Should We Leave the EU?

[EM2]

By no stretch of the imagination is this country overcrowded. Less than 3% of it is built on, and almost 80% of urban areas are designated 'natural' (2012 figures, source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18623096)

 

[Railops]

A doctor from Australia has no right of entry but a jobless unskilled dosser from Bulgaria can breeze straight into our large and expanding black economy to pay no tax and have a right to use the NHS.
When freedom of movement was originally suggested it was meant to be for workers not just for people to wander into a country and contribute nothing.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

just like we have chosen to permit freedom of movement!

You may have chosen to permit freedom of movement but this referendum will be the first test as to whether the general electorate agree with you and the EU,

 

[Antman]

Not really true. If, as a result of Brexit, freedom of movement is stopped, then lots of people will through immigration restrictions be prevented from living where they wish, from pursuing the careers or the studying that they want, and even in some cases from having contact with their own families. They will be instead forced to remain in their home country when they do not wish to do so - and in some cases, that may well include British people being forced to reside in the UK against their wishes (assuming other countries respond in kind to our denying freedom of movement to the UK to their citizens). Maybe you think that's a price worth paying for Brexit, but please don't fool yourself into thinking that that won't happen, because if Brexit is accompanied by removal of freedom of movement, it will. It already happens on a large scale to people from outside the EU, and also affects many British citizens who have family outside the EU.
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This is simply not true. This has been pointed out to you many times on these forums, and as I recall, on numerous occasions various people have pointed out the reasons why this is not true. So I'm not sure why you continue to repeat something that you must by now surely realize is not true?

Amongst the other things that result from economic migrants are:

• Cheaper food and services etc. within the UK (raising the effective living standards of many other people, including many poorer people).
• Keeping jobs within the UK that would otherwise have been moved abroad.
• Enabling many businesses in the UK to stay afloat: Think for example, agricultural businesses that are under pressure from supermarkets to provide cheap food, under threat that the supermarkets will otherwise simply buy from abroad instead.
• Working in many industries that are unable to recruit enough UK workers (think for example: NHS)
• Buying things for themselves (economic migrants, do need to eat, y'know! They don't just work and never consume anything) - thereby providing more customers for UK businesses.
• Provide Labour and even set up in business in trades related to building - thereby helping to get some more houses built or improved (but obviously the flip side of that is the added pressure on the housing market because migrants need somewhere to live.)

And yes, of course in some cases, one of the effects of economic migrants is to suppress wages - and I don't deny that low wages and poor working conditions is an issue that needs addressing. But is not, as you incorrectly claim, the only impact (or even the only significant impact) they have.

It is true but I'm not going over it all again, I even included youtube footage of the late Bob Crowe saying pretty much the same thing.

 

[TheKnightWho]

A doctor from Australia has no right of entry but a jobless unskilled dosser from Bulgaria can breeze straight into our large and expanding black economy to pay no tax and have a right to use the NHS.
When freedom of movement was originally suggested it was meant to be for workers not just for people to wander into a country and contribute nothing.

Has the black economy been a talking point in the Mail today? It seems to be the new favourite topic of conversation for some.
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It is true but I'm not going over it all again, I even included youtube footage of the late Bob Crowe saying pretty much the same thing.

Someone saying something doesn't make it true.

 

[Antman]

So Paul from Grimsby won't work picking vegetables or stacking shelves for minimum wage, but Pawel from Gdansk will.
Maybe the reason is that Paul is a lazy git?

Maybe Paul has a mortgage and a family to support whilst Pawel lives in a cheap and grotty bedsit and sends most of his wages back to Poland?
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Has the black economy been a talking point in the Mail today? It seems to be the new favourite topic of conversation for some.
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Someone saying something doesn't make it true.

Well you seem to think so about yourself!

 

[radamfi]

A doctor from Australia has no right of entry but a jobless unskilled dosser from Bulgaria can breeze straight into our large and expanding black economy to pay no tax and have a right to use the NHS.
When freedom of movement was originally suggested it was meant to be for workers not just for people to wander into a country and contribute nothing.

Why talk about Australians and Bulgarians when our precious right to go live in better countries is at risk?

 

[Railops]

Has the black economy been a talking point in the Mail today? It seems to be the new favourite topic of conversation for some.

Are you sticking to this statement ?

