe to do it. At one point I managed to get a member of the European Commission (the so called un-elected rulers) to come and work for me and deliver what the UK wanted. I never failed to get what the UK wanted in Europe. I am happy in Europe because I know we run it most of the time. So what do I think about the arguments (not that it will change anybodies mind)?
Europe rules the UK
Not the case. The EU is a club, with rules we have helped to write. Our parliament chose to follow most of these rules on our behalf (we normally don’t make decisions in the UK by referendum – we normally elect people to parliament to make decisions on our behalf). Europe only has the power over the UK that our parliament gives it, and it can be taken back at any time. Take the European Court of Human Rights – we only need to take account of its decision, not obey it. How we do that is our choice, we are not compelled, but in most cases we choose to follow the decision. This is why we are able to have a referendum and choose to leave if we want. If Europe truly ruled us we would not be able to leave.
We pay a fortune to stay in Europe
Okay, on average for every £10 we earn 1p goes to Europe (in comparison about 55p goes to the NHS). We pay the equivalent of a cafe latte a week per person to Europe. You can report numbers in different ways to give different effects. In total it adds up to a big figure (remember the take care of the pennies idea?), but it’s still small compared to the amount of money we have as a country. The effect of staying or leaving is much larger than the direct costs (the so called £350 million a week). The difference between exchange rates in the past week caused by the referendum itself could easily be worth more, the direct costs are simply tiny compared to the potential indirect cost/savings.
We need to align with countries with bigger growth like China.
Normally growth is measured in %. A little bit of maths here. A speed increase of 5mph from 10mph is 50% growth. A speed increase of 10mph from 100mph is a 10% increase. So the 50% increase is actually smaller than the 10% increase. Don’t be surprised that countries with small economies have higher % growth. The economy of China is only half the size of the economy of Europe, and it’s the biggest economy quoted. Quite simply many of the “high growth” economies added together do not have the capacity to replace our trade with Europe.
The EU is a failing region
So how do we define failure? Do we define it by wealth, culture, peace or some other measure. One big issue is the amount of debt – how much do we owe? Well, the UK debt is rising as a proportion of GDP faster than that of the EU; the UK balance of payments is negative and that of the EU is positive; and the EU is investing a higher proportion of GDP than the UK so in relation to wealth the UK is a bigger failure than the EU. Peace, well think of the recent wars – they are taking place up to the border of the EU, but not within. To me this is the main reason for the EU – to create peace among countries that have had the most violent wars for centuries. It is hard to see any significant difference that says the UK is much better than the EU, rather the facts suggest we are marginally worse.
The EU is responsible for mass migration to the UK
The simple fact is that most migrants to the UK do not come from the EU – and so most are subject to UK immigration policy, not the so called open borders of Europe. Each of these people need to apply to the UK government for a visa, and they have granted over 150,000 a year for a while. This is nothing to do with Europe, it is the choice of our government whether to allow them to enter the country or not. The numbers have increased by around 50,000 over the last few years to close to 200,000. Why doesn’t the remain campaign say this? Well it would mean David Cameron admitting that failing to meet his election immigration target was fully in his control and so he has failed.
EU is run by un-elected grey mandarins
There are three organisations in the European legislative structure. There is the parliament, we elect MEPs, and in my experience they are more in touch with their constituencies than MPs. There is the European Commission (the civil service) that cannot create any legislation – they are similar to our civil service. Here I agree with the leave campaign that the Commission could benefit from being cut back (but that is a detail for me, not a reason to run away and hide). And finally there is the Council (that most people have never heard of) which has significant power. The Council is made up from members of each countries parliament, and in some areas we have special votes that gives the UK more say than would be the case with PR. So in the EU there are two elected groups that approve all the legislation. In the UK, of course, we only have one elected body, an un-elected civil service and an un-elected house of Lords. There is a bit of pot and kettle here.
