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.

RDM_83 again

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

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

Firstly note I am using the termnatives because thats what the report uses it doesn't imply any political leanings

Unless I am reading that wrong immigration seems to have a much more complex effect than simply reducing waiting times, it also pushes up the waiting times for those populations that move away from an area with high migration.
So while you can argue that on the grand scheme its not an issue, to a native voter they can rightly point to their personal experience of migration increasing their waiting times.
There seems to be a bit of kicking the can down the road, migrants are less likely to report health issues and be younger, what happens when they age and hopefully integrate and take up native attitudes that healthcare is a right and something that should be expected not a privilege. I briefly lived in an area which had higher rates of TB than many 3rd world countries that is going to cause some massive long term issues.
In relation to the statistics themselves relating to the NHS, I know from NHS workers that the A & E statistics at least are subject to some serious manipulation, due to waits over 4 hours in A & E being penalised what a hospital does is create a new department that is not termed A & E and move anybody thats approaching the deadline to that new department.
Here's a Spectator article about the gaming of stats.

In relation to the broader point and I am not blaming migrants for this issue (long tradition of Irish nurses abroad etc), but rather the attitude of the British elites on both right and left (or more specifically an English attitude) of using migration to fix problems rather than tackle the class system and inequalities within the native population.
The worst performing group in education is white working class boys, perhaps instead of abandoning that group and then demonizing them when they grow up and vote for populists, they should be target and prioritized as a resource rather than leaving them to rot on the dole and zero hour contracts.

ancapailldorcha

RDM_83 again wrote: »

Unless I am reading that wrong immigration seems to have a much more complex effect than simply reducing waiting times, it also pushes up the waiting times for those populations that move away from an area with high migration.
So while you can argue that on the grand scheme its not an issue, to a native voter they can rightly point to their personal experience of migration increasing their waiting times.

You've not backed yourself up whereas I have so I'm disregarding this. The issue is an inadequately funded NHS, not immigration. I've heard several NHS nurses, doctors and administrators complain that there simply is no chaff left to cut.

RDM_83 again wrote: »

In relation to the broader point and I am not blaming migrants for this issue (long tradition of Irish nurses abroad etc), but rather the attitude of the British elites on both right and left (or more specifically an English attitude) of using migration to fix problems rather than tackle the class system and inequalities within the native population.
The worst performing group in education is white working class boys, perhaps instead of abandoning that group and then demonizing them when they grow up and vote for populists, they should be target and prioritized as a resource rather than leaving them to rot on the dole and zero hour contracts.

Elites from anywhere on the left-right spectrum tend to be the least representative members of society so it's not surprising that they haven't a clue. I'm firmly convinced that immigrations is good for an economy so I don't think that's where the problem is. White working class boys are in a position where they are being demonised but this is endemic in the media. Look at programs set in working class areas and see that they're portrayed as being feckless wasters or worse, scum. Simply put, nobody is standing up for them as they are girls, minorities and the LGBT community. Owen Jones' book Chavs is something you might want to consider reading.

RDM_83 again

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

You've not backed yourself up whereas I have so I'm disregarding this. The issue is an inadequately funded NHS, not immigration. I've heard several NHS nurses, doctors and administrators complain that there simply is no chaff left to cut.

Did you read the report? As I stated on the wider scale it may be neutral to positive (provided migrants never age and/or integrate in to the native mindset that healthcare is something you should access not a reserved privilege) but for a native the effects may result in an increase in waiting times.

A likely explanation of this result is that intra-region native mobility is diUusing the effects of immigration within a region (see Tables 5). Immigration may decrease waiting times at the local level, but the outflow of natives in response to immigration may increase waiting times in other local areas

ancapailldorcha

Yes. It mentions that waiting times in deprived areas may increase. I've never met a single immigrant who came over for free healthcare or the UK's purported luxurious benefits system. They come over to work and they make a net contribution to the British economy. It would be nice if this contribution were invested in the NHS of deprived areas but this does not appear to be the case.

Anyway, it looks as if Dave is about to water down his flagship in-work benefits demand:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/12047089/David-Cameron-will-dilute-his-flagship-migrant-benefit-reforms-in-order-to-save-his-EU-referendum-negotiation.html

IrishTrajan

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

You've not backed yourself up whereas I have so I'm disregarding this. The issue is an inadequately funded NHS, not immigration. I've heard several NHS nurses, doctors and administrators complain that there simply is no chaff left to cut.

It is literally the second paragraph of your link.

