I don't need to mate. It was utter bollocks, end of.Tell it to the U.N. they were formed to tell lies about developed countries. Check out ‘fact check’ as well.
Shit now the rest of the World knows how weak and desperate we are we could end up with trade deals in which we lose money trading with them every year have a massive imbalance in trade, have to except any standards they impose. Still we'd never be that desperate that we could be forced into paying billions for the privilege of constantly losing out would we?
Won't stop me trying thoughDon’t waste your time.
The cunts won’t care about the truth.
The bastards.What the EU does for its citizens
Since 1957, the European Union has benefited its citizens by working for peace and prosperity. It helps protect our basic political, social and economic rights. Although we may take them for granted, these benefits improve our daily lives.
Peace & Security
Central and western Europe has never known so long a period without war. The EU is the most successful peace project in human history and has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Europeans are closely linked economically and culturally, and through the democratic values we share.
Single Market
The single market is the world's most highly developed and open marketplace. It is based on the EU’s 4 key freedoms, which enable you and other citizens to:
High food & environmental standards
- live or work in any EU country
- move your money
- sell goods without restrictions
- provide services on the same basis.
Because EU countries cooperate so closely, our food and our environment meet some of the world's highest quality standards. Unscrupulous companies can't get away with selling contaminated food or polluting our rivers and countryside.
Consumer benefits
Shoppers can now feel safe in the knowledge that they will get their money back if they return products. Travellers can buy train or plane tickets, knowing they can get a refund if their journey is delayed or cancelled. And the standards which goods in EU shops are required to meet are among the world's most stringent, in terms of both quality and safety.
Human Rights
The EU protects all minorities and vulnerable groups, and stands up for the oppressed. Regardless of a person's nationality, gender, language group, culture, profession, disability or sexuality, the EU insists on equal treatment for all.
Global Power
EU countries acting in unison have much more of a voice on the world stage than 28 small and medium-sized nations acting separately. We have political clout. As regards trade, our regulatory and product standards are adopted worldwide as the global norm.
Other benefits the EU brings its citizens are:
- You can use your phone and online services at no extra cost wherever you are in the EU. You can also access your online video and music streaming services across the EU, safe in the knowledge that your personal data is protected under EU law.
- Your rights are protected while you're travelling: EU rules protect your rights in the event of delays or cancellations. Whether travelling by plane, train, boat or bus, you are entitled to fair treatment.
- You can benefit from training and support for your business: EU programmes like Erasmus+ help you get training to make the most of your career. The EU also helps you get the most out of your business – from finance to coaching, and from business networks to exchange schemes.
- As a worker, you're protected from unfair treatment in the workplace under the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. This bans discrimination, including in the areas of pay and dismissals.
- As an EU citizen, you're protected against the downsides of globalisation by EU support for small businesses and rules to make sure that big companies pay their fair share of tax.
You gave your opinion - it does not surprise me and I respect itI take issue with this...i do not see how the EU are weaponising this. Brexit contravenes the GFA, an historic agreement negotiated and agreed by the UK with Ireland. Brexit is not being dictated by the threat of terrorism, Brexit is ignoring (trying to ignore) the terms of the GFA. You want to proceed with Brexit without considering or working with the GFA.
It proceeded Brexit, was agreed and ratified by the UK....it cant be set aside.
I just dont see how the EU and particular Varadkar as you keep mentioning, are weaponising and threatening the return of terrorism.
That is where you delve because it suitsIt’s when you delve into specifics and areas of debate. For example if we go off what the leave side said prior to the referendum that we’d be economically better off, then that has been proven false now.
What areas of being a nation do you think we’d be better off for being out of the EU?
What?A lengthy response but unfortunately it avoids answering my simple question 'why you and others would put a no deal Brexit in front of rescinding Article 50'
Your dismissal of the problems that a no deal brexit will create for the GFA lack any sort of depth
Your dismissal of the risks that no deal brexit impact on Scotland who voted heavily in favour of remaining are interesting. I guess that you are referring to similar problems with customs/borders if Scotland were to leave. Yes I get that, and I don't think Scottish independence is inevitable but more likely in a 'no deal' scenario.
I like discussing things with you mate, but only if you will do me the courtesy of answering my primary question. If you don't want to, say so, I could understand why you choose not to as well. Where are you btw?
