Economics & Trade

As reported in today’s Daily Mirror, the Conservative government has admitted that it has no concrete evidence to prove that so-called ‘benefit tourism’ exists. And yet, Prime Minister David Cameron has vowed to ‘crack down’ on benefit tourism to reduce the numbers of EU migrants coming to Britain. Mr Cameron wants EU migrants in Britain […]

The British government has turned down millions of pounds of EU funding to help those affected by flooding and lack of food. Hundreds of thousands across the UK are so poor that they are having to rely on charitable food banks to stave off hunger. The EU parliament agreed to provide aid for those suffering […]

So, according to the front page of today’s Daily Express, the EU referendum result is already done and dusted and Britain has decided to leave. Really? Yes, a majority of voters want Britain to quit the EU, if the results of a poll by Survation are to be believed. (Readers here will remember that last […]

For the first time in a generation Britain will vote on its membership of the European Union, probably in the autumn of 2016. How to vote in that referendum is a difficult choice for anyone on the left. Since the 1990s the anti-EU camp has been dominated by the chauvinist and racist right, initially on […]

More than three years after the EU leaders agreed to establish a banking union for the Eurozone and Mario Draghi announced that he was ready to do ‘whatever it takes’ to save the euro, it is time to take stock of what has been achieved so far in making the European Monetary Union (EMU) a […]

Eurosceptics often complain that migrants are taking British jobs and bringing down wages, especially in the low-skills sector. But the real threat isn’t from migrants – it’s from machines and robots that are predicted to replace half of all British jobs within twenty years.

The EU principle is quite clear. EU citizens are entitled to work in any other EU country and enjoy the same working rights as the nationals of that country. Those rights will vary EU country to country. But that isn’t the point. The point is that if I go and work in France, as an EU […]

The EU referendum campaign is going to get ‘nasty’, promised those pushing for Britain to leave the EU. In a taste of what’s to come, two Eurosceptic students interrupted a speech by Prime Minister, David Cameron, at a CBI conference yesterday, yelling, “CBI! Voice of Brussels”. The Daily Telegraph reported that the ‘Vote Leave’ campaign […]

Britain has more job vacancies than can be filled by the native workforce. That, in a nutshell, is why we need migrants. The country has a chronic skills shortage and without migrants helping to fill that gap, Britain – and Britons – would be poorer. Britain now has more people at work than ever before. […]

Brexit options should be made clear Free movement across most of our continent is a fundamental right of all EU citizens. But if Eurosceptics have their way and Britain leaves the EU, British people will most likely lose the right to move freely across Europe, and citizens from the rest of Europe will lose the […]