General Election - 8thJune

Hermann said:

I think I read somewhere that over 50% of their workforce commutes in from other countries.

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Obviously not a passionate nation - not enough nookie going on to achieve self sufficiency !

IndoMike said:

It's not just the financial impact (and it's difficult to see how that can be anything other than negative), but it's also the fact that in effect we're saying that we don't want to belong to Europe : that we don't really need Europe. A kind of lack of solidarity and friendship. In my opinion we were stronger together.

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We are not saying we don't want to be part of Europe. We are saying we do not want to be in the European Union. There is an important distinction.

Hermann said:

Except Norway and Switzerland are part of the single market and have unrestricted immigration. Something May and co have ruled out.

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Hermann said:

Plus although they don't officially have freedom of movement, they basically do. I think I read somewhere that over 50% of their workforce commutes in from other countries.

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I echo both of these - the overwhelming majority of workers in Liechtenstein commute in from Switzerland (made easier by the fact that the national currency of Liechtenstein is the Swiss franc).

Switzerland's relationship with the EU is based on a framework of hundreds of bilateral agreements which essentially replicate the same or similar requirements of EU membership - crucial to the Brexit debate this includes the same 4 basic freedoms (including freedom of movement) and in this respect Switzerlands border to the EU is more open than that of the UK, as it is a member of the Schengen zone which the UK is not.

In terms of complexity and timing, the bilateral agreement framework took roughly 14 years to agree and negotiate, often case by case. So not realistic to expect to be able to replicate that on the Brexit timeline.

Final relevant point I would add is that a Swiss referendum voted in favour of restricting freedom of movement back in 2013 - the EU response to this was to make the necessary adjustments to their own programs, for example Swiss students were necessarily excluded from the Erasmus program of student interaction and exchange. The upshot of that was that the eventual enabling legislation to pass the referendum decision into Swiss law (just on that one matter of freedom of movement) is still not yet finally agreed by the Swiss parliament over 3 years later - and when it is implemented it will be done in such a way that does not prevent freedom of movement of EU nationals, does not affect the Schengen zone, and does not endanger the other related bilateral agreements. So, not sure that would be a particularly desirable outcome for many leave campaigners in any event.

Alistair20000 said:

We are not saying we don't want to be part of Europe. We are saying we do not want to be in the European Union. There is an important distinction.

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But we are rejecting their sacred institution. It's not like stopping your Trust membership. Interraction between the UK and Europe will become more complicated, ties will be broken. It's not gonna be as it was before and we can't have our cake and eat it. Of course geographically we will still be in Europe, but psychologically?

Hermann said:

Cameron ran a shambles of a campaign based on the only political tactic he ever had: scaremongering. Sadly when he hasn't got the Mail and Sun on his side it doesn't work.

That doesn't however mean that the leave campaign wasn't full of lies and scaremongering itself.

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Do people really take notice of Newspaper editorials? Years ago I remember Eric Haydn the then owner of the 'Clock Tower Cafe' waving a copy of the Daily Mirror above his head and saying, "Who on earth pays good money only to be ordered how to think Politically by this rag?" Perhaps in the mid 60's they did so.

Nowadays I believe newspaper opinions count for less when you see that the Sun only sold 1,666,715 copies in January 2017 compared to 3,006,565 in January 2010. As for the 'Mail' or to be more accurate, the 'Daily Mail' and the 'Mail on Sunday.' The Daily Mail is certainly Pro-Brexit as apposed to the MoS which is very Pro-Remain. For example, one of their chief political columnist and rabidly Pro-EU is Dan Hodge who, apart from being the the son of Former Labour minister Glenda Jackson, worked for the then London Mayor Ken Livingstone, is an 'on and off' Blairite member of the Labour party, and, to top it all off, is an official of the GMB_Union.

All politicians tell lies. The Late Bob Monkhouse once said: "The only time a politician tells the truth is when he is calling another one a liar." As for Brexiteers telling lies,well, are they any different from those batting for the Remainers or indeed the Remainers themselves? Take Ian Hislop the editor of Private Eye and 'Have I Got News For You' panelist, that unfunny little creep leads a constant barrage of sneering innuendo against anyone connected to the Leave movement.

Whenever I see his magazine in Sainsbury's or Asda I surreptitiously shove it out of sight behind Land Rover Monthly.

I'm an avid Private Eye reader, but they have been decidedly damascene and one-eyed in their Brexit coverage, falling for example into the trap of confusing "suggestion" with "pledge/promise".

Jason H said:

falling for example into the trap of confusing "suggestion" with "pledge/promise".

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I'm not having this revisionism.

These were the deliberate headline attention grabbers:

"Let's give our NHS the £350 million the EU takes every week"
"We send the EU £350 million a week. Let's fund our NHS instead"

History is full of party lines being amended once the tide goes out.
Even comic-strip con-men have the decency to say 'it's a fair cop guv'.

Er, yes, suggestions, exactly as I said. "Let's" being the operative word. "We will" or "We promise to..." are promises / pledges.

Vote Leave, as a campaign group rather than a party of government, had absolutely no say in government policy, nor did it claim to have.

Jason H said:

Er, yes, suggestions, exactly as I said. "Let's" being the operative word. "We will" or "We promise to..." are promises / pledges.

Vote Leave, as a campaign group rather than a party of government, had absolutely no say in government policy, nor did it claim to have.

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Again, I'm not having it.

It was promoted, simply, as pure cause and effect and it was the headline statement of the campaign.

But it wasn't a pledge or a promise. Something some people on the Remain side seem to have failed to grasp. I don't see hordes of Leavers saying "Hang on, where's this £350 million a week for the NHS"?