How refreshingBehave there have been thread after thread with debates on both sides . Arguments during the referendum and after where both sides debated the pros and cons of leaving on tv radio and bluemoon.
You just choose not to listen to the other side of the argument
Yet to see any leaver....
What bollox
Yeah - but....Try posting about the £8 billion per year in contributions we're saving, the freedom to negotiate our own trade deals with the growing economies outside the EU, the restoration of Parliamentary sovereignty, the supremacy of the British courts, the ability to control who and how many are allowed into this country, the ability to set our own farming policy outside the CAP, the ability to regain control of our own fishing waters, the possibility of reducing tariffs on goods coming from outside the EU, not to mention the common sense of getting out now before the federalists start chipping away further at the rebate and opt outs or deciding that a trading bloc needs it's own army, and see what happens ;)
Who's said I was talking about the EU so touchy. £78 billions better off we should try a more equal balance of trade with EU we must be shafting em big style.“Constantly losing out” proves you know absolutely nothing about the topic of conversation.
We’re roughly £62bn-£78bn better off per year with our EU membership.
We pay billions to be a member but make much more out of trade. It’s a member’s club in which we pay to enter and we always win more than the entry fee.
Fuck all is my point of view;-)Yeah, but apart from the peace and security, single market, the high food and environmental standards, consumer benefits, human rights, global power, mobile roaming, travelling rights protection, business training and support, worker protection and small business support......
What have the EU ever done for us?
That is where you delve because it suits
I have no doubts that if we 'genuinely' leave we will be very glad we did in years to come
I tend to think that my opinion is at least as valid as yours - I am old-fashioned that way
Who's said I was talking about the EU so touchy. £78 billions better off we should try a more equal balance of trade with EU we must be shafting em big style.
Yeah, Amber Rudd said much the same. It’s crap obviously, it’s just a coincidence the growth in food poverty and food banks over the last few years has been so marked. Anyway, as soon as we are out of the EU, things will get so much better, we don’t need to worry at all.I don't need to mate. It was utter bollocks, end of.
Their definition of poverty as being less than £15 each per day each to live off *after housing costs* is not a definition of poverty which would resonate with most people I think. Wealthy? Of course not. Struggling? Yes, very likely. "Living in poverty"? No.
Heck, why not set the arbitrary amount at £500 and say 85% of children are living in poverty. Knock yourself out.
No. It really didn’t. Never mind, I won’t ask again. Have a good holiday.What?
It most certainly did answer that question
Also, I genuinely think that Scotland is FAR more likely to leave the UK if we do not first leave the EU - and of course therefore more likely to stay in the UK.....
Frankly, IMO, it is pretty obvious
I am in a bar in Cyprus which is soon to be announced as an official MCFC supports club
You are completely and utterly wasting your time mate. I have finally accepted that there is no point using reasoned argument.I take issue with this...i do not see how the EU are weaponising this. Brexit contravenes the GFA, an historic agreement negotiated and agreed by the UK with Ireland. Brexit is not being dictated by the threat of terrorism, Brexit is ignoring (trying to ignore) the terms of the GFA. You want to proceed with Brexit without considering or working with the GFA.
It proceeded Brexit, was agreed and ratified by the UK....it cant be set aside.
I just dont see how the EU and particular Varadkar as you keep mentioning, are weaponising and threatening the return of terrorism.
Thank God for the USA then by far our biggest export market.It was obvious you were. Again you’re displaying a very poor level of understanding of how the EU works.
We don’t trade with the EU as an overall entity, we trade with other individual members within the Single Market.
Thank God for the USA then by far our biggest export market.
Hope notAnd once we are out of the EU, we can look forward to a completely unfettered continuation of Tory policies that will deliver more of this:
(Source last years report by the UN special envoy on poverty in the UK) The commentary on the findings of the report are from him.
Government-led misery
The UK Government’s policies have led to the systematic immiseration of millions across Great Britain.
Child poverty
Close to 40 per cent of children are predicted to be living in poverty by 2021.
Following drastic changes in government economic policy beginning in 2010, the two preceding decades of progress in tackling child and pensioner poverty have begun to unravel and poverty is again on the rise.
Relative child poverty rates are expected to increase by 7 per cent between 2015 and 2021 and overall child poverty rates to reach close to 40 per cent. For almost one in every two children to be poor in twenty-first century Britain would not just be a disgrace, but a social calamity and an economic disaster rolled into one.
