Stephen Booth

Most of our problems today are caused by our being locked into this European nightmare, and hidebound by their restrictions.

I wondered if anybody on this forum had any ideas about how we could positively engage to leave it?

I suppose another way round the same problem would be to actively engineer Europe's demise from within, somehow. Some sort of 'Black Wednesday' plus, where the Euro was rendered worthless, perhaps.

It seems to me thought that perhaps the most direct way would be the best method, by somehow creating a climate of public opinion which rejected Europe, leading to people electing a Eurosceptic government pledged to withdraw from the EU. We need something more than this negative propaganda, something with a positive vision of the way forwards.

Does anybody have any ideas on this?

__________________
Britain Out of Europe Now !

Britannist

UKIP leader Nigel Farage MEP said in his last television interview (on 'Straight Talk' with Andrew Neil, shown on BBC Parliament last week) that withdrawal from the EU would take the British Parliament a day or "a week at the most" (to get the relevant legislation through i.e. repeal of the 1972 European Communities Act).

Nigel Farage also said in the interview "What would take longer is the removal of the thousands of unwanted pieces of legislation - EU Directives, rules and regulations - incorporated into British law since we entered the EEC/EU."

Spike

There seems to be no exit strategy at all, and without one we have not got a hope in hell of withdrawing.

It is also highly noticeable that whilst other member states and even regions have heavy representation in Brussels (the Bavarians have a beautiful headquarters literally outside the Parliament's back door) the UK has virtually nothing. We cannot consider withdrawal as an option until we have full representative infrastructures in place in Brussels and Strasbourg.

The British Ambassador in Brussels really described his role as "primarliy social".

Andrew Constantine

Stephen

If England ceases to be in the Union (i.e. as in UK) either by leaving it directly, or by the Union collapsing if the Scots pull out, there is a good possibility that England would de jure be out of the EU too.

This is a reason why I have kept banging on in this forum for English members of UKIP to take the English Parliament road. Some of the most able thinkers in UKIP share my views (see Britannist's posts on this subject).

Andrew Constantine

andypandy

Despite certain trade agreements, moving to either Norway or Switzerland as they are, at least for the moment, independent of the EU, and have vastly better living standards - and are far more democatic - than this, increasingly police-style state we are living in.

tito

I would hate to see the collapse of the Union (UK)

Britain is built on common values, that is why it works.

andypandy

No, Britain was built on Common geography, nothing more.

Britannist

Thank you Andrew. Yes, it's mostly pro-EU politicians who are trying to deny the people of England equality with Scotland in the UK (pro-EU Lord Falconer and ex-'Europe' Minister Denis McShane MP repeatedly spoke against the idea of an English Parliament all of last year as did the discredited europhile Blair). Scotland has a Parliament and we want one too. The very last thing the EU wants is for the English to have a platform (an English Parliament) in which the people of England can have a national voice.

Paul Beck

It's worth noting that Norway has the highest standard of living in the world, followed by Iceland. Both are memebers of the EEA-- but not the EU. See here for the UN Human Development 'standard of living' Index: ttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...ent_Index#High

So they don't exactly suffer from being out of the EU. They are still in the EEA, so they can still trade with the EU minus the "Parliament" and the resulting diktats and expensive membership.

Norway has twice rejected EU membership via two referenda of its electorate (last time 1994)*. There were worries that EU membership would ruin the high standard of life in the country-- seems Norwegians were proved right since they have had the highest standard of living since 2001, coming second to Canada in the years before that.

Fellow EEA member Liechtenstein has hardly suffered from being outside the EU either!

As a side point does UKIP advocate withdrawal from the EEA (European Economic Area) as well-- what would be the pros and cons of this?

*Iceland as far as I know, has never applied for EU membership.


[/url]

Spike

If you do business in / with Norway, you would not imagine that you are dealing with a non-EU member state. To do the business, they have had to adopt the systems and procedures. Switzerland is going the same way.