Claire Phipps wrote in Wednesday’s EU referendum morning briefing that “the leave campaign had lobbed another immigration story into the morning papers” – it’s fair to say our readers caught the idea of an “Australian-style points based immigration system”, tossed it around the field a bit and generally enjoyed developing their own spin.
Here we look at that and two other conversations about the EU referendum happening below the line: you can read about them here and click on the links to get involved, or head over to our EU referendum live blog to follow the news and conversation as it happens. Also worth a look is Wednesday’s Opinion live debate, which asked readers whether this has been the most abusive political campaign ever in Britain.
1. EU referendum live: Vote Leave plans points system and mandatory English for migrants
On Wednesday’s Politics live blog it was that immigration plan from the Leave team that dominated the conversation. But whatever your feelings on immigration policy, many of you saw problems with importing a system from down under and agreed with our home affairs editor Alan Travis, who writes that “it is bizarre that Conservative leave campaigners want a system that would actually double immigration to Britain”.
I think immigration is too high and needs tackling. Seeing how the USA, which is thoroughly independent (and can do what it likes) has the same problem of unauthorised, unplanned migration, I think leaving the EU won't solve the problem.
Bigger government would, but the people leading the leave campaign are very much against that. So their motives are extremely suspect. Getting rid of our right to 28 days leave and other pesky big government, socialist stuff that the EU forces on us is more likely their motive.
I'll vote remain. I'll hope the government will eventually grow up and tackle extreme housing costs, clamp down on illegal employment, and slum landlords. I know the rest of Europe doesn't have our housing crisis. It's not the EU's fault, and it's at the heart of many problems affecting Britain.
There's one flaw in the points quota idea...the UK post Brexit will have to negotiate a new economic relationship with the EU. I can't see the EU, which has had the free movement of people as a core principle since the Treaty of Rome ever accepting it. If they did the risk is that other EU nations might demand it as well. So it's a total no goer....
I suspect the Vote Leavers know this full well - but as a good bit of populism it grabs the headlines and gets the issue of immigration into the headlines and that is their main vote winner and the thing that gives the BNP, EDL, Britain First and Kippers worked up and giddy.
As always be careful what you vote for - the Tory right might float the idea of migrant points systems etc, but these are the people who hve butchered State education, tried to cut benefits and unleashed Atos on claimants and want to slash worker's rights. These people will through a few scraps away in order to pursue their neo-Thatcherite ideology and the losers will be the core Vote Leave/Brexit voters.
The "Migration Watch UK, which campaigns for stricter immigration controls, has dismissed the Australian system as unsuitable for the UK"
Also a great point made concerning immigration from Ryan Coetzee above, 'No policy on immigration is the right policy if it crashes the economy'.
Voting is underway, postal votes are being cast. This very day the trend is being set and the question, will we play an active or a passive role in the world after June 23nd. For if we did choose the passive road, then one thing for sure, our destiny is truly in other's nations hands. What an irony, the whole argument for Brixit centers around the notion of gaining greater autonomy and yet our nation's prosperity and that of its citizens would be subjected to the whims of others. Will they play ball and dance to our tune or will they have the audacity to play hardball. The nations destiny and prosperity will be will be determined by the actions of others, not a great place to be.
And, hold on, is the idea of a points based system in the UK a new one at all?
The point system with mandatory English already exists. The Leave campaign should have googled how the UK visa system actually works before making it part of their grand reform.
The only thing that might change is what countries it applies to. Which would be, apparently, the EU countries, until we negotiate for freedom of movement again to be part of the European trading block.
2. EU debate: the most abusive political campaign ever in Britain?
Every Wednesday our Opinion and Community desks run a live blog where readers can discuss the issues of the day with Guardian writers. Today’s theme? The EU referendum, no less. The focus was on the behaviour of politicians. Michael White said referendums “bring out the divisive worst in us all – leaving a bad, lingering smell” – and many of you agreed.
I don't think that it was ever possible to have a rational debate about the EU. We have been fed screaming lies by most of our major newspapers about the EU for the past 25 years, from Up Yours Delors, to bendy bananas and everything in between.
The campaigns are simply continuing this pattern of lies and exaggerations. To be honest I'm now just incredibly angry that David Cameron called this referendum in which it's almost impossible to sort fact from fiction, which is based on incredibly complicated economic and geopolitical arguments, and which the layperson can have little hope of making a fully informed judgement on.
Something this important should never have got this far, and if we leave, then Cameron will go down in history as the Prime Minister who ruined Britain for a generation or more.
So far as we have only heard the voices of the right. The lack of truth (I don't mean matters of opinion, I mean matters of fact) in the debate has also been notable. It has suddenly become acceptable on both sides to mislead the voters. That brings a new level of distrust.
