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amazing times.
What you say about the Euro and Germany being the main beneficiary is totally true. But you also need to make things or offer services that people want to buy if you want to trade more with the rest of the world - something that Germany has been very good at for a very long time. Germany's export success is not just due to the Euro - the've introduced labour market reforms, invested heavily in R+D, exercised wage constraint and offer brilliantly designed and high quality manufactured goods. And they are part of the EU.
Britain has let its manufacturing base whither (this began even before we joined the EU) and consistently ranked amongst the lowest investors in R+D amongst major economies. Our companies are often not as productive as their EU and global competitors. In short, we are not up to competing with the big boys in the global market. This situation will not miraculously change because we leave the EU.
If we can't make the necessary changes while we are in the EU (and there is nothing stopping is) then there is zero reason to believe we will behave differently outside the EU.
I understand this sentiment but it's a totally false 'choice'. France and Germany do not forget about their national self interest just because they are in the EU. As Germany has demonstrated, you can have an incredibly strong brand and be unbelievably successful by being in the EU - perhaps even because you are in the EU.
There is absolutely nothing at all to stop the UK going out and trading more with the rest of the world while being part of the EU.
I agree though with your implied criticism of the Remain campaign which has not made enough of the positive reasons for staying in.
What people in the UK are never reminded about is the fact that the EU has not been imposed on us. We applied to join the EEC and were refused entry twice before getting in. We had a referendum on membership in 1975 and voted to stay. Since then the UK has played a leading role in shaping the EU into what it is today. The EU was NOT imposed on us - the UK helped make it what it is - i.e. The world's largest single trading block and a beacon to many around the world of how a continent that was at war for centuries can build prosperity, peace and (to a large extent) stability.
Those voting for Brexit are throwing away all these achievements and all our influence in Europe (and arguably globally) in the misguided belief that by being outside the EU everything will magically be better.
If we leave we will be forcing Germany to assume an even more dominant position in Europe - as history shows us, this is rarely good for Europe or for Britain. The UK's presence in the EU has been and still could be an incredible force for good.
And we take the current relative peace in Europe for granted. History also shows how quickly things can fall apart, especially when countries like the UK turn in on themselves and away from the continent and the world at large.
A lot is at stake and leaving is simply a massive, pointless gamble, with no clear objectives about what it will even achieve.
The UK will survive but being outside the EU will not make us more successful or influential - probably the opposite. Bririan in the EU has prospered and can continue to do so if we stop navel gazing and knuckle down to the hard work of building a successful economy and being a helpful player on the world stage.
Currently we are a bit of a laughing stock globally as no one apart from the Leave campaigners even understand what the UK thinks it will achieve by leaving the EU. To outsiders there are simply no perceivable benefits to leaving. And it's true. The leave campaign simply don't have a single good point to make to justify leaving. It's all jingoistic hot air and promises about immigration and sovereignty that are actually totally impossible to deliver.
The UK economy is totally dependant on migrant labour. That's just a fact. If we leave the EU and stop the Poles coming in, we still have to get those cabbage pickers from somewhere. And we still need people to clean the floors and be nurses in our hospitals. And Boris aims to increase trade and grow the economy - how do you do that when we have massive skills shortages and the only people willing/able to do half the jobs are foreigners?
Brexit supporters are being sold a bogus prospectus - thin air sold as a long term strategy. The Brexiteers, as some on hear have acknowledged, haven't the faintest idea what will happen once we leave - great way to run a country!
Well just off the top of my head I am currently overseeing a new rota change at work. The staff want to work 7 nights in a row and this works for fine for the business but higher management have blocked it because of the 'EU Working Time Directive' which limits the amount of hours someone can work in a week and they are petrified of being sued somewhere down the line.
Ok mate I'm all ears. How does the average voter go about changing this entity to make it 'a more efficient, less bureaucratic and more democratic entity'?
Remarkably we actually have a say for the first time in my lifetime but look at the choices on the table:
1. Vote leave and take a bit of a punt in the dark.
2. Stop moaning and keep on drinking the Kool-Aid being served up by the smug EU and their apologist poodle Cameron.
I've said numerous times give me a third option whereby we can stay in but the EU is committed to serious reform but that's not on the ballot paper so what can you do but go with the lesser of two evils.
Where are your 'nuanced solutions' and 'politicians who have the guts to explain difficult solutions into clear and understandable measures'? They don't exist mate.
So apart from rioting in the streets (I'm not Greek so not really an option) the only means I have open to me is the protest vote of Brexit.
Indeed.
Finally the ruling elite are reaping what they have sown by painting anyone who raises a question contrary to their liberal propaganda as a rabid racist. Maybe we will have to pay a price but if it allows the working man to give the sneering political class a kicking and remind them who they are working for then maybe it's worth paying.
In the words of the late, great Rik Mayall 'Bang on.'