TheKnightWho - Student -

All people coming to the UK do not immediately need to use the NHS - they will immediately start paying tax though.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

By no stretch of the imagination is this country overcrowded. Less than 3% of it is built on, and almost 80% of urban areas are designated 'natural' (2012 figures, source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18623096)

We are importing a population the size of a city like Coventry every year. Only the Netherlands has a higher population density - there are plenty of far less crowded parts of Europe aching to be developed. Why do you want everyone coming here ?

 

[EM2]

Maybe Paul has a mortgage and a family to support whilst Pawel lives in a cheap and grotty bedsit and sends most of his wages back to Poland?

And maybe Paul still lives at home with his parents but can't be bothered to get off his backside and actually work, and expects the state to provide for him?

 

[Barn]

just like we have chosen to permit freedom of movement!

So freedom of movement is fine for decently affluent British people but not for dirty eastern europeans?

This is lazy. I've never expressed an opinion as to British retirees in Spain. I don't know what the people and authorities in Spain think of that situation. I've never suggested that Britons should expect to have free movement if that is withdrawn from Europeans coming here.

What's clear though is that they haven't been sent / exported there. A government is responsible for its country's entry requirements. It is not responsible for preventing people leaving - that is up to the recipient country to decide.

PS: How dare you attribute words like 'dirty Eastern Europeans' to me? Do the decent thing and retract that please.

 

[EM2]

Why do you want everyone coming here ?

I don't think that I've ever said that.
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What's clear though is that they haven't been sent / exported there. A government is responsible for a country's entry requirements. It is not responsible for preventing people leaving - that is up to the recipient country to decide.

And no-one has been sent or exported here either.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

Why talk about Australians and Bulgarians when our precious right to go live in better countries is at risk?

People with money can live anywhere

 

[Railops]

People with money can live anywhere

Didn't you know nobody from here ever worked or visited Europe until the EU gave us permission.

 

[Barn]

I don't think that I've ever said that.
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And no-one has been sent or exported here either.

No, when did I say they have? When have I blamed any country for sending anyone anywhere?

 

[EM2]

Are you sticking to this statement ?

I can't see how people can buy food, drink and clothing without paying tax.

 

[Railops]

I can't see how people can buy food, drink and clothing without paying tax.

Tiny compared to NI and Income Tax, how much VAT do you reckon an Eastern European living 10 to a room and working cash in hand contributes to the economy ?

 

[EM2]

No, when did I say they have? When have I blamed any country for sending anyone anywhere?

So what's the problem? Bulgarians come here, Britons go to Provence.
There are 2.2m Britons living elsewhere in the EU - http://thelondonpost.net/2015/02/what-happens-to-british-expatriates-if-the-uk-leaves-the-eu/

While much of the debate about the UK’s membership focusses upon the 2.3 million citizens of other EU countries living in the UK, a nearly identical number of UK citizens live in other Member States.

 

[tony_mac]

By no stretch of the imagination is this country overcrowded. Less than 3% of it is built on, and almost 80% of urban areas are designated 'natural' (2012 figures, source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18623096)

I think just about all of our Northern cities have significantly lower populations now than they did in the past.
Liverpool is quite an extreme example, but is barely half as populous now as it was in the 1930s.
As a population expands, a country naturally has the ability (and revenue) to also expand the necessary services. That stays the same whichever country the new people (or their parents) were born in.

 

[radamfi]

Didn't you know nobody from here ever worked or visited Europe until the EU gave us permission.

But you use the example of an Australian doctor just a few minutes ago. Under some if not most Brexiters, us Brits will be in the same difficult position as an Australian. These people think nothing of ruining their dreams and desires of their fellow countrymen.

 

[EM2]

Tiny compared to NI and Income Tax, how much VAT do you reckon an Eastern European living 10 to a room and working cash in hand contributes to the economy ?

Depends how much they eat and drink and spend. But that's not the point. You seemed to suggest that TheKnightWho's statement that

All people coming to the UK do not immediately need to use the NHS - they will immediately start paying tax though.

is not true.
They do immediately start paying tax, just not the tax that you think was meant.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

Has the black economy been a talking point in the Mail today? It seems to be the new favourite topic of conversation for some.
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Someone saying something doesn't make it true.

