Cameron's demands

oscarBravo

Is it just me, or is there something deeply unrealistic about someone who basically wants to be part of a club but doesn't want the rules to apply to him?

- No to ever closer union

It's been there since the Treaty of Rome. Contrary to those who try to claim that the EU was supposed to be a trade agreement and nothing more, it has always been about ever closer union. It's in the bloody preamble, ffs - not exactly buried in the small print.

And what does it even mean to be exempt from it?

- Permission to discriminate against other EU citizens

It's utterly beyond me how he thinks this one can fly. Would he agree to allowing British ex-pats to be treated as second-class citizens in France or Spain in return?

- National parliaments can ignore EU laws

Yeah, that'll work. Each EU country can implement the directives it feels like, and ignore the rest. Maybe we should allow some football clubs to ignore the offside rule if they don't like it.

Honestly, is he just trolling?

Nodin

As I've said before, the British problem with the EU does not have a basis in reason. The only question remaining is whether Cameron actually believes in this nonsense or is merely pandering for his own gain.

ancapailldorcha

The problem is that Cameron won't campaign to leave the EU while his party has a considerable contingent of Eurosceptics. This means that he's now forced into winning some symbolic, yet ultimately meaningless concessions such as insisting that new arrivals contribute to the exchequer for 4 years before they become eligible to claim benefits.

Immigrants have always been a scapegoat and now the EU has joined them. This makes things difficult for him. He commissioned a report in 2012 regarding the balance between EU regulation and that imposed by Westminster which found that the balance was about right. Unsurprisingly, that never gets a mention. EU membership is a good thing for the UK. Unfortunately, Dave has dug himself into a pit and extricating himself from it will be painful.

BoJack Horseman

I didn't think the 'demands' were that unreasonable.

- Ensuring retained membership of the single market..... Easy, the rest of the EU certainly doesn't want to impede trade with the UK, no problem ensuring that, its not like it was in doubt.

- ensure 'competitiveness is written into Europe's DNA..... Saying & Doing are very different of course.... No EU state claims to want to be uncompetitive anyway.... the devil is the detail though (labour law).

- A 4 month hiatus on EU-migrants claiming benefits.... it will hardly shatter the union that..... it may seem a huge deal.... but EU migrants waiting 120 days before claiming benefits won't cost much and is hardly worth 'Brexit' over

- An addendum saying "ever closer union...cept for Britain".... again, I dont think it will be a huge deal.... after its granted I imagine other countries will ask for ditto.


These demands seem deliberately easy to achieve.
The demand to be able to negotiate trade deals unilaterally seems to have been dropped

ancapailldorcha

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

- A 4 month hiatus on EU-migrants claiming benefits.... it will hardly shatter the union that..... it may seem a huge deal.... but EU migrants waiting 120 days before claiming benefits won't cost much and is hardly worth 'Brexit' over

Is it not 4 years? 4 months barely seems worth mentioning.

BoJack Horseman

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Is it not 4 years? 4 months barely seems worth mentioning.

Aah.... ok.... you are right.... don't know why I heard "4 months" on the radio, so I assume they misspoke.

4 years of in-work benefits would be a hard sell.

Difficult because of the stupid situation Britain has gotten itself into where so many workers receive unearned tax credits (social welfare top-ups).

Godge

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

I didn't think the 'demands' were that unreasonable.

- Ensuring retained membership of the single market..... Easy, the rest of the EU certainly doesn't want to impede trade with the UK, no problem ensuring that, its not like it was in doubt.

- ensure 'competitiveness is written into Europe's DNA..... Saying & Doing are very different of course.... No EU state claims to want to be uncompetitive anyway.... the devil is the detail though (labour law).

- A 4 month hiatus on EU-migrants claiming benefits.... it will hardly shatter the union that..... it may seem a huge deal.... but EU migrants waiting 120 days before claiming benefits won't cost much and is hardly worth 'Brexit' over

- An addendum saying "ever closer union...cept for Britain".... again, I dont think it will be a huge deal.... after its granted I imagine other countries will ask for ditto.


These demands seem deliberately easy to achieve.
The demand to be able to negotiate trade deals unilaterally seems to have been dropped

oscarBravo wrote: »

Is it just me, or is there something deeply unrealistic about someone who basically wants to be part of a club but doesn't want the rules to apply to him?

- No to ever closer union

It's been there since the Treaty of Rome. Contrary to those who try to claim that the EU was supposed to be a trade agreement and nothing more, it has always been about ever closer union. It's in the bloody preamble, ffs - not exactly buried in the small print.

