BREXIT - A Poll & Discussion

[Capetonian]

Ibbie, I'd like to think that the politicians are not looking at it for their own good but rather for that of the general public. Of course we know that's not the case. All politicians are lying, conniving, snivelling, self-serving hypocrites, and it matters not of which flavour/party affiliation they are. In the end, they always shaft the electorate and the 'man in the street'.

I understand that everyone's situation is different. I know people who have gone back, or are planning to do so, to the UK from France, Spain, and Portugal because as they get older they feel that the UK health care options are better, not to mention to return to their closer families and friends and all that is familiar to them. I also know people, one being a very close friend, who live outside the UK because they feel the health care (France in the case of my friend who had prostate cancer) is better outside the UK. He is very concerned over a Brexit possibility as he is in the very good (but very expensive) French health care system, and has stated that if he had remained in the UK he might by now be dead.

If I look at this purely in my own self-interest, I might be better off financially if the UK remains in the EU, but I'm trying to take a broader view of what's best for the UK and its people, and I do not feel that continued membership is a good option. Without listening to the likes of Boris, Farrage, and IDS, I came to my own conclusions long ago, from the beginning, that the EU was a crazy madcap scheme and doomed to failure. I wrote a satirical piece for a magazine about this in 1991, but even before then was opposed to it. In my late teens, about the time that the UK joined up, I was opposed to it. With each twist and turn my opposition becomes more vehement.

I am not without sympathy for you and others in your situation, but I am trying to look at it from a non-personal perspective. If the UK were to leave the EU, how do you know that you would not, as a long term resident in Spain, be able to remain in Spain and benefit from the health care that you currently enjoy? I certainly hope, for you and others in your situation, that this would be the case, but part of the problem and I think the above FT article spells it out, is that nobody knows what the outcome of a Brexit would be in this respect.

[frostbite]

My local newspaper is running a similar poll online and I am delighted to see a very similar reult to this one.

[msdad2]

frostbite echo per chance. I comment on it often.

[frostbite]

Spot on!

[om15]

I have come to the conclusion that the UK would be better placed in the long term if the governing powers were restored to an elected British Government.
If we leave there will be an immediate financial penalty no doubt, but I suspect not as bad as the Remain team would have us believe. One factor that we haven't discussed is the large number of Europeans that now reside in the UK, have jobs, own houses and so on, I think that there are many thousands of Spanish people here that can vote, this, in a neck and neck finish could actually result in us remaining in the EU as no doubt they will have a similar point of view that Ibbie has expressed.
Therefore the balance could be swayed by British people who no longer reside the UK, together with EU citizens that have moved to the UK, voting for the UK to remain in the EU simply because the alternate could mean uncertainty and complications for their own residence position.

The feeling that I get from talking to the people I work with is that there is a growing dismay at the whole situation in Europe and that we need to get out, this from people in aviation who have spent many years working and living abroad, not parochial at all, Cameron must now realise that he has misjudged the mood.

[Dirk]

I'm not sure if it was here or on some other forum, but I read one poster moaning about the fact he wouldn't get to vote on this, because he had left the UK 68 years ago, yes 68 fugging years ago.
I for one am astounded that someone who decided to fugg off 68 years ago thinks he has some right to decide what happens to people in the country he fugged off from 68, yes 68 fugging years ago!!!!

The old twilight zone show would seem rather ordinary when placed alongside a mindset such as this

[Alisoncc]

Don't buy into that at all Dirk. Everyone has a right to voice their opinion, irrespective of whether they currently live in the UK or not. I would suggest that there are a vast number of ex-pats who place great value on the customs, traditions and mores of their birthplace. The fact that the present and previously elected bunch of fcukwits have chosen to totally stuff it up doesn't in anyway diminish that perceived value. If anything it just increases the anger.

I haven't lived in the UK since 2000, sixteen years ago, yet regularly scan the Times, Telegraph and Guardian on-line newspapers. If I want to know what is happening in the world I head for the BBC website, and invariably go on to view the UK only pages. Where I am domiciled has little relevance to my mindset with regard to my interest in the UK's affairs. I grieve for the country I once knew, in the same way one might grieve for a child who has gone bad.

Are you seriously suggesting that the person you speak of has less rights than the mega-millions of legal and illegal immigrants flooding the country. People with minimal comprehension of what it means to be British, and proud to be so. In my youth I was prepared to fight and die to preserve those customs, traditions and mores, swearing an oath of allegiance to the Queen, her heirs and successors. Although highly unlikely, I would have no hesitation in manning the barricades again if called.

Alison

[probes]

"Had the UK not been in the EU when we originally had to make the decision to move to another member state and the implications known,we may not have made the decision to move." - but there was a reason to leave, originally?
Being non-british - it seems to me that the UK might be worse for a while, but the EU might shake and really change something... if that's even possible. The bureaucracy is enormous. And enormously expensive.

[OFSO]

Leaving the UK many years ago (in my case in 1968) did NOT mean I severed all ties, far from it, and still have deep concerns about the UK's membership of the Titanic, sorry, the EU. Of course I cannot vote in the upcoming referendum because the present government suspects most expats would vote in favour of leaving. Should the UK government think we would all be in favour of staying in the EU, no doubt laws would be rushed through enabling us to vote..... democracy in action.

[unifoxos]

the present government suspects most expats would vote in favour of leaving

And, as usual, I believe that they are wrong in this - in which case I am very pleased about it.

[Capetonian]

because the present government suspects most expats would vote in favour of leaving.

