EU ?

[Owd Codger]

If the French cancel the agreement over Calais and our border checks there, then we become less secure.
There will not be any checks prior to lorries arriving in the UK and any migrant arriving here will claim asylum, refugee status etc. It will be out of control and withing the UK.

I still have not heard one matter from a "Leaver" politition that makes any kind of sense for us to depart the EU.
Whether that be trade, fisheries, agriculture, border security or anything else. The more I hear them the progressively worse case they make.

Free Trade means more Trade and more Jobs.
Lets keep it that way!

Exactly, a European Union based on trade only, and not a political and Judicial gravy train for those involved which was never voted on by the electorate.

And as for your first comment, illegal immigrants are already getting away with what you are saying due to all vehicles entering the country not being checked with 'body heat' equipment at all Seaports due to us having a Government unlike other countries not willing to spend money on the equipment.

As for us no longer being able to have customs personal on the other side of the channel, Australia seems to manage quite well and better than us with their customs and immigration control on anybody and anything entering their country at all their own Air and Seaports.

[i'm spartacus]

Nobody has mentioned the ECHR - the issue is with the European Court of Justice in which unelected European judges strike down laws enacted by democratically elected governments.

Nobody mentioned the ECJ either! Hence my question, was WW on about the ECHR, because as I said in my post some people are stupid enough to vote to leave the EU because they think we'd be voting to leave the ECHR behind as well.

As to the ECJ striking down laws, no it can't.

Yes it can and has done as already pointed out in another post.

But I'd be interested to know as in this country why do you think governments should be above the law?

Parliament is a directly elected body elected by the people. Parliament makes the law because we elected them to do so. Why should a Parliament elected by the people of this country, have its laws overruled by an unelected body?

People seem to have this weird notion that our western governments are in fact dictatorships who should as a matter of course if the courts say "no, you can't do that" simply rewrite the law so that they can do whatever it is they want to do.


It is a mind numbly stupid attitude and shows a complete lack of understanding of how democracies work.

Governments are subject to the rule of law. In our case national law and EU law.

We do not elect judges in our courts either but they can (and do) send the government packing and thank God they can.

Complaining that the governments is being overruled by a court be it a domestic one or the ECJ is crazy. You are asking for Government to be allowed to rule unchecked by the law.

As to the ECJ itself, what exactly are you complaining about?

As in the previous answer. There are those who make the law (Parliament), and there are those that apply the law (judges).
Parliament has been making laws for hundreds of years and our own unwritten constitution has provided the checks and balances whereby we managed quite well for centuries before the EU. Unpopular governments are eventually voted out and replaced by the next government. Allowing an unelected body to overrule an elected body is comparatively just as scary.

The ECJ ensures that European law is interpreted and applied in the same way in every member state.

Your problem with that is what?

Laws made by who? Unelected bureaucrat's is the answer

The Judges and Advocate Generals are appointed by joint agreement of the governments of the member states. (In the UK judges to our courts used to be appointed by the Lard Chancellor but are now made by the independent Judicial Appointments Commission).

So these ECJ Judges are appointed by democratically elected governments. Problem with that?

Of course there is a problem with that, the ECJ has become a law making body which isn't the roll of a court. Notwithstanding that, the entire European system is based on a totally different legal system than the UK

So saying it can "strike down laws enacted by democratically elected governments" is complete bollocks anyway.

So what are you and WW complaining about exactly?

Whether you like it or not, it is a fact that the ECJ can and has overruled laws enacted by national governments. One example has already been provided. The EU as a common market is fine; agreeing trade rules is fine; overruling national governments is not the job of unelected judges.

Using expletives adds nothing to your argument.

Your problem is that you have a conclusion in your mind before you start reading up; and you obviously are reading up. With your conclusion in mind, you are looking for evidence to support your conclusion which will in most instances lead you up the wrong path. The difficulty is that you haven't had a formal education in the processes and your conclusions are flawed

[i'm spartacus]

Pardon me if this seems rude, but look it up. There are literally hundreds of ECJ cases going back over decades against every member state. The role of the ECJ is very very well documented.

To start you off, the ECJ struck down the Merchant Shipping Act 1988 which was an attempt to protect British jobs; it also led to the government paying Spanish fishermen £55 million in compensation.

Just recently, the ECJ ruled that the UK cannot automatically deport foreigners who are sentenced to more than one year in prison under the Borders Act

I think you are the one who needs to look it up.

Neither are a simple as you like to make out.

The shipping act was an attempt to introduce a law that was against existing EU laws, those relating to the common fisheries policy, the UK had signed up for. The fact it lost is/was no surprise and the fact before it did, it denied shipping rights to other fleets was bound to lead to compensation.

It was an Act introduced by Parliament that was declared at odds with EU law after the fact and following challenge and was the subject of five separate cases brought against the UK government. The Common Fishing Policy set quotas for each member state, and after Spain joined the EU, Spanish fishermen wanted to take advantage of British quotas (quota hopping). Spanish fishermen set up British companies in order to fish British waters on a British quota and sell their catch in Spain. The Government concerned that this would cost British fishermen their jobs, enacted the Merchant Shipping Act which required all British registered boats to have at least a 75% share of British owners. The ECJ overruled the Act, and British fishermen lost their jobs

Now you can argue you don't like the common fisheries policy but stop trying to blame the ECJ for doing its job of upholding EU law.



