Democracy? You're kidding, right?

One of the problems eurosceptics have is convincing people we're "run by Brussels". There's a good reason for that. We're not. It's more accurate to say we are told what to do by Brussels. It's even more accurate to say we're told what NOT to do by Brussels. So we're free to do what we like so long as it's within a predetermined set of parameters. How we do it is entirely up to us.

Very often that puts us in the position of having to do things we don't want to do in a way that we don't want to do it because the ways we do want to do things are prohibited. And as stupid as that often seems, we can always count on our ow government to make it even more complicated and more expensive. It's not even strictly accurate to say we're told what to do by Brussels. Governance is now global. As previously explored, our membership of the EU removes our power of veto at all the top tables.

So what we often end up with is law we don't want, never had a choice in and have to implement them in ways ill-suited to our own needs, often conflicting with more suitable local governance.

Many would ask particularly what difference would Brexit make since our own government and diplomatic corps are usually at the forefront of the stupidest global initiatives and wouldn't use the veto even if they had it. It's a fair question. The answer is probably not a lot. We would likely have ended up an equally lunatic energy policy even outside of the EU - but the critical distinction being that we own that decision. We are responsible for those we elect.

This is still quite an abstract distinction and more a point of principle - and the reason we struggle is that people's concerns in the wallet tend to take immediate precedence over concepts such as sovereignty; a word which is becoming increasingly meaningless, along with the word democracy which seems to elicit a hollow laugh whenever you mention it. There's a good reason for that though.  

The word democracy stems from the Greek word, dēmokratía, comprising two parts: dêmos "people" and kratos "power". Without a demos, there is no democracy. But people without power is not democracy either. So when we look at the chain of political institutions we see global bodies where we have no power of veto agreeing to things then passing them down to the EU where MEPs can nether repeal or propose legislation, in a parliament where we have a mere 1.2 MEPs for every million citizens, who even voting together as a bloc (which they rarely do) could never hope to prevent something becoming law if the UK did not want it. 

It is then passed as a directive and turned into domestic law by our own parliaments, mangled by Whitehall and handed to councils who are told what and how to do something. So it's not just the EU that has an allergy to democracy, its all the way down through the chain, with only a voting ritual every five years to change the guard at Westminster.

So when asked why bother leaving the EU since it won't make any major difference - we're in something of a pickle again. Without comprehensive domestic reform Brexit is largely an exercise in futility. But domestic reform is putting the cart before the horse. If the government is not acting on the instructions of the people at the global level, and agreements eventually arrive at our shores via an EU directive, then we've not really accomplished very much. And so while Brexit accomplishes little on its own, it is a precursor to broader meaningful reforms such as separation of powers and proper local devolution.

Today Labour leadership contender Liz Kendall spoke of the need to hand more powers to local authorities. In this we would not disagree, but she cannot speak of handing away powers that are not in her gift - with fishing, agriculture, energy and employment law all being specific competences of the EU. Far from being a democracy, the EU is an obstacle to it. Thus, rather than democracy, what we have is a benign managerialism.

The big problem euroceptics have in convincing people to vote out is that this benign managerialism to all intents and purposes actually works quite well, with little in the technical regulation that would inspire people to go to the barricades. Neither promises of utopia nor predictions of doom either way are sufficiently believable to mobilise a movement, and when the real experts are saying Brexit makes little noticeable difference, why wouldn't you be satisfied with the status quo? After all, it's not Communist China with mobile execution vans, there are no Stasi squads putting bloggers in jail and give or take, free speech is healthier than it ever has been. What is so bad that we need to rock the boat?

The answer to that is not much. The problems we have a wildly exaggerated and we can't say for certain whether Brexit would be any improvement since what affects us also affects EU member states. The immigration problem won't go away for any of us regardless of Brexit. So what is it about?