And what does it even mean to be exempt from it?

- Permission to discriminate against other EU citizens

It's utterly beyond me how he thinks this one can fly. Would he agree to allowing British ex-pats to be treated as second-class citizens in France or Spain in return?

- National parliaments can ignore EU laws

Yeah, that'll work. Each EU country can implement the directives it feels like, and ignore the rest. Maybe we should allow some football clubs to ignore the offside rule if they don't like it.

Honestly, is he just trolling?

These are two different interpretations of something Cameron had said, yet neither of you provided a link.

Where is the real truth?

oscarBravo

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-34770875

Jim2007

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

These demands seem deliberately easy to achieve.

I originally thought so too, but I was wrong. To achieve his objectives a couple of things would need to happen which are unrealistic:

- There would need to be a treaty change to provide the guarantees on a single market, which means 29 governments plus at the very least 3 referenda.

- It is impossible to have a single market in financial services where one of the major players (UK) is not under the supervision of the ECB and furthermore expects to be exempt for any bail in liability should things go wrong. It would no longer be remotely close to a fair market.

- Equal treatment of all citizens is a fundamental concept of the EU, there is no way that any PM is going to be able to return to his electorate if he accepts that idea. And furthermore it is highly questionable as to the role that UK tax credits play in the market place there are very good grounds to argue that they are in fact an illegal subsidy to UK industry since it allows them to employ works at lower wage levels than they would otherwise be able to.

- And as the Germans in particular have pointed out, he as not explained why the UK fails to apply the current restrictions on economic migrants from the rest of the EU. Current rules provide for the UK to return migrants who have failed to establish an economically viable position, clearly being on benefits does not meet those requirements, so why have the UK not applied the rules???

oscarBravo

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Immigrants have always been a scapegoat and now the EU has joined them. This makes things difficult for him. He commissioned a report in 2012 regarding the balance between EU regulation and that imposed by Westminster which found that the balance was about right. Unsurprisingly, that never gets a mention. EU membership is a good thing for the UK. Unfortunately, Dave has dug himself into a pit and extricating himself from it will be painful.

I thought this was interesting:

“They appear to have taken the number of EU/EEA migrants claiming benefits from DWP data, made some ‘adjustments’, and divided by the number of EU/EEA migrants here for less than four years according to the LFS,” the Times newspaper quoted him as saying.

Mr Portes described some aspects of the figures as “very suspicious” and contrary to statistical “common sense”.

More and more, I'm getting the sense of a PM who's pandering to the xenophobic underbelly of his party, and ignoring the well-being of his country in the process.

ancapailldorcha

The term "benefits" as he's using it will apply to any EU migrant in a low paid job claiming tax credits which I would think is a fair amount of people. Ed Miliband gave a figure of "fewer than 6%" in a debate which, assuming that this refers to unemployment benefit would seems somewhat reasonable. There is no way that 43% of the 330,000 EU migrants (net immigration from the EU), ie ~150,000 people just decided to land here so they could claim £60 a week and live in a bedsit and that's before one factors in the restrictions on migrants claiming.

I don't mind Cameron too much. That said, he's only really got himself to blame for this mess. There were warnings from various sources that this might split his party. Given the slender majority he commands it's only going to get worse from here.

BlitzKrieg

I'm curious

3 if the 4 issues are pretty much already resolved

1. There is protection for non euro states in the EU. I believe the treaties have both under different sections with clear statements of defining none euro states and their access to the common market

2. The red tape is a bit of a red herring so much of eu law is simple but becomes complicated in it'd implementation on a national level. It's hard to figure out where you want to cut the red tape without risking your own national control by handing over more abilities to the EU to streamline or taking more back to a national level and making it even longer for laws to process through.

3. Britain already has quite a few amendments excluding them from plenty in eu treaties already

KingBrian2

Without the € what is Britain's actual commitment to Europe. I'm disappointed countries like Norway, Denmark and Switzerland are not in the Zone. If they were in it Europe would have members that value being European and would not treat it as a giant piggy bank just looking to scrounge out a couple of pennies instead it would be as it was envisaged from the start a community of Nations representing Europe as a whole working on the challenges of diversity and global security together.

ancapailldorcha

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Without the € what is Britain's actual commitment to Europe. I'm disappointed countries like Norway, Denmark and Switzerland are not in the Zone. If they were in it Europe would have members that value being European and would not treat it as a giant piggy bank just looking to scrounge out a couple of pennies instead it would be as it was envisaged from the start a community of Nations representing Europe as a whole working on the challenges of diversity and global security together.

