Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Funnily enough Roger, long before the UK joined the EU I was travelling between and living in the cities of Italy and France with no problems whatsoever, as did my parents and their generation. And, come to think of it, so did their parents and grand-parents.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
A patronising post but nothing wrong with that!
There's a difference between visiting various cities in the world and being able to work in them as easily as you can your local Tesco. A friend of mine has recently been fined £15,000 by the Home Office for employing an Algerian to wash the dishes in his cafe for a few hours on a Saturday night.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
Before we joined the EEC it was generally the wealthy who travelled widely and worked in Europe;
It still is. Indeed many of the UK citizens who currently work in the EU originally came from countries in the EU. Much of the increase in work travel and migration is due to a more mobile global upper class.
Increases in bucket and spade holiday travel since say the 1950s on the other hand has naff all to do with the EU.
Whilst Brexit genuinely does have the potential to be quite painful, I think bleating that we'll never see amazing foreign architecture again, never witness a beautiful foreign sunset again or never again witness boys kissing in a Nice pavement cafe while drinking coffee (sorry Roger, I was too busy crying with laughter to read that post properly) is over egging the pudding a bit. That's not Project Fear, that's Project Taking The Piss Out Of The Vast Majority Of People Who Don't Have Rogeresque Lifestyles.
Hooray! Witty, amusing Roger is gone, pompous Roger is back. Thank God for that, my whole world view was shattered yesterday, normality is restored.
Let's look at the data from the ONS. Sadly it's based on 2011 Eurostat data so hardly finger-on-the-pulse stuff.
There were 83k British kids (i.e.
Ongoing cheap air travel will also depend on a deal with the EU and an agreement to abide by EU laws. Ditto with data roaming charges and the other countless ways in which being a part of the single market makes life easier for the millions of Brits who travel to the continent each year.
Data roaming charges that are only finally being abolished in 2017?
How on earth did people manage before then?
They paid a lot more money to use their mobiles abroad.
But the change could have been brought in by UK gov legislation, or market forces; waiting for the EU to (finally) do something about it probably took longer.
Anyway, is it worth saving a bit of money on a phone abroad, in order to have the whole EU thrust upon us?
Putting that in every post about your political opponents makes you sound, well, a bit swivel-eyed..
The swivel-eyed right is one element only of those whose views I do not share. There are also many Tories who are much more pragmatic than the Redwood's, Cash's and Rees Moggs, and far less willing to inflict damage on the country and its economy.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
Malta has the lowest level of cycling in the EU. Correlation not causation I'm sure.
Never been to Malta. Is it very hilly or do they just not like cycling?
Their roads do have something of a reputation for crazy drivers though - who was it said 'on Malta they drive in the shade'?
Biggest deterrent to taking up cycling for most people is fear of traffic - you answered your own question!
It's why Birmingham (flattish) has a cycle to work level of 1.6% while in Bristol (hillier) it's over 7%.
Bristol's got some very good dedicated cycle paths too - there's an old railway line circles the east side and runs on to Bath. Gentle gradients, no cars, lovely scenery. Well worth checking out for any cycling aficionados.
One of my students made this very point yesterday.
I responded that if turnout had been as high among the young as among the old, Remain would almost certainly have won.
With luck, that has impressed the importance of voting when given the chance on the whole class.
We don't know that Remain would have won. There's probably something different about the type of young people who did and didn't bother to vote, and therefore how those non-voters would have decided.
For instance if university students and graduates were more likely to vote than those in manual occupations.
This is true, which is why I used 'almost'.
Anecdotally however I would have said university students were less likely to vote than manual workers, simply because university students can be quite mind-blowingly childish, thoughtless and irresponsible in a way that it simply isn't possible to be if you are working for a living. Happy to be proven wrong if anyone has any data to the contrary.
I also made the point that a lower turnout in Scotland probably had a bearing, but in mitigation the Scots must be utterly sick of referendums.
An interesting question. I was sceptical, but there is some evidence that you're right. Here are the Cambridge wards
The student dominated wards are Newnham, Castle & Market, which do have the lowest percentage turnouts.
I don't have any figures on this either, but by the 23rd of June wouldn't most students have gone home for the summer?
That is of course another possibility to account for Cambridge's figures, although it shouldn't affect postgraduates.
However, most of the ones who had left will probably have been on holiday rather than voting at home.
Judging - anecdotally and unscientifically - from my Facebook feed around that time, the twentysomething graduates I know were bothering to vote, overwhelmingly for Remain, and getting postal/proxy votes if they were going to be away.
Both of us are being anecdotal and unscientific!
Seriously though, it's an interesting point.
Thanks - it would be great if there were some proper polling to get to the bottom of who did and didn't vote, but I guess by its very nature it would be tricky to get right.
Mr. Roger, if only some sort of travel had been possible before the EU existed.
It's not about travel; it's about the Brexitards turning their backs on a broader European identity and the lifelong mobility and freedom that went with it.
I have a nephew who wanted to go to university in Spain. Will he still be able to? Probably, but it might be more expensive and complicated so he might not bother and he'll just have his horizons broadened in Hull instead of Seville.
I have a friend who wanted to retire in France and bought a house for that purpose. Will he still be able to do it? Probably not, the health insurance costs for non-EU residents in France have put that beyond him and his wife.
But it's all worth it because something, something, something sovreignty.
Both will be fine. A deal will be done. We'll trade access for sovereignty; free movement will essentially remain in place. Thank-you President Trump.
More comfortable with brexitards than leftards I see! The abdabs we used to face when people used that
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Funnily enough Roger, long before the UK joined the EU I was travelling between and living in the cities of Italy and France with no problems whatsoever, as did my parents and their generation. And, come to think of it, so did their parents and grand-parents.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
A patronising post but nothing wrong with that!
There's a difference between visiting various cities in the world and being able to work in them as easily as you can your local Tesco. A friend of mine has recently been fined £15,000 by the Home Office for employing an Algerian to wash the dishes in his cafe for a few hours on a Saturday night.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
Before we joined the EEC it was generally the wealthy who travelled widely and worked in Europe;
It still is. Indeed many of the UK citizens who currently work in the EU originally came from countries in the EU. Much of the increase in work travel and migration is due to a more mobile global upper class.
Increases in bucket and spade holiday travel since say the 1950s on the other hand has naff all to do with the EU.