The analysis of their data shows that immigration actually reduced waiting times for outpatient referrals. On average, a 10 percentage point increase in the share of migrants living in a local authority would reduce waiting times by 9 days. The authors find no evidence that immigration affects waiting times in A&E and in elective care. Their research does reveal, however, that the effects can be very different in deprived areas: they observed that native internal migration (often triggered by immigration inflows) does increase NHS waiting times.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Elites from anywhere on the left-right spectrum tend to be the least representative members of society so it's not surprising that they haven't a clue. I'm firmly convinced that immigrations is good for an economy so I don't think that's where the problem is. White working class boys are in a position where they are being demonised but this is endemic in the media. Look at programs set in working class areas and see that they're portrayed as being feckless wasters or worse, scum. Simply put, nobody is standing up for them as they are girls, minorities and the LGBT community. Owen Jones' book Chavs is something you might want to consider reading.

If the migrants are highly skilled or entrepreneurial, or if the economy needs low-paid workers for manual jobs (which most European economies do not need at the moment), you'd be right.

But right now, unemployment is quite high across Europe, and non-EU migrants tend to be unemployable due to their lack of skill in a skill/service-driven economy.

http://www.zeit.de/2015/47/integration-fluechtlinge-schule-bildung-herausforderung

(59% of Migrants to Germany can barely read or write).

http://www.euractiv.com/sections/social-europe-jobs/non-eu-citizens-twice-likely-be-unemployed-303834

Non-EU citizens aged 20-64 were in 2013 twice as likely (21.3%) to be unemployed in one of the EU's 28 member states compared to "nationals" (10.0%), new data from the EU's statistics office Eurostat shows.

The data also revealed that the employment rate was 56.1% for non-EU citizens, compared with 68.9% for citizens of the reporting country.

In Sweden, which has the biggest gap, the employment rate for non-EU citizens was 50.2% compared with 81.3% for nationals (-31.1 percentage points), followed by Belgium (-28.8), the Netherlands (-26.8), France (-22.0), Finland (-20.5) and Germany (-20.2).

Even looking at Ireland,

http://www.thejournal.ie/eu-employment-unemployment-1596939-Jul2014/

Some 65.8% of Irish citizens were employed here last year, compared with 54.4 of non-EU citizens in Ireland and 68.6% of nationals from other EU states.

Overall, 56.1% of non-EU nationals aged 20-64 were employed; 68.9% EU nationals were working in their state. The rate of employment among EU citizens living in another EU country was even higher, at 70.9%.

So, yes you would be correct, immigration does help an economy some of the time. However, in our current predicament, it simply doesn't. We are running 9% unemployment and suffering from "brain-drains" in several areas due to the emigration during the Recession.

Highly skilled migration would benefit us, non-EU migrants who can neither read nor write will not.

IrishTrajan

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Yes. It mentions that waiting times in deprived areas may increase. I've never met a single immigrant who came over for free healthcare or the UK's purported luxurious benefits system. They come over to work and they make a net contribution to the British economy. It would be nice if this contribution were in

Once again, that depends entirely upon the needs of the economy, and does not seem to hold water.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/european-immigrants-contribute-5bn-to-uk-economy-but-non-eu-migrants-cost-118bn-9840170.html

Immigrants from Poland and the other nine countries that joined the EU in 2004 have contributed almost £5 billion more to the UK’s economy than they used in benefits and public services.

Analysis by the University College London Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration found that while the fiscal contribution by European workers was overwhelmingly positive – amounting to £20 billion in a decade – the same was not true for non-EEA arrivals.

Between 1995 and 2011, immigrants from outside the EU made a negative contribution of £118 billion over 17 years, the report found, using more publicly-funded services, including the NHS, education and benefits, than they paid in tax.

[..]

While the employment rate has been slightly higher for EEA immigrants since the mid-2000s, it was lower for those from outside of the EU.

ancapailldorcha

IrishTrajan wrote: »

Once again, that depends entirely upon the needs of the economy, and does not seem to hold water.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/european-immigrants-contribute-5bn-to-uk-economy-but-non-eu-migrants-cost-118bn-9840170.html

Yes but the "natives" are also a net drain on the economy according to that piece. Anyway, I thought this was about EU immigration, no?

IrishTrajan

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Yes but the "natives" are also a net drain on the economy according to that piece. Anyway, I thought this was about EU immigration, no?

I disagree with Cameron on his EU migration stance, but it seemed from your post that you were encouraging all migration.

ancapailldorcha

IrishTrajan wrote: »

I disagree with Cameron on his EU migration stance, but it seemed from your post that you were encouraging all migration.

