The debate is heating up and let's hope that everyone
exercises their right to vote on June 23. No doubt the terminally ignorant will
refuse to vote because they can't be bothered but I for one will not be missing
the opportunity to have my say.
I always vote and especially for two reasons. One, my very
good friend, Dee, who lived well into her nineties and had seen it all,
reproached me for my blasé attitude towards voting (I couldn't be bothered
either). Dee reminded me that women had given their lives in order that I
should have the right to vote. From that moment on I hurried down to the ballot
box in earnest. So please, be cynical by all means but don't be so apathetic
that the democratic process means nothing to you.
The second reason I vote is because I've lived too long. Let
me explain. There comes a time in everyone's life where a certain amount of
clarity suddenly happens, like a light bulb being switched on. By age 50 one
has generally seen and experienced every category of the good, bad and ugly on
the planet. Very little is shocking but a lot is worrying. For example, the
current problems with migrants, useless and self-serving politicians, the crazy
ones intent on blowing things and people up, and the rampant corruption that
has inveigled itself into the core of our society, those things worry me more
than global warming. I might not live long enough to see the earth turn into a
desert but I do pay tax. I'd rather have a say as to how my taxes are spent,
thank you very much. And for that reason I'll be voting out as I don't think
staying in the EU makes any sense at all. I would hasten to add that all those
who want to stay probably have a personal stake such as a house in Tuscany or
some other economic interest that they don't want affected or to lose.
For all intents and purposes, I estimate that not much will
change with regards to Western Europeans currently residing in the UK and as
was the case pre-EU, the UK will have treaties with wealthy countries to allow
travel without needing a visa. Citizens of poorer parts of the world will
probably have to pay exorbitant sums and jump through hoops in order to travel
into the UK. This is how it used to be and it would make perfect sense to
return to controlling our borders. As a frequent traveller to France, it
worries me endlessly how no one even asks for my passport let alone my hound's.
The UK will also regain a level of independence. We
currently have to pander to The European Court and judges sitting outside of
the UK are making directives that impact our daily lives. Furthermore, the EU
costs us a lot of money and in terms of value for money, I fail to see what
that is apart from surrendering our sovereignty and our ability to decide when
a Cornish pasty is not a Cornish pasty. Such earth-shattering revelations don't
actually make my life more worth living. I would prefer to see potholes fixed,
less illiterate feral youngsters, more jobs and a greater sense of patriotism.
The rot in our financial services- the tremendous breadth of
corruption that enables the savvy to get obscenely rich on the back of someone
else's paucity and to rig markets to suit their end game, none of that will
change if we stay in the EU. (You can be sure that on June 24th someone will have
made a killing hedging the euro against the pound). In response to the
financial crisis of 2008, the EU proposed a Banking Union of member states to
regulate the banking sector and protect deposits from disappearing altogether.
When Greece defaulted on its loan repayments recently, Greeks automatically
rushed to empty their accounts, so convinced were they that the Union would
protect them.
The argument of losing jobs if we leave is also speculative.
Our manufacturing is dying- see Tata Steel. We are not competitive because our
costs are too high. In a world of sweatshops and it must be said, expectations
which differ to ours, we cannot compete. In the Third World however measly the
pay it puts food into hungry bellies. In the West we want to have it all. There
is a fundamental difference in the way we expect to be compensated for the
effort we put into our jobs. For example, I once advertised for an assistant,
one young woman I interviewed balked at the annual salary on offer and
exclaimed that she would get more per month if she ‘had a sprog for a
footballer’. Is that person going to work sixteen hours a day or make
sacrifices in order to succeed?
Our rising energy costs which are some of the most expensive
in the world, force us to be less competitive. Food is ridiculously overpriced
and how anyone on a meagre wage can actually eat properly is a minor miracle.
To be fair and as a former avid vegetable grower, our climate is not conducive
to food production except for seven or eight months of the year and therefore
in order to satiate our expectations once again, we are forced to import food.
Politicians too easily absolve responsibility for all that
is wrong in the UK by declaring their hands are tied (viz the migrant crisis
where any policy has to toe the line with EU Diktat). Crucially, answer this:
is the UK government fully engaged in EU policy development, after all, that
was what was written in the ‘rule book’.
For all of the above reasons, I'm out. It’s adieu from me to the EU. Ignore the scaremongering that we would lose
jobs: we might actually become more competitive because we will have to.