I have no idea what the present government 'thinks' or even if it is capable of thought, let alone rational thought, but I would think that most expats in the EU would vote in favour of staying in the EU since they are generally benefiting from it.
In a democracy, which of course we're not, expats in the EU would have a vote, those outside of the EU, not. That would seem fairer.

[Ibbie]

Should the UK government think we would all be in favour of staying in the EU, no doubt laws would be rushed through enabling us to vote..... democracy in action.

They "sat" on a bill to allow all expats in the EU to vote only a few weeks back. They intend bringing one in,but after the referendum.
A judicial review into this has been requested, which if granted, would delay the referendum until all EU expats get their voting rights.

https://www.leighday.co.uk/News/News-20 ... xclusion-f


http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/84d19344-eac8 ... z44034Pj4Z

[Dirk]

Don't buy into that at all Dirk. Everyone has a right to voice their opinion, irrespective of whether they currently live in the UK or not

Read the Posts Alison, he wasn't moaning about not being able to express his opinion, as you say, everyone can and will do that.
He was moaning about not having a vote in a country he left 68 fugging years ago.
You wanna leave a country and live somewhere else?, great, fugg off and close the door behind you.

[ExSp33db1rd]

Dirk - I agree with all that Alison said in her reply to you (#27). I left from choice of course, but as a result of actions towards me that made moving preferable to staying at that time, and one can only play Life the way one sees it today, but initially with the intention of returning, later facts altered that decision and I now embrace a new domicile, but that doesn't alter the fact that I have many ties with the UK that could be altered to my disadvantage, whichever way the vote goes. I still hold a British Passport and therefore would like to be able to have some say in the matter, I didn't "fugg off and close the door, raising two fingers to it on the way out " and I think I have as much, if not more, right than a bunch of "new" previously foreign born citizens who just happen to be in a position to receive a ballot paper today.

Living as far as one can possibly get from the UK, I doubt that my opinion is worth a rats **se to anyone, but I do try to keep up, and would vote to stay in, I feel that one can "possibly" negotiate better terms from the inside than with ones' nose pressed against the glass, and the days of "The Natives Are Revolting, Send A Gunboat" are far past.

I am encouraged that my 5 teenage grandchildren, all UK Citizens / residents, (tho' two are temporarily at school in New York) and without any prompting from me, are unanimously of the same opinion.

I was bemused to recently receive a communication from the M.P. for North Wilts. encouraging me to follow his lead in this matter ( stay in, I think ? it's in the garbage can now ) bemused because he had clearly appreciated my NZ domain address in using my e-mail ( thinks - where did he get that from ? No, don't bother this is the Internet age ) and I was never living in the North Dorset constituency. As I am interested in a matter that affects my pension, i.e the CPI v.v RPI issue that has been,and will again be, before Parliament, I thanked him for his letter, and suggested that if he wanted my support then I could use his, and explained the issue to him, and what I would like him to do for the group concerned. I received a reply telling me to "fugg off" - or words to that effect, he couldn't help me as I wasn't one of his constituents ! Curiouser and curiouser - said Alice.

[probes]

I feel that one can "possibly" negotiate better terms from the inside than with ones' nose pressed against the glass, ...

not until the 'decisionmakers' are convinced no-one will exit anyway.

[obgraham]

Dirk, it's me you're referring to, and you're being a dipsh!t.

My family left UK, and took me with them when I was 2 for chrissakes! I simply made the observation, somewhat tongue in cheek, that I had checked on eligibility to vote on this matter and did not qualify. There are many electoral situations the world over where all with a claim to citizenship get a vote. This is not one of them.

You obviously don't understand that the vast majority of people who emigrate from one place to another (there are loads of them here) will always retain, to a greater or lesser degree, an attachment to the country and culture of their birth. I suggest you unwind that twist in your Jockeys.

[Dirk]

OBG, Makes no difference if you were taken when you 6 months, you are not a UK resident, have not been for pretty much your whole life and you want to be able to vote on matters of great concern to those who do actually live here.
If you don't see how absurd that is, you need a check up, from the neck up.

[Capetonian]

You obviously don't understand that the vast majority of people who emigrate from one place to another (there are loads of them here) will always retain, to a greater or lesser degree, an attachment to the country and culture of their birth.

If you are living or working temporarily somewhere other than your 'home' country, then I would agree that you probably should have a right to vote in matters affecting your original home country. On the other hand, if you have made your home somewhere else, then you probably lose the right to vote in affairs relating to your country of origin, that no longer being your home. It's a difficult one as the opinions are subjective as are the definitions of 'temporary'.

Some people want the best of both worlds, i.e. to choose where they vote and pay taxes, to suit themselves, but residence in most cases is a matter of fact, rather than choice, and there are a number of 'tests' to establish residence. It used to be simply the '182 day rule' but is now far more complex with many criteria.

There is an interesting concept in English law (I do mean English, not British), that being the concept of 'domicile' (as opposed to residence) which states that if you were born in England of English parents, you may never lose your English domicile unless you can prove that you have severed almost all links with that country and established family and social links in another country. English domicile can thus apply to people who have lived elsewhere for decades, and HMRC use this to determine some tax liabilities when you shuffle off.

[probes]

Interesting. How much difference does this "best of both worlds" make to countries with former colonies, or without them?

[obgraham]

... you want to be able to vote on matters of great concern to those who do actually live here.
If you don't see how absurd that is, you need a check up, from the neck up.

Though my original post had an element of levity apparently lost on you, Dirk, I'll remember your statement as I read the interminable and repeated threads both here and in TOP telling us in America how we ought to be voting.

Meanwhile, please follow my instructions and vote "out"!