Millions go to Europe these days for much more than bucket and spade holidays.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
@Cyclefree I am a great admirer of most of your posts, but on this point specifically I think you've got it completely wrong. The world has changed dramatically since 1970's. The fact that people lived and worked freely around Europe before we joined the EU is of almost no relevance to the world now. This was a major misconception people had in the EU referendum and it needs to be challenged. As things stand now, if you are young (eg a non professional), a non EU citizen and want to live and work in the the UK or any other EU country well all I can say is good luck with that. It's virtually impossible and you are headlong in to a bureaucratic nightmare. Myself and many of my friends are well acquainted with this with various foreign partners over the years resulting in relationship failures and at least one premature and ill advised marriage. I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'. So on this point specifically the younger generation have undoubtedly been fucked over by the older generation. The question is how much does it matter to them. There are other issues as well, back in the real world those of us who have EU partners on real world incomes and dual national children have also been fucked over on many levels, not least the huge uncertainty created by this decision in terms of things like welfare access, healthcare, access to state pensions. As angry as we are we are a minority though and what we are seeing now is the tyranny of the majority. Nothing more and nothing less.
Thank you for the piece as always, David. Thought provoking but as usual much with which I disagree. As is the default on here these days, everything and everyone is viewed through the prism of June 23rd.
There is plenty of evidence it's not that important - I would argue had we voted REMAIN, Cameron would be enjoying equally healthy leads over Corbyn. The problem Labour has fundamentally is that while there are (I suspect) a number of people who could and would vote Labour in preference to the Conservatives, LDs, UKIP, Greens or whoever, they cannot and will not do so while a) Jeremy Corbyn is leader and b) the Party's evident fragmentation, ill-discipline and disunity continues.
As both Conservatives and Liberal Democrats can attest from experience, disunited (or parties appearing to be disunited) parties are frequently shunned by the electorate. I would argue the Conservative Party is as divided as ever on Europe but it has maintained the facade of unity under May.
Labour's disunity would matter less (once could argue there was plenty of division under Kinnock, Blair, Brown and Milliband) were it not for Corbyn. The relentless character assassination of Corbyn (mostly self inflicted it has to be said) has made him electoral poison for much of the country.
Given a forced choice, I would choose May over Corbyn and I'm no fan of the current Prime Minister and given a Government led by either the Conservative or Labour parties is all that's on offer for now, I can well understand the big Conservative poll leads.
Corbyn's replacement doesn't have to be Blair Mark 2 (even as May tries in vain to be Thatcher Mark 2 or is lauded as such by the Mail) and nor do I think it matters if they were for leaving the EU or not. All they need to do is change perceptions - first, that the Party is united, second that the Party, and here I'm picking my words carefully, is more in line with the British people. I've never, for example, had a problem with Corbyn talking to Hamas, the IRA or any other group, it's part of the democratic process - I have a problem with his unequivocal support for their aims especially if those aims are predicated on violence, terror and the deaths of British service men and women.
Condemning ALL violence is a coherent and credible position - desiring peaceful and diplomatic resolution to all conflicts is laudable - but the condemnation has to be equal and unequivocal. There are things Britain has done in wars which should be condemned but that is as nothing compared to what those fighting us have done to civilians and others. The sentiment is noble but the tone in which it is expressed needs to be carefully balanced and nuanced.- Corbyn fails miserably.
This is the problem I have with the Leave argument, and the independence argument in Scotland. That we're better off on our own, to make the decisions that affect us, is perfectly valid case to make. But it's a disconnection and that means less individual freedom. In this instance freedom to move but also freedom to trade etc. It's disingenuous in my view to claim it will make no difference, or worse that through disconnection we somehow become more open to the world.
Whilst Brexit genuinely does have the potential to be quite painful, I think bleating that we'll never see amazing foreign architecture again, never witness a beautiful foreign sunset again or never again witness boys kissing in a Nice pavement cafe while drinking coffee (sorry Roger, I was too busy crying with laughter to read that post properly) is over egging the pudding a bit.
Well, quite. I'm not going to deny being less certain about my choice to leave than I was a year ago, while not yet in bregret territory, and in fact outside the needless bureaucratic control, particularly over minutiae, that seems the driving goal of the eu, I always admired the dream of sharing movement and culture with our European partners.
The thing is we can still share a lot with them while not in a political project, even if not everything some wanted, and that sort of approach doesn't lament the loss of an elevated shared and expanding European culture, it laments that cities in the med are prettier, have a better climate and the people aren't fat buffoons. It presents us as beneath them in need of them to be acceptable.
That we and they might be better together is a fair view. That we have no value or beauty worth the name without them, as implied, makes us not a partner but a charity project.
A friend of mine has recently been fined £15,000 by the Home Office for employing an Algerian to wash the dishes in his cafe for a few hours on a Saturday night.
Ever consider that your friend is helping people make desperately dangerous trips at the mercy of people smugglers, quite possibly dying in the process. So they can wash his dishes.
Do you ever think that just maybe, your friend has those floating corpses in the Med on his conscience? Thought not. There's a bloody good reason the state fines employers for taking on people who are prepared to break all the rules and illegally gain access to this country. And don't even get me started on how that fvcks up the asylum system for those truly in need of help.
This is the problem I have with the Leave argument, and the independence argument in Scotland. That we're better off on our own, to make the decisions that affect us, is perfectly valid case to make. But it's a disconnection and that means less individual freedom. In this instance freedom to move but also freedom to trade etc. It's disingenuous in my view to claim it will make no difference, or worse that through disconnection we somehow become more open to the world.
That's like saying anyone who ever moves out of their parents house to start a home of their own is less free.
We can be more open to the world since now we are free to strike deals on our own rather than pandering to the lowest common denominator as to what is acceptable in Walonia.
Not sure I agree with this but his options are limited. Barely 1 in 4 of the population are willing to lend Labour their vote. If you look at that 1 in 4 they are mainly strong remainers. Corbyn is pissing off his last band of supporters.
It is true his position is more in line with what the country as a whole thinks but the country as a whole has concluded that he is not fit to lead his party, let alone be PM. Perhaps he should be thinking more about those willing to give him the time of day.
So on this point specifically the younger generation have undoubtedly been fucked over by the older generation. The question is how much does it matter to them.
Sorry but this is bullshit. They had exactly the same chance to go and vote as the older generation, but they didnt. So the answer to the question posted in the last sentence is clearly "not enough"
But the change could have been brought in by UK gov legislation, or market forces; waiting for the EU to (finally) do something about it probably took longer.
