Wes Tender

I just re-watched it to catch up on the part I'd missed and Truss claimed that the Government would produce figures from the Civil Service to show what the implications would be to our leaving in terms of lost trade. When asked how soon this information would be available, she could not give a definitive answer beyond soon. What is laughable, is that the Conservative Party promised a referendum at the General Election last May, went into negotiations with the EU over reforms and had not had the forethought to have this information ready to hand at the time of the announcement of the referendum date. The information will only be estimates anyway, but it still should have been available a long time ago. Despite this information not being available, that did not prevent Abbott and Truss bandying about figures about how much trade we do with Europe and implying that it would be severely diminished should we leave. Truss also had too much of a tendency to state that everything she said about trade with Europe was fact, in particular that anybody who wished to trade with the EU had to accept the free movement of peoples as a condition of agreement to trade with them. It was mentioned that China had a trade agreement with Europe and the question begged to be asked whether that meant that 1.3 billion Chinese therefore had the right to migrate to the EU zone. If the free movement of peoples was only a condition of trade appertaining to those countries in Europe but not part of the EU, it should have been made clear. If the examples of that would be held up as Norway, Switzerland and Iceland, then it would also be reasonable to argue why as the fifth biggest economy in the World, we couldn't negotiate a trade deal that still allowed us control of our borders. Julia Hartley-Brewer made some good points on trade, but could have done more to challenge this free movement of peoples question. Abbott was indeed a joke and does the remain case no good at all. Labour seems to have adopted a very low profile on the referendum altogether up to now. I do hope though that the Beeb will indeed be balanced in their choice of panellist and audience. Last night we had two proper politicians for the remain camp and three non-politicians generally in the leave camp, so presumably there will next be two politicians in the remain camp and three non-politicians in the stay camp.

This is a bit disingenuous, seeking to to label those who wanted a referendum as being on the extreme fringes of the left. I don't know how old you are, and therefore how far back your experience of the European project goes, but of course there had been deep divisions within the Conservative Party going back to the early Thatcher years. Those dissident voices were labelled as right-wingers and the so-called "wets" who were quite happy to give away our sovereignty were on the left of the party. Of course, there were then also quite sizeable sections of the Labour Party who were against further integration towards anything but a Common Market too. Maybe you didn't see the programme a couple of nights ago comparing the changes to the Political Parties' views on Europe at the time of the last referendum under Harold Wilson compared to now, when it was largely the Conservative Party for staying in and the Labour Party against.

There has been a need for a referendum for many years, regardless of some opinion polls' outcomes, which have been proven to be of questionable value and able to be manipulated depending on how the question is phrased. If there was no need for a referendum, how has it been that one has been promised in election manifestos some time before this last election? The time for a referendum was when with successive treaties, the whole basis of what was our membership of the Treaty of Rome which established the European Economic Community, changed from the so-called "Common Market", a trading association, into a progression towards a Federal European EU via the subsequent Treaties of Maastricht, Amsterdam, Nice and Lisbon. The Eurosceptics have felt aggrieved for years that these substantial changes were steam-rolled through willy-nilly and it has largely been down to the rise of UKIP that sufficient pressure has been brought to bear upon the Conservative Party to promise a referendum should they win the election. So regardless of whether some would argue that the electorate had not clamoured enough for a referendum previously, there is a much stronger case to be made that morally and democratically there needed to be a referendum for them to agree to the fundamental changes that were imposed on us by Europe.

My analogy was in response to Timmy's analogy:- Your analogy is really quite illogical, as who in their right minds would leave your imaginary hotel unless there was something potentially better available? Your analogy might have some point if there were grouses that one had about the hotel's shortcomings, that it had been over run with poor quality guests who didn't know how to behave properly, and the facilities were often unavailable due to the sheer number of people wanting to use them. Furthermore, one couldn't get seating near the pool because the Germans had reserved it by placing towels on it, and people who had paid far less than you got the same standard of accommodation. But really, these analogies are pointless, as the purpose of them is only to illustrate what any sensible person realises; that there is no definitive outcome to our leaving that can be prophesied with any real accuracy. Each side is going to use either a carrot approach (leave) or a stick approach (stay) to entice opinion towards their position. As far as I'm concerned, the fear factor case that we would lose a huge amount of trade is not convincing, especially as a lot of that trade is done with the most powerful EU states, whose biggest corporations having the greatest influence over their governments would be the losers. On the other hand, far too much has been made of the trade aspects, whereas many of the leave proponents are influenced by their concerns over immigration, loss of sovereignty and the subjugation of our legal system to that of Europe.

