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Thread: EU Referendum - Who's made their mind up

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    Default EU Referendum - Who's made their mind up

    So who's already made their mind up which way to vote, stay in or leave ?

    I've actually started watching some of the debates on TV now and I have to be honest its hard to get past a lot of the political bull and scare mongering

    One of the main arguments for leaving is we'll have full control of how and when we do things from laws to trade, where as one of the main arguments for staying is we're economically better off in EU.

    So I decided to do a bit of research into this and the results (based on facts and true figures) is quite surprising

    Our net contributions (minus the rebate) into the EU are £14.7Bn (£282M a week) and we receive £7.6Bn back, leaving us as net contributors of £7.1Bn (£136.5M a week)
    This means we can effectively then take our £14.7Bn, still pay all the activities in the UK that receive EU funding and have £7.1Bn a year left

    Now there's lots of talk that we'll end up with a Norway style trade agreement if we leave so I thought I'd have a look at what that actually is;

    Norway currently contributes approx. £866M a year in order to participate in various agreements (including free trade). These payments are calculated based on their GDP so if we end up with a worse case scenario of a Norway style agreement and we choose to pay into all the things that Norway does (unlikely we would want to pay for the Schengen and several other things) we could end up with a bill of around £5.1Bn (given our GDP is approx. 6 times bigger than that of Norways). That still leaves us £2Bn a year better off.

    To put that £2Bn into perspective, Local Governments have had to cut £1.9Bn from their budgets this year and have to save a further £3.5Bn over the following 3 years. That EU saving would effectively mean no more cuts to local authority budgets.

    Given the strength of the UK economy and our trading position globally its unlikely that we'll end up with a trade agreement anywhere near as bad as Norway has, so the £5.1Bn contribution will probably be a lot less if we still want to fully participate in all the free trade agreements across the EU.

    So even as a worse case the UK is financially better off outside of the EU, despite what our beloved Government keeps telling us.

    Personally I'm in the Vote Leave camp
    We get our full independence back, we don't have to follow any of the EU rules we don't want to, and we're financially better off every year.

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    I have spoken to quite a few people and I have yet to speak to anyone who is voting to stay in.

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    I'm instinctively pro-European, but I have stopped equating that with being pro-EU. It's like having to justify the existence of FIFA because I love football. I am not swayed by purely economic arguments, because I don't think we can tell how things will pan out if we leave. Whilst I think alot of people will be swayed by scare stories on both sides, for me the issues are more cultural.

    My main reason for staying.
    EU takes our money and then puts it back into parts of the country that maybe a Tory Govt. wouldn't. Alot of 'EU money' has gone in to the North West, North East and Northern Ireland in the last 20 years. Now, it isn't the EU's money to start with, but if we didn't put the money into the EU to then give back to the regions would that money end up there? I doubt it. They don't have the same biases and prejudices as national Govts of both colours, and so will not think 'should we plow money into Belfast, Newcastle, Liverpool when they won't vote for us anyway?'. Instead they just put the money were they think it is most needed and will have the best end result. So, in a crazy way the EU acts as a decentralisation device for public money.

    My main reason for leaving.
    Free movement of people and wage stagnation. I think free movement was a fantastic concept, but I think it only works within large areas where economies are on a similar level because the movement of people is fairly equal in all directions. If you had an economic block of the UK, France, Germany, Holland and Denmark you'd see movement at a fairly low level and in equal directions. Wages in those countries would not be affected because people wouldn't really move from one to the other for economic reasons on the whole. Similarly, have a block of Poland, Ukraine, Hungary, Greece etc, the same would happen.