Actually while we're it at it lets get down to Marseille and take it to the Russians too!! Who's with me?
COME ON INGERLUND!!
Wizard, classic case of misinformation or someone (you?) not doing your home work. The UK allows workers to opt out of the 48 hr week. Employers can even ask staff to opt out of it. So another EU myth evaporates into thin air...
There are exceptions though. Like airline staff. Crazy. Let em work 24/7, I say! Damn workers rights getting in the way of a good bit of exploitation.
And it'll be the working man who suffers most if we leave.
https://www.gov.uk/maximum-weekly-working-hours/overview
An excellent video giving the history and future direction of the EU.
Lovely stuff.
The sovereignty issue is a red herring. This is about whether we want to be sad pathetic little Britain outside the EU (soon to be just Little England when Scotland leaves) sat on the sidelines shouting at johnie foreigner, blaming everyone but ourselves and feeling sorry for ourselves, or an engaged, modern and successful world player.
Brexit is for those who think going and sulking in the corner is the way to get mummy's attention. Meanwhile the grown ups are in the EU trying to tackle the world's big problems and
Take your pick.
As Wizard said, all Brexit is actually about is sticking two fingers up at the world. Flicking the V to the 'elite' as if the elite are going to be the worst impacted by Brexit.
By leaving we are basically saying we can't hack it playing with the big boys so we're going to go and play make believe on our own while the world passes us by.
Awesome.
Yeah cheers mate I have actually read it numerous times but once again don't let the facts get in the way of your presumptions.
The problem is not opting out of it but a gutless management (the leadership style du jour filters down from our ruling elite it seems) too scared not to follow EU doctrine to the letter. If we were a private company then fine they would all opt out but as we are effectively a public company no one got the bottle to make a decision and why should they as they have no shareholders who they are accountable to for their shit decisions (hey presto another parallel with the EU. TfL it seems is a microcosm of EU poor management, waste and lack of accountability).
So the problem is not the EU... It's your management team. Or am I missing something?
All the EU has done has said that there should be a maximum number of hours beyond which no one can be asked to work if they don't want to. If you do want to work longer then that's fine, but your employer can't force you to. Most people in the UK would (if the EU wasn't mentioned) consider that quite fair I suspect. Especially when applied to people whose job is to drive heavy vehicles and mass transit.
That's my whole point. The EU monster is a phantasm dreamed up by the Daily Mail. Most of this nonsense about straight bananas etc. is just that - total nonsense.
When the UK government recently looked into why Britain supposedly has so much trouble with EU red tape they discovered the issue was not EU regulation but the British obsession with forms and box ticking. I.e most of the pointless bureaucracy and soul destroying audit compliance guff is self imposed and literally nothing to do with the EU.
This is demonstrated by the example you've given. There is a perfectly sensible piece of EU legislation that helps protect the ordinary working man from being exploited. If he wants to opt out he can. The 'problem' (as ever in the UK) appears to be inept management.
Leaving the EU will do literally nothing to change this, unless you are one of those loons who literally believes in no workers rights whatsoever. In which case Brexit is probably for you, as Boris and Gove will want to take a hatchet to whats left of employee rights once we are out of the EU.
Sure the ordinary working man will come out of it really well as we move into the sunlit uplands of a low wage low skill economy.
Actually the consensus is that the European super state concept is pretty much dead - there is zero political will for it amongst other member states. And even if it wasn't, Cameron has negotiated an explicit UK opt out from 'ever closer union' - an opt out that other states are likely to want to get as well.
You are right that the Euro may require more integration of fiscal policy but that will be something for the Euro countries to pursue amongst themselves. Meanwhile the UK opt out makes explicit what has been obvious for some time- the EU is no longer about a one size fits all approach and the UK very clearly has the best of both worlds by being in the single market but outside the Euro.
I had a good career with a good salary for 25 years, but have been made reduntant twice in the last 8 years, I don't think that it's a coincidence that each time I've got a new job it has been at less money than the previous with more demands for that money. On the first occassion it was 33% less. I'm lucky I lived through the Thatcher years of the mid to late 80's when I earned a lot of money & invested it wisely. Today the opportunities of that time are gone thanks to the treaty of lisbon which has put an enormous strain to comply on the majority of Businesses, even those who don't export.
So that's why I'm voting OUT, because I want England with or without the rest of the UK to take back control of regulations.
The job insecurity and workplace exploitation you describe sounds like it is a product of economic liberalisation and the erosion of workers rights under successive UK governments. The EU actually helps set basic standards for workers - precisely the things that people like Wizard attack as 'EU bureaucracy'.
If we leave the EU there is likely to be more zero hours contracts, job insecurity and lower wages. That is the model advocated by people like Boris and Gove.
No only those selling into the EU would have to comply, which is currently between 4 & 5 % only.
Depends how you look at things.