It's about the future. This is not a referendum on whether we accept the status quo. This is about whether we want to travel in the EU to its final destination. For sure we're probably never going to join the Euro, and the full federalist dream is never going to come to fruition either. But that's the problem. What the EU wants to happen never will happen but that won't stop it from persistently trying. And really what is the point when we don't need it, nobody wants it (apart from those euro-elites whose incomes depend upon it) and it's rooted in an idea from the early part of the last century, long before such things as affordable airliner travel and the internet. Put simply, Europhillia is luddism. 

More and more countries are confidently stepping into the first world and into the global community and the future of global trade means a global conversation, with every voice being heard rather than elites speaking on our behalf. We don't want the world breaking up into competing blocs. We want inter-governmentalism with nations speaking directly to nations without a middleman constantly watering down our agreements. If we want the full benefits of trade then why ask for permission and why add the delays of the Strasbourg talking shop? Why wait to invite India or Brazil to the table? Why say to the world that you can come in if you're Polish but not Peruvian, Indian or Canadian? It's no longer the 1960's. There's more reason for British people to flock to India than in the other direction.

The EU has been negotiating TTIP on our behalf. We have secured certain opt outs but then so has everyone else in Europe, which means that trade deal is a lot weaker than it could have been. What could we have negotiated for ourselves? I have a stronger desire to visit and trade with New York or Mumbai than I have Berlin or Amsterdam. But then why not with everybody on our own terms and in our own time?

Rather than fighting off immigrants in the Mediterranean and blowing up smugglers boats we would be trading freely with Africa and spending aid directly, helping to build first world administrative systems that reduce the need to migrate in the first place. Sure the EU could do that, but the chances of the money getting much further than a Brussels Mercedes dealership are nil.

We're a first class country denying our own place at the top table, and for two long we have been inward looking to Europe when we should have been looking out. It's time to let the obsolete ideas of the last century die and persuade Europe that it's small idea of a United States of Europe is dead. A world of free nations awaits us. 

The old problems are long gone for Europe. Europe isn't going to go to war over coal and steel any more than Lincolnshire is going to fight Humberside over pork. The notion that we would suddenly start fighting each other without the EU is a quint superstition. In the final analysis, I can't think of anything more likely to cause regional instability than an antidemocratic entity that just won't take no for an answer. It's already put up walls with Russia, building new walls in Bulgaria and fortifying Southern Europe. That doesn't look very much like progress to me. Arguably, the inherent inefficiencies and corruption in the system are more likely to provoke internal war.

It isn't political union or flags that keep the peace. The EU is built on foundations of intellectual sand. Trade, travel and communication bring the peace. Freedom preserves it. So why close ourselves off to the world? Why be a little Europe when we can be a great Britain?

Europhiles: The lies they tell

Pro-Europa has published its list of twelve reasons to stay in the EU. They're making it easy for us. Let's have a look...

1. Jobs
Around 3.5 million British jobs are directly linked to British membership of the European Union’s single market – 1 in 10 British jobs.

We're not sure this is quite right. We think it's closer to five million jobs that depend on free trade as part of the single market, and may be substantially more. But Pro-Europa is being dishonest in that the EU is not the single market. That would be the EEA which we would have full access to as part of Efta.

2. Exports & investment
The EU buys over 50 per cent of UK exports (54 per cent of goods, 40 per cent of services).
Over 300,000 British companies and 74 per cent of British exporters operate in other EU markets.
American and Asian EU firms build factories in Britain because it is in the single market.

Again we see the same lie put a different way. They will persistently conflate the single market with the EU. Our illustration above shows that isn't the case. It's looking more and more like we can boost trade by exploiting more favourable deals outside the EU. Our car industry may depend on it.

3. Trade
The EU negotiates trade agreements with the rest of the world. Outside the EU Britain would have to renegotiate trade deals alone. While the EU is the world’s largest market, a UK outside the EU would not be a high priority for other counties to negotiate a trade deal.