    But at a EU wide level it ends up with millions travelling from East to West for purely economic reasons. This is resulting in huge swathes of industries now seeing no wage growth due to the over-supply of Eastern European workers. This results in companies not seeing any need to increase wages because there is no demand for them to do so from short-term migrant labour, and it also means that agencies get used instead of offering staff contracts, which leads to crap sick pay, crap annual leave pay, etc, etc. When British people apply for such jobs and don't like the terms in front of them, the companies feel no need to improve them because they know they can fill positions from Europe. Which then leads to a never ending cycle of these jobs being at the low end of the wage spectrum and constantly filled by Eastern Europeans. But it doesn't stop. In London we now have Polish workers complaining that Bulgarians are 'dragging down Polish wages', blissfully unaware that there shouldn't be any such thing as a 'Polish Wage'. And Bulgarians will then complain about the next entry countries migrants doing the same to them. It's a race to the bottom, and these industries will be completely off limits for British people who need to earn enough money to save for a mortgage, raise a family, go on holiday, etc, etc. I worked for a London council, and their landscaping and street cleaning contracts in two years went from about 20% Eastern European workforce to about 75%. The vast majority of them lovely fellas, worked hard, polite, punctual, you name it, model workers.

    I never once thought it was wrong for them to want to come here and do the jobs, because economically it was wonderful for them and their families back home. They work here for a year or two, share a flat in a crap part of London with 4 or 5 other fellow nationals, save loads of money and then go home, with enough money to set themselves up, buy a house and raise a family. But what about the people here who used to do those jobs to set themselves up? To do so now would not leave you with much at the end of the week. The Governments who oppose any limits to free movement are the very ones who's people leave and come to work in the UK and Germany. Those Governments don't need to raise the pitiful wages over there, they don't need to improve conditions, because they know hundreds of thousands of the people who are actively looking for work will travel West. These people then bring the money that they make over here and set themselves up back there. It's a win-win for those Governments, because they don't need to find entry-level employment for them, they don't need to pay unemployment benefits, and then they reap the rewards when their workers come home with more money than they could ever get back there.

    So, free movement is the main issue for me. I love it as a concept, but in an economically unequal continent it is causing massive issues. It also results in quotas being made to limit the amount of people who wish to come here from outside of the EU, which to me is equally unfair. I think immigration is a good thing culturally and economically if the immigration is balanced and is flowing from all directions. When a skilled person in Nigeria or Brasil is forced to wait in line whilst a brickie or a gardener from Poland or Bulgaria has no such restrictions it is unfair, and results in immigration not being something that enriches us culturally but becomes one that is forcing our wages down, not benefiting the working classes, and leaving us with industries paying members of staff under the going rate because the people they hire are in dreamland to earn even the minimum wage.

    All the other arguments are hard to prove or disprove, but for me, free movement and the unfair nature of it is the reason I will probably vote Leave. With a really heavy heart.

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    My head says leave but part of me is nagging that it is just for the fat cats who will get fatter and the man in the street wont see a penny.ie most of us.
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    I am voting in mainly because Boris Johnson Michael Gove Ian Duncan Smith and the right wing press want us out!!

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    Quote Originally Posted by mufcsaint View Post
    I am voting in mainly because Boris Johnson Michael Gove Ian Duncan Smith and the right wing press want us out!!

    Sent from my E2105 using Tapatalk
    Kate Hoey and George Galloway - cornerstones of the right then?

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    If you want to see a further erosion of workers rights and a complete disbanding of the NHS then crack on and vote to leave.

    The whole migration argument is a none starter, it is literally a fantasy land argument that if we leave that we will suddenly have magically sealed borders.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Div View Post
    I have spoken to quite a few people and I have yet to speak to anyone who is voting to stay in.
    You have now! :-)

    Interestingly, I've spoken to a quite a few people and I have yet to speak to anyone who is voting to leave. :-)
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gray77 View Post

    All the other arguments are hard to prove or disprove, but for me, free movement and the unfair nature of it is the reason I will probably vote Leave. With a really heavy heart.
    This is the thing that concerns me. What about the many, many people from Europe who've made lives here? What about the many Brits who've made their lives in Europe.