No, it couldn't. The UK government can't force EU telecoms carriers (which carry the roamed traffic) to do anything. The best they could do would be to force UK carriers not pass roaming charges on to their customers which would result in a) more contracts with no roaming at all and b) more expensive contracts that did roam.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
Malta has the lowest level of cycling in the EU. Correlation not causation I'm sure.
Never been to Malta. Is it very hilly or do they just not like cycling?
Their roads do have something of a reputation for crazy drivers though - who was it said 'on Malta they drive in the shade'?
Biggest deterrent to taking up cycling for most people is fear of traffic - you answered your own question!
It's why Birmingham (flattish) has a cycle to work level of 1.6% while in Bristol (hillier) it's over 7%.
Bristol's got some very good dedicated cycle paths too - there's an old railway line circles the east side and runs on to Bath. Gentle gradients, no cars, lovely scenery. Well worth checking out for any cycling aficionados.
And the Bath Two Tunnels is wonderful.
Don't forget everyone - cycling is great, cyclists are awful.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Funnily enough Roger, long before the UK joined the EU I was travelling between and living in the cities of Italy and France with no problems whatsoever, as did my parents and their generation. And, come to think of it, so did their parents and grand-parents.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
A patronising post but nothing wrong with that!
There's a difference between visiting various cities in the world and being able to work in them as easily as you can your local Tesco. A friend of mine has recently been fined £15,000 by the Home Office for employing an Algerian to wash the dishes in his cafe for a few hours on a Saturday night.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
Oh back to that one - you mean the 'friend' who was breaking the law.
But the change could have been brought in by UK gov legislation, or market forces; waiting for the EU to (finally) do something about it probably took longer.
No, it couldn't. The UK government can't force EU telecoms carriers (which carry the roamed traffic) to do anything. The best they could do would be to force UK carriers not pass roaming charges on to their customers which would result in a) more contracts with no roaming at all and b) more expensive contracts that did roam.
It was a 2-way street. A deal could have been made, but everyone was waiting for the EU.
This is the problem I have with the Leave argument, and the independence argument in Scotland. That we're better off on our own, to make the decisions that affect us, is perfectly valid case to make. But it's a disconnection and that means less individual freedom. In this instance freedom to move but also freedom to trade etc. It's disingenuous in my view to claim it will make no difference, or worse that through disconnection we somehow become more open to the world.
It is undoubtedly true that Brexit means all of us - on a personal and work level - will see rights we currently enjoy taken away from us. But for most, these rights are unknown, invisible or entirely abstract. "Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got til it's gone?" and all that. However, I suspect deals will be done and ways will be found. It's in no-one's interests for this not to be the case - especially in the time of Trump.
Being more open to the world is another matter. As has become clear, for most countries we want to deals with that will involve looser rules on immigration into the UK; while for the US it would involve us accepting the trade deal they want. Both scenarios are immensely problemstic politically.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
On the last one, there's some data here with mixed results: US and Australia top, then France and Germany:
My anecdotal impression is that most students woiuld like to spend time studying abroad for a micturee of excitement and employment prospects, and that young people generally are very relaxed about working abroad if there's a good opportunity (this isn't just a middle-class thing, cf. Auf Wiedersehen Pet), and are not too fussed whether it's Europe or America. They tend to be Remainers partly because the effect of Brxit is perceived to narrow the options.
On the first point, not a large constituency, but it's grown quite a bit since Brexit. Lots of people took the EU for granted and are upset that we're detaching from it. But I doubt if the passionate fans - the sort of people who change political preference over it - exceed 20%.
Not sure I agree with this but his options are limited. Barely 1 in 4 of the population are willing to lend Labour their vote. If you look at that 1 in 4 they are mainly strong remainers. Corbyn is pissing off his last band of supporters.
It is true his position is more in line with what the country as a whole thinks but the country as a whole has concluded that he is not fit to lead his party, let alone be PM. Perhaps he should be thinking more about those willing to give him the time of day.
Maybe he actually accepts his days are numbered, and while he might privately see the country as a whole will not elect him, he can keep the party as a whole on the track and in a position acceptable to the country, so that when he goes the party is not stuck in some arch remain or rejoin stance - the thinking being right now the position is not bad but the leader is not credible, but without him they could have been with a leader who is not bad but a position that is not credible.
Just a theory, but labour is still in a strong position despite all it's travails, it can still come back from this. Some worry corbyn is so bad he is fatally wounding them, but maybe he accepts even if he is not the right leader, the party could survive that if it has the right policies, but a good leader after him won't save them if they have the wrong policy.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
While I think you are generally right, Roger going quite so far OTT doesn’t help us.
Incidentally, what is going happen to those British students who have enrolled at Maastricht Uni? Presumably those there will be able to finish, but what about anyone thinkimng of applying now?
My daughter got the offer of an Erasmus funded year in Rome yesterday. She is delighted and I am more than a bit jealous. If such things existed in the late 70s they were beyond my ken and ambition.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
I think a lot of people will miss the possibility of using that right, although far fewer did or would have actually utilised it, so the number downright furious about its loss will be less.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam without any restriction........
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
Why was Theresa May given such a clear and surprisingly warm welcome by the public in Valletta yesterday? What, if anything, were the Maltese people attempting to say to the EU leaders? Are we likely to see this degree of warmth towards her repeated in other EU capitals? If so, is this likely to influence the UK's Brexit negotiations?
Mr. Roger, if only some sort of travel had been possible before the EU existed.
It's not about travel; it's about the Brexitards.
I think using the word "tard" is rightly frowned upon here, old chap. Maybe you're more Claris than Dura Ace.
Its always revealing when people sneer down their nose at a plurality, if not a majority in their own country. Something of a speciality around here at the moment.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
Not a lot. Free movement is very much an upper middle class thing, for British nationals.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Mr. Roger, if only some sort of travel had been possible before the EU existed.
It's not about travel; it's about the Brexitards turning their backs on a broader European identity and the lifelong mobility and freedom that went with it.
I have a nephew who wanted to go to university in Spain. Will he still be able to? Probably, but it might be more expensive and complicated so he might not bother and he'll just have his horizons broadened in Hull instead of Seville.
I have a friend who wanted to retire in France and bought a house for that purpose. Will he still be able to do it? Probably not, the health insurance costs for non-EU residents in France have put that beyond him and his wife.
