DaveLovesDee

On the section for Wales, it lists a number of projects I've never heard of but misses a large number of projects that I know are funded by the EU.

I think the kind of projects are industry-specific.

Perth

Brit living in the USA here - can you please explain: Farage is an MEP, yet he wants the UK to leave the EU. Am I missing something

DaveLovesDee

Ukip MEPs attend the fewest European Parliament votes of any party in the EU's 28 countries

Farage also uses the excuse that he leads a political party, so has other responsibilities. Then maybe he should choose being an MEP or a party leader.........

Perth

Thank you Dave I suppose it's not all that different from the geniuses here who are so anti-government (Rubio, Cruz, Ryan, etc) but are all on the government payroll

DaveLovesDee

Exactly. They'll claim it's to effect change from within Government, but they don't seem to even attempt much change.

uk_grenada

Frankly, i believe the eurocrats think the job of the eu is to harmonise its members, to seek the average solution financially and in other ways. Concrete coloured people if anyone remembers the song... Unfortunately if you were near the top of the european pile before, you are to be averaged down... As harmonisation means people seek the sweet places in their new 'country' you willalso be overrun with people from strange and exotic places with different life rules / standards / customs.

In theory overall the eu could prosper and its citizens benefit overall - not seeing that at all, unless im an ex goat herder from turkey longing to come to london/paris/munich this october to flip burgers. Oh yes - you know turkish people get the run of europe then, thats the next wave of immigration to the uk germany and france.

uk_grenada

The european experiment is actually over imho, it just doesnt recognise it yet. The germans have kept greece afloat in fear of the first exit, demands from the other much larger bankrupt economies of spain portugal and italy will grow until theres a loud NEIN from the german voters. Implosion of any of those economies will stuff the eu.

Brexit? Apart from sounding like muesli, im all for it. Other countries survive in europe without the eu, uk plc can prosper and be more agile then. We need to ge aligned with asia and the south american economies.

DaveLovesDee

Harmonisation is making a set of standards across the 28 countries. If you want the benefits of EU membership such as free movement of people, goods and services with restrictions, you also need to accept the rules.

The US is little different. Each of the 50 states have laws that affect only residents of that state (as do each of the EU's 28 countries) and there are Federal laws that apply across all 50 states which make interstate movement of people, goods and services easier (as the EU does). The US has a single currency (as do 19 EU countries) and the EU Parliament has more equal representation than the US states do in Congress.

European experiment?

I think it's going very well actually. I'm not sure how much experience you have in the Caribbean of what the EU does, but bar a few issues has been a benefit to most of the UK.

Greece's financial problems were not caused by the EU but by the Greek government not collecting taxes they were owed and by individual European banking institutions taking advantage of Greece needing financing but lending at extortionate rates.

The Asian and South American markets will continue to buy cheap Asian products like they usually do. It costs much more to ship a container of British-made products to somewhere like Korea than it would to ship them from China, not including the difference in product cost between China's very low wages and our wages in the UK.

South East Asian countries are members of the Association of South Eastern Asian Nations and some of the South American countries are members of Mercosur (aka Southern Common Market..

You will probably find that every one of the top 20 countries is a member of some kind of trading bloc such as these and the EU. I doubt this is a co-incidence. Also consider your local supermarkets. The larger chains will be cheaper because they buy in bulk.

uk_grenada

Decades of uk based european and american business operations is my background. Greece fleeced the eu for many years, projecrs like new water and sewage management for their many islands was of huge benefit to them, but they just didnt pay for it, The french germans and uk did. They even had the audacity to take the eu to the european court when the rate of the projects progress was considered too slow. The european banking institutions of course are run by bankers, of course they squeeze their customers.

There are huge numbers of alliances treaties etc everywhere, its the skillful negotiation and subsequent explotation of these that the eu is spectacularly bad at. British negotiations were pretty good generally. The DOT were an effective ally to uk plc, i could cite loads of win wins, eg pilkington float glass made the uk billions as we swapped that technology with the russians and japanese. Why do you think nasa uses pilkington ceramics and glass, it was russian technology better executed by the uk.

The cost of shipping is controlled by 3 companies in an oligopoly. Maersk sealand [40% of denmarks gdp, owned by the 2 moller brothers] , evergreen [aka the taiwanese govt] and the various chinese chippers run by their govt really. I worked for maersk, only one dept had to make a profit, the treasury that controlled freight rates to move money globally for investment or other purposes.

uk_grenada

We all know the american states generally screw the federal govt. l had huge fun in texas, 'we arent american, we fly the texan flag' they have a capitol building in austin that works for a month every 2 years to make sure the politicians cant do too much damage. They are independant by nature and their central govt is pretty powerless in places. The EC isnt like that, it is simply insidious. Economic co-operation zone, yeah right, if you want to have a european corporate hq, it can be in any country, so long as you also have one in brussels, or you wont get access to various committees. You can employ hundreds of people to keep track on whats going on there, in any major industry. Its a ridiculouslytop heavy bureaurocracy.

uk_grenada

New report reveals 65 per cent of UK laws made or influenced by EU | Politics | News | Daily Express

DaveLovesDee

The main EU decision-making bodies include the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament.

The CofM is made up of Ministers from each EU country. The EP has 751 members elected by voters in each country. The UK has 73 MEP's (about 9.5% of the total). Not bad for 1 of 28 countries (just under 4%).

13%

uk_grenada

So regulations dont count lol... But full marks for attempting to slide it in without a proper named link, very european commission.


MEP's - a proper gravy train, some never attend, like the euro skeptics they only joined to abstain, others make sure they are on the 8am in and 6.05pm flight out [or they cant claim the 550 euros full attendance plus expenses] but they only vote on massive papers they couldnt be bothered to read written by the real rulers, the commission.

Long held british political maxim - the more people in the room, the less gets done, more chance to sneak in an ammendment at 4am, more chance to divide and cure their corns, problem is the eurovision effect, the eastern blocks help themselves and their neighbours, the germans vote with the british - often, the pigs just want more money and they know who has to supply it.

[imagine if thatcher and merkel ever got together, by now germany and the uk would own the eu]

Editha

I've heard many variations on this theme, but I'm not aware of any of them being specifically British. Personally, I'd call it a banality rather than a maxim.

uk_grenada

The European Commission

The European Commission has announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU, rather than German, which was the other contender. Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had room for improvement and has therefore accepted a five-year phasing in of "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make sivil servants jump for joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k", Which should klear up some konfusion and allow one key less on keyboards.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f", making words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e" is disgrasful.

By the fourth yer, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters. After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis and everivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. ZE DREM VIL FINALI COM TRU!

Herr Schmidt