Brexit for prosperity
Of course, as Declan Ganley says, the entire EU motor industry combined got more attention than one country alone. But what if we didn’t agree with the EU position which tends to suit continental countries’ priorities? The fact is that (for example) Australia does its own deals with Japan without needing an EU to hold its hand and, because it is a significant market for Japan, they take notice. The UK is not a minnow. We are not the Isle of Man. It is nonsense to think that outside the EU we would have no influence at all. In practice, a lot of regulation actually comes from a higher level anyway – such as the UN, WTO, etc – where the UK would have a seat at the table and an independent voice if we were not in the EU.
In my view we should negotiate the best trade deal we can get with the EU and extricate ourselves from the political union which brings us no benefit and does not work in any democratic way.
As for bigger being better, this is just not true either. It appeals to political theorists (socialists). Wedgwood Benn, having zero knowledge or experience in business or industry, decreed that the British-owned motor industry should be merged together in one giant company called British Leyland, in order to compete with the likes of Mercedes-Benz. What an utter disaster that was. They two main players would definitely have been better off apart
Rick Hamilton, Tokyo, Japan
Declan Ganley paints a rosy, predictable and overworn picture of major economies all rushing to engage in trade deals with the EU’s 500 million people. He must come and visit us on the European Parliament’s International Trade committee to see the reality: I am trying to push the EU-India Free Trade Agreement which has stalled yet again after 8 years negotiating. No trade deal with China has even started, only an investment deal – and excessive EU human rights and sustainable development clauses would make an FTA a non-starter. China and India are on record saying they prefer bilateral deals – that’s why George Osborne was in China. In reality, if UK left the EU under World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules it would be guaranteed a Most Favoured Nation WTO deal already enjoyed by Japan, China, India, the USA (now), Canada (now) and Australia. Dan Hannan has it right.
David Campbell Bannerman (MEP), Norwich, UK
To some extent one would expect the EU’s share in world trade to diminish as other countries begin to export, as mentioned by Daniel Hannan. But the decline in the EU share is down to more than other countries becoming prosperous. Much of it is down to the EU insistence that the convoy system is adopted: all member states are to proceed at the pace of the slowest. And don’t even start me on the distortions caused by the euro and its role as a golden calf.
Alan Hawkes, Saffron Walden, UK
Patients, not paperwork
I agree with Julia Hartley-Brewer (Britain’s NHS should offer treatments, not treats) that there is a problem here if what is being spent per person on personal budgets is more than what is spent on everyone within the conventional system. The sums should be comparable but I find it strange that a commentator on the right appears to prefer the collective to the individual approach.
My husband has Parkinson’s. We have not pursued the personal budget approach because the paperwork is horrendous; if you employ people as carers, you are responsible for national insurance, and now pensions, too. No one helps with this. You have to juggle the admin with whatever else (i.e. paid work) you, as sole carer, are trying to do. So long as the total cost does not exceed what would be spent collectively – and this should be the condition – I see no reason why someone should not choose to build a summer house or go riding, if that helps keep them out of hospital.
My husband has been offered services that he neither wanted nor needed (cooking lunch, singing, dancing), while services that he would like and would help his morale (a half-hour trip in his wheelchair that is too heavy for me to push, someone to accompany him on a short walk as he uses his walker, listening to him read aloud to help his speech, someone to stay overnight if i have a work assignment away) are not available, for a whole range of reasons, including – for wheelchair-pushing – our old friend ‘health and safety’.
Mary Dejevsky , London, UK
Crying for Argentina
I disagree with the perception of the Kirchner government presented by Federico N. Fernández (Argentina: An alternative against populism).
Because I have never voted for the Kirchners, I consider myself a “neutral” citizen. I travel abroad a lot for research purposes, learning different ways to see the economy, the society. I think the Kirchner government has failed in many policies, but it is not true that they go “against the institutions” or “against the people” who think differently.Naturally, every government makes wrong decisions and some people complain, but one should consider also all the good policies this government has developed, and that there are a lot of independent, intellectual people that support them.
About Cambiemos, it is difficult to say that they mean “the return to the republican values and to restate the constitutional order”, as the writer mentioned. For other analysts, they represent the failed “neoliberal policies” our country suffered in the 90s, with external economic recipes that led Argentina to the 2001 economic crash. A free open market caused local industry to disappear, and led to an irresponsible international borrowing policy to “subsidize” the internal consumption of imported goods, and consequently to starvation and more poverty.
All the world knows that the biggest economy, the US, is “The” free market promoter. But what is not seriously discussed in the World Trade Organizatio, is that they have (along with the European Union) one of the highest subsidies to the primary economy in the world, distorting the free market of commodities and causing adverse trade situations for those economies that do not subsidize that sector, such as Argentina.
Joaquín Hasperué, Buenos Aires, Argentina
No haven in sight
I fully agree with Daniel Hannan (Look to Guernsey for a model of a post-EU Britain) that the “you cannot compare” argument is overused. However, Guernsey is a tax haven, in the sense that it uses its tax system to draw in capital from abroad, and this option is only open to small territories (Guernsey, Monaco, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg). The reason is that being a tax haven is only a valid development option if the quantity of internationally mobile capital is very large compared to the size of the country. If the US tried abolishing its taxes in order to attract foreign money, it would indeed attract foreign money, but this advantage would be insignificant compared to the size of the US economy, and the federal state would lose its revenue.