Me too!

Taken from Barnet forum just now.

Or it's like spending your holiday every year for the past 40 in some small guest house in Blackpool. Your friends tell you that there are much better places available for the same price, you could be really daring and actually go abroad where the climate is better and you could experience different cultures and food. But no, that guest house in Blackpool is what you are familiar with. You know where you are with them. It might be grotty and past its prime, and you are bored stiff with it, but it has a dreary familiarity about it. Going elsewhere seems like taking a giant leap into the unknown. It isn't the sensible pragmatic choice.

No reason why we could not have enacted most of that list off our own bat, apart from the Bloc stuff, of course. What is listed as its greatest achievement, peace between European neighbours, can largely be credited to NATO.

Apart from Spanish Bulls and Donkeys and any bird that attempts to migrate over Southern Europe.

I don't have much love for George Galloway's politics, but his response to being grilled by the Beeb presenter on the personalities of the leave campaigners is delicious. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-35633733

Are there any strictly impartial commentators out there? Everybody expressing an opinion on our membership of the EU in the media does so from a perspective of some sort of personal interest. I agree with your last sentence. Commentators can weigh up the pros and cons of us leaving, but none of them can do it from a position of absolute certainty.

It is, isn't it? I posted it yesterday and got this response from Timmy:- I don't think that he likes to see his assertion challenged that we will have to accept the Norway/Switzerland position on trade with the EU if we left. But it appears that the opinions of Hannan are not to be given any credence, as he was an MEP for 17 years, therefore he isn't supposed to voice any opinions on the EU. The same principle applies of course to Teachers commenting on the education system, military officers' comments on the Armed Forces, Consultants' opinions on the NHS, etc. No MP can voice his opinion on the reform of Parliamentary democracy either, especially not those who have been on that gravy train the longest.

Here is a very up to date opinion on the merits of the situation that applies to Norway and Switzerland's (and Iceland's) trading relationship with the EU and why we could expect more. Timmy won't agree with it, of course. http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/2016/02/what-britain-would-look-like-after-brexit/

It isn't all 35 years ago. The butter mountain resurfaced seven years ago. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/4316726/EU-butter-mountain-to-return.html and of course the Common Fisheries Protection legislation is also much more recent. Hedgerows and wildlife margins have been a feature of British farming for over 240 years since the Inclosures Act and the act is still in force today. I'm amused that the CAP is credited by you as the reason why we have so many varieties of cheese. I assume that should we leave the EU, the implication is that all of the hundreds of varieties that we produce will disappear too.

It isn't difficult to find arguments critical of the CAP http://www.debatingeurope.eu/focus/arguments-for-and-against-the-common-agricultural-policy/#.VssyyOzJrXY In the interests of balance, there are the plus points, but then again, there are pros and cons on every aspect of our membership. After so many years of existence, it is appalling that there still exist so many negatives to the system. I can well remember the farcical aspects of the CAP within the first few years of our membership, the wine lakes, butter mountains of over-production of subsidised farming benefiting the peasant farmers of France and Southern Europe at the time. And then when we couldn't find any better solution to deal with the butter mountain, we sold the surplus to the Soviet Union at ridiculously low prices. Our fruit orchard industry was also decimated by cheap imports from France flooding our market. The Common Fisheries Policy of the EU was equally as stupid, decreeing that fish caught that were not included in the quota of the fishermen had to thrown back into the sea dead. Some of their policies over the years have just been truly mental.

Who knows what would be negotiated? I just queried the rather random thought that we would be required to contribute to the cost of running "EU institutions", whatever they may be.

You can reach that conclusion even before there has been any horse-trading over new trade deals should we vote to leave the EU? Power to your crystal ball.

The media have obviously got it all badly wrong, devoting their headlines to the story. They should have polled all the people you know to gauge that there was no mileage the story.

As it explains about the report:- It was prepared for the Britain Stronger in Europe group that’s campaigning for the U.K. to remain an EU member in a referendum promised by Prime Minister David Cameron. That's totally and utterly unbiased in every way then.

I'm talking about size of economy and you're talking about something else entirely. Or are you going to argue that those countries you mention have larger economies than ours apart from Germany?

