[Osem]

Originally Posted by martyh

when i looked i found conflicting information ,i got confused ,my head exploded ,i stopped looking .How on earth anyone is supposed to keep track of this idiotically confusing system is beyond me





I don't see how you can avoid discussing immigration and benefits to foreign nationals in a referendum on leaving the EU thread as that is the first thing people who get to vote on the matter will be thinking of .
Imagine how many jobs would be available if foreign workers had not taken them ,imagine how reduced the benefits bill would be if we weren't supporting foreign workers on low wages ,Imagine how much the country would save if we weren't ploughing billions into the EU .Rightly or wrongly that is what joe bloggs will base their decision on so you can rest assured that every media outlet with an agenda will be pushing that agenda using immigration and asylum until the vote happens

---------- Post added at 22:30 ---------- Previous post was at 22:16 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

And I haven't even started on the "Rotterdam Effect" yet. Hands up who's aware that when compiling export statistics, goods are counted as having been exported to whichever country has the 'port of first discharge'.

A lot of our worldwide exports go to Rotterdam (Netherlands) or Antwerp (Belgium) because these ports have excellent onward connections for places we sell goods to - anywhere else in the world you could name. But because our goods are counted as having been exported to the Netherlands or Belgium, rather than, say, Singapore or India, the result is to inflate our apparent trade with those countries at the expense of our trade figures with the rest of the world. And because both the Netherlands and Belgium are in the EU, the end result is to tip our export figure towards the EU and away from the rest of the world.

The truth is, nobody knows exactly what the real figures are. However, when you look at the amount we export to the other major economies of the EU you can do a little extrapolation. Our apparent exports to Belgium and the Netherlands, per capita, are 3-4 times higher than those to France and Germany (which don't host major international ports through which British exporters habitually send their goods). Reverse the percentages and it's reasonable to postulate that our exports to the EU, far from being somewhere around 47%, are actually nearer 37%.

In short, even if there were any substance to the scare-story that leaving the EU would shut our exporters out of the continent, the impact would be far, far lower than claimed.

I may be wrong but you seem to be suggesting that the official numbers aren't accurate. How outlandish! I dare say you'll soon be denying that, if we do leave the EU, the Eurozone countries will make us pay the price by cutting off their exports to the UK and forcing us to source alternatives from the rest of the world with all the economic doom that would entail...