I will blame Brexit - It's been an unmitigated disaster. Pushed by the people it benefitted the most - the wealthy. Like all the hedge fund managers who made millions when pound crashed - removing caps on banker's bonuses. Wealthy have raked it in while rest have suffered
Boooo the EU is the greatest organisation in history, Europe is better than us, I consider myself European not British, there are no downsides whatsoever to uncontrolled immigration, I fancy Von Der Leyen.
We are far less politically powerful/influential now than when we were in the EU. We don't have uncontrolled immigration.
We kind of do. Although we've replaced the white European faces with brown Asian and black African faces, so those who voted to get rid of immigrants are going to be very disappointed - and they do exist, like the one I came across in the local Chinese ranting about sending them all back...
Brexit an undeliverable project propagated on lies that’s systematically destroying our economy but yes we would definitely have.been conscripted into some EU army. We can celebrate our glorious isolation as we get poorer and poorer denying our kids the opportunities we had. Happy days.
Anyone who is granted the right to stay has gone through the immigration process and are therefore controlled. Those who are denied access are returned. Any who try to slip the net should be tracked down and processed. The procedures are in place so to me that's not uncontrolled regardless of whether people agree with the criteria for entry or not. The government has wilfully allowed the processing procedure to fail however causing a huge backlog and an opportunity to grab some votes from the xenophobes.
I voted remain from an economic point of view, I could see the harm of leaving a trade bloc. However the political overreach is real and very concerning, I think those countries who were controlled by the Soviet Union and those badly effected by the Second World War like Greece are particularly sensitive to being told what to do politically, they just saw the economic advantages of the EU as well. Countries are routinely ignoring the political rulings from Strasbourg.
Yeah, except the Home Office doesn't count those coming in on valid visas and those going out - so it has no record of how many actual illegal immigrants are in the UK. Estimates range from around 700,000 - 1,000,000 mostly from South Asia and living under the radar. These are separate to anyone claiming asylum or migrating legally. According to recent figures, ~10% of UK exports are students from abroad coming to study here temporarily. And I believe these are counted among the net migration figures.
Whilst I am in full agreement that the EU has for years been overstretching its remit and involving itself way too deeply politically in matters which should be kept domestic for the separate nations, I have seen absolutely nothing which would lead to a conclusion that we are better off out of it. By any measure: be that economically, global standing, regarding defence or anything else. Brexit has been an unmitigated disaster - the failure of successive Tory governments to achieve anything like the right exit deal before the exit was enacted exacerbates this hugely of course - but I dont see how it would have been of net benefit in the short, medium or even long term regardless. I too have read the latest on defence and energy and I think you’re stretching a little with your conclusion to be honest. As I say I’m not happy about the level of interference though I’m not sure our kids would have been primed to be sent into conflict - and the energy strategy, whilst again clearly being extra-territorial interfering, looks to have more benefit than detriment in terms of protection to consumers. The EU is hugely flawed and there were drawbacks to being ongoing members. That is very clear. However there are more drawbacks to not being members, our withdrawal from the union’s cost to this country and those of us living in it ongoingly is immeasurable. I’ve said this before - I’m of the view that this is the first generation in living memory, possibly ever, where the prospects for my kids and the next generation look worse, and opportunities more limited, than they were for me and my generation. Things looked a hell of a lot rosier late nineties to early 2000’s than they do now.
Mateusz Morawiecki (Poland) - Viktor Orban (Hungary) - AfD (Germany) - Geert Wilders (Netherlands) - Giorgia Meloni (Italy.) 5 good reasons for being glad we're not part of the EU.
Mateusz Morawiecki is only acting Polish PM following the election last month and likely to lose that position. Wilders is unlikely to be Dutch PM (although not impossible). AfD are polling about the same level as the Tories here (21%) - albeit with more parties. Boris Johnson - Liz Truss - Richie Sunak are 3 really good reasons to have remained. (You can add Teresa May in if you want, although she was more competent than either of those 3).
This is the point though. It doesn't matter how big you are. It's a single superstate not a collective. Really good example today. For not following a number of EU rules, the EU rightly withheld 900 million euros in aid to Hungary. Partly self motivated blackmail and partly cos he's a Putin fanboy, orban has been blocking all initiatives to assist Ukraine. The EU has caved in and given him his money and he has unblocked the aid to Ukraine. But, without addressing the original issues. Don't think many western governments would have signed off such actions if they had a collective vote on it.