This is dishonesty on stilts. Plenty of countries have free trade deals with powers like China and replicating the same memorandum of understanding is no major undertaking, assuming we would need to, but having EU affiliate status as an EEA member means our existing trade deals don't change. If anything it means we can negotiate new trade deals a lot faster as Iceland and Norway do.

We have seen in recent years a departure of the US automotive industry to Mexico which trumps the US on free trade. It has agreements with 45 countries, meaning low tariffs for exporting those cars globally and favourable deals on the import of components, for which both the US and the EU have protectionist barriers on. We can do better.

4. Consumer clout
British families enjoy lower mobile phone roaming charges, lower credit card fees, cheaper flights and proper compensation when flights are delayed or cancelled. These sorts of benefits could not be achieved by Britain alone.

For me this is something of a moot point since my Three mobile never works when I leave the country but this is all mainly fluff. Certainly nothing worth surrendering our democracy for. That said, in reality, these benefits are the result of global agreements. It's a little dishonest for the EU to take credit for them.

5. Clean environment
Through commonly agreed EU standards, national Governments have achieved improvements to the quality of air, rivers and beaches. Good for Britain and good for Britons holidaying or living abroad!

Most of these standards are agreed at the global level by the WHO, UNEF and major British NGOs. They are then adopted by the EU verbatim. All the EU does is either water them down or delays them. Some of these measures are actually counter productive or inferior to our own standards. Outside the EU we would have a veto at the global level but we usually end up voting for the common EU position. We need a stronger voice at the top table to make sure we get the right results for our unique island.

6. Power to curb the multinationals
The EU has taken on multinational giants like Microsoft, Samsung and Toshiba for unfair competition. The UK would not be able to do this alone.

I'm not entirely sure that a sovereign nation could not take on the multinationals alone. Iceland does. We have a large enough market to make our voice heard, but supposing Pro-Europa is right, nobody is talking about making the EU our enemy. It is inconceivable that we would cease to co-operate with the EU on mutually beneficial matters as indeed Norway, Turkey and Israel do.

7. Freedom to work and study abroad – and easy travel
1.4 million British people live abroad in the EU. More than 14,500 UK students took part in the European Union’s Erasmus student exchange scheme in 2012-13. Driving licences issued in the UK are valid throughout the EU.

Again this is playing on the assumption that the EU is the single market. It isn't. Free movement would still be a reality outside of the EU, only we would have a great deal more control about who we let stay and what benefits they are entitled to. It should also be noted that Efta members and Turkey are full members of Erasmus.

8. Peace and democracy
The EU has helped secure peace among previously warring western European nations. It helped to consolidate democracy in Spain, Portugal, Greece and former Soviet bloc countries and helped preserve peace in the Balkans since the end of the Balkans War. With the UN it now plays a leading role in conflict prevention, peacekeeping and democracy building.

This is an assertion that will make some of our readers choke on their cornflakes. Ukippers believe the EU was directly responsible for the chaos in Ukraine. One could argue a strong case, but a more moderate individual would still say Ukraine was badly mishandled by the EU in its rush to get an association agreement, and it can be said that such cowboy diplomacy was indeed a provocation to a wounded Russia. Similarly the EU's ill thought out intervention in Libya has consequences. The EU also weakens African governments adding more instability to the region.

We think NATO can take more credit for keeping the peace. As for "consolidating democracy", it's a meaningless expression from an institution that is itself not a democracy. The notion that the EU helped secure the peace is mildly offensive given how dependent Europe was on the USA for its military security during the cold war - and still is.

9. Equal pay and non-discrimination
Equal pay for men and women is enshrined in EU law, as are bans on discrimination by age, race or sexual orientation. This benefits Britain and British people who live in other EU countries.