But it's all worth it because something, something, something sovreignty.
Let's wait and see what the deal is before assuming the worst. Certainly I have heard that the property market has already suffered much in France as the 'expat punters' have melted away but that is not quite the same here in Spain where things are continuing [very slowly] to improve. Regarding healthcare it is probable that deals will be made for existing retirees and possibly for new ones too. As to your last point I voted remain but this is happening because we are a democratic nation and a clear majority voted to Leave. Now is the time for everyone to make it the best deal we can.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam........
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
Because it wasnt only that which was voted on, the eu is the sum of all its parts not just the bits we like, the eu was and is a very large package and everyone was affected by bits of it, sometimes substantially.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
This is the problem I have with the Leave argument, and the independence argument in Scotland. That we're better off on our own, to make the decisions that affect us, is perfectly valid case to make. But it's a disconnection and that means less individual freedom. In this instance freedom to move but also freedom to trade etc. It's disingenuous in my view to claim it will make no difference, or worse that through disconnection we somehow become more open to the world.
That's like saying anyone who ever moves out of their parents house to start a home of their own is less free.
We can be more open to the world since now we are free to strike deals on our own rather than pandering to the lowest common denominator as to what is acceptable in Walonia.
I am distinguishing between freedom as a nation, where I accept Leave has a decent argument, and individual freedom. As a nation we might want to stop people moving.As individuals we want to do what we want without impediments.
On your second point, I am afraid I think you are wrong. Disconnection means fewer opportunities. The opportunities available afterwards were mostly there before. In concrete terms, the deals we get, which will be necessary because we have rejected our previous arrangements, will afford fewer opportunities overall than we had earlier.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
Not a lot. Free movement is very much an upper middle class thing, for British nationals.
There are clearly a lot of upper middle class pensioners in Benidorm then. Lots of younger ones doing summer stints in the bars and clubs on the costas and in Greece, Cyprus and Portugal, too.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam without any restriction........
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
Because the proportion of the electorate who walk into jobs in Florence or spend three months chilling in Amsterdam is vanishingly small.
I can confirm that salads are available in Spanish shops - however most people at this time of year opt for weather appropriate veg. I find it hard to believe that in the UK the weather is making people desperate for Iceberg lettuce - unless global warming up there is accelerating rapidly.
Not sure I agree with this but his options are limited. Barely 1 in 4 of the population are willing to lend Labour their vote. If you look at that 1 in 4 they are mainly strong remainers. Corbyn is pissing off his last band of supporters.
It is true his position is more in line with what the country as a whole thinks but the country as a whole has concluded that he is not fit to lead his party, let alone be PM. Perhaps he should be thinking more about those willing to give him the time of day.
Maybe he actually accepts his days are numbered, and while he might privately see the country as a whole will not elect him, he can keep the party as a whole on the track and in a position acceptable to the country, so that when he goes the party is not stuck in some arch remain or rejoin stance - the thinking being right now the position is not bad but the leader is not credible, but without him they could have been with a leader who is not bad but a position that is not credible.
Just a theory, but labour is still in a strong position despite all it's travails, it can still come back from this. Some worry corbyn is so bad he is fatally wounding them, but maybe he accepts even if he is not the right leader, the party could survive that if it has the right policies, but a good leader after him won't save them if they have the wrong policy.
Maybe. Remain is a cul de sac as a position because it will have no relevance at the next election but whether it is holding his party together with yet more front bench resignations is open to doubt.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that might show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
Why was Theresa May given such a clear and surprisingly warm welcome by the public in Valletta yesterday? What, if anything, were the Maltese people attempting to say to the EU leaders? Are we likely to see this degree of warmth towards her repeated in other EU capitals? If so, is this likely to influence the EU's Brexit negotiations?
To the latter, probably not. It is in everyone's long term interests for all sides to play nice and be warm with each other to achieve the best possible deal for us all, but domestic and European politics will ensure as we've seen here and over there that hardball will be played at times, and it's a question of how much that happens, or how much the individual nations concerned feel they need to play hardball to appease their domestic support or the eu as an institution.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam without any restriction........
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
Because the proportion of the electorate who walk into jobs in Florence or spend three months chilling in Amsterdam is vanishingly small.
You could have said the same thing about the first people to drive a car.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers. It's really a question of whether the politics or pragmatism win out. It's down to the intrepid Mrs May and her numberless minions now.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
A lot of people fall in to this category, particularly the 20k per year grad category. But still it is a minority as Nick Palmer points out, very sad to see peoples aspirations being gleefully rubbished.
I can confirm that salads are available in Spanish shops - however most people at this time of year opt for weather appropriate veg. I find it hard to believe that in the UK the weather is making people desperate for Iceberg lettuce - unless global warming up there is accelerating rapidly.
My wife makes a really nice lettuce soup. We often have it at Christmas.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
They may have little choice. They will not only be permitted in imports from the US, they will be allowed in products currently sold here.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
Not a lot. Free movement is very much an upper middle class thing, for British nationals.
There are clearly a lot of upper middle class pensioners in Benidorm then. Lots of younger ones doing summer stints in the bars and clubs on the costas and in Greece, Cyprus and Portugal, too.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers.
A lot of Brits spend part of the year in the EU - pensioners in Spain in the winter, for example, or younger people working in southern European resorts in the summer. A lot of trades people also go across to work on specific projects.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers.
A lot of Brits spend part of the year in the EU - pensioners in Spain in the winter, for example, or younger people working in southern European resorts in the summer. A lot of trades people also go across to work on specific projects.
Not much of that if anything is likely to change afterwards.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
As someone who lives on the Med I can confirm that your anecdote is completely wrong. Similarly on visiting central France in November I can confirm that, in Limousin at least we used unpleasant and overpriced motorway cafes and the only restaurant in the charming village we stayed at was a [very ordinary] pizza place.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers.
A lot of Brits spend part of the year in the EU - pensioners in Spain in the winter, for example, or younger people working in southern European resorts in the summer. A lot of trades people also go across to work on specific projects.
Not much of that if anything is likely to change afterwards.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
Outside the EU, you'll still be free to mix with other rich people in France, and avoid mixing with the lower classes in this country, so what's your problem?
