Sometimes this EU referendum has got so tiring that you might just be best placed to choose whether you are ‘in’ or ‘out’ based on the status of your belly button.
Churlish perhaps, but not less nonsensical than some of the points being made as we approach polling day.
Before we get much further I might as well chuck my cards on the table. I’m voting Remain on Thursday and not just because I’ve got an ‘in’ belly button (too much information, sorry).
I tended to shy away from making my political views on individual topic too well known when I worked in journalism because I honestly made an attempt to be an impartial observer. I think/hope I managed that. Not that I expect many people care too much either way about my two penneth now but, you know, it’s cathartic to type it out.
The thought of Brexit actually fills me with dread. I’ve always thought that this debate should really be about their side proving, on the balance of probabilities, that we’d be right to make such a big change as leaving the European Union. I honestly don’t think they’ve got anywhere close. If you're still uncertain now then I'd say they've not done enough to persuade you either.
Neither side got off to the best of starts it has to be said. When the words 'Hitler' and 'World War Three' were thrown around by Boris Johnson and David Cameron you got a feeling for the sort of campaign that was coming.
I shan’t waffle on too much about experts because you’ll undoubtedly have seen all that elsewhere. Still, I do find it worrying to see the casual nature to which they’re all brushed aside by some on the Leave side. Of course experts have been wrong before, but it’s insufficient to simply use that line alone to oppose what they are saying. Whatever you think of the detail and some of the longer term forecasts, I struggle to formulate a case for thinking we’d not be worse off by leaving. I don’t expect the weather forecasts to be 100% accurate but if they say it’s going to chuck it down I pack a coat. What the economic forecasters say about Brexit makes me think some stormy clouds are looming if we follow that path.
Many people ask for ‘facts’ to help them make their decision. We’re being asked to vote on the future, of which there are no hard and fast ‘facts’. We have to weigh up the forecasts, predictions and promises from politicians, pundits and experts and it’s not really acceptable to complain about this if we don’t find it easy. It’s our right to vote and our duty to find the information we need.
Then there’s the tosh about £350 million. There have been exaggerations on both sides but this is the biggest whopper of the lot. Presumably it was too much hassle to get the Battlebus repainted with the true number (which they could still have used for the basis of their case) so they’ve had to stick with a ‘stat’ that just isn’t true. That this line unravels so quickly upon examination makes you question the judgement and accuracy of the rest of the campaign.
So much is confusing about the whole referendum debate. Most recently we saw Boris Johnson calling for the UK’s ‘independence day’ while, during the campaign, harking back to the nation’s ‘better days’. You know, when we had the empire. The same empire that the Americans cut loose from in their ‘independence day’. So, are we voting to come out of the EU because it has got too much like the British Empire in order to try to rekindle better times we had as the British Empire? My head hurts. Maybe Boris just meant he had a ticket to see the new film at the cinema on Friday when the tawdry campaign finally ends?
My head also hurt when I saw Nigel Farage’s hideous ‘Breaking Point’ poster but for a different reason. I’m all for robust campaigning but that was a step too far. Whether it was intended to or not, it reached into the nastiest of propaganda playbooks, the sort that whips up hatred of others. Everyone behind that poster – and I’m well aware that many Leavers were equally unsettled by the image – should be utterly ashamed of themselves. Look in the history books and you might see some similar images. You won’t be happy to see who used them.
I wish I’d had a pound for every mention of the ‘Australian style points system’ – the cliché of choice during the immigration debate. As someone who worked in Boston in Lincolnshire it would be wrong of me to argue that everything about immigration has been positive. Boston hasn’t had the investment it has needed to keep up with its population expansion and that still hasn’t been addressed. It isn’t alone. Yet this isn’t the fault of the migrants. The vast majority of them work hard and pay enough into the system to help fund better infrastructure.
Unemployment is, thankfully, low and the jobs being done by EU migrants would be necessary if we left the EU. I doubt those who yearn for ‘control’ would get what they want by a Leave vote. The predicted economic dip is definitely not worth the risk for such a flimsy promise.
The EU is far from perfect but too much of our view of it is clouded by caricature of the sort peddled by Boris himself as a journalist. ‘Brussels bureaucrats’ are much fewer in number than ‘Whitehall bureaucrats’, for example, and it is not strictly true to label the EU as unelected. We chose our MEPs (although too many of us don’t bother) and we also chose our Governments who then represent us at an EU level and also pick our commissioner. If we don’t like our MEP we can vote them out and if we don’t like the deal we are getting in Europe then we can kick our Government out and elect one that can do our bidding. Criticise the EU if you like but let's avoid such generalisations.
The EU has been a handy bogeyman for governments to hide behind and blame for all of our ills. Much of that mud has stuck and Cameron and co are now struggling to undo it.
Journalist Robin Lustig wrote a piece on the Huffington Post that resonated with me in this respect. It contained the following passage:
So the UK Government does get its own way in Europe. We aren’t dictated to at an EU level. Add that into the fact that we’re not in the Eurozone or part of the Schengen agreement, throw in a few other opt-outs and rebates and you realise that we currently have our European cake and eat it. We won’t get better terms from the outside and that could diminish the trade, education and research relationships we benefit from.
Then there’s the fact that the likes of Michael Gove rail against the daily influence the EU has on policymakers. If the EU is so controlling, how did Gove manage to completely overhaul the schools system? Surely such fundamental change should be impossible with Brussels on our back? Or there’s HS2, benefits changes, tuition fees, military air strikes…big decisions that we’ve made for ourselves in our Parliament. It doesn’t add up to me and smacks me of people using the EU as an excuse. If we vote out, who will the next scapegoat be?
Finally, this whole ‘we want our country back’ nonsense makes me wince. It’s not unpatriotic to want to stay in the EU. We should stay, work with our neighbours and fight for a better future together. Walking away isn’t patriotic or anything to be proud of. I want us to play a full part of the world we now live in if that doesn't sound too woolly.
The world has changed since we joined the European project – globalisation has happened and we can’t ignore it. Barack Obama probably summed it up best when he said that our voice is amplified by being in the EU rather than being diminished. It’s the way we can have an influence that’s relevant to the day and age we live in. It won’t feel any more like ‘my country’ if we vote out, quite the opposite.
I don’t doubt that many people will think I’m talking nonsense. That’s the beauty of free speech. Let's still be friends though, eh? See you on the other side on Friday…