Norway and Switzerland aren't actually in the EU. They have limited access to the single market in the form of a preliminary deal. Norway's population have rejected membership twice now.

BoJack Horseman

BlitzKrieg wrote: »

I'm curious

3 if the 4 issues are pretty much already resolved

These conditions are indeed very modest in their scope & scale.
Almost tokenistic.... (perhaps welfare is the biggest bug bear)

I assume this was very deliberate on the part of Cameron.
Appear all-action, but limited substance.

(Which is fine by me, if this modest fare is enough to keep them in the EU, then grand.)

BoJack Horseman

Jim2007 wrote: »

- There would need to be a treaty change to provide the guarantees on a single market, which means 29 governments plus at the very least 3 referenda.

But is this not already the status quo??
the UK is obviously a member of the single market.... there is no issue with that changing.

- It is impossible to have a single market in financial services where one of the major players (UK) is not under the supervision of the ECB

Again, is that not the way things are at the moment?

and furthermore expects to be exempt for any bail in liability should things go wrong. It would no longer be remotely close to a fair market.

True, it was unfair that Britain was able to fernagle itself out of EFSF commitments just because the beneficiary was in the EZ... it was supposed to be an EU fund, not an EZ fund

And as the Germans in particular have pointed out, he as not explained why the UK fails to apply the current restrictions on economic migrants from the rest of the EU. Current rules provide for the UK to return migrants who have failed to establish an economically viable position, clearly being on benefits does not meet those requirements, so why have the UK not applied the rules???

The traditional art of Tory double speak.
Blame the outside when the fault is internal.... tis very very common.

Jim2007

BlitzKrieg wrote: »

1. There is protection for non euro states in the EU. I believe the treaties have both under different sections with clear statements of defining none euro states and their access to the common market

Ah yes but what he wants is a free market in financial services, but without the UK having any responsibility to bail in should things go wrong. Which would basically mean the London banks would be able to conduct market operations in Euros with indemnity since the Euro would more or less be the market - it would not be a fair market at that point. The devil is in the detail.

KingBrian2

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Norway and Switzerland aren't actually in the EU. They have limited access to the single market in the form of a preliminary deal. Norway's population have rejected membership twice now.

I know all that, what I am saying is the Nations of Europe have control over their own affairs while Europe would have a single economy. The trend in recent years was towards military expansion, membership based primarily on political patronage as opposed to countries reaching the standards as laid out in the EU treaties.

Jim2007

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

But is this not already the status quo??

It is not about what is, it is about what is to come! The financial services market is just starting to open up and if DC can get the UK in the game with limited responsibilities it would give them a major advantage!

BlitzKrieg

Also I just realised the issues with red tape, Britains ever closer union bollocks and probably the immigration issue would all have been much non issues if the european constitution had been passed as there wouldnt need to be a new treaty made up to make these changes.

RJohnG

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

The term "benefits" as he's using it will apply to any EU migrant in a low paid job claiming tax credits which I would think is a fair amount of people. Ed Miliband gave a figure of "fewer than 6%" in a debate which, assuming that this refers to unemployment benefit would seems somewhat reasonable. There is no way that 43% of the 330,000 EU migrants (net immigration from the EU), ie ~150,000 people just decided to land here so they could claim £60 a week and live in a bedsit and that's before one factors in the restrictions on migrants claiming.

I don't mind Cameron too much. That said, he's only really got himself to blame for this mess. There were warnings from various sources that this might split his party. Given the slender majority he commands it's only going to get worse from here.

It's a lot more than £60 a week An EU family with say 3 kids will get £650 a Month tax credits. £156 a Month child benefit. About £440 a Month unemployment benefit. Housing benefit. Council tax benefit. Free school meals and clothes allowances. If one is disabled a free car etc.

Much more than they would get in any Eastern European Country being in work.

Fratton Fred

RJohnG wrote: »

It's a lot more than £60 a week An EU family with say 3 kids will get £650 a Month tax credits. £156 a Month child benefit. About £440 a Month unemployment benefit. Housing benefit. Council tax benefit. Free school meals and clothes allowances. If one is disabled a free car etc.

Much more than they would get in any Eastern European Country being in work.

And unlimited free health care from the day they enter the country.

My parents are both very pro-eu, but as they are ageing spend more time in hospital waiting rooms. They have made several comments about "eastern Europeans" who can't speak a word of English, but get the same entitlement to health care as they do.

It does sound xenophobic, but I know a number of people who are concerned about health tourists.

ancapailldorcha

RJohnG wrote: »

It's a lot more than £60 a week An EU family with say 3 kids will get £650 a Month tax credits. £156 a Month child benefit. About £440 a Month unemployment benefit. Housing benefit. Council tax benefit. Free school meals and clothes allowances. If one is disabled a free car etc.

