EU would insist on a swift divorce from the UK before negotiations on new EU/UK relationship.

According to RTE (Ireland’s National broadcaster) the EU would want a swift divorce from the UK in the event of a Brexit and would only after that be prepared to start negotiations on a new EU/UK relationship, see link below.

Based on an assumption that the UK gives notice to leave the EU at a special summit the weekend after the referendum, RTE reports that the EU would want to start negotiations on the mechanics of the exit so that the UK would leave the EU on 1st July 2018.

The other 27 EU member states would not be prepared to extend the 2 year period to negotiate a more comprehensive exit agreement.

RTE cites two unnamed sources who confirm this.

This is in stark contrast to various Leave campaigners who assert that the EU would be falling over itself to negotiate an exit agreement favourable to the UK.

EU would insist on a swift divorce from UK before negotiating a new agreement with the UK

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British citizens living in EU granted leave to appeal in EU Referendum challenge

Press release from Leigh Day the lawyers acting for British citizens excluded from the EU Referendum franchise.

3 May 2016

British citizens living in EU granted leave to appeal in Brexit challenge

The High Court has given permission for lawyers acting for two British citizens, fighting a legal battle for the right to vote in the EU Referendum, to take their case to the Court of Appeal.

On Thursday (28 April 2016) two High Court judges rejected the legal challenge taken by 94-year-old Harry Shindler, a Second World War veteran who lives in Italy, and lawyer and Belgian resident Jacquelyn MacLennan against the UK Government’s decision to exclude British people who have lived elsewhere in the European Union for more than 15 years, from voting in June.

Lawyers from law firm Leigh Day argued that under the EU Referendum Act 2015 up to 2 million British citizens are being unlawfully denied the right to vote on the UK’s continued membership of the EU.

They told the Court that if the vote in June is to leave the EU then all British citizens will lose their status as EU citizens. This means that those British citizens living outside the UK but in the EU will become “resident aliens” living and working abroad under sufferance rather than by right and no longer able to claim the protections of EU law .

The Court also heard arguments that the ’15 year rule’ acted as a penalty against British citizens for having exercised their free movement rights. The rule prevented them from participating in a democratic process, the result of which might bring to an end the very EU law rights on which they rely and base their working and private lives every day.

Lawyers are seeking an expedited hearing at the Court of Appeal to hear the challenge to the High Court ruling within the next few weeks.

ENDS

Posted in expatriates, VotesforLife | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Just who has the most to lose?

Imports & Exports.jpg

By Paul Wild a member of one of the SY2E groups

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History is for understanding and learning from, not distorting

I’ve seen a number of references lately to events and influential figures of the Second World War.

Comments along the lines of “Our armies didn’t fight and die to keep us free from Nazi domination for us to have foreigners telling us how to run things”, “We fought against Hitler and now Germany is telling us what to do”, and “Churchill must be turning in his grave”.

I’m sure I don’t have to tell you which side of the discussion these come from.

Let’s talk about Hitler and the Nazis first. I think it’s fair to say that any sentient human being can see that comparing modern Germany to the Third Reich is not only completely inaccurate but also deeply offensive, and indeed racist. Also, Hitler wasn’t German.

The implication that poor little UK is being bullied and exploited by the EU is of course false, but other writers have already addressed that at some length and with plenty of supporting facts.

However, let’s pretend that the UK is indeed in this position. What is the logic behind leaving the EU to sit on our own in the North Atlantic, with no-one under any obligation to help or support us against anyone else who decides we’re a prime target for bullying and exploitation?

If we kick the EU in the teeth by leaving, I doubt that many of our near neighbours will feel particularly inclined to assist us.

Now, about Sir Winston (as he became), among the (if not the) greatest of Great Britons, who led the UK through and out of the valley of the shadow of death. For much of that time, the hardest parts especially, we were extremely short of viable allies.

He saw and urged that one of the best ways for history not to repeat itself (again) was for the countries of Europe to form an ever-closer union. Two World Wars were already two too many.