We can still do the same stuff with the EU if we leave
So what is the EU? Well, that is a question I have been unable to get answered from government as yet. My best guess is that it is defined in The European Union (Amendment) Act 2008 which links to the Maastricht Treaty as well as the Euratom Treaty. In other words it is the umbrella treaties – so we would not be committed to withdrawing from the lower tier agreements (except each of these would impose rules on us and claim payment from us – it would be like withdrawing from making the club rules but still paying the dues and obeying the rules). If we leave we are likely to withdraw from the lower tier agreements and set up new agreements, but unlike the scaremongering of the remain campaign these are likely to be easy to put together if we follow the same format as exists with others.
We have a common customs area. This is the area where we can trade without having to fill in pesky customs forms. Leaving the EU would initially mean leaving this area, and we would need to conclude an agreement with the EU to rejoin (like Turkey has), but like the leave campaign say this is likely to be easy (but only if we follow the standard format for such an agreement). An agreement would involve agreeing to the customs tariffs set by the EU, why, because otherwise people would simply send things to the UK and forward them to the EU to bypass their tariffs. So we would need to apply the EU set tariffs, but would not be able to influence them. It is very likely that we would need to follow EU standards, not just for exports to the EU but for all goods – but would not be able to influence the standards. Why would we need to do this for non-EU goods – well the idea is that all goods within the common area meet the same standard, otherwise each and every shipment crossing a border would need to be checked. So in effect we could probably carry on as we are, but just would have no voice on decisions affecting our industry.
We have free movement of people, even if we are not a full part part of the Schengen area. We want to control this to prevent an influx of low paid workers taking our jobs according to the leave campaign. Britain is full. The only way to control the number of people coming in to your country is to require a visa for specific purposes (with perhaps a visa waiver system for vacations). This is possible, but would cut both ways – if we require EU citizens to have a visa to work here they will ask us to have a visa to work there. And costa del brit would probably be at an end (long term retirement vacations). Ireland have signed up to join the Schengen area (and are in the process of implementing it), and so we have two options there – put a border up between the north and south, or put the border up at the Irish Sea – requiring anybody from Northern Ireland coming to GB to show passports – in my view starting the process of uniting Ireland under Dublin rule. Without a doubt the second option is less costly and less likely to result in a return to the bad old days, restricting the free movement of people is fairly likely to result in leaving Northern Ireland behind as part of a united Ireland.
There are a number of other bits that we would be leaving behind. There would need to be new agreements put together for things like energy (the electricity we get from France), nuclear non-proliferation (this would involve setting up new agreements with the UN). It is likely that the new nuclear reactors being built would be subject to significant delay or, more likely, be cancelled (that’s £12 billion investment from Europe). Most of our overseas trade agreements are currently negotiated through the EU – leaving the EU would leave these trade agreements. Just to be clear this is Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Ukraine, Montenegro, Albania, The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Faroe Islands, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Morocco, Tunisia, Palestinian Authority, Syria, Ecuador (not yet ratified), Colombia, Peru, Central America, Iraq, Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Korea, Cameroon, Madagascar, Mauritius, the Seychelles, Zimbabwe, Chile, Mexico, South Africa , CARIFORUM States, Turkey, San Marino and Andorra. Plus there are about another 25 agreements waiting for ratification and 25 part way negotiated. That’s 110 trade agreements we would need to negotiate. Leaving the European trade area is not aligning with the rest of the world – it is also leaving trade agreements with over 50 other countries.
There are so many unknowns in the event of leaving – ask most people and they will tell you they don’t know exactly what it would mean. That is the biggest risk to us, two years of panic to untangle ourselves from Europe and another ten years of trying to negotiate our way back to where we currently are. The cost of this could be enormous – it could even bankrupt our country. Would you invest in a country with no trade agreements in place? This isn’t project fear, it’s simply project I don’t know.
I believe a lot more time and effort should have been put in to prepare facts before a referendum was held. But we have the rush we have because of the desperation of the conservative party to win the last election. This is one of the biggest arguments for voting remain at this time – we don’t know enough to make the change. We are being pressured into making a decision without the real facts.
Call me cantankerous, but if somebody tries to make me make a decision before I am ready to I just plain refuse. And perhaps this is the real way to look at this referendum. The question isn’t stay or leave, it’s whether we risk change or not. Is there enough information to make me change, no. So until somebody can give me real facts – and enough to convince me that such a big change is worth risking I’ll stay where I am.