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that might show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I think if I'd been asked to guess ahead of the Valletta meeting, whether the Maltese people would be warm and welcoming towards Theresa May or negative and critical, I would have opted for the latter and therefore her reception yesterday genuinely surprised me, although I guess one has to take into account our historic links with the island and its people.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
You're misreading the words and deliberately misinterpreting them.
Yes Parliament was sovereign - but delegating its responsibilities away from the people we elect and to people not accountable to British voters. Now Parliament is going to reclaim its responsibilities and the voters will regain the control to kick out lawmakers we don't approve of.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
Tyranny of the Majority seems to be the new term of art for people that lose when the public are consulted. When more people vote for a Labour government than a Conservative one, and Corbyn moves into No 10, can I call that the Tyranny of the Majority as well ? Pitiful.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
Not a lot. Free movement is very much an upper middle class thing, for British nationals.
There are clearly a lot of upper middle class pensioners in Benidorm then. Lots of younger ones doing summer stints in the bars and clubs on the costas and in Greece, Cyprus and Portugal, too.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
There are significant numbers. Maybe not millions, but hundreds of thousands. Resorts across southern Europe fill out every summer with young Brits doing temporary work. And they tend not to be upper middle class.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
Talking of which off to Costas for my Saturday morning bun!
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
We don't need to wait for a US-UK trade deal to buy them!
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers.
A lot of Brits spend part of the year in the EU - pensioners in Spain in the winter, for example, or younger people working in southern European resorts in the summer. A lot of trades people also go across to work on specific projects.
Not much of that if anything is likely to change afterwards.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
It's a better reason than any other.
And frankly, given that you appear keen to turn Labour into the Lib Dems, I can well understand why you don't trust democracy. The problem is, once you go down that route, what's to stop anyone from preventing you from having your say. The world offers precious few examples of democracy being stripped from a country in order to impose more liberalism.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers.
A lot of Brits spend part of the year in the EU - pensioners in Spain in the winter, for example, or younger people working in southern European resorts in the summer. A lot of trades people also go across to work on specific projects.
Not much of that if anything is likely to change afterwards.
I agree. To all intents and purposes free movement will remain in place.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam without any restriction........
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
You really don't like democracy do you. Oh for the ancien regime eh.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
Talking of which off to Costas for my Saturday morning bun!
It doesn't really matter that a majority of Corbyn's lost voters were for Leave or even that so many Labour seats are in Leave areas. Labour voters are by a large majority Remainers and by chasing the right wing straight banana vote he's just alienating his core supporters
Nothing is more anathema to Labour values than watching their leader chase those with UKIP values and he shouldn't be surprised when he's treated like an unprincipled pariah.
You don't understand what Labour values are, do you? The clue is in the name: it's supposed to be the party of the working class. Not only should it reflect their opinion but if it is to have any future, it has a duty to do so.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
That's slightly my point. Why are those of us who are forever crossing borders or who have children who we would like to be able to walk into a Saturday job in Florence while studying the history of art or earning some pocket money on a three month chill out in Amsterdam without any restriction........
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
But I suspect you are a tiny minority. Your freedom of movement to enable your kids to do Saturday jobs in Florence is a plumber in building site in Halifax's problem competing with an EU citizen prepared to accept lower wages and live ten to a house ( slight cliche I know but as illustration). There are many more of "plumbers" than you, I'm afraid.
Of course it may be that the Yorkshire plumber had other reasons such as lack of democratic accountability or dislike of ever closer union to vote leave too.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
Outside the EU, you'll still be free to mix with other rich people in France, and avoid mixing with the lower classes in this country, so what's your problem?
I dunno why Rog hangs around in old blighty. He'd be far happier becoming a citizen of Monaco.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
The thing I am genuinely curious about is whether it will feel like we have sovereignty AFTER we Brexit. Sovereignty isn't the absolute, like virginity, that people think it is. It is subject to all sorts of compromises, pooling and stresses.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
More significantly, they will start to appear in basic products that are already here. There is no choice if all affordable products containcorn syrup. The wealthy will be fine, they'll have the cash to buy the premium stuff.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
There is as much logic to it as there is to the argument to Remain.
Those who seek to characterise Leave voters as mad, bad, or stupid, are demonstrating plenty of feelings, attitudes and emotions, and anything but rationality.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
There are significant numbers. Maybe not millions, but hundreds of thousands. Resorts across southern Europe fill out every summer with young Brits doing temporary work. And they tend not to be upper middle class.
Hundreds of thousands living across a continent that is made of our nearest neighbours that we have free movement with versus well over a million living thousands of miles away on the opposite side of the globe that requires a visa from "an Australian-style points based immigration system" to get into. Actually THE Australian system not just style.
Clearly these hundreds of thousands locally are small fry and even if they needed to get a visa like the over a million in Oz needed to get they would be able to get it.
You seem to think that there was nothing good before the EU and nothing good outside it. It's a view. But not a very intelligent or cultured one.
Perhaps when you were working and travelling we were either in the EU or the rules were more lax then?
When I was a child we weren't in the EU. And yet I grew up in Italy and moved between it, the UK and Ireland as easily as now. My father travelled all round Europe in the fifties in a similar way. So did others in his family and in my mothers.
I look back through all the generations on all sides of my family and see travel and work abroad in every generation. I simply don't accept your absurd characterisation that not being in the EU will mean no travel to or from Europe and no cultural exchange. Overstating your case does not help.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
HAHAHAHA.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
Not a lot. Free movement is very much an upper middle class thing, for British nationals.
There are clearly a lot of upper middle class pensioners in Benidorm then. Lots of younger ones doing summer stints in the bars and clubs on the costas and in Greece, Cyprus and Portugal, too.
I think the young and flexible will still do ok in Spain and Portugal - where the 'rules' are often seen as optional anyway - less so in France where my friend cannot employ even a cleaner for her cafe or a temporary fill-in without enormous costs and bureaucracy.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
You're misreading the words and deliberately misinterpreting them.
Yes Parliament was sovereign - but delegating its responsibilities away from the people we elect and to people not accountable to British voters. Now Parliament is going to reclaim its responsibilities and the voters will regain the control to kick out lawmakers we don't approve of.
It doesn't really matter that a majority of Corbyn's lost voters were for Leave or even that so many Labour seats are in Leave areas. Labour voters are by a large majority Remainers and by chasing the right wing straight banana vote he's just alienating his core supporters
Nothing is more anathema to Labour values than watching their leader chase those with UKIP values and he shouldn't be surprised when he's treated like an unprincipled pariah.