The problem is with the referendum is that although we can expect remain to be much the same as before, we have no idea what trade deal we might get from the EU on exit. The government has therefore faced the voters with an impossible decision.
Because of the lack of knowledge of the implications of leave, the breadth of valid opinion is going to be great, yet politicians have gone beyond that to mislead us on facts.
Perhaps when we hear from the left could they bring a new morality to the debate. It is sorely needed.
Lets have more facts, even if they are to say we do not know answers to many questions. Lets also have opinion, but make it clear that's what it is.
Some good historical context was discussed here:
I am old enough to remember the 1975 campaign, and the contrast is striking.
Back then the level of debate was both erudite and civilised. Arguments from both sides were well-rehearsed, passionately made but with a reasonable grasp of reality. The economic argument was certainly very important. But - and this some present of the time conveniently forget - the political significance of the decision was thoroughly debated.
Both sides were comfortably cross-party with little suggestion that there was anything odd about Tory, Labour and Liberal politicians sharing a platform. By and large it was civilised and good-humoured.
This time, my impression is that Tory "big beasts" are shouting at one another, and drowning out other voices from opposition parties or outside politics completely. Boris Johnson in particular is using the campaign to further his leadership ambitions, and anyone with any sense must doubt his sincerity in supporting Leave.
So will the economy bomb, depending on the decision we take? Will we be flooded with new swarms of immigrants? Bogus statistics and spin dominate. The amount of money sent to the EU - £350m a week according to Leave - is a blatant lie, as is the contention that Turkey will join the EU shortly, and Britain doesn't have a veto, which is also blatantly untrue.
For me, the decision stems from Britain's history and long term foreign policy. We have always taken a keen interest in what is happening on our continent. When we have walked away or tried to ignore that, we have bitterly regretted it. We have always sought to retain our seat at Europe's top table. Our trade, culture, security political interests have always been closely allied to Europe.
So why would we want to vacate our seat at Europe's top table which would be the certain result of walking out of the EU? Like it or not, that is where Europe's big decisions are made on many issues. We would lose our voice by leaving an empty chair. But these big strategic and political arguments have hardly been debated.
I am totally disgusted with this whole process. I thought last year's election was boring and drawn out. This is significantly worse.
I can see no good outcome to this referendum. It won't stop the arguments and resolve the key issue of Britain place in the world. For all the difference it will make I know how I am going to vote - the same as 1975. But I do this in despair rather than the feeling that I am participating in an uplifting democratic act.
This whole process is a travesty.
Not everyone thought things were as bad as all that, though.
Personally, I don't think the discourse surrounding the EU referendum has been particularly bad. In fact, as much of a rarity as it is, the media has generally covered the actual issues at point pretty reasonably.
What's more problematic within the media is the way the referendum is reduced to a horse-race scenario at times, via somewhat selectively-weighted opinion polls; with a lot of gossip and speculation about who said what, and what they might have meant by it. None of this is especially constructive.
The one aspect of discussion on this site which has stood out, for me at least, is how many people do not really have a good knowledge of the EU - either its best aspects, its worst ones, or even the basic mechanics of it. I know I haven't been alone in attempting to explain some of these to people who support Brexit - I would guess people with more expertise than me would have found much the same: many people simply do not know enough about the EU to make a properly informed decision on the referendum; and it's easy enough for someone to be mislead by decidedly highfalutin claims made by people on both sides of the debate. These have been commonplace, particularly from Ukip and Conservative party figures. Fullfact is a good resource available to people, though; it's worth keeping in view.
Plus, it doesn't seem to be true that women have been absent from the issue, so much as marginalised within the media coverage. Frances O'Grady, the Trade Union leader, has repeatedly outlined her views on this. So have the Green Party's leading figures, who are all female; and the economists Ann Pettifor and Frances Coppola, for instance, have done too.
Oh how we used to laugh at the US with their Trumps, their Palins, their Bachmanns, their Bush Jrs and their Quayles. It could never happen here. Oh no.
As one commentator said below, it would be nice if the Brexit (and Remain) camps could produce one clear, costed manifesto (each - obviously). But they can't because we now have, effectively 6 political parties: Right wing In; right wing out; centre in; centre out; left in and left out. And they all hate each other. The Blairite remainers hate the Corbynite remainers etc. It's a fucking mess.
It's come to an awful choice from where I'm standing: staying in the awful EU or the spectre of Boris. IDS. Gove sweeping to power, unconstrained by ... well anything really (even reality).
There was also intrigue in voices from our readership living in, but not from, the UK and who aren’t eligible to vote.