    Will it be a case of sending the buggers back?
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    Quote Originally Posted by DD View Post
    This is the thing that concerns me. What about the many, many people from Europe who've made lives here? What about the many Brits who've made their lives in Europe.

    Will it be a case of sending the buggers back?
    ahhh....you see we only send good people abroad to make an honest living, while those entering our country are scrotes.

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    Quote Originally Posted by DD View Post
    This is the thing that concerns me. What about the many, many people from Europe who've made lives here? What about the many Brits who've made their lives in Europe.

    Will it be a case of sending the buggers back?
    It concerns me as well Dave, because I hate being on the same side as little Englanders who really just don't like foreigners too much. I don't really see any issue with people who are settled here. I don't really want to get rid of anyone, and I really don't want to see anybody come back who decided they wanted to live elsewhere. It's a thorny issue, but I live in London and I am completely accustomed to sharing the tube, my streets, my office, my public spaces with people from absolutely everywhere, and it's one of the reasons I love living down here.

    But I think the dual issues of wages and cheap labour are big ones, and I think that really needs to be clamped down because with every new group of accession countries the worse it's going to get. There are about 800,000 Polish people in London right now. Some of them are settled (my ex boss and his No.2 who have been here for ten years are not unlike thousands of others) and some are here short term. If every single one of them wants to stay here, I'm cool with that. Half of them would choose not to, and I think this will force companies to have to improve the wages and conditions of some jobs because they'll have to attract homegrown workers. That will be better for everyone, including the foreigners doing those jobs as well.

    I think the current levels of immigration are actually fine in terms of numbers, but my issue isn't the number of immigrants, it is the concentration of huge numbers of them being from one part of Europe that is far below us economically. It just produces a race to the bottom in terms of wages, because each new group of accession countries tends to be worse off than the last, and so the people coming over tend to be happier to work for crap wages than the ones that came before them. If we had the same levels of immigration but it was evenly spread between people from worse off economies and those who are on a similar level I think it would work alot better. But lots of people who are from outside of the EU are stuck on quota lists whilst those in the EU have no such issues. It's unfair, and is resulting in our economy being massively skewed, with jobs that alot of working class people used to do now being nearly completely taken up by Eastern Europeans. They work hard, they aren't doing anything wrong, but economies should pay wages that reflect a persons job, not reflect where a person comes from. It doesn't right now, and it'll only get more off kilter as we go along.

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    Quote Originally Posted by johnnyl View Post
    ahhh....you see we only send good people abroad to make an honest living, while those entering our country are scrotes.
    Yawn. Who has said that? Is this the argument that all people who oppose the EU are racists? Try harder.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Gray77 View Post
    It concerns me as well Dave, because I hate being on the same side as little Englanders who really just don't like foreigners too much. I don't really see any issue with people who are settled here. I don't really want to get rid of anyone, and I really don't want to see anybody come back who decided they wanted to live elsewhere. It's a thorny issue, but I live in London and I am completely accustomed to sharing the tube, my streets, my office, my public spaces with people from absolutely everywhere, and it's one of the reasons I love living down here.

    But I think the dual issues of wages and cheap labour are big ones, and I think that really needs to be clamped down because with every new group of accession countries the worse it's going to get. There are about 800,000 Polish people in London right now. Some of them are settled (my ex boss and his No.2 who have been here for ten years are not unlike thousands of others) and some are here short term. If every single one of them wants to stay here, I'm cool with that. Half of them would choose not to, and I think this will force companies to have to improve the wages and conditions of some jobs because they'll have to attract homegrown workers. That will be better for everyone, including the foreigners doing those jobs as well.