If anything the EU has always lagged behind Britain in such ventures, but this is one of those areas where the noble stated intent has very different results in practice. Unintended consequences can be more damaging than discrimination. In modern Britain the people themselves would be successful in fighting for and securing such rights and would find they were kicking at an open door given the diversity of MPs in Westminster. It is preferred that such rights are fought for and won from the grassroots level rather than imposed by a supranational authority. Rights so easily gifted can be just as easily be revoked. We need control over our own employment and discrimination laws.

10. Influence in the world
As 28 democracies, and as the world’s biggest market, we are strong when we work together.
Britain is represented in many international organisations in joint EU delegations – giving Britain more influence than it would have alone. The EU has played a major role in climate, world trade and development.

This assertion is risible. The repeated europhile meme is that Norway has no influence outside the EU. This is a lie. The dishonesty of this received argument preys on the ignorance of the public in where EU law comes from.

The vast majority of EU law is not EU in origin. The EU institutions themselves employ fewer than the BBC collectively thus cold not possibly author the masses of regulation churned out all the time. They come from international bodies such as WP.29, WTO, UNECE, Codex, NAFO and a dozen other bodies you have probably never heard of - on which the EU effectively takes out seat and negotiates on our behalf.

While Ukip and others say we don't have a seat at the WTO and other such institutions, we do. However, trade is an exclusive competence of the EU so we're forced to adopt the common EU position derived from its advanced observer status. What this means is we have no independent power of veto.

Norway on the other hand is a member of Efta but still has its own independent vote because Efta is not a supranational organisation. Thus Norway gets a veto on single market rules and regulation before they even get down to the EU level. Such regulations do not get as far as the European Parliament without a global agreement. So when it comes to things like automotive industry regulations, Norway has more say than we do, and it doesn't even have a car industry. Many of the employment regulations, so called "workers rights" come from bodies as diverse as the ILO and WHO. Norway has a strong influence there too.

Norway used its veto when it came to the 3rd Postal Directive, a Directive the UK had no option but to implement. That's British "influence" for you.

11. Cutting red tape
Common rules for the common market make it unnecessary to have 28 sets of national regulations.

Red tape gets a bad name. The EU is accused of adding red tape but not all of it is bad. Different regulatory regimes create technical barriers to trade. Regulatory harmonisation facilitates trade. Consequently, there is a global effort to harmonise regulations, and most regulations are now made at the global level. Presently we have no power of veto at the top table as an EU member. That stops us preventing bad laws or new laws weaker than our own.

As it happens, securing a global agreement with Japan's automotive industry to join the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) would eliminate much of the regulatory divergence in the automotive industry. A comprehensive "trade deal" between the EU and Japan then becomes largely redundant. If we can work toward a similar agreement in electronics then again the EU is totally irrelevant.

Similarly the The International Air Transport Association (IATA) and UNECE has signed a Memorandum of Understanding to strengthen their support to developing countries seeking to implement the World Trade Organisation (WTO) Trade Facilitation Agreement. All the bluster about the EU negotiating with other blocs is a mentality belonging to the last century, with global trade bodies now securing their own interoperability frameworks, leaving the EU far behind.

12. Fighting crime
The European Arrest Warrant replaced long extradition procedures and enables the UK to extradite criminals wanted in other EU countries, and bring to justice criminals wanted in the UK who are hiding in other EU countries. Eurojust helps UK authorities work with other EU countries’ to tackle international organised crime such as drug smuggling, people trafficking and money laundering.

As crime is moving off the streets and onto the internet, it's never been more important to have intergovernmental co-operation. On the whole, we would argue that the EAW is a good thing in principle and we could very easily opt into it without being members of the EU - and we might even secure certain essential opt-outs. It certainly wouldn't be in the EU's interests to refuse if that was our choice. Pro-Europa seems to think Brexit marks the end of all international co-operation. That is, frankly, silly.

13. Research funding
The UK is the second largest beneficiary of EU research funds, and the British Government expects future EU research funding to constitute a vital source of income for our world-leading universities and companies

This is what is known as a bare faced lie. Israel and Switzerland are global leaders in scientific innovation. They are not in the EU.