I would but it would require significant alterations to British society. I think these are likely to happen over the next few generations but in today's society, I would not support complete open borders.

IrishTrajan

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

I would but it would require significant alterations to British society. I think these are likely to happen over the next few generations but in today's society, I would not support complete open borders.

That's demonstrably a bad idea, but I'm not going to get into it, we'll just end up derailing the thread more.

ancapailldorcha

IrishTrajan wrote: »

That's demonstrably a bad idea, but I'm not going to get into it, we'll just end up derailing the thread more.

In today's world it would be unsuitable. As I said, significant changes would be necessary.

Anyway, I'll leave it there as well. This is off topic.

View

IrishTrajan wrote: »

http://www.zeit.de/2015/47/integration-fluechtlinge-schule-bildung-herausforderung

(59% of Migrants to Germany can barely read or write).

The article you quote refers to refugees not migrants. It also uses Albanians as an example although Albanians do not qualify for refugee status.

And, more importantly, whether a person is a refugee or not does NOT depend on their academic ability (or any other factor to sort them into "desirable" or "undesirable" categories).

IrishTrajan

View wrote: »

The article you quote refers to refugees not migrants. It also uses Albanians as an example although Albanians do not qualify for refugee status.

And, more importantly, whether a person is a refugee or not does NOT depend on their academic ability (or any other factor to sort them into "desirable" or "undesirable" categories).

Many thousands of the people applying for refugee status are not genuine refugees, and Germany has kinda thrown out the rule book on dealing with refugees when they refused to implement the Dublin Protocols.

Even so, that doesn't detract from the other links proving non-EU migrants are a drain on the German economy, not a benefit.

Labarbapostiza

RDM_83 again wrote: »

Firstly note I am using the termnatives
There seems to be a bit of kicking the can down the road, migrants are less likely to report health issues and be younger, what happens when they age and hopefully integrate and take up native attitudes that healthcare is a right and something that should be expected not a privilege.

First, healthcare is a right, and not a bloody privilege. At least ten percent of any money I have ever earned or spent, has been a contribution to the healthcare system. And immigrants are in the same position. If you pay for something, it is absolutely your right to get something in return.

I am actually on a waiting list for an operation. A minor procedure, but I have to wait all the same. I'm not blaming immigrants. There is all kinds of F-acting with the way the service is put together. But more young immigrants is a major part of any solution. More old people will just mean a longer waiting list for me. And I've already f-ing paid for the procedure several times over.

In relation to the broader point and I am not blaming migrants for this issue (long tradition of Irish nurses abroad etc), but rather the attitude of the British elites on both right and left (or more specifically an English attitude) of using migration to fix problems rather than tackle the class system and inequalities within the native population.

But we have just as much of a class system in Ireland as they do in Britain. In Ireland, your income and the precarity of your life is dictated by your class. The people who understand this, and benefit by it, do not want to see any change, except to benefit more by it. And then many others just see it as immutable reality.

The worst performing group in education is white working class boys, perhaps instead of abandoning that group and then demonizing them when they grow up and vote for populists, they should be target and prioritized as a resource rather than leaving them to rot on the dole and zero hour contracts.

This education thing. A lot of people have been conned by it. A Trinity graduate with some flouncy degree, landing a 40k job on graduation, rising to as much as 70k by the time they're in their late 20s, that has nothing to do with their "education", that's their class. And the companies who hire these people often cannot afford not to, as their clients have the same flouncy degrees and don't like dealing with knackers.

There are also several tiers to pay in manual labour, that are not dictated by skills, but by class. A lot of white working class males in the UK are not tapped into the networks that give them access to the higher paid tiers.

I was talking to a Danish friend (woman). Danish women are having a hard time getting men (the men they want). Danish women have more education than Danish men. University educated Danish men don't earn very much. Danish men in high tier manual labour do....but the girls don't want them either.

View

IrishTrajan wrote: »

Many thousands of the people applying for refugee status are not genuine refugees,

And many thousands ARE genuine.

We don't deny people, who genuinely need social welfare, social welfare because some people fraudulently claim it. Nor should we deny genuine refugees assistance because some seek to make fraudulent claims.

IrishTrajan wrote: »

and Germany has kinda thrown out the rule book on dealing with refugees when they refused to implement the Dublin Protocols.