    I think the current levels of immigration are actually fine in terms of numbers, but my issue isn't the number of immigrants, it is the concentration of huge numbers of them being from one part of Europe that is far below us economically. It just produces a race to the bottom in terms of wages, because each new group of accession countries tends to be worse off than the last, and so the people coming over tend to be happier to work for crap wages than the ones that came before them. If we had the same levels of immigration but it was evenly spread between people from worse off economies and those who are on a similar level I think it would work alot better. But lots of people who are from outside of the EU are stuck on quota lists whilst those in the EU have no such issues. It's unfair, and is resulting in our economy being massively skewed, with jobs that alot of working class people used to do now being nearly completely taken up by Eastern Europeans. They work hard, they aren't doing anything wrong, but economies should pay wages that reflect a persons job, not reflect where a person comes from. It doesn't right now, and it'll only get more off kilter as we go along.
    While there are elements of truth in that, I would say that there are more reasons why we have this race to the bottom in wages.

    1) Big corporations rule the roost and have much more influence over government policy that do the people who actually vote for their government.

    2) Tax credits - although this is seen as welfare for working people it is in reality allowing businesses to pay derisory wages knowing full well that the government will top wages up. This creates multiple problems because it reduces tax intake from workers (a loss to the government), requires the spending of money to top up (another loss to the government) and lastly the profits that the corporations make are shielded from paying fair tax in a multitude of ways.

    3) Skilled jobs have been sold down the river this resulting in poorer paid jobs. There is an illusion that a "free market" exists, however it is just that....an illusion. Labour is exploited in cheaper countries and is conducted in appalling conditions that simply would not be allowed here. The so called free market that exists here, is one where workers have to compete and "be efficient" (or cheaper) while those who really matter (the wealthy) do not and will happily rely on costs / risks to their business being fronted by the government subsidy / bail out. In essence, they want a small state for your healthcare, education, security but a large one when it comes to socialising the costs and risks of their business.

    Sort them out, and I will take "the nasty immigrants" line seriously.....divide and conquer is what people fall for over and over again. While the high earners blame those on tax credits, and the tax credits group blames the unemployed, and the unemployed blame the disabled and everyone blames the immigrants the true thieves are riding off into the sunset.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Gray77 View Post
    Yawn. Who has said that? Is this the argument that all people who oppose the EU are racists? Try harder.
    never mentioned any such thing.

    Back from the world of your imagination, what the point was that in general people view differently those who leave the country and those who enter. There is a significant negative bias in the population toward immigrants which is not seen in how people in general view Brits who have themselves migrated abroad.

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    Quote Originally Posted by johnnyl View Post
    ahhh....you see we only send good people abroad to make an honest living, while those entering our country are scrotes.
    Thanks

    I'm looking at this from an outsiders perspective (I could have voted but saw that as hypocritical) and have to say it is difficult to find any nugget's of truth in the tonnes of BS being written in the press. But warnings of dire consequences on every subject on both sides of the argument will leave people thinking it's probably best to stay put

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    Quote Originally Posted by Gray77 View Post
    It concerns me as well Dave, because I hate being on the same side as little Englanders who really just don't like foreigners too much. I don't really see any issue with people who are settled here. I don't really want to get rid of anyone, and I really don't want to see anybody come back who decided they wanted to live elsewhere. It's a thorny issue, but I live in London and I am completely accustomed to sharing the tube, my streets, my office, my public spaces with people from absolutely everywhere, and it's one of the reasons I love living down here.

    But I think the dual issues of wages and cheap labour are big ones, and I think that really needs to be clamped down because with every new group of accession countries the worse it's going to get. There are about 800,000 Polish people in London right now. Some of them are settled (my ex boss and his No.2 who have been here for ten years are not unlike thousands of others) and some are here short term. If every single one of them wants to stay here, I'm cool with that. Half of them would choose not to, and I think this will force companies to have to improve the wages and conditions of some jobs because they'll have to attract homegrown workers. That will be better for everyone, including the foreigners doing those jobs as well.