Inequality
Although the United Kingdom is the world’s fifth largest economy, one fifth of its population (14 million people) live in poverty, four million of those are more than 50 per cent below the poverty line, and 1.5 million of them experienced destitution in 2017, unable to afford basic essentials. And 2.5 million people survive with incomes no more than 10 per cent above the poverty line – just one crisis away from falling into poverty.
Given the significant resources available in the country, the sustained and widespread cuts to social support, which have caused so much pain and misery, amount to retrogressive measures in clear violation of the United Kingdom’s human rights obligations.
Policies of austerity introduced in 2010 continue largely unabated, despite the tragic social consequences.
For all the talk that austerity is over, massive disinvestment in the social safety net continues unabated.
…it has resulted in:
• 14 million people living in poverty,
• Record levels of hunger and homelessness,
• Falling life expectancy for some groups,
• Ever fewer community services,
• Greatly reduced policing,
• Access to the courts for lower-income groups has been dramatically rolled back by cuts to legal aid.
The imposition of austerity was an ideological project designed to radically reshape the relationship between the Government and the citizenry. UK standards of well-being have descended precipitately in a remarkably short period of time, as a result of deliberate policy choices made when many other options were available.
A booming economy, high employment and a budget surplus have not reversed austerity, a policy pursued more as an ideological than an economic agenda.
Far-reaching changes to the role of Government in supporting people in distress are almost always “sold” as part of an unavoidable fiscal “austerity” programme needed to save the country from bankruptcy. In fact, the reforms have almost certainly cost far more than their proponents will admit. The many billions extracted from the benefits system since 2010 have been offset by additional resources required, by local government, by doctors and hospital accident and emergency centres, and even by the ever-shrinking, overworked and underfunded police force to fund the increasing need for emergency services. The Government’s ‘work not welfare’ mantra conveys the message that individuals and families can seek charity but that the State will no longer provide the basic social safety net to which all political parties had been committed since 1945.
The bottom line is that much of the glue that has held British society together since the Second World War has been deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos.
It might seem to some observers that the Department of Work and Pensions has been tasked with designing a digital and sanitized version of the nineteenth century workhouse, made infamous by Charles Dickens, rather than seeking to respond creatively and compassionately to the real needs of those facing widespread economic insecurity in an age of deep and rapid transformation brought about by automation, zero-hour contracts and rapidly growing inequality.
As Thomas Hobbes observed long ago, such an approach condemns the least well off to lives that are “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”. As the British social contract slowly evaporates, Hobbes’ prediction risks becoming the new reality.
I welcome the moves to adopt a uniform poverty measure, to systematically survey food insecurity, and to further delay the rollout of Universal Credit. That programme will be improved by plans to provide more time to repay advances, to reduce debt payment limits, and to reduce extreme penalties. But, for all the talk that austerity is over, massive disinvestment in the social safety net continues unabated.
It is difficult to see recent changes as more than window dressing to minimise political fallout. The situation demands a new vision that embodies British compassion and places social rights and economic security front and centre.
Austerity policies have deliberately gutted local authorities and thereby effectively eliminated many social services, reduced policing services to skeletal proportions, closed libraries in record numbers, shrunk community and youth centres, and sold off public spaces and buildings including parks and recreation centres. It is hardly surprising that civil society has reported unheard-of levels of loneliness and isolation, prompting the Government to appoint a Minister for Suicide Prevention.
The Government should restore local government funding to ensure crucial social protection can help people escape poverty, reverse particularly regressive measures such as the benefits cap and two-child limit, and audit the impact of tax and spending decisions on different groups.
***
The Department for Work & Pensions’ response is predictable. The secretary of state Amber Rudd is trying to curry some PR by lodging a formal complaint with the UN about it. And a spokesperson points out that the UN’s own data shows that the UK is “one of the happiest places in the world to live” (it came 15th actually), and that Alston’s report “paints a completely inaccurate picture of our approach to tackling poverty” and is a “barely believable documentation of Britain, based on a tiny period of time spent here.
True, Alston only conducted his investigation from 5 to 16 November 2018. But as his report says itself, even if you put statistics aside, the extent of poverty in Britain “is obvious to anyone who opens their eyes”. And that’s why government responses will never ring true until it actually engages with the problem and starts afresh.