AN early referendum on whether to remain in the European Union (EU) now looks inevitable, after David Cameron and European Council President Donald Tusk reached agreement (“Cameron vexed by left and right over renegotiation of EU membership terms”, The Herald, February 4). The terms agreed to for continued UK membership confirm both the reactionary character of the EU and the failure of its stated mission of uniting the continent.
The demands he placed on the EU were for more powers for parliament to block proposed EU legislation, greater protection for EU member states not in the Eurozone, action to boost competitiveness, and a limit on the in-work benefits paid to EU migrants working in Britain. His overall aim seems to me to be to encourage racism and xenophobia, to exempt the UK from what little remains of the EU’s human rights and workplace legislation, and to safeguard the City of London against competition from European rivals, above all Germany.
The agreement of Mr Tusk to these xenophobic and anti-working class measures is a refutation of those within the Labour Party and the supposed liberal media who depict the EU as the guardian of a more progressive social and political agenda. The EU has again proved to be an instrument for the imposition of policies of austerity and social reaction shared by all of its constituent governments. The compromises arrived at are bound up with a general assertion of national interests within the EU that threaten to tear the continent apart.
Greatest attention has been paid by noxious parts of the UK media to restricting benefits for migrants, with Mr Cameron adopting a sickening pose as a defender of social housing, the National Health Service and the welfare state.
The man who announced that the UK was now in a permanent “age of austerity” now portrays migrants as a danger to the welfare state even as he allows companies like Google to pay virtually no tax. EU migrants account for just 2.5 per cent of benefits and 7sevenper cent of tax credits, with both EU and non-EU migrants under-represented among out-of-work benefits recipients. Between 2001 and 2011, EU migrants made a net positive contribution of £20 billion to the UK, while non-EU migrants made a net contribution of more than £5 billion.
Alan Hinnrichs,
2 Gillespie Terrace, Edinburgh.
WE are at a crossroads in our island history. Do we want to pull up the drawbridge, retreat behind our borders, forget the lessons of history, centuries of internecine war with our neighbours and pretend we are independent in an increasingly interdependent world?
When are we to rid ourselves of the self-deception that we are ruled by Brussels, where we are represented both on the Commission and the Council of Ministers by government appointment, no more unelected than a government quango? When are we to remember that one of the 28 European judges is one of our own? When do we remind ourselves that we elect our MEPs by proportional representation which ensures, as far as possible, that every vote counts, unlike Westminster.
It seems to be that just as Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have submitted to the rule of Westminster on most of the significant powers that any independent nation might wish to enjoy, there is a perfect logic to the United Kingdom agreeing to sacrifice some of its own individual freedoms to the greater whole, Europe. But it seems the logic only works one way.
We further delude ourselves if we believe that we can revive our trading relations with the rest of the world and still enjoy cost-free trading relations with our largest trading partner, the EU.
What is so depressingly familiar is the insular, mildly xenophobic attitude of much of our press towards the EU, which it regards as a predatory foreign power. It is marked by rank self-interest and a delusion about our place on the world stage.
The EU is an aspiration, which requires a lot of good will, understanding and co-operation. The EU is not perfect but neither are we. We should not be complacent about the benefits it brings us and certainly not forget history.
Trevor Rigg,
15 Greenbank Gardens, Edinburgh.
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