Which will be the former trading partners? You're yet another one who infers that us leaving the EU will mean that they won't wish to continue trading with us. You say that if we leave we will face increased competition from the EU for trade with other markets. Do they currently withdraw from competing against us out of common decency? Of course they already compete against us for non-EU trade. The country selling the best products at the most competitive price and service will continue to be the one getting the orders. Regarding trade with the rest of the World, it in't necessarily a case of we would be doing it already if it was that easy. We have already been increasing trade with the rest of the World to a greater extent than most of our EU partners. There are EU rules and regulations that hamper our trade elsewhere which when removed will make it easier for us. High transport costs? Being an Island to the West of the richest part of the EU gives us an advantage with shipped imports from around the World. Volatile currency? Ironically, the Euro is far more volatile the Pound. I suspect that most Germans and French would prefer to have their Deutschmarks and Francs back.

We aren't that great, are we? Only the 5th biggest economy in the World. The only person I have seen mention rolling the clock back 75 years is you. Yes, Australia and New Zealand had to find new markets and the Far East was the natural one due to proximity. But the World is a smaller place with the improved global communications and we also trade with the Far East too. Linguistically and culturally we have a great deal more in common with most of the commonwealth than we do with much closer EU neighbours such as Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania. Again, you seem to be of the misguided opinion that if we "flounced" out of Europe, that we would not be able to continue trading with the EU on mutually agreeable terms.

I'm reading reports that Boris Johnson is about to join the Leave campaign. Here is the big beast that can make the difference! It appears that Cameron urging him not to link arms with Farage and Galloway didn't persuade him to ally with the Stay brigade. Despite the personality smears on Farage and Galloway, it doesn't mean that both of them are wrong to hold their views.

http://www.betteroffout.net/the-case/10-eu-myths-about-withdrawl/ It seems that there are conflicting cases depending on whether one chooses to believe the Stay or the Leave campaigns. Ironically our trade with the rest of Europe has declined because of the strength of the pound against the weak Euro. Should we therefore join the Eurozone and get rid of the Pound to make our goods cheaper to buy? Many prophesied doom and gloom if we were to remain outside of the Eurozone, but it helped our economy being outside and we aren't obliged to help bail the basket-cases whose economies have suffered by being in the straight-jacket that Euro membership entailed. All very well these articles predicting the dire consequences on our economy by pointing up the trading benefits we derive with the EU block, but it doesn't seem to have occurred to the people espousing these scenarios that by leaving the EU, we are not hell-bent on ceasing trade with the EU. Neither will the main exporter countries within the EU wish to see their exports to us suddenly cease. Who is in the driving seat were we to leave? Again, the answer to that depends on what position one holds regarding our current membership. Yes, the basis of our trade with Europe will have to be renegotiated, but it is the most powerful nations of the EU who have the most exports to us and therefore have the most to lose by attempts to make trade with us more difficult. On the other side of that coin, we would regain lost sovereignty and control of our borders, would not be burdened by mass immigration from the poorer EU members, would not be obliged to pay them benefits, we would be able to cut through the bureaucratic red-tape imposed on our industries by Brussels, would not be burdened by the inefficiencies of the CAP, could revive our fisheries industry by regaining our territorial waters, etc, etc. Naturally, if we left the EU and unfair trade restrictions were imposed on us, we would seek to increase our trade with our Commonwealth friends and the rest of the World, to the further detriment of the EU states. One thing is for sure though; if the EU were to attempt to bully us, as recommended by the idiot who wrote that article, they will have severely misjudged the British character and it would backfire against them spectacularly. In my opinion, that sort of approach from the EU would provide a huge boost for the Leave campaign.

You assured me that there was no way that Corbyn would be elected leader of the Labour Party, so your judgement is a little suspect when it comes to predictions on peoples' voting intentions. There are voters who despise Farage, Galloway and Iain Duncan Smith, but of course equally there are also those who despise Cameron and Osborne too as toffee-nosed Eton snobs. You have a very poor opinion of your fellow countrymen, believing that they would vote on issues as important to the Country as these, based purely on the personalities of the main campaigners rather than on the debate of the pros and cons of our continued membership. But if as you say there are plenty of voters who will do that, then equally there are plenty who will base their votes on what the media tells them to do. And I would judge the media to be largely Eurosceptic. Just to bring you up to date, though, the referendum no longer asks for a "yes" or "no" vote. It has been changed to "stay" or "leave" options.