SWISS ROLL?

There are some interesting developments in Switzerland.  They narrowly voted in a referendum i n 2014 to curb freedom of movement of people and have been negotiating with the EU ever since. The deadline is fast approaching and new talks are scheduled for next week (19th Sep).  Switzerland seem to be backing down in the face of the EU's hard line (HERE) with most political parties now supporting a plan to ask companies to prefer local candidates over those from the EU, a significant watering down of the original proposal and even then the EU may not accept it.

I think it shows how much Switzerland values the limited access to the single market that they have (it excludes financial services).

However, now they are to visit the UK for discussions with our government on ways in which the two countries together can force the hand of the EU.  The Swiss are some 8 million people so they don't add an enormous amount of weight and many eastern European countries are adamant about the free movement principle. Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how it all pans out.

CAN THE UK EVER BE INDEPENDENT OF THE EU?

I came across this very interesting article (HERE) published by Edinburgh University's European Futures website about what the EU is like for non-members in Europe, as we are likely to be in a few years.  The point of the article is that the EU has become so large and powerful that it completely dominates Europe or has hegemony over it as the article puts it.

Countries like Norway and Switzerland have voluntarily entered into agreements where they accept EU rules and directives and shape their laws to be directly equivalent to EU laws. They have allowed the EU to have hegemony in Europe.  If we leave the EU and do not become part of EFTA or the EEA and we even exit the customs union (as we must if we are to sign separate trade agreements) we will be the only European nation to be completely independent of the EU.  But in practice, how independent would we really be?

We would have to abide by a lot of EU rules if we are to continue to trade with them. Our financial services sector would have to show equivalence with EU financial regulation.  There is bound to continue to be cross border cooperation on environmental issues as well as security.   EU citizens in the UK will almost certainly continue to enjoy the same rights as they do now and UK citizens in the EU will have reciprocal rights.

The UK will therefore ipso facto be forced to accept many rule changes and new directives but will have little or no influence in shaping them. The article puts it this way:

"What is peculiar about the form of dominance that the associated non-members experience is that it is both structural and at the same time voluntary. It is an arrangement that accidentally inhibits and intimidates the parties. The management of externalities and collective action problems created by interdependence is skewed by a European political order in favour of full members of the EU. By being excluded from common decision-making procedures, the citizens of the associated states find themselves as second-rate Europeans".

IMMIGRATION NOT TO BLAME SAYS UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR

A professor at Oxford university writing in the British Medical Journal has claimed that austerity rather than immigration was the reason so many voted to leave the EU (HERE).  He argues persuasively that European countries have a far better social model with less inequality and better health and living standards than we have.  I think this is right.

Professor Dorling writes: "The UK has been systematically underfunding education and training, increasing student loans and debt, tolerating increasingly unaffordable housing, introducing insecure work contracts, and privatising the services the young will need in future."

Norway does not believe their arrangements are right for theUK

Many are suggesting a way out of the problem would be to join the EEA, the European Economic Area along with Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and Liechtenstein.  To adopt this model we would need the four existing members plus all 27 members of the EU to agree.

But a report in The Independent (HERE) says questions are being in Norway raised about the UK joining the EEA and whether or not this would be to their advantage or not. So it's not clear this option even exists.

Also, we would be obliged to pay into the budget and accept freedom of movement so UKIP wouldn't be entirely happy about that either and would probably grow in strength in some hitherto Labour areas.

And of course, we would have to accept 75% of EU laws with no formal way of influencing them.