A bit of a generalisation there - there are people who read the Guardian who are opposed to the EU as well. I raised the issue of the black economy because I have watched it in practice over the past few weeks with regard to some people doing building work. Much of the building boom is on the back of this cheap labour - why do we need a building boom anyway ? What is wrong with a structured measured programme - oh sorry, I forgot we need to house the 330'000 a year plus EU migrants. This is utter madness, as I keep re-iterating regeneration of nations should be the EU's key policy not facilitating mass population shift to bolster a short time boom for 'get rich quick' businesses.

 

[tony_mac]

Tiny compared to NI and Income Tax, how much VAT do you reckon an Eastern European living 10 to a room and working cash in hand contributes to the economy ?

And you know there are lots of these because... ?

Oddly enough, all of the 'Eastern Europeans' that I know earn far more than I do!
And of the people I know who have never worked a day, they are all born British.
(Obviously just an anecdote, and not in any way meaningful, but that seems to be enough to count as 'evidence').

 

[anme]

Didn't you know nobody from here ever worked or visited Europe until the EU gave us permission.

This is a really dangerous argument. It is much much easier to live and work in the EU as an EU citizen than as someone else. It's not just about visas and work permits, but also pensions, healthcare, right to buy property, access to benefits, not having to leave if you lose your job, right to bring your family, etc, etc.

Do not compare the rights EU citizens have with the limited access often granted to others.

 

[Antman]

But you use the example of an Australian doctor just a few minutes ago. Under some if not most Brexiters, us Brits will be in the same difficult position as an Australian. These people think nothing of ruining their dreams and desires of their fellow countrymen.

Well there seems to be plenty of Aussies over here so what difficult position are they in?

 

[Mutant Lemming]

I think just about all of our Northern cities have significantly lower populations now than they did in the past.
Liverpool is quite an extreme example, but is barely half as populous now as it was in the 1930s.
As a population expands, a country naturally has the ability (and revenue) to also expand the necessary services. That stays the same whichever country the new people (or their parents) were born in.

The city boundary of Liverpool is quite narrowly defined and the corporation built many post war and sixties estates in areas which are outside the city boundary. Quite often the boundary is just a line drawn in suburbs. Although there has been decline you should really add about three quarters of the population of Sefton and all the population of Knowsley to get an overall figure for what is generally regarded as being Liverpool.

You could also do the similar with surrounding districts of Manchester and Nottingham.

 

[EM2]

the 330'000 a year plus EU migrants.

There are not '330'000 a year plus EU migrants'.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36382199

Net migration to the UK rose to 333,000 in 2015, according to Office for National Statistics estimates - the second highest figure on record.
Net migration is the difference between the number of people coming to the UK for at least a year and those leaving.
The figure for EU-only net migration was 184,000, equalling its record high.

So, let's say we leave the EU. That reduces that 333k to 149k. How will leaving the EU help reduce that to 'tens of thousands', like our Prime Minister promised?

 

[Barn]

So what's the problem? Bulgarians come here, Britons go to Provence.
There are 2.2m Britons living elsewhere in the EU - http://thelondonpost.net/2015/02/what-happens-to-british-expatriates-if-the-uk-leaves-the-eu/

That figure has been debunked - see the BBC's reality check report:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36046900

As I said, I haven't expressed an opinion on what other countries should choose for their immigration policies. I don't expect hypocritical special treatment for UK citizens if we deny free movement to others.

The reality will, as always, be far more nuanced. I wouldn't be surprised if the solution was something similar to the originally-envisaged European model: you can live in a country if you can support yourself without recourse to public funds.

 

[radamfi]

Well there seems to be plenty of Aussies over here so what difficult position are they in?

They don't have freedom of movement to the UK. However, a lot of them have European parents or grandparents so can acquire a second passport. One of my ex-colleagues is Australian but has an Irish grandparent and so got an Irish passport to enable her to live in the UK or the rest of the EU/EEA for life if she wants. So under Brexit she would retain freedom of movement whereas I may not.

 

[Antman]

They don't have freedom of movement to the UK. However, a lot of them have European parents or grandparents so can acquire a second passport. One of my ex-colleagues is Australian but has an Irish grandparent and so got an Irish passport to enable her to live in the UK or the rest of the EU/EEA for life if she wants. So under Brexit she would retain freedom of movement whereas I may not.

I'm not sure I see the problem, I don't have free movement to Australia and if I wanted to go there I would have to meet certain criteria and quite rightly so.