As an expat living in the UK, I also welcomed the referendum at first as I believed the EU has changed a lot and people should be consulted on whether they feel it is moving in the direction they want.
But frankly I have started to become very worried about the language being used in the referendum campaign, particularly now that immigration has become the main focus. There seems to be no filter anymore and blatant racism is close to becoming the mainstream way of describing foreigners. You almost expect this by certain parts of the media but you also expect high ranking politicians to not sink to the same level. Watching what is crawling out from under the rocks now is scary.
If there is a vote to leave the EU I pretty much expect the newspaper headlines to read: "The British people have spoken - now get them out!". From there it is just going to get worse.
3. Brexit could spread shockwaves through global economy, says OECD
Knock-on consequences of a potential Brexit were postulated in analysis by the OECD, which found that the UK economy would be just under 1.5 percentage points smaller in 2018 than it would be if the country voted to stay in the EU. There was some scepticism among readers not about the figures but about how politicians use economic arguments and policy to score political points rather than influence people’s lives.
Not the brightest thing to say.
"You can send shockwaves through the global economy" is the kind of thing that voters might take as flattery, and choose to do just to feel great and powerful.
That shockwaves in the economy translate on the ground to schools and hospitals being closed, people starving, joblessness, despair, further abandonment of social and environmental aims and generally way more misery for everybody, doens't seem to dampen the fervour.
Maybe another way of putting this would be to say that the speculators and traders - along with the owners of big multinational corporations - see a dent in their profits if the UK votes to claim back their self-determination.
That's not the same thing as an "economic slump". Time and again - and this forecast is perhaps an imperfect example - we see valuations, share prices, markets, currency exchange rates [all the things that underpin our modern world] at the mercy of emotional guesswork.
Perhaps another way of looking at this might be to ask the question, "If taking back control of UK borders and control of UK laws can be *this* damaging to the UK economy, what have successive governments been getting so wrong for the last 40 years?"
The negative spin and arguments are beyond offensive now.
Respectfully, the Remain camp would have us believe that the world would end if we vote out. They seem to think that a vote to leave would result on an outbreak of stupidity of a magnitude the world has never seen.
Can I politely point out to all the political pundits on all sides of this debate that it is their *job* as an *elected* official to carry out the will of the people. If we vote to leave, it is their job to make that decision work. If they can't we'll sack them and find replacements who can. Whilst there are many elected officials in government today who do have years of experience in administration, MPs need to be reminded that the only qualification they needed to get their job was to have enough people to vote for them. That doesn't automatically qualify them to know what will and won't happen regarding the UK renegotiating it's relationship with the EU. And that's what this is: a clean-sheet renegotiation, as opposed to being shackled to the same-old approach that so clearly isn't working.
After Brexit, the UK will simply become an EFTA member to join the EEA, like Switzerland and Norway. So nothing much will change on the ground. But, heck yes, there will be major repercussions in the house of mirrors of the UNREAL economy of the stock markets. And that lunatic casino may wreak havoc on the real lives of real people in the real economy of the real world. It's absurd that billions are being traded per second, that the UNREAL economy is so much bigger than the real economy, and that it can harm us so much. That's got to change. Do I sound like Bernie? This whole Brexit thing is so much ado about nothing, it's pathetic and perverse. It's a mindfunk, and a career opportunity for some politicos.
Before we go, just one more comment to highlight from the latest in our ‘What has the EU ever done for my …’ series: today on TV viewing.
Since this article concentrates on "my viewing" it fails to mention how the UK broadcasting industry really benefits from the EU. If one looks as the licenses issued by Ofcom it becomes obvious that there are hundreds of TV services that broadcast from the UK to other parts of Europe. These will mostly employ technical and back room staff from the UK domestic workforce. For example, Discovery Network channels may be transmitted originally from the UK for countries like Poland. This can happen because of the EU Television Without Frontiers Directive. If we leave the EU then many of these jobs in broadcasting and related services like transmission could be lost.
We’ll be back tomorrow with another roundup of what you’re talking about in the comment sections on the EU referendum.. You can help inform what we report on by filling in the form below.
To use the Australian immigration model would be completely unsuitable for the UK on many levels. Firstly, it's aimed at families that want to move there permanently, this is mainly because Australia is thousands of miles from everywhere, the UK is not. secondly the Australian model is about building the society they think they want, it's almost social engineering, and in my opinion has led to a bland middle-classness in Australia as a whole. Thirdly, it would make the UK's potential workforce much less mobile, it would take months for applications to be processed which could easily lead to shortages of staff, particularly for more seasonal jobs. Do we really need all that bother when the staff are a few hundred miles away, or less? All that bother to hire some fruit pickers? I don't see it somehow.