Decision made, Remain

Against my initial desire to leave the EU, Ive come down on the remain side.

I have researched pages of texts, fact checking various claims, read pages of different opinions from both sides and watched many video clips on the subject from both sides. If anyone disagrees with me that is your right, but I would ask how much research have you done to look beyond the lies, the misinformation and the misleading quotes.

If your just making an opinion based on any of the below

1. We need our country back.
2. We need to close our borders
3. We need to make our own rules
4. Migrants are taking all our jobs
5. EU bureaucrats are not voted in

Then I would suggest you need to do a bit more research and place your vote from an informed point of view rather than gut reaction.

I have promoted both sides claims on Facebook and played devils advocate to see what others comments would be and where possible tried to engage in intelligent debate rather than scaremongering, which both sides seem to have descended into.


My personal thoughts are these for what they are worth and I'm going to keep this very simple as pages could be written on 100's of differing issues.

I make these points more as an aide memoir for myself, on my quest for the right answer, rather than trying to convince others to vote differently and post them only because people ask me how I'm going to vote.

So here goes...These are the main reasons I will vote to remain

1. Three out of four models the UK could take after leaving the EU to facilitate trade, involve us accepting the EU rules and regulations and free movement of people without any say in making those rules.
2. (This one is a personal opinion), I don't believe the EU will let us leave and succeed. If they do others would follow us and that would be the end of the EU. Their just not going to let that happen, they will force a recession on the UK so that they can point the finger and say "there you go, leave if you want but look what happened to the UK and they were the 5th biggest economy in the world" For those that think the EU couldn't do this cast your mind back to 16 September 1992 when George Soros shorted the pound costing the country 3.4 billion pounds.  The EUs might is far bigger than Sorros.
3. David Cameron is totally for TTIP and judging by comments he's made would accept it tomorrow. Apart from the Tories gradual privatisation TTIP is the biggest threat to the NHS. Its highly unlikely that TTIP will get through the EU without being vetoed.
4. The Conservatives are in power currently till 2020, as far as I can tell they have no plan B for what happens if a vote to leave were to happen. This is important because what they would do in the event of a leave vote could sway a lot of people, including me. If there were rational plans or even ideas of what they will do and the plans looked reasonable then they could have swayed me. But there's nothing, well nothing credible, Gove saying there will be bumps in the road, Boris seems to be clueless.
5. I'm for the NHS, I'm not for a return to Victorian values where those that couldn't afford treatment were left to die. I would also like to see an NHS that is not used as a political football. Boris Johnston, Michael Gove, Iain Duncan Smith, are the main leaders of the Leave campaign and all are for privatisation of the NHS. As these would probably end up in power in the event of an out vote, I have to vote against.

So there you have it I admit I've gone in a full circle but its been based on a lot of research.

LINKS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Wednesday
http://eubsdeflector.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/i-dont-know-about-you-but-i-am-quite.html 
http://eubsdeflector.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/part-2-case-for-remain-pros-devil-we.html
http://eubsdeflector.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/mr-gove-on-question-time-my-worries-i.html
http://garysoapbox.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/the-eu-conundrum-have-i-convinced.html 
http://garysoapbox.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/ok-ive-decided-im-voting-out-of-eu.html
http://garysoapbox.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/to-stay-or-not-to-stay-that-is-question.html
Winner of the IEA Brexit essay
Long essay written for the IEA in 2014 and awarded a prize as a finalist
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/504604/Alternatives_to_membership_-_possible_models_for_the_UK_outside_the_EU.pdf