David Davis, secretary of state for exiting the EU, has focused his attention on removing the rights of EU workers in the UK (EU workers may get backdated deadline to stay, 18 July).
The prime minister, Theresa May, is also interpreting the Brexit vote as a vote to end the free movement of labour within the EU. But the government has no mandate to do so. The referendum vote was a vote to leave the EU, not to end the free movement of labour.
This is true despite misleading media “debates” blaming savage welfare cuts and worsening working conditions on immigrants and refugees, thus fuelling the post-referendum fivefold peak in race hate crimes. Absent from these “debates” are key facts, such as that immigrant workers contribute far more in taxes than they draw in benefits, or that public and private industries – from factories, farming and construction to the NHS – depend on the work of immigrant workers. We recognise the huge social, cultural and economic value of migration.
These “debates” divert the attention of local working people from the real causes of their concerns: the ongoing economic crisis, widening international inequalities, war, austerity and attacks on workers’ rights and conditions.
If, as a result of UK-EU negotiations, free movement within the European Economic Area ends, then EEA workers will be drawn into the same points-based immigration scheme, subject to the same continual visa restrictions and employer-sponsorship arrangements that non-EEA workers face. Something similar will likely happen to UK nationals living in or moving to the EEA.
All this will set off further demands for restrictions on non-EU immigrants. This vicious circle will put increasing competitive pressure on local working people, and weaken workers’ collective power and international solidarity.
The trade union movement has a long history of fighting alongside and defending immigrant workers, from Grunwick in the 1970s to current campaigns against the points-based immigration scheme.
As the experience of the UK and Ireland shows, open borders work. We believe it is right and timely to campaign for the free movement of labour, both within and without the EEA, under the slogan Free Movement for All.
Dave Muritu Chair, UCU equality committee, UCU NEC, Sandwell College, Lucia Pradella King’s College London, Phoebe Moore UCU rep, law and politics, Middlesex University London, Carlo Morelli UCU NEC, University of Dundee, Rachel Cohen UCU NEC, City University of London, Chris Jones UCU NEC, president UCU Wales, Sean Wallis UCU NEC, University College London, Marion Hersh UCU NEC, University of Glasgow, Jeff Fowler UCU NEC, University of Sunderland, Bruce Heil UCU NEC, The Open University, Lesley McGorrigan UCU NEC, University of Leeds, Sue Abbott UCU NEC, Northumbria University, Amy Jowett UCU NEC, Hackney ACE, Sean Vernell UCU NEC, City and Islington College, Patricia McManus UCU NEC, University of Brighton, Margot Hill UCU NEC, Croydon College, Alan J Ryan UCU NEC, De Montfort University, Julia Charlton UCU NEC, Northumbria University, Paul Errington UCU NEC, Teesside University, Joan Harvey UCU NEC, Newcastle University, Vicky Blake UCU NEC, University of Leeds, Ariane Bogain UCU NEC, Northumbria University, Xanthe Whittaker UCU NEC, Leicester University, Mick Dawson UCU NEC, Brooklands College, Mandy Brown UCU NEC, Lambeth College
• David Davis needn’t worry about the “sheer generosity” of rights granted to EU nationals triggering a “surge in new arrivals”. One of the many things Mr Davis and his fellow Brexiteers don’t seem to understand is that it was the UK’s reputation as a tolerant and cosmopolitan society, light years ahead of most other European countries in terms of multiculturalism and mutual respect, that attracted many of us to make our lives here. By destroying this reputation, leave campaigners and voters have done more to curb future immigration from EU countries than the most draconian measures the new government will be able to impose.
Silke Lührmann
Swansea
• Donald Tusk is setting what he considers “tough terms” for us walking away from the EU. He says if we wish to trade with the EU then we must accept “free movement of people”, the very thing that caused many people to vote leave.
It would do no harm to mention to Mr Tusk that, while access to the single market is desirable, it is not essential for the UK. On the other hand, EU access to British markets is a virtual necessity. Outside the EU we have nearly 200 other nations with which we can trade, and many of them have already said they want deals and terms with us – terms which will not include unlimited immigration as part of the deal.
Meanwhile, trade goes both ways, and if the EU cuts off our trade we can put a block on them selling to us. Since they sell us billions of pounds worth of goods per year more than we do them, it is they, not us, who will come off worst from any “trade war”. The UK is one of the biggest importers of goods from the EU, and they threaten us at their peril. If no deal were done at all and we just left, the outcome would be that we would have to pay a 4% tariff on the goods we sell to the EU. However, we could implement the same tariff on their goods and in effect be better off than we are now because we import more. Also the terms EU and Europe are not interchangeable; the EU only represents and talks for about half the countries in Europe. Despite his sabre-rattling, Mr Tusk can do nothing about our deals with the rest of the continent.
Mr Tusk is threatening the UK for one reason. He is attempting to prevent other EU members from demanding their own referendums, and by imposing hard terms on us believes he will frighten the French, Germans, Dutch, Danes and about seven other nationalities who also want to leave, into staying. The EU is on the verge of collapse, and their only reply is to threaten and bully members. The sooner article 50 is triggered, and we are freed from it, the better.
Dave Belcher
Newcastle, Staffordshire
• Larry Elliott is right to point to the dysfunctional economics which meant that Osborne’s warnings had little impact on the many people who suffered under his policies (Brexit: time to try alternatives to failed policies, 18 July). But what has that got to do with being in the EU? The leave campaign piggybacked on this fully justified dissatisfaction, irresponsibly added misinformation, false promises, empty slogans and lies, and now the narrow referendum result is taken as a “democratic” mandate to prepare to leave, which in reality it is not. As Theresa May’s welcome focus on those economically struggling implicitly recognises that the vote was about dissatisfaction with much, but not the EU. Parliament needs to vote to stop the stampede to Brexit for the benefit – even survival – of the UK.
John Richer
Oxford
• “Two fingers to the 27 nations whose goodwill we will need if we are not to sentence this country to a future of penury,” writes Jonathan Freedland in his excellent article about the appointment of Boris Johnson (Opinion, 16 July). I’d like to introduce one element that seems to have escaped both leave and remain politicians in this country, but not their continental counterparts. During their Brexit campaign, leave politicians insisted that trade with the UK is of such importance to the EU that it is in the EU’s interest to come to mutually beneficial arrangements. Yet there is one clear reason why the EU simply cannot afford to do so. The most serious threat to the survival of the EU is Ukip-like parties that have sprung up all over the continent. The most effective way to fend off this threat is to punish the UK for its decision to leave and to set an example of the dire consequences. So the Brexit vote leaves those European politicians who value the EU with the choice between the lesser of two evils: not to give an inch, which might lead to the break-up of the UK during an extended period of recession, or to face a serious threat to the very existence of the EU itself, were they to give into the wishes of the UK. It seems unlikely that they will opt for the latter.
Wyck Gerson Lohman
Llwyndafydd, Ceredigion
• The flipside of the falling pound may well be that exports become cheaper, as Larry Elliott says. But that begs the question of what we are to export. Our capacity to make things is much reduced and much of our advanced manufacturing capacity is tied into European projects – think Airbus wings and Rolls-Royce engines – while there is surely a limited demand for British call centres, commercial contract cleaning and hairdressers, and we can’t go on recycling the world’s dirty money for ever. Add to this the threat to tourism generated by the hostility to foreigners shown by the more reactionary Brits, making the UK a less attractive place to visit, and it is not at all clear where the compensatory gains are going to come from.
Roy Boffy
Walsall
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