In conclusion we can see that the europhile case is built on the lie that the EU is the single market, that Britain is weak and can't survive without surrendering it right to self-govern, and seem predominantly inward looking on little Europe, seemingly unaware of globalisation or keep to distract you from it. It is a myopic vision locked in the ideology of yesteryear and seems to ignore the last thirty years of technological progress. Trade is global and so is regulation. They want a "European Community". We want a global community.

Presently, our voice is silenced by the EU. At best we have 1/28th of a voice and only 1.2 MEPs per million people. Europhiles would call that democracy - but any system where the voice of over sixty million people can be overruled cannot by definition be democracy. Voting rituals alone don't make a democracy and when the voices of so many are drowned out, that peace peace the EU claims to keep will not last. This referendum is a chance to correct a historical mistake and to retake our place in the world as a true democracy. One way or another we will eventually leave the EU. This is an opportunity to do it peacefully, amicably and without disastrous repercussions. 

Busting the Norway myth

The repeated europhile meme shall be that Norway has no influence outside the EU. This is a lie. The dishonesty of this received argument preys on the ignorance of the public in where EU law comes from.

The vast majority of EU law is not EU in origin. The EU institutions themselves employ fewer than the BBC collectively thus cold not possibly author the masses of regulation churned out all the time. They come from international bodies such as WP.29, WTO, UNECE, Codex, NAFO and a dozen other bodies you have probably never heard of - on which the EU effectively takes out seat and negotiates on our behalf.

While Ukip and others say we don't have a seat at the WTO and other such institutions, we do. However, trade is an exclusive competence of the EU so we're forced to adopt the common EU position derived from its advanced observer status. What this means is we have no independent power of veto.

Norway on the other hand is a member of Efta but still has its own independent vote because Efta is not a supranational organisation. Thus Norway gets a veto on single market rules and regulation before they even get down to the EU level. Such regulations do not get as far as the European Parliament without a global agreement. So when it comes to things like automotive industry regulations, Norway has more say than we do, and it doesn't even have a car industry. Many of the employment regulations, so called "workers rights" come from bodies as diverse as the ILO and WHO. Norway has a strong influence there too.

Without our veto at the top tables, we only get to influence the minutia at the EU level, horsetrading as to how and when we implement that which has already been decided. That much cannot be changed once it has got as far as the EU commission let alone the parliament. Even if all our MEPs voted together, which they rarely do, we couldn't prevent a law we did not want. Norway can.

We will still end up abiding by Single Market rules when we leave the EU, as will the US because the standards are global, but at least we will finally get a say in how they are made and which ones we adopt.

Europhiles essentially parrot the classic europhile propaganda, that conflates the EU with the single market. The EU is not the single market. It is made up of many concentric circles with no single authority. Many believe the EU makes the rules. It doesn't.

But even at the EU level Norway is on several committees and co-operative bodies and does steer regulations, with a few exceptions which are nether here nor there considering the improved influence they have at the top table.

The likes of British Influence actually know all this full well, but it's their dirty little secret that they keep from you because they know that well meaning people will continue to repeat their mantras verbatim. Public ignorance is their most potent weapon.

Setting ourselves up to fail

The more I delve into issues surrounding international trade and regulation trying to keep pace with Richard North, the more I discover how little difference Brexit will make as far as industry will notice. But we have a problem. Ukippers are filling up the airwaves with promises of milk and honey - and that a libertarian regulation-free utopia is just around the corner. If we win this referendum, they're in for a mighty shock.

In any eventuality we will still be subsidising our agriculture, we will still be paying large sums to producers to seemingly do little, we will still be making compromises over our fishing grounds and there is very little point in deregulating manufacturing. Much of what is said about EU red tape is hokum.