If your problem is with the common fisheries policy you should say so and say what you expect after an exit. Will we still have to open up our waters to foreign boats in order to access the EU market? If not why not? Do you have the answer to that?

The Common Fishing Policy was only a side show to this as it was nothing to do with the main issue.

The deportation ruling is not as simple as you make out either and hasn't been made yet anyway.

I can see why you made that comment, and technically you are correct in that the documentation relevant to the ruling has not yet been handed down; however, the decision has absolutely been made. The way the ECJ works is not like our courts, where the court comes back into session and the judgment is delivered. The ECJ give what they call a preliminary opinion before the actual ruling, which is in effect what they have decided the ruling is.

It concerns the AUTOMATIC deportation of non-EU criminals who are sentenced to more than 12 months.

The ruling of the ECJ says instead of this being automatic the Home Secretary must consider each case on its merits taking into account if the criminal constitutes a genuine, present and sufficiently serious threat to society where that criminal has a UK family.

The reason it went to the ECJ is because a Moroccan woman who was jailed for 12 months in 2012 was issued with an automatic deportation order after completing her sentence.

She has a dependant son who is a UK citizen, so the automatic deportation of her means her son would be being "constructively deported" from the EU. He is an EU and UK citizen so deporting him along with his mother is the UK deporting a citizen of this country to one he is not a citizen of!

Your understanding of how decisions on issues brought before the courts, and how those decisions are applied in subsequent judgments is very, very flawed. I suggest you look up the two Latin phrases ratio decidendi, and obiter dictum. Not strictly applicable to the EU but something they have sort of adopted because of our membership. No decisions are ever so narrowly confined, and given the right circumstances the reasons for the decision could be extended into any proposed deportation.

I don't know the full lineage of the child but he will be a citizen of Morocco if is mother is Moroccan.

It seems to me this is in fact an example of the ECJ putting the brakes on an ill thought out draconian measure from Theresa May and the ruling, if it comes into force, is quite sensible.

If you think about it for a minute as it stood the law of automatic deportation of families is little different to cursory transportation to Australia as used to be done.

I am sure after due consideration there will still be plenty of other deportees.

Well put DaveO.

When xenophobia and prejudice are
taken out of the argument, facts are like a beam of light.

I am actually quite offended that you believe I am prejudiced and xenophobic. I have an opinion based on fact and not on prejudices or otherwise. I object strongly that anyone refers to me in that manner, and just because I don't happen to come to the same conclusion as you, it doesn't make my views any less valid.

[cpwigan]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-e ... m-35901811

Is it any wonder people are confused. Stay post a list that 250 say stay; leave post a list that says 250 say leave.

I do think it reflect IMO that nobody with any certainty can say what will happen. My take and it is conjecture; the EU in this day and age / circumstances will not play hard ball with the UK over trade even if we exit. The original EU would have nut now? not a chance.

[i'm spartacus]

You may not trust the tories and their bill of rights, but we will have a general election four years from now, and we get to choose whether we throw them out. The difference with the EU is you don't get to choose who makes the decisions - ever.

That is both naive and incorrect. You have just seen a government be elected based on system whereby they got a majority based on 24% of the electorate voting for them.

The first past the post is the system we have and no system is perfect. In any event your comment is foolish.

We get to vote for our governments and we return one no matter how many people vote for them - we get to vote!

Based on this they are pushing for a system whereby Parliament can veto a law of a democratically elected government via its English Votes for English Law proposals which everyone who cares knows that will result in Tory rule by the back door in England even if the don't win an election in future.


Add in the reduction to 600 MP's and we are heading for a one party state very soon. The idea we can overturn the ripping up of our rights is naive and even if we could, how many people's lives are going to ruined in the five years before an election?

I thought this thread was about the EU?

You don't like the Conservatives, I get that; but what has this got to do with the EU? and if we voted to stay in the EU. how would any of the above change things domestically?

But hey, in your world that will be OK because we voted for our own misery shunning the protection being an EU citizen gives.

What protection?

How does remaining in the EU save us from the 'Tories coming to get us'? Do you suppose a vote to stay in the EU is a vote for a Labour government and greater protection?

As to this bit:
The difference with the EU is you don't get to choose who makes the decisions - ever

Complete and utter bollocks.

Expletives again and adds nothing.

EU decisions are made by the Council of the European Union made up of ministers from the member governments (so you get to choose the UK ministers by your vote) in conjunction with the European Parliament, made up of MEP's (who you also elect).

So how on earth can you say "you don't get to choose who makes the decisions".

You do. If you can be bothered to vote.

The EU commission make the all the day to day running and propose any new legislation for the EU. The candidates are chosen individually by the 28 national governments, which means it is not possible for a Commission Member or its President to be removed by a election.

You get to vote for your MEP (not in some gerrymandered electoral system either) and for the ministers who represent you on the Council.