You don't understand what Labour values are, do you? The clue is in the name: it's supposed to be the party of the working class. Not only should it reflect their opinion but if it is to have any future, it has a duty to do so.
Labour as it was is dead. It is now the doctors and teachers party. Indeed the Labour office in my constituency is in the most posh part of town.
I can confirm that salads are available in Spanish shops - however most people at this time of year opt for weather appropriate veg. I find it hard to believe that in the UK the weather is making people desperate for Iceberg lettuce - unless global warming up there is accelerating rapidly.
My wife makes a really nice lettuce soup. We often have it at Christmas.
Yes - but pay a premium for the out of season lettuce no doubt - the chef purists would not be pleased
A lot of the discussion so far seems to assume that Leave/Remain views were somehow fixed for eternity on June 23rd. Labour will have problems with their Leave-inclined supporters if Brexit proves to be a success and, more importantly, if they personally benefit from it.
With all due respect to the Leave voters of Sunderland, Stoke and Hartlepool they were voting Leave because they believed there will get something out of it for themselves. I doubt any of them give a FF about the sovereignty arguments of effete Leavers like Rees-Mogg - they are in it for more stuff for themselves - if they don't get it they will turn on Brexit in an instant.
The £350m a week for the NHS, for example, might have been a good wheeze to win the referendum which Boris et al can now airily dismiss but a lot of these Labour Leave voters believed it to one true and if they don't see the NHS dramatically improving they may well seek electoral retribution .
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
Maltese women are the only European nationality with higher BMI than UK, but apart from that I agree. Brexit Britons will have narrower horizons.
I haven't been to Malta for years but returning from France the differnce in obeisity is extraordinary. If you see a very large person in the environs of Nice the chances are they're English. Considering most Britons are slaves to fitbit it's surprising
Obesity in Britain is heavily class related, though all SE are fatter than tbey used to be.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
The additives that go into US food products - corn syrup? - have a direct impact on obesity levels there. When they tell us what trade deal we can have, allowing these will be part of the package.
Do British people have to buy these products ?
No, but they will sell well. Britons just love sugary, fatty, salty easily digested pap.
Talking of which off to Costas for my Saturday morning bun!
Run out of deep fried Mars Bars?
Never indulged with that. At the risk of sounding all Sean T more likely some crumpets.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
There is as much logic to it as there is to the argument to Remain.
Those who seek to characterise Leave voters as mad, bad, or stupid, are demonstrating plenty of feelings, attitudes and emotions, and anything but rationality.
I wasn't talking only about Leavers. Sensitive much?
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
Outside the EU, you'll still be free to mix with other rich people in France, and avoid mixing with the lower classes in this country, so what's your problem?
I dunno why Rog hangs around in old blighty. He'd be far happier becoming a citizen of Monaco.
Roger is very representative of a certain sort of urban, upper-middle class, left-wing Englishman who hates his own country.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
There are significant numbers. Maybe not millions, but hundreds of thousands. Resorts across southern Europe fill out every summer with young Brits doing temporary work. And they tend not to be upper middle class.
Hundreds of thousands living across a continent that is made of our nearest neighbours that we have free movement with versus well over a million living thousands of miles away on the opposite side of the globe that requires a visa from "an Australian-style points based immigration system" to get into. Actually THE Australian system not just style.
Clearly these hundreds of thousands locally are small fry and even if they needed to get a visa like the over a million in Oz needed to get they would be able to get it.
Exactly. The numbers of British nationals living and working in Anglophone countries that impose immigration controls far exceed the numbers on the Continent, suggesting that if you have the skills foreign countries want, it's not too difficult to live and work abroad.
Are there any recent surveys on attitudes to the EU? Is there a large constituency of voters who feel "passionately enthusiastic about the EU." How many would consider working in the EU? How many would consider working in the Anglosphere? Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Not quite the same but according to Wikipedia ( I know) there was a survey done about 12 years ago on Brits living abroad. Now it's out of date, pre financial crash etc but there are some interesting figures in it ( can't link - technology hopeless, sorry). Spain was top EU country with 761k, France was 200k Germany was a bit over 100k. However, USA, Canada, S Africa, NZ, and Ireland were all ahead of France and top of the pile was Australia with 1.2M.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that my show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
I posted some of the ONS figures earlier. If you'd like the full report, it's here.
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers. It's really a question of whether the politics or pragmatism win out. It's down to the intrepid Mrs May and her numberless minions now.
Wow. That says there's only about 300k in Spain and that's the top destination.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
There are significant numbers. Maybe not millions, but hundreds of thousands. Resorts across southern Europe fill out every summer with young Brits doing temporary work. And they tend not to be upper middle class.
Hundreds of thousands living across a continent that is made of our nearest neighbours that we have free movement with versus well over a million living thousands of miles away on the opposite side of the globe that requires a visa from "an Australian-style points based immigration system" to get into. Actually THE Australian system not just style.
Clearly these hundreds of thousands locally are small fry and even if they needed to get a visa like the over a million in Oz needed to get they would be able to get it.
No, hundreds of thousands living temporarily in a specific part of the continent to add to the hundreds of thousands living permanently there and the others that go over each year to work on specific jobs and projects. That takes us into the millions. That's why we'll see a fudge and to all intents and purposes freedom of movement will remain in place. The White Paper gives so much wriggle room.
The right to be an EU citizen and to live and work wherever I like in the EU is not a right I ever wanted nor one that I will miss. I expect most of my fellow voters would also take that view.
That's OK, because what we've gained - "sovereignty" - is entirely illusory anyway. As the White Paper laughingly confirms, Parliament was always sovereign but it didn't feel like that. So that feeling justifies the whole damn thing.
I value having a legislature that is accountable to British voters alone.
And your values won by a slender majority. But let's not pretend there's any logic to any of it. It's all feelings and attitudes and emotions, as HMG has usefully confirmed.
There is as much logic to it as there is to the argument to Remain.
Those who seek to characterise Leave voters as mad, bad, or stupid, are demonstrating plenty of feelings, attitudes and emotions, and anything but rationality.
I wasn't talking only about Leavers. Sensitive much?
If that is so, your post didn't make that clear.
I can agree there are strong emotions on both sides.