That's why Ukip is becoming a bit of a problem. We're not going to re-industrialise, we're not going to "take back control of our borders" and we're probably not going to get much in the way of trade deals that we don't already have. Things have gotten a bit more complex since the twenty year old eurosceptic arguments were developed.

On the face of it, if you take our word for it that all of the above if true, you might ask why bother leaving, and why all the fuss? Kippers would have it that the ultimate destination of the EU means Britain becoming a minor state of a Federal Europe, eating frogs legs and spending Euros. But that doesn't look like a reality either, nor does the threat of an EU army.

We're never going to join the Euro and even if the EU does achieve the final killer treaty, whatever government we end up with in Brussels couldn't be much worse than our own. Half of the global initiatives that filter down through the EU very much have British officials in the driving seat. The "EU madness" is very much of our own making. As much as our energy policy has impositions from Brussels upon it, it's our own parliament that triple gold-plated it to become one of the most absurd pieces of law ever passed.

At this point,you could be forgiven for ceasing to care altogether since the measurable economic advantages to Brexit are negligible. Very few of the old eurosceptic arguments stand up and even in a federal superstate, Lizzie won't be kicked out of BuckPal anytime soon.

The reason we at eureferendum.com know all this is because we have put all the traditional eurosceptic arguments through some very serious stress testing, and we keep treading in the cold cat sick of reality.

International trade means international regulation which means huge compromises, often taking on laws we don't want for greater good. The broader national interest means compromise. For sure we would have a few more vetoes, but we can't really rely on our government to use them much. We have a veto on UNECE matters pertaining to the environment and I struggle to find an instance where we have used it.

Even falling back on the old tropes about identity and culture doesn't really hold much sway since we as far as identity goes, the Scottish are busy building their own with Wales not too far behind. We have many problems, many of which are of our own making, wrongly blamed on the EU and more probably the result of the centralisation and corporatisation of local authorities. 

So what is the actual point? For me, it's about scrutiny and accountability. The EU negotiating on our behalf in any circumstance is intolerable but what troubles me more is that Strasbourg is the mechanism of scrutiny. MEPs are a subspecies of politician who are even less fit to govern than most MPs. As if that weren't bad enough, in the European parliament, even if all our MEPs voted together, we are still a minority by default which means, to use a reductio ad absurdum argument, that if the EU decided we were all suddenly going to drive on the right, in practice we couldn't stop them.

We might also ask if we'd even know what hit us if that did happen. Even our own government is often surprised by measures it has previously agreed to. TTIP went through without our national parliament ever getting to scrutinise it. Something like that is far too important to outsource. 1/28th of a voice is not enough.

As much as anything it's a cultural thing. The problem with us is that we're just not cut out to take an interest in EU politics. Our politics is culturally based in London. We're quite parochial like that, which means important EU matters are ignored when really they shouldn't be. It is treated as foreign news and reported as such. Neither the people nor the media really grasp that the EU is a government in its own right, and it's that ignorance and passivity on which the EU depends to progress it's federalist agenda. There is a democratic deficit that cannot be fixed.

For sure we could have an elected commission and an elected EU president, and that would make for a fine democratic façade (and would essentially establish the EU as a nation in its own right), but that would not make a it a democracy any more than the proverbial wolves voting on the dinner menu. And that's the ultimate principle to fight (and die) for.

Because the EU has always been a top down imposition on the peoples of Europe, with neither a demos nor a mandate, the European Parliament will always be viewed as a foreign talking shop, and our lack of engagement in it ensures we will always get a bad deal. We will treat euro-elections as an opinion poll on the incumbent government thus will always end up with the madcap fringes like the Greens and Ukip representing our interests. Cranks and cronies who are simply not up to the job.

If there are to be new rafts of regulation that could fundamentally change our country, I want Westminster and our fierce internet headbangers chucking it around for debate. TTIP has barely been discussed in any great detail, people are pretty ignorant of what it is, and those who oppose it seem to oppose it for all the wrong reasons. That's because it's abstract to the British political machine.