Much more than they would get in any Eastern European Country being in work.

And how many are landing here to claim all this?

RJohnG

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

And how many are landing here to claim all this?

Too many would be my answer.

View

RJohnG wrote: »

Too many would be my answer.

I'd imagine that many citizens in other EU member states would say the same about UK based banks and bankers doing deals either in their member states or for companies based in them. This, of course, generates huge sums of money for "The City", drives the economy of London & SE England (plus further afield) with the result of both being large amounts of tax (corporate, income and cgt) for the Exchequer, all of which helps pay for a sizeable chunk of the public services in the UK.

Somehow though I doubt you object to that.

Labarbapostiza

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

The problem is that Cameron won't campaign to leave the EU while his party has a considerable contingent of Eurosceptics.

A few years back, Tory central office commisioned a study into why so many of their back benchers were Eurosceptics. And the kind of stuff the study revealed was lunacy. It's things like Eurosceptics believing that it's a European directive that they can't slap their children around, it's not, it's English law. But the whole thing is based on an empty paranoia, that the EU devil just happens to fit. The famous European directive on bananas, having to be straight, was invented by Boris Johnson as a joke.

The Daily Mail is a contributing factor. They take European directives and turn them inside out. Directives to stop producers misleadingly labeling meat as British, when it had only been packed in a British factory, were warped by the Daily Mail into somehow Europe attacking British farmers.

This means that he's now forced into winning some symbolic, yet ultimately meaningless concessions such as insisting that new arrivals contribute to the exchequer for 4 years before they become eligible to claim benefits.

The more symbolic the better, since the anxiety is meaningless, what it needs is a witch doctor to do a magic dance.

Immigrants have always been a scapegoat and now the EU has joined them. This makes things difficult for him. He commissioned a report in 2012 regarding the balance between EU regulation and that imposed by Westminster which found that the balance was about right. Unsurprisingly, that never gets a mention.

The balance isn't just right. It's nearly all gravy. The City of London does very well out of it. They have major functions of the EU banking system in London. Imagine if the City were cut off from Europe.

EU membership is a good thing for the UK. Unfortunately, Dave has dug himself into a pit and extricating himself from it will be painful.

He's got a much harder problem. Some of the Eurosceptics like Lord Wolfson, want Britain out of the EU not for any pragmatic reason, but that ultimately it might mean the end of institutions like Britain's aristocracy. Which still does exist and has very wealthy members like Wolfson, who is were is for being an aristo. These people do not care if they destroy the British economy. They also want, or absolutely need, the entire break up of Europe for Britain's exit to be anything more than suicide.

Then there are the others. "Eurosceptics" in the financial services. These people not interested in any of the practical problems of the EU, they want to see it broken up because, the break up is predicted to be a multi trillion Euro or whatever revenue stream for financial "services". They're the same people trying to privatise Britain's NHS, because of the fees it would generate.

For Ireland, if Britain decides to self immolate, we're all going up in flames too.

ancapailldorcha

Labarbapostiza wrote: »

A few years back, Tory central office commisioned a study into why so many of their back benchers were Eurosceptics. And the kind of stuff the study revealed was lunacy. It's things like Eurosceptics believing that it's a European directive that they can't slap their children around, it's not, it's English law. But the whole thing is based on an empty paranoia, that the EU devil just happens to fit. The famous European directive on bananas, having to be straight, was invented by Boris Johnson as a joke.

Would you have link to this? It sounds mental.

Labarbapostiza wrote: »

The Daily Mail is a contributing factor. They take European directives and turn them inside out. Directives to stop producers misleadingly labeling meat as British, when it had only been packed in a British factory, were warped by the Daily Mail into somehow Europe attacking British farmers.

The balance isn't just right. It's nearly all gravy. The City of London does very well out of it. They have major functions of the EU banking system in London. Imagine if the City were cut off from Europe.

I refuse to believe anything I see in the Mail, Express or the Sun at this stage. The lies they've printed about Jeremy Corbyn are unreal. I was delighted when he became Labour leader but now he seems to be capitulating to the far left elements of his party.

Labarbapostiza wrote: »

He's got a much harder problem. Some of the Eurosceptics like Lord Wolfson, want Britain out of the EU not for any pragmatic reason, but that ultimately it might mean the end of institutions like Britain's aristocracy. Which still does exist and has very wealthy members like Wolfson, who is were is for being an aristo. These people do not care if they destroy the British economy. They also want, or absolutely need, the entire break up of Europe for Britain's exit to be anything more than suicide.