    I think the current levels of immigration are actually fine in terms of numbers, but my issue isn't the number of immigrants, it is the concentration of huge numbers of them being from one part of Europe that is far below us economically. It just produces a race to the bottom in terms of wages, because each new group of accession countries tends to be worse off than the last, and so the people coming over tend to be happier to work for crap wages than the ones that came before them. If we had the same levels of immigration but it was evenly spread between people from worse off economies and those who are on a similar level I think it would work alot better. But lots of people who are from outside of the EU are stuck on quota lists whilst those in the EU have no such issues. It's unfair, and is resulting in our economy being massively skewed, with jobs that alot of working class people used to do now being nearly completely taken up by Eastern Europeans. They work hard, they aren't doing anything wrong, but economies should pay wages that reflect a persons job, not reflect where a person comes from. It doesn't right now, and it'll only get more off kilter as we go along.
    It doesn't answer the question though. What IS going to happen to the millions who have made Britain/Europe their homes who suddenly find that they are in a country with which they no longer have that free right to work?

    We've created this situation for them. I just don't think we can go back now. What are we going to do? Have a mass ethnic cleansing?

    Seriously, what happens to their rights to work here and our rights to work in the EU? Are people going to be actively deported for not meeting criteria they once met?
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    Quote Originally Posted by DD View Post
    It doesn't answer the question though. What IS going to happen to the millions who have made Britain/Europe their homes who suddenly find that they are in a country with which they no longer have that free right to work?

    We've created this situation for them. I just don't think we can go back now. What are we going to do? Have a mass ethnic cleansing?

    Seriously, what happens to their rights to work here and our rights to work in the EU? Are people going to be actively deported for not meeting criteria they once met?
    I imagine they will just have apply for a visa to work here. I don't see us booting thousands of Europeans out of the country!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Barry Lager View Post
    I imagine they will just have apply for a visa to work here. I don't see us booting thousands of Europeans out of the country!
    I think that is a fair point, but I see British youngsters on tv saying they want to travel around Europe so staying is their favoured position. Believe it or not I first went "abroad" in the early 60's without problems just as NOW you had to have a passport and you got a stamp on it to say you'd been. Now you don't get a stamp but you still need a passport.
    When I can't get an appointment at my doctors or see the doctor I want or see schools with non English speaking pupils joining on a weekly basis and thousand upon thousand of "refugees???" queuing up to get here I'm out.
    If leaving was going to be as catastrophic as Cameborne make out then they would never have let us morons decide.
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    I voted no the first time and lost though everyone I spoke to said the same yet we lost 2 to 1. Nothing has happened to change my mind. Out!

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    This is about fat cats getting fatter.You or I won't see a penny.
    Learned comment from The Don

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    Quote Originally Posted by Scouse Don View Post
    This is about fat cats getting fatter.You or I won't see a penny.
    Not as fat as some of the many many thousands of 'fat cats' currently resting in a comfy seat in Brussels.
    If you have an hour free, watch this, might open some eyes a little ...
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    Massive subject to respond to on a forum..
    But a few points.
    If we are in or out, the fat cats will still rule what happens to our money.
    Immigration. The people I see not working, bumming around this area almost to a man/woman were born in this country.
    So to say those coming over here don't work is a myth for the most part. But we do need to restrict numbers just to make the pure maths work regarding services, houses, space and quality of life.
    I think if we left the first couple of years while we work out the practicalities will be weird, with the stock market bombing, interest rates rising, but like always things will return to normal and five years later we will never know any difference.
    I am voting out. Why well in truth just because I feel we should get away from others having a input into our lives, good or bad.
    Plus I hate golf so if we are out no more Rider Cup..

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    Quote Originally Posted by 49er View Post
    Plus I hate golf so if we are out no more Rider Cup..
    We'd have to go back to USA vs GB & Ireland as it was until the late-1970s. We let the Europeans in, so I doubt much would change. I hope that doesn't have a massive influence on your vote!

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    I made my mind up as soon as IDS Bo Jo Gove Peter Hitchins and the right wing press said we should leave

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    basic point none of us will see a penny if we leave.
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