Watching the 28 European leaders sailing through the port of Valletta was such a depressing sight. The EU meant that every citizen of the UK could not only visit but go to school in work in live in go to university in bring up a family in this beautiful city in Malta as easily as they could any town in Britain.
To have had a future where Rome Venice Florence Paris Amsterdam Berlin Copenhagen and Vienna were as accessible as Hartlipool Bradford Grimsby Rotherham and Clacton and to have had it taken away was a crime.
Im surprised the young people of this country didn't rise up in rebellion against their selfish ignorant parents and grandparents.
Perhaps as they watch their children follow them into a life of obeisity in their cultural wasteland they might just pause for thought.
How often do the majority of people travel outside the UK. One, perhaps twice, a year and then to a beach resort.
You and I live in a world where people travel across borders and work internationally all the time. I've taken, and this is not a boast, just an observation, 18 international flights so far this year. I don't think I have much in common with the voters of Hartlepool, Grimsby, Clayton et al. To be honest, I'm pleased that I don't, but equally their vote in a national referendum is worth as much as mine.
Why are we having that taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out?
Because we live in a democracy?
That's a crap reason. It's a tyranny of the majority. By the same token I can think of lots of interesting referendum questions..... Shall we confiscate Philip Green's billions and give them to the NHS?
Outside the EU, you'll still be free to mix with other rich people in France, and avoid mixing with the lower classes in this country, so what's your problem?
I dunno why Rog hangs around in old blighty. He'd be far happier becoming a citizen of Monaco.
Roger is very representative of a certain sort of urban, upper-middle class, left-wing Englishman who hates his own country.
No, I think he only hates aspects of his own country, and loves other parts. In that way he is no different to the rest of us. We just vary over the aspects that we hate. All patriots are like that. Look at how Trump hates some aspects of his own country for example, including most of his home city.
As a proportion of the British population, their numbers are very small. The notion that there are huge numbers of us commuting to our jobs and second homes on the Continent or spending months chilling in Amsterdam is fantasy.
There are significant numbers. Maybe not millions, but hundreds of thousands. Resorts across southern Europe fill out every summer with young Brits doing temporary work. And they tend not to be upper middle class.
Hundreds of thousands living across a continent that is made of our nearest neighbours that we have free movement with versus well over a million living thousands of miles away on the opposite side of the globe that requires a visa from "an Australian-style points based immigration system" to get into. Actually THE Australian system not just style.
Clearly these hundreds of thousands locally are small fry and even if they needed to get a visa like the over a million in Oz needed to get they would be able to get it.
Exactly. The numbers of British nationals living and working in Anglophone countries that impose immigration controls far exceed the numbers on the Continent, suggesting that if you have the skills foreign countries want, it's not too difficult to live and work abroad.
But wasn't Brexit supposed to be about increasing the life chances of people with fewer skills?
Comments
How many would consider working in the EU?
How many would consider working in the Anglosphere?
Where would students prefer to continue their studies?
Increases in bucket and spade holiday travel since say the 1950s on the other hand has naff all to do with the EU.
But the change could have been brought in by UK gov legislation, or market forces; waiting for the EU to (finally) do something about it probably took longer.
Anyway, is it worth saving a bit of money on a phone abroad, in order to have the whole EU thrust upon us?
The world has changed dramatically since 1970's. The fact that people lived and worked freely around Europe before we joined the EU is of almost no relevance to the world now. This was a major misconception people had in the EU referendum and it needs to be challenged. As things stand now, if you are young (eg a non professional), a non EU citizen and want to live and work in the the UK or any other EU country well all I can say is good luck with that. It's virtually impossible and you are headlong in to a bureaucratic nightmare. Myself and many of my friends are well acquainted with this with various foreign partners over the years resulting in relationship failures and at least one premature and ill advised marriage.
I see no reason not to believe that we will have a similar status to US or Canadian citizens in respect of living in the EU once we leave, ie highly paid professionals like yourself, Roger and most other posters here will have no difficulty working in the EU, but ordinary minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year graduates will be locked out, in the same way as we supposedly want to stop these people from the EU from living here and competing for 'our jobs'.
So on this point specifically the younger generation have undoubtedly been fucked over by the older generation. The question is how much does it matter to them.
There are other issues as well, back in the real world those of us who have EU partners on real world incomes and dual national children have also been fucked over on many levels, not least the huge uncertainty created by this decision in terms of things like welfare access, healthcare, access to state pensions.
As angry as we are we are a minority though and what we are seeing now is the tyranny of the majority. Nothing more and nothing less.
Thank you for the piece as always, David. Thought provoking but as usual much with which I disagree. As is the default on here these days, everything and everyone is viewed through the prism of June 23rd.
There is plenty of evidence it's not that important - I would argue had we voted REMAIN, Cameron would be enjoying equally healthy leads over Corbyn. The problem Labour has fundamentally is that while there are (I suspect) a number of people who could and would vote Labour in preference to the Conservatives, LDs, UKIP, Greens or whoever, they cannot and will not do so while a) Jeremy Corbyn is leader and b) the Party's evident fragmentation, ill-discipline and disunity continues.
As both Conservatives and Liberal Democrats can attest from experience, disunited (or parties appearing to be disunited) parties are frequently shunned by the electorate. I would argue the Conservative Party is as divided as ever on Europe but it has maintained the facade of unity under May.
Labour's disunity would matter less (once could argue there was plenty of division under Kinnock, Blair, Brown and Milliband) were it not for Corbyn. The relentless character assassination of Corbyn (mostly self inflicted it has to be said) has made him electoral poison for much of the country.
Given a forced choice, I would choose May over Corbyn and I'm no fan of the current Prime Minister and given a Government led by either the Conservative or Labour parties is all that's on offer for now, I can well understand the big Conservative poll leads.
Corbyn's replacement doesn't have to be Blair Mark 2 (even as May tries in vain to be Thatcher Mark 2 or is lauded as such by the Mail) and nor do I think it matters if they were for leaving the EU or not. All they need to do is change perceptions - first, that the Party is united, second that the Party, and here I'm picking my words carefully, is more in line with the British people. I've never, for example, had a problem with Corbyn talking to Hamas, the IRA or any other group, it's part of the democratic process - I have a problem with his unequivocal support for their aims especially if those aims are predicated on violence, terror and the deaths of British service men and women.