Clearly the EU is far from perfect, but it’s young, only 50 or so years old, and it is capable of change. Nor is the UK the only member to think that change is necessary. It can take time to move in the right direction: think about how long the UK Parliament had been in existence before there was universal suffrage, for example.

If Sir Winston had thought the correct UK reaction to lack of perfection in Europe was to abandon it to its fate, then even if we’d been in Europe to leave Dunkirk in 1940, we certainly wouldn’t have been back in Normandy in 1944.

He had more vision and sense of responsibility, understanding that the UK was uniquely placed in a number of ways to influence Europe’s future for the better.

That unique place might have changed somewhat, but it is still unique. Without the UK, the EU will be destabilised (one of the few outcomes of a Brexit that’s certain). This will obviously be bad for the EU, but how can it be good for the UK?

In or out of the EU, we are unalterably part of a global economy. In the EU, we are a biggish fish in a biggish pond, outside it we are a small fish in an enormous pond. Future trade deals are not a given.

But equally importantly, we once again have an opportunity (even, dare I say it, a duty) to play a pivotal role in the future of Europe and to be an ever-more-influential figure on the world stage.

If we turn our backs on that, then I believe Sir Winston will turn in his grave.

 

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Unions of Nations – Why is sovereignty a problem? We’ve been sharing sovereignty since 1603

2 Unions of Nations

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Demagogues: why they are a threat to the UK in this EU referendum (and everywhere else).

According to the dictionary, a demagogue is a person, usually an orator or political leader, who gains power by arousing peoples’ emotions and prejudices, it comes from the Greek “demos”, people and “agogos”, leader.

They rely on emotions, that’s not so bad, on paper and from a distance, but the most important aspect is their use of prejudices. Prejudices cause people to make mistakes and get angry, the mistakes are used to modify their perceptions of things to the demagogue’s advantage and fuel anger to make people forego rational thought and deliberation, again to the demagogue’s advantage.

I touch on this in: International Conspiracies: A Demagogue’s Favorite Ploy about demagogues and their conspiracy theories.

Their end game usually doesn’t involve you directly, on paper this doesn’t sound terrible, but the devil is in the detail. If you’re along for their ride towards what they claim is a better future, everything is dandy, but what if you personally have to be sacrificed in order to achieve their goal?

In the eyes of most demagogues an individual is an expendable asset in their quest for a “better” future. Their vision is usually indistinct and involves little effort from those it’s supposed to benefit.

Unfortunately, accounts of early demagogues are hard to find. In the last hundred years they are far better known, usually because of the massive trouble they cause(d):

Stalin, his purges and gulags; Hitler (enough said); Mao and the Cultural Revolution; Joseph McCarthy and his anti-communist frenzy; Anita Bryant stirring up hatred for and persecution of homosexuals, also in the US.

Back to the present: Udo Voightis is rabble-rousing in Germany and Geert Wilders is encouraging racism and violence in the Netherlands.

One of the earliest and more obscure was Cleon, an egotistical, power-hungry 5th century BC Athenian orator. Notably he convinced parliament to pass a resolution to kill every man in the city and sell everyone else into slavery. He used their pride and prejudice against them.

Fortunately the executioner was away and the slave market was closed, so that they could rescind their decision.

Not everybody gets a second chance.

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Leave campaigner says £4,300 per family is a price worth paying to run & hide from the EU

Price worth paying

Out of touch Leave campaigner Aaron Banks thinks £4,300 “is a price worth paying” – UK families are #StrongerIn pic.twitter.com/bKIKO31M5O

— Stronger In (@StrongerIn) April 28, 2016

 

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Not all issues stop at Dover, we must engage in the European Union, not run & hide from it.

No the EU does not take away our sovereignty

Because some issues don’t stop at Dover. Working together on the big issues is why Britain is #strongerIN #Remain pic.twitter.com/l3SuppRvtk

— Margaret (@margarance) April 30, 2016

 

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