I don’t know how to vote!
And here’s why…
I don’t feel like I’ve been given any useable information. Both sides keep banging on about the trade deals and yes, trade is important for the economy, but that isn’t the number one thought in most people’s mind. Most people are thinking about there not being places to live, the schools being too full, the NHS being under ridiculous pressure and workers being exploited (i.e zero hours contracts).
If we focus solely on these 4 things, none of them are solved by leaving the EU. None of them were caused by the EU.
There’s not enough housing.
Yes,
more people have arrived,
yes,
that causes an imbalance in supply and demand.
But it has also been exacerbated by political policy.
http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/feb/19/new-build-houses-falls-short-despite-small-increase
If we know there are more people coming to the UK, we can build more AFFORDABLE housing. We can control the rents of the housing we have and we can free up empty properties and properties which are in a state of disrepair.
Some ideas:
Creating projects where people renovate vacant council properties for a % of ownership maybe.
Tax benefits for agreeing to rent control possibly.
I’m sure if you get a group of housing experts from both sides of the political spectrum, some people from say, Shelter and some other charities like, maybe Age Concern/Help the Aged. Put them all in a room, with the goal to sort out the housing shortage with more than just, ‘build more homes’. I think they would come up with something which might work.
The Schools are too full
Well, again that’s not because of the EU, that’s more to do with the fact that we’re not building enough schools.
What we ARE doing is selling off school land. http://schoolsweek.co.uk/one-school-every-two-weeks-gets-government-go-ahead-to-sell-off-part-of-playing-fields/
Privatising the hell out of something that should always remain a public service. http://metro.co.uk/2015/06/03/the-government-is-privatising-our-school-system-and-disregarding-parents-teachers-and-communities-5228512/ – this from last year, and although they backed down, the fact that they even considered forced academisation in the first place is very troubling…
Education should not be for sale and it should definitely not be used for creating profit.
When we allow this, these sorts of things happen http://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/mar/29/academy-shut-sixth-form-a-level-provision-uk-borough-knowsley
While we’re at it, if we continue to piss off teachers in such a massive way, it won’t matter how many schools we build, there’ll be no-one to teach in them.
Why would you live under the Ofstead Sword of Damocles, when you could be being paid more money, with better working conditions, sitting in a sunny country somewhere exotic?
More and more teachers are deciding it’s not worth it. http://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/feb/26/uk-schools-suffering-as-new-teachers-flock-abroad-warns-chief-inspector
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35666644
The EU is not responsible for this. Governmental tinkering is to blame. People with no experience of teaching, using the education system as their personal plaything is to blame.
There’s too much pressure on the NHS
Well, again, let’s see if this was caused by the EU
Firstly, this explains better than I can
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/how-the-nhs-is-being-dismantled-in-10-easy-steps-10474075.html
These policies would have led to pressure anyway, whether there were more Romanians coming here or not, why?
I’ll let NHS London explain
https://www.myhealth.london.nhs.uk/news/nhs-today
So let’s stop using the NHS as a reason to leave, shall we?
Immigrants are driving down wages.
Maybe, but I believe that the EU has helped UK employees much more than harmed them.
http://www.itv.com/news/update/2016-06-14/corbyn-staying-in-the-eu-will-protect-workers-rights/
Ask yourself this question:
Who do you trust more to protect worker’s rights?
a) The Conservative government
b) The EU
You now have an easy choice in the referendum.
If you chose a) vote LEAVE if you chose b) vote REMAIN
BUT, BUT, BUT
What’s this about trade tariffs?
If we leave we may have to re-negotiate trade agreements, but we will always trade with the EU, BMW et al will still want to sell their cars over here, tariffs will inevitably increase the exclusivity.
People who are easily impressed by a shiny car will be even more impressed if you have to wade through a mountain of paperwork to get your Mercedes or if they are in anyway more expensive or harder to obtain.
Plus, if we’re not locked into EU trade deals,
it would be nice to give commonwealth countries a bit of a boost with our trade.
I was in St Lucia at Christmas and the loss of the Banana industry has hit hard. Fields of banana trees have disappeared. The many people previously employed in the industry are not unemployed in an economy that was barely hanging on anyway. Now the island pretty much only has tourism going for it. Which is fabulous for the north of the island, but disastrous for the rest of it.
So if we get rid of the EU trade deal, we would again be free to buy Bananas from the Carribean, rather than South America.
So LEAVE it is.
BUT, BUT, BUT…
Every debate I see, I find myself agreeing with both sides at some point in the debate,
(unless it’s Boris or Nigel Farage talking, in which case, I instinctively disagree on principle, whatever they say)
I find myself left with even less of an idea of what to do.
UNTIL…
The sentence that Boris and his mates repeat about 500 times actually sinks into my brain and is evaluated:
IF WE LEAVE, WE WILL GAIN MORE CONTROL OVER HOW WE ARE GOVERNED.
It occurred to me, that not all the WEs in that sentence are referring to the same thing.
IF WE LEAVE, WE WILL GAIN MORE CONTROL OVER HOW WE ARE GOVERNED.
If you replace the green WEs with, ‘WE, the British Public’
And the red WE with, ‘WE, the current government’
For me the sentence takes on a bit of a sinister tone:
IF WE, THE BRITISH PUBLIC, LEAVE, WE, THE CURRENT GOVERNMENT, WILL GAIN MORE CONTROL OVER HOW WE, THE BRITISH PUBLIC, ARE GOVERNED.
If that comforts you, vote LEAVE
If that scares the bejesus out of you, vote REMAIN.
For all its faults, I personally, would trust the social conscience of Germany, Sweden, Finland, pretty much every country in the EU (except maybe, France – a couple of the eastern countries are a little suspicious too 🙂 ) more than I trust the social conscience of a Conservative government.
My personal Leave/Remain list
REMAIN
Telephone costs.
I ring my friend Claudia, in Germany, as often as I want, for as long as I want and I only pay £5 a month for that privilege (plus I can call ANYWHERE in the EU as well)
I remember the days of a 10 minute mobile phone call costing nearly £20 in old money, I now pay £1.99 per day for unlimited mobile calls, texts and data.
Cheap Flights to the continent
European legislation has reduced the costs and conditions (taxes/regulations) of travel
Free movement of people
It doesn’t just go one way! I still harbouring a dream of just one day packing up and moving to Berlin.
The fact that it is a simple process of just packing up and getting there is brilliant. Outside of the EU, this would be a bit more of a pain in the arse, trust me, I’ve queued up for days to get a residency permit in Germany before! No way I want to return to that torture!!!!!
LEAVE
Help out Commonwealth countries
See above
David Cameron will go
cancelled out by the probability that Boris goes in, which is arguably worse – so it doesn’t count
I think I know how, I’m voting
BUT, BUT, BUT
My head hurts!
#makingthechange 