Condemning ALL violence is a coherent and credible position - desiring peaceful and diplomatic resolution to all conflicts is laudable - but the condemnation has to be equal and unequivocal. There are things Britain has done in wars which should be condemned but that is as nothing compared to what those fighting us have done to civilians and others. The sentiment is noble but the tone in which it is expressed needs to be carefully balanced and nuanced.- Corbyn fails miserably.
The thing is we can still share a lot with them while not in a political project, even if not everything some wanted, and that sort of approach doesn't lament the loss of an elevated shared and expanding European culture, it laments that cities in the med are prettier, have a better climate and the people aren't fat buffoons. It presents us as beneath them in need of them to be acceptable.
That we and they might be better together is a fair view. That we have no value or beauty worth the name without them, as implied, makes us not a partner but a charity project.
Do you ever think that just maybe, your friend has those floating corpses in the Med on his conscience? Thought not. There's a bloody good reason the state fines employers for taking on people who are prepared to break all the rules and illegally gain access to this country. And don't even get me started on how that fvcks up the asylum system for those truly in need of help.
We can be more open to the world since now we are free to strike deals on our own rather than pandering to the lowest common denominator as to what is acceptable in Walonia.
It is true his position is more in line with what the country as a whole thinks but the country as a whole has concluded that he is not fit to lead his party, let alone be PM. Perhaps he should be thinking more about those willing to give him the time of day.
Don't forget everyone - cycling is great, cyclists are awful.
Middle aged Mediterraneans are a bit podgy, but fat young people on the Med are almost always British or Irish. Our Continental cousins have more healthy lifestyles.
It was a 2-way street. A deal could have been made, but everyone was waiting for the EU.
Being more open to the world is another matter. As has become clear, for most countries we want to deals with that will involve looser rules on immigration into the UK; while for the US it would involve us accepting the trade deal they want. Both scenarios are immensely problemstic politically.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/may/28/study-abroad-uk-students-overseas
My anecdotal impression is that most students woiuld like to spend time studying abroad for a micturee of excitement and employment prospects, and that young people generally are very relaxed about working abroad if there's a good opportunity (this isn't just a middle-class thing, cf. Auf Wiedersehen Pet), and are not too fussed whether it's Europe or America. They tend to be Remainers partly because the effect of Brxit is perceived to narrow the options.
On the first point, not a large constituency, but it's grown quite a bit since Brexit. Lots of people took the EU for granted and are upset that we're detaching from it. But I doubt if the passionate fans - the sort of people who change political preference over it - exceed 20%.
Just a theory, but labour is still in a strong position despite all it's travails, it can still come back from this. Some worry corbyn is so bad he is fatally wounding them, but maybe he accepts even if he is not the right leader, the party could survive that if it has the right policies, but a good leader after him won't save them if they have the wrong policy.
How many minimum wage school leavers or 20k per year grads do you think there are currently swanning around Europe who haven't got a rich mummy and daddy to pay for them?
....having it taken from us by the votes of people who are not affected whether we remain in or get out? I wouldn't feel I had the right to vote on whether people should be able to spend their days watching the Jeremy Kyle show just because I loathe it..
Why was Theresa May given such a clear and surprisingly warm welcome by the public in Valletta yesterday?
What, if anything, were the Maltese people attempting to say to the EU leaders?
Are we likely to see this degree of warmth towards her repeated in other EU capitals?
If so, is this likely to influence the UK's Brexit negotiations?
On your second point, I am afraid I think you are wrong. Disconnection means fewer opportunities. The opportunities available afterwards were mostly there before. In concrete terms, the deals we get, which will be necessary because we have rejected our previous arrangements, will afford fewer opportunities overall than we had earlier.
Please refrain from using the term Brexitard.
No details I could see on when these folk had left for foreign parts, or how long they had been there and that might show some interesting trends ( has there been a surge of under 30's opting for the EU over the English speaking world over the past 20 years or is it just oldies buggering off to sit in the sun and drink agreeable red in retirement whilst young keen IT professionals head for California?) Dunno. But 1.2M in Australia and 115k in Germany - The EU never went to our hearts really did it (Roger clearly excepted!)? Roger is dead right about the glories of European cities of course, and I see no reason not to potter about in future in them, but how many people really think "yup, Duessdorf. That's where I dream of spending my life, in comparison Bondi beach just has no appeal". Some but not many I venture.
http://bit.ly/2kzcdxW
Released on January 27th, 2017, though the data is mostly from Eurostat's 2011 numbers. I think it provides a bit more perspective on who's where, and (possibly) what they're up to. Based on > 12 month residency though.
I've deepest sympathy with @nielh's post though. I've never been one of the Panglossian Brexiteers. It's really a question of whether the politics or pragmatism win out. It's down to the intrepid Mrs May and her numberless minions now.
But still it is a minority as Nick Palmer points out, very sad to see peoples aspirations being gleefully rubbished.
Yes Parliament was sovereign - but delegating its responsibilities away from the people we elect and to people not accountable to British voters. Now Parliament is going to reclaim its responsibilities and the voters will regain the control to kick out lawmakers we don't approve of.
And frankly, given that you appear keen to turn Labour into the Lib Dems, I can well understand why you don't trust democracy. The problem is, once you go down that route, what's to stop anyone from preventing you from having your say. The world offers precious few examples of democracy being stripped from a country in order to impose more liberalism.
You really don't like democracy do you. Oh for the ancien regime eh.
https://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-rankings/2016
Of course it may be that the Yorkshire plumber had other reasons such as lack of democratic accountability or dislike of ever closer union to vote leave too.
Those who seek to characterise Leave voters as mad, bad, or stupid, are demonstrating plenty of feelings, attitudes and emotions, and anything but rationality.
Clearly these hundreds of thousands locally are small fry and even if they needed to get a visa like the over a million in Oz needed to get they would be able to get it.
With all due respect to the Leave voters of Sunderland, Stoke and Hartlepool they were voting Leave because they believed there will get something out of it for themselves. I doubt any of them give a FF about the sovereignty arguments of effete Leavers like Rees-Mogg - they are in it for more stuff for themselves - if they don't get it they will turn on Brexit in an instant.
The £350m a week for the NHS, for example, might have been a good wheeze to win the referendum which Boris et al can now airily dismiss but a lot of these Labour Leave voters believed it to one true and if they don't see the NHS dramatically improving they may well seek electoral retribution .
I can agree there are strong emotions on both sides.
Same old arguments, same old posters.
I think I'll go torture a kitten instead. It would be more fun.