British Referendum on EU Membership: Some Facts You Should Know
The British people should be clear about just what they will be voting on at the EU referendum this coming Thursday. What does it actually mean to stay in the EU? What does it mean to exit?
Concerning the second question, the dominant issue in the debate is the question whether there will be a significant negative economic impact on the UK from exiting the EU. The Prime Minister and the heads of the IMF, the OECD and various EU agencies have given dire warnings that economic growth would drop, UK exports would decline etc. But what are the facts?
I have specifically tested this, using advanced quantitative techniques. The conclusion is unambiguous: it makes no difference to economic growth. Economic growth is almost entirely determined by factors and policies that are decided at home (namely the amount of bank credit created for productive purposes - sadly very small in the UK in recent decades, thus much greater economic growth is possible as soon as steps are taken to boost it). Remember that a smaller economy like Norway fared extremely well after its people rejected EU membership in a referendum in 1995 - against the dire warnings and threats from its cross-party elites and the united chorus of the heads of international organisations. Besides, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and China never needed EU membership to move from developing country status to top industrialised nations within decades.
As for the first question, namely what it means to stay inside the EU, the report issued by the "Five Presidents" of the EU last October tells us.[1]. The report starts with the frank admission that "with 18 million unemployed in the euro area, a lot more needs to be done to improve economic policies" in the EU. So the central planners in Brussels and at the ECB in Frankfurt are not unaware that under their rule, a historically unprecedented economic dislocation has taken place in the EU during the past ten years, including massive asset and property bubbles, banking crises and large-scale unemployment in all the periphery countries - with over 50% youth unemployment in Greece, Spain and Portugal, as well as the lack of any serious controls of the EU external borders to prevent an influx of unparalleled numbers of illegal immigrants and economic migrants. However, the EU central planners are in denial about the fact that these problems have been caused entirely by their own misguided and disastrous policies. As a result, they argue that the solution to such problems can only be further concentration of powers into their hands: " we need more Europe ", as Mrs Merkel put it.
The Five Presidents' Report makes clear that the EU is not simply a free trade area. That project had been left behind with the 1992 Maastricht Treaty and a very different kind of Europe has become enshrined with the 2007 European Constitution (called 'Lisbon Treaty', since the people of Europe in several referenda rejected it)[2]. Instead, the EU is the project to abandon all national sovereignty and borders within and melt all European nations into one single country, with one central European government and single monetary, fiscal, foreign and regulatory policy. This United States of Europe, an undemocratic behemoth that the European peoples never wanted, is the culmination of the much repeated mantra of "ever closer union".
The economics is clear: there is no need to be a member of the EU to thrive economically, and exiting does not have to impact UK economic growth at all. The UK can remain in the European Economic Area, as Norway as done, or simply agree on a trade deal, as Switzerland has done, and enjoy free trade.
The politics is also clear: the European superstate that has already been formed is not democratic. The so-called 'European Parliament', unique among parliaments, cannot propose any legislation at all - that is all determined by the unelected European Commission. A vote to stay in the EU is a vote to abolish the United Kingdom as a sovereign state and merge it into the undemocratic United States of Europe that the European elite is building. Norway voted in 1995 on EU membership. Leading parties, big business, central bank, major media outlets and the talking heads on TV were pleading and threatening the Norwegian public to vote 'in'. The people remained steadfast and voted 'out'. Norway did splendidly. And so much more will the UK.
Richard is Chair in International Banking , Director, Centre for Banking, Finance and Sustainable Development; within Southampton Business School at the University of Southampton.
[1] In case you had not been aware that there was even a single, let alone five presidents of the EU, these are, according to the EU: The unelected president of the European Central Bank, Goldman Sachs alumnus Mario Draghi, the unelected president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, the unelected Brussels Commissar and "president of the Eurogroup", Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the "president of the Euro Summit", Donald Tusk, and the president of the European Parliament, Martin Schulz.
[2] Technically, the European Constitution and the Lisbon Treaty are not precisely identical. However, all major changes envisaged in the European Constitution are also reflected in the Lisbon Treaty, which some experts say is de facto the same as the European Constitution. Source: Author of the European Constitution Valery Giscard d’Estaing.