Then there are the others. "Eurosceptics" in the financial services. These people not interested in any of the practical problems of the EU, they want to see it broken up because, the break up is predicted to be a multi trillion Euro or whatever revenue stream for financial "services". They're the same people trying to privatise Britain's NHS, because of the fees it would generate.

For Ireland, if Britain decides to self immolate, we're all going up in flames too.

The Economist made an excellent argument for staying in a few weeks back. I don't see how people can think leaving would be anything but an economic disaster for the country.

Labarbapostiza

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Would you have link to this? It sounds mental.

It is mental. The closest you can see to an actual conspiracy is the Wolfson Prize. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfson_Economics_Prize

In particular, the 2012 Wolfson prize. For proposals on the safe dismantlement of the Eurozone. I read through the shortlisted proposals, and they were all pretty mental. The winner had a proposal that the elites of Europe should plan the break up in secret, and then do the whole thing in a night, not giving the people a chance to get their money out their banks etc.

Simon Wolfson is behind the prize. I believe the whole thing is just a scam and there is no cash behind the prize. It's just a PR trick, it got world wide coverage in the media. And the idea is to put the idea in the public's heads that the Eurozone must be broken up.

Simon is the chief executive of NEXT, the clothing retailer, now Britain's largest clothing retailer. What exactly is Simon's beef with the EU. If the Britain was out of the EU, Simon would be able to keep any potential competition out of his market.

I refuse to believe anything I see in the Mail, Express or the Sun at this stage. The lies they've printed about Jeremy Corbyn are unreal. I was delighted when he became Labour leader but now he seems to be capitulating to the far left elements of his party.

Well, the thing is, lots of people do believe the Mail. It has the biggest readership/believership, in the UK. And it's been engaged in a long drip drip campaign of poisoning the British public's minds against the EU.

The Economist made an excellent argument for staying in a few weeks back. I don't see how people can think leaving would be anything but an economic disaster for the country.

For the majority of people it would be a disaster, but for people like Wolfson, it would most likely make them richer.

IrishTrajan

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Without the € what is Britain's actual commitment to Europe. I'm disappointed countries like Norway, Denmark and Switzerland are not in the Zone. If they were in it Europe would have members that value being European and would not treat it as a giant piggy bank just looking to scrounge out a couple of pennies instead it would be as it was envisaged from the start a community of Nations representing Europe as a whole working on the challenges of diversity and global security together.

You're right, Norway and Switzerland wouldn't use Europe as a piggy bank.. Instead, Europe would use them as one. Hardly in their national interest now, is it? Denmark is part of the EU, I'm not sure what you're talking about there, unless you mean just the Eurozone - in which case, you can argue that Sweden and Poland (and others) are ridiculous for not entering the Eurozone.

Also, global security? Norway is part of NATO, Switzerland has been neutral since the Napoleonic Wars. Why would Norway join the Eurozone to affect global security when it's already in NATO? And why would the Swiss even care? If it isn't a time-piece or a bank account, they don't want to know.

Labarbapostiza

Fratton Fred wrote: »

And unlimited free health care from the day they enter the country.

My parents are both very pro-eu, but as they are ageing spend more time in hospital waiting rooms. They have made several comments about "eastern Europeans" who can't speak a word of English, but get the same entitlement to health care as they do.


It does sound xenophobic, but I know a number of people who are concerned about health tourists.

Okay, this is how people get things arseways and then want even more self defeating "solutions".

Let's take the UK. The UK population is aging, which means there's a higher proportion of older people to young people than before. Old people are the greatest medical expense. Regardless of any way you cut it, healthcare for older people is paid for by the young. The less young people, the harder it is to fund the health system. And the worse life becomes for both the young and old.

The vast majority of migrants are young. The reality is they have little use for the health care system....they don't use it that much...

What the migrants do is share the burden of the health care for the old. Not for their grandparents, but for someone else's.....This also reduces the burden on young people..........If pays off for everyone.

A lot of antipathy for migrants especially in the UK is misdirected. Living standards are falling in the UK largely due to the ratio of coffin dodgers to young growing. The way to reverse the fall in living standards is to reduce this ratio.......either by killing off the old, or by increasing the numbers of young people, by opening the doors.


And....if we let our demographic ratios get out of hand (too many old people), old people in the future will not have anything like the level of health care they enjoy today.

ancapailldorcha

According to this, immigration seems to reduce NHS waiting times. Labarbapostiza has said more or less everything else.