- Dec 18, 2014
- 1,997
- 1,043
Cameron might have engineered the referendum, but to attribute dissatisfaction with the EU and ultimately the decision to leave as being a Conservative problem really is an attempt to re-write history and to deny the reality of what actually brought all this about. The seeds for this discontent were sown as far back as when we joined the Common Market in January 1973 on terms that were not favourable to the UK. Members of both Labour and Conservative parties were very much divided by the terms and decision to join and by subsequent parliamentary legislation. The original SDP gang of 4 were always very pro European and played a major part in gerrymandering votes in Parliament to keep us in the EU but ultimately left the labour party in 1981 after it became official Labour policy to withdraw from the EU. Ever since that point there have been large numbers of Labour and Conservative voters who have wanted out of the EU. With the exception of the LibDems who have always been solidly pro-EU, members of Labour and Conservatives have campaigned for the UK to be out - including the current Labour leader!! For 40 years the pro-European league of LibDems, and EU leaning Labour and Conservative MPs have held sway. They engineered deeper integration into the EU with no exit plan ever being part of the contract, this making it almost impossible to get out. That's why we have the mess we are in, with the pro-EU lobbies working as hard as ever to keep us aligned so that when the storm passes they can re-engineer our re-joining.The EU is the biggest regulated, protectionist, anti-free trade block in the world. A free market UK, free of the EU and its regulations could be a powerhouse in the world economy and that terrifies the EU. The prospect of having a deregulated economy on its doorstep, leaving the EU economically behind would cause further problems for the "project" and that's why they want to tie us down.
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