This is both incorrect (because the Dublin Regulations specifically allow for a member state to process any and all applicants on its territory if it so chooses) and irrelevant as it has little to do either with whether a person is a genuine refugee or with the decisions of the individual member states to admit "normal" (non-refugee) migrants to their territory.

IrishTrajan wrote: »

Even so, that doesn't detract from the other links proving non-EU migrants are a drain on the German economy, not a benefit.

Again that has nothing to do with whether a person is a genuine refugee or. not. And, it remains entirely up to each sovereign nation within the EU to admit "normal" migrants as it sees fit based on their respective analysis of whether those "normal" migrants will be a positive or negative for their country.

IrishTrajan

View wrote: »

And many thousands ARE genuine.

We don't deny people, who genuinely need social welfare, social welfare because some people fraudulently claim it. Nor should we deny genuine refugees assistance because some seek to make fraudulent claims.

I've said months ago when this Mediterranean Crisis was coming to a head that I support helping genuine refugees - not the bogus bullshít artists peddling lies, or the bleeding heart knee-jerk reactionaries.

View wrote: »

This is both incorrect (because the Dublin Regulations specifically allow for a member state to process any and all applicants on its territory if it so chooses) and irrelevant as it has little to do either with whether a person is a genuine refugee or with the decisions of the individual member states to admit "normal" (non-refugee) migrants to their territory.

The Dublin Regulation (Regulation No. 604/2013; sometimes the Dublin III Regulation; previously the Dublin II Regulation and Dublin Convention) is a European Union (EU) law that determines the EU Member State responsible to examine an application for asylum seekers seeking international protection under the Geneva Convention and the EU Qualification Directive, within the European Union. It is the cornerstone of the Dublin System, which consists of the Dublin Regulation and the EURODAC Regulation, which establishes a Europe-wide fingerprinting database for unauthorised entrants to the EU. The Dublin Regulation aims to “determine rapidly the Member State responsible [for an asylum claim]”[1] and provides for the transfer of an asylum seeker to that Member State. Usually, the responsible Member State will be the state through which the asylum seeker first entered the EU.

[...]

On 3 December 2008, the European Commission proposed amendments to the Dublin Regulation, creating an opportunity for reform of the Dublin System.[9] The Dublin III Regulation (No. 604/2013) was approved in June 2013, replacing the Dublin II Regulation, and applies to all member states except Denmark.[10] It came into force on 19 July 2013. It is based on the same principle on the previous two i.e. that the first Member State where finger prints are stored or an asylum claim is lodged is responsible for a person's asylum claim.[11]

View wrote: »

Again that has nothing to do with whether a person is a genuine refugee or. not. And, it remains entirely up to each sovereign nation within the EU to admit "normal" migrants as it sees fit based on their respective analysis of whether those "normal" migrants will be a positive or negative for their country.

The problem with that is that it doesn't work in practice. Britain offered to take refugees from the camps themselves rather than participate in Germany's plan to relocate people... And the Germans threatened to rewrite the Dublin Protocols to force them to comply (when Germany had no basis to force a non-Schengen member to do anything).

And when people argue against non-EU migration, they're depicted as xenophobes or racists.

oscarBravo

IrishTrajan wrote: »

...I support helping genuine refugees - not the bogus bullshít artists peddling lies...

And how do you distinguish them before they claim asylum?

IrishTrajan

oscarBravo wrote: »

And how do you distinguish them before they claim asylum?

Setting up processing camps outside the EU (akin to what Australia does) and having their claims processed there - the nonsense of launching appeal after appeal, or having anchor babies to remain has to be done away with.
Providing greater funds to the migrant camps so they can function more effectively.
Streamlining the system as much as possible so those who are refugees can be brought to Europe pro rata, as quickly as possible. None of this "I'm refusing to go to Estonia or Finland, I want Germany or Sweden" nonsense.

ancapailldorcha

IrishTrajan wrote: »

Streamlining the system as much as possible so those who are refugees can be brought to Europe pro rata, as quickly as possible. None of this "I'm refusing to go to Estonia or Finland, I want Germany or Sweden" nonsense.

Why is this nonsense? If I was displaced from here and I was offered a choice of Germany or Italy, I'd take the former. What's wrong with this?

Labarbapostiza

IrishTrajan wrote: »

Setting up processing camps outside the EU (akin to what Australia does) and having their claims processed there - the nonsense of launching appeal after appeal, or having anchor babies to remain has to be done away with.

"Processing" camps....that's a nice modification on the auld concentration camps.

You want concentration camps.

I suppose your one of theses lads who thinks the wrong side won WWII.