MEP's are the only directly elected EU politician's. There have been recent moves to increase the powers of the European Parliament on the grounds it is the only directly elected body and therefore is accountable to the general public. A common criticism of the European Parliament is that the power of making the big decisions lies with the European Council and the European Commission. Generally, it is felt that the council, which is where the leaders of the member states come together, is where the real power lies in the EC. A recent move to increase Parliament powers is therefore to try to remove the image that the Parliament is merely there to make the EC look accountable.

Your final paragraph is an exercise in absolute paranoia. It may come as a very big surprise, but the UK was a principle architect of the Convention on Human Rights, even worse, the it was the idea of the Tory politician Winston Churchill. The problem with the Convention, isn't the convention itself, but the misuse of its articles compounded by the emasculation of our own judicial system, powerless to act against the primacy of the EU. To suggest that we are incapable of replacing the current system with something that restructures our priorities is incredible

Hang on. Now you are confusing the ECJ and the ECHR.

Not at all. I was replying to someone else on a different issue altogether and unrelated to the ECJ.it is you that are confusing the two as you did in the first instance by mentioning the ECHR on an issue that was palpably nothing to do with the ECHR

As I pointed out the ECHR has nothing to do with the EU. Yet here you are saying the EU is reason we fall foul of the Convention on Human Rights because the Eu overrules our courts.
That is completely incorrect and is why I mentioned the ECHR in the first place in a previous post!

Which was why I said nobody mentioned the ECHR. The ECHR makes judgments by majority vote which are binding on the State concerned. The court has the power to order that the breaching state pays compensation but it does not have power to overrule national decisions or national laws.

Looks like I was right people will vote to leave the EU because they think the EU is what enforces the European Convention on Human rights.

People are entitled to their opinion on the effect of the current application of the convention with the Human Rights Act, which is in some instances clearly gives too much weight to the individual over the many. But you are correct in that people see it as purely EU issue which it isn't

Similarly your statement that 'they' will cancel our employment rights. We did have employment rights before the EU; anyone who has a job, has an employment contract. Contracts have been enforceable and remedies for breaching a contract have been available through the courts since God was a lad. What your are suggesting is that we wouldn't have progressed at all without Europe. What you will actually find if you care to look, is that many of the employment rights we have go much further than the EU ever intended that we should go

The working time directive was opposed by the Tories and would never have been implemented without the EU. There is no way you can argue it would have been implemented without the EU.

There were a great many working people opposed to WTD, not only the Conservatives. The Labour Government that enacted the directive into UK legislation but insisted on the opt out clause so that people could get out of it.

Since they have been elected (in 2010 as well as 2015) they have reduced various rights such as reducing notice period for redundancy down from 3 months to 1 month

I thought you was a fan of Europe?
Introducing a 45 day notice brings the UK into line with other EU countries.

and are busy going after the trade unions again.

There is a always a balance to be struck between workers and employers. The employers have to make profits in a globalised economy, and we have to be competitive by way of pricing. Other global players are not encumbered by such things as workers rights. China has steel workers with no rights and on very little pay, producing and shipping steel to the EU cheaper than we can make it in our own back yard.

And by the way - the government can't subsidise the industry because of EU rules.

You can go on strike for more pay and less hours, but in a global economy, your employer can up sticks and go and find somewhere that doesn't come with the baggage. The net result is that large employers make money in foreign countries and pay all their taxes to some other government, and we have workers with a whole gamut of rights, but no jobs.

It's as clear as day once free of any constraining EU legislation on employment your, rights will disappear.

The idea they will come back if that government is thrown out is nuts. Governments do not spend five years in office undoing everything the last government did and of course if they did then what is to stop the next government doing just the same? Laws that governments oppose in opposition do not get routinely repealed (e.g. Thatcher didn't repeal the end of Grammar schools).

A theory based purely on speculation and assumption which you present as truth to support your conclusion. If you say it out loud to yourself, you may probably realise how ridiculous it sounds.

The evil Tories will spend the next four years taking away all of your rights.

And assuming then we have a Labour government - they wont do anything about it.

And it's all as clear as day - John chapter 11 verse 35

[SJ]

We're all doomed :conf:

[The booze hound]

We're all doomed :conf:

Damned if we do, damned if we don't!

[stevethegas]

Europe is a continent, not some strange foreign place, because the British Isles are in the continent of Europe. Getting on with our neighbours seems to me to be a good idea.
It might suit Donald Trump, and Vladimir Putin for the UK to leave the EU, so what does that tell you about the twerps who are going to vote for Brexit?

If we vote out, Scotland will leave the UK, quickly followed by Wales, and Little England will left alone. Scotland and Wales will remain part of the EU, and England will become an economic wasteland. Only an idiot will vote out.

So BREXIT = Bloody Ridiculous European Xenophobia by Ignorant Twerps

[SJ]

I'm proud to be an ignorant twerp because in the real World nothing will radically change. Ignorance is bliss doomed I say.

[dontshootthemessenger]

How do Switzerland and Norway survive without being in the EU ,stevethegas ?

Perhaps we should have abandoned the Pound and joined the Euro -that has been such a good EU idea