09-28-2016, 05:56 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-28-2016, 06:17 PM by Stone de Croze.)
Post Brexit, and in discussions with the European Union, I feel the UK needs to sign up to current animal welfare, workers rights and environmental legislation. Such legislation has been fought for by an alliance of progressive forces across Europe and to surrender them would have a detrimental effect in these areas.
Regarding trade and employment deals with the current EU (as one does go with the other),we must not forget there are large numbers of Britons working or living in the EU or who may wish to work or live in the EU at some point. Therefore the adoption of some UKIP or Tory right wing policy of 'pulling up the drawbridge' is impractical and unacceptable. As many pundits have predicted, access to the Single Market would depend upon free movement of labour. What I would suggest is adapting the present 'unmanaged' free movement of labour into a 'managed' free movement of labour. This would involve access to the UK under a 3 month visa, whereby citizens of EU countries have to support themselves for this period and find employment if they wish to remain, with rights of citizenship after a certain period. Such a deal I believe could be brokered, as well as being largely acceptable to citizens of the EU and Britain
Admittedly we may still have to pay a small levy to trade within the Single Market, but the benefits of access to the single market, as well as increased trade with the rest of the world would outweigh any outlay. At the same time this 'managed' form of free movement would provide the benefits of immigration for which this country still depends, whilst limiting the negative impact.
I still believe the goal of a 'Commonwealth of Europe' as described in the Liberal Party manifesto is a good thing, and that we still need dialogue and co-operation in areas such as climate change, human rights and animal welfare. A policy of 'working towards this', I believe is still very much worthwhile.
Regarding trade and employment deals with the current EU (as one does go with the other),we must not forget there are large numbers of Britons working or living in the EU or who may wish to work or live in the EU at some point. Therefore the adoption of some UKIP or Tory right wing policy of 'pulling up the drawbridge' is impractical and unacceptable. As many pundits have predicted, access to the Single Market would depend upon free movement of labour. What I would suggest is adapting the present 'unmanaged' free movement of labour into a 'managed' free movement of labour. This would involve access to the UK under a 3 month visa, whereby citizens of EU countries have to support themselves for this period and find employment if they wish to remain, with rights of citizenship after a certain period. Such a deal I believe could be brokered, as well as being largely acceptable to citizens of the EU and Britain
Admittedly we may still have to pay a small levy to trade within the Single Market, but the benefits of access to the single market, as well as increased trade with the rest of the world would outweigh any outlay. At the same time this 'managed' form of free movement would provide the benefits of immigration for which this country still depends, whilst limiting the negative impact.
I still believe the goal of a 'Commonwealth of Europe' as described in the Liberal Party manifesto is a good thing, and that we still need dialogue and co-operation in areas such as climate change, human rights and animal welfare. A policy of 'working towards this', I believe is still very much worthwhile.