So the UK is free to take inspiration from Guernsey, but it cannot adopt the “tax haven” development policy.
Mathieu Vasseur , Frankfurt, Germany
Divided we stand
Ian Martin’s article (Here’s how moderate Labour must fight back against Jeremy Corbyn) proposes a struggle that should have taken place half way through Ed Miliband’s tenure as leader of the Labour Party. Now sadly, the possibility of Labour reverting to social democratic politics will not return.
I suggest that moderates turn their backs on Corbyn and the Labour Party and take the brave step of forming a new political party – let’s call it the Democratic Party.
The Democratic Party, free of Trotskyites and the trade unions could develop policies popular with an electorate searching for future major improvements in, for example, care for the elderly, education and house building.
It may take ten to fifteen years for the Democratic Party to succeed electorally but the alternative is unthinkable for those who believe a moderate left of centre political party with a chance of forming a government is vital to our democracy.
When the vote on Clause Four was announced at a special Labour Party Conference Tony Blair said he next change would be concerned with changing the name of the party. Everyone thought he was joking. I wasn’t so sure at the time.
Peter McGeer, Devon, UK
Iain Martin’s 6-point plan for the moderates or whatever they call themselves in the Labour party for taking back power is merely a mirror image of the entryist tactics used by their hard-left opponents. It is doomed to fail. Trying to build a ‘party within a party’ while encouraging voters on the doorstep to join simply tells ordinary people that the party is hideously split. This will not encouage people to vote Labour. Instead they will probably defect to the Lib-Dems or UKIP. Moderate Labour MPs should do the same.
The fact that Labour activists and the unions were way more extreme than the electorate and most of the party’s MPs has been an open secret for over a decade. Unions have strong presences at major neo-communist demonstrations like Owen Jones’ Peoples’ Assembly in London and elsewhere is a bit of a giveway as to their leanings. However the Labour leadership at the time did absolutely nothing about the hard Left, assuming that it had learnt its lesson in the 1980s and would be supine forever. This is naive in the extreme.
Labour moderates have to accept that Labour is no longer their party and is now dedicated to the building of a socialist one-party republic.
In fact if these dispossessed moderates genuinely believe that country comes before party, then it is in the clear national interest for them to split off and form a new party or join forces with whichever other party is closest to their beliefs tomarginalise Corbyn’s organisation.
Their party has rejected them. It is time for them to return the compliment.
Paul T. Horgan , Bracknell, UK
I was a Labour supporter for many years but just could not trust Mr Milliband to economically run the country and I am afraid I have almost lost complete trust in the Labour Party.
As a disabled veteran, I work hard to be as self-reliant as much as I can, and now any aspirations I might try to fulfill to better my own life and that of my family seem absolutely pointless under a Corbyn administration. Aspiration brings meaning to a lot of people’s lives; without aspiration there is no advancement. Yes I believe in a compassionate society however the days of that being a reality are now even further away as this will push those with extremist views to become even more so.
The election of Corbyn serves no useful purpose it will detract from engagement in thoughtful government by putting up needless defensive barriers as each camp defends an extreme perspective. The world today is one requiring a global governance perspective, the situation faced here in the UK is also the same across the world; the world is at war with extremism and we must have trustworthy politicians capable of coming to the right decisions in the interest of the safety and security of our people not only in this country but globally.
Pete Doherty , Kincardineshire, UK
The Conservatives shouldn’t be too smug about UKIP. What is happening to Labour today, with the election of Corbyn, could happen to the Tories too, especially if (as pundits predict) Osborne wins the leadership election. Both parties are hopelessly out-of-touch with their bases.
Corybn may not last as Labour leader. It may not be UKIP that replaces the Conservatives. UKIP may replace Labour or they may both disappear altogether. Nobody knows. To quote Mr Prescott, the tectonic plates have moved. Earthquakes are unpredictable things, as is the scene when they are over
George Bathurst, Windsor, UK
Trickling down
Interesting article on the Strawmanning of trickle-down by Daniel Hannan, but I don’t think it really covers the main critiques of right-wing economics that some are trying to advance.
It is obviously true that reducing income tax rates from punitive (98%) to sensible (around 50% on very high incomes) will increase revenues for the reasons given. It doesn’t follow that “further tax cuts beyond that level will produce the same result” – indeed, logically it cannot do so because at some point the curve will reverse, eventually meeting the Origin of the Rate v Revenue graph where both rates and revenue are zero.
As such, the use of the Laffer curve to justify cuts in rates from (say) 50% to 30% is at best suspect, especially given that (as Hannan again notes) this tends to come from on-shoring income streams – something that can only happen a finite amount. That said it should be noted that the reverse is also true.
But the argument that “the proportion of tax paid by the wealthiest went up” is only half the question – you also need to look at the proportion of earnings change.
Therefore the real case for the left in politics today is not to rebut such obvious Straw Men nor to scream at the wind about the inequality that has been brought about by the policies we’ve seen over the last three decades. It is to provide a credible alternative that accounts for governments role in refereeing a robust competitive market in some sectors of the economy, and administering some other parts of the economy directly because a single provider is more efficient than a market
James Wood, Leeds, UK
