EU referendum, brexit and the aftermath

Much different of course than being paid UK money, drink pints and do fuck all for his constituents ;)

Sadly some will see it like you say.

our 'islander' mentality

Iceland is in the EEA.

Euro 2016 thread >>>

I would be more interested to know how many current UKIP supporters would traditionally have identified as Labour, and how this would affect the balance of leave/remain if these voters were added to the current labour supporters.

Don't forget the complete wipe-out of the Liberal Democrats. The majority of whom, I guess, will now be Labour voters, cancelling out the ex-Labour voters who have defected to UKIP.

You no have to be islander for don't trust politician bureaucrats who serve the highest point of power, but it shouldn't be that the reason for getting confused and vote for that kind of power.

Wut?

Italians have no faith in the political classes either.

I just hope that nobody takes to heart a lot of this discussion. Really, the serious decisions for each of our futures is greater than this referendum. I still want to poke bears, stir shit, and troll a little, because if you can't have a laugh and see the funny side - whilst thinking/planning progressively aloud or otherwise - then you're really fighting a losing battle.

I meant that as islanders we mistrust the concept of being told what to do by bureaucrats in mainland Europe. It's probably got something to do with the Second World War and the perception that we won it.

Fact is, a lot of people don't like the idea of the free movement of labour within the EU and will believe the Daily Mail when it says x-number of Romanians are on their way over here to take our jobs, even when there aren't many jobs to take in the fist instance.

Fuck me, that Farage speech. He knows how to charm them "I know that virtually none of you have ever done a proper job in your lives, or worked in business, or worked in trade, or indeed ever created a job"

I enjoyed the Chair interjecting to say "I know you are getting emotional, but you are acting like UKIP normally acts in this chamber"

On the Labour/Tory/UKIP, a lot of traditional labour voters that I know would never vote Tory, it just doesn't happen. However, a fair few would view UKIP as acceptable. They've capitalised on a number of the concerns that Labour left behind to try and court more middle England votes (and they're not the tories).

complaining loudly about EU immigrants taking jobs (which is an issue which is real in some areas and should not have been shoved under the carpet)

Well, it is and it isn't. Firstly, I'll agree that the issue should definitely not have been shoved under the carpet. There should have been a lot more open discussion rather than writing people off as racists.

However, while the narrative being put out by the likes of EDL, Biffa's, UKIP, the Tories and the tabloid press that we're under siege by a tidal wave of EU immigrants taking jobs that should rightfully be British, the reality, as ever, was a lot more complex.

Firstly, there was frequently an issue, particularly around temporary, seasonal and sessional work of British people simply not applying for jobs. Employers still needed a workforce and so necessarily tapped into a willing migrant workforce.
At the same time, things were being compounded by a British move towards getting people into further and higher education programmes. At the same time other European countries, particularly in the east were continuing to generate skilled and semi-skilled labourers.
So in that frame, EU immigrants weren't coming and taking our jobs, they were coming to do the jobs that we weren't doing. We were to slow to react and in that respect, Britain became an open market for people looking for work that wasn't available at home.
But if we then pull out to a bigger picture, Europeans on the continent have lived literally cheek to jowl with their neighbours in other countries for centuries. Over the past 200 years, our main border is pretty much the only one that hasn't shifted at some point in some way. So as well as their own nationality, people living in the EU have also identified as European. It's not an identity that we have really adopted as Brits. So for them, they aren't "coming over here" and taking jobs. With the UK being part of the EU, those jobs were every bit as much theirs to apply for fair and square. From their viewpoint, we had the same choice to go to their country and do the same if we wanted to. We just chose not to.

So if your facebook friends are complaining loudly about immigrants coming and taking jobs, one response would be why not go to those countries and take some back. It is, afterall, a system of fair access that extends through all 28 member states. For the most part, the response is that British people don't want to go over "there" and live in "that country". An othering response which is why this loud complaining is demonstrative of an underlying racism.

I fail to see the funny side as an EU national living in Northern Ireland.

Suggestions welcome :)

Are there any epidemiologists or statisitions on here? I'd like someone to have a look over some simple numbers that I've put together around this.

What level of statistical analysis? I'm formerly trained in quantitative analysis, but I wouldn't call myself a statistician.

Depressing as hell:

https://amp.twimg.com/v/ca77c55a-7faf-45e8-acf9-69ed3acc9513

@Chalfie is the man for stats.

Yeah. Fucking heart breaking.

I always imagine I'd step in a situation like this. As someone with a Canadian accent (and a British passport) this video specifically made me clock why that wouldn't help.

Tbf nothing to do with brexit but yeah terrifying. Idiots will always be idiots.

I agree with all that. But if somebody sees a factory taking on cheaper EU workers there's nothing they can do. Ironically they don't blame the usually LOCAL owner of the place...no it's the immigrants fault. Of course.

And they may have a skillset that isn't worth anything in the EU (or think so) as they see "themmuns" coming here.

There will be losers. Mostly caused by all what you say. (for example Harland and Wolff could not fill all contracts locally as the skills were lost on loss on work) but anybody that dares to say to people "hey perhaps you should take a course, it's not just other people's fault, empower yourself" won't get any good response.

The Greens at least said "let's put the money we get from immigration into areas that are under pressure".

:(

Am I not supposed to do a disappearing act? :P

NI just lost 2 billion of peace money (ok was only going to run to 2023)

I can only make bad jokes about flegs on toast atm :)

If you can get to the end of this video, you're a braver man than me...

bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-3­6650014

All rage.

Nope I made it 2 mins in - what a fucklord

Looks like EP is trying to force Cameron to start the exit process by holding meetings with the EU today/tomorrow.

No words...

Can't he just withhold the article 50 "official notification"?