The EU model could hardly be described as representetive either. We have a mere six MEPs to represent somewhere like South West England. That works out at 1.2 MEPs per million people, to represent seven cities and several large towns. This is not democracy by any definition I understand.

For all we might grumble that democracy in the UK is no real democracy, there is a certain force that guides Westminster in ways that Strasbourg is immune. We need to make it work better, but it's better than what the EU calls democracy. Strasbourg is not steered by public debate and popular discourse.

That is why we must repatriate the scrutiny process. Whatever veto we then end up using will at least be a people's veto. It matters because minutia matters. My example de jour being the shipping container. There are better designs but we settle for the mediocre one because universality is what makes the global shipping trade work as efficiently as it does. Perhaps one of the greatest innovations of the modern world.

The shipping container dictates the size of lorries, the types of dock crane, and the shape and size of ships, the width and camber of roads and the height of bridges. That does mean lorries are now much bigger than we would necessarily want for our roads on this little and ancient island, but the common good benefits are there for all to see. But then cyclists get squished so now we are remodelling our cities. Just one small design standard can change everything. Next time that happens, I want our parliament in Westminster looking at it.

There is also another dimension to this. Many lament the triviality and emptiness of British politics. Our parliament seems ever more preoccupied with interfering in our daily lives. What it really is, is displacement activity. Maybe if parliament was looking at the larger matters of trade it would find less reason to poke its nose into things that do not concern it, and leave the more trivial matters to local councils.

By restoring parliament to matters of importance, we restore its prestige and dignity and thus in the process restore its gravitas. That would perhaps go some way to fixing the crisis of confidence we have in our politics - with each level of government doing what it should. We may then start to see councils responding to to the wishes of citizens having reacquired the powers to act.

That is the battleground on which we must fight. We fight to make Westminster mean something again, to restore the primacy of our domestic politics. Brexit doesn't mean a renaissance of empire and fortune, but a renaissance of politics and participation. That in itself is worth having.

Making false promises of what Brexit will achieve is an open goal for the No camp. If the Yes camp puts eurosceptic arguments under half the stress we have put them under, then they will crumble the moment the debate heats up. Brexit cannot deliver a utopia, it cannot deliver total sovereignty nor can it give us complete control of our borders. A global, internet connected, modern Britain can never close itself off. But Brexit can reconnect the people with their politics and politicians, and it gives us the power to say no when it really matters.

A managerial federal Europe may indeed deliver a base level of prosperity, but we are more than economic units to be managed. We are people and we must have a say in our politics otherwise we are merely spectators of our government rather than participants. Managerial federalism may work while the going is good, but all good things inevitably come to an end. What then? If the people do not say no in this referendum, they may already have said no for the very last time.

How to win the EU debate

One of the reasons I only reluctantly engage in any online EU debate is because I have been a Eurosceptic all my life and I have read every cliché, every hackneyed mantra, every block capital rant, every slimy press release and every glossy brochure.  I am so utterly sick of the sight of it I would be happy to leave the EU purely on the basis of never having to see such drivel again, regardless of the more delicate matters therein.

Further to this, if there is one thing more tiresome than your opponent distorting the truth, it's watching your own side engaging in the debate and getting it wrong. So single-minded are they in their ignorance that they interpret any criticism of their arguments as an attack from a "Lib/Lab/Con Europhile Gramscian Marxist traitor" (whatever that means). This is particularly evident among the Ukip fraternity. It's boring, it's lame, and more to the point, it is not going to win us an EU referendum. The aggressive and bullying posturing of "cyber-nats" has tainted the Scottish independence debate and it has not won anyone over. It is that same stunted attitude that will lose us an EU referendum.

The way to win the debate is with rational, measured, realistic answers. The outcome of the referendum will be less about why we should leave the EU, but what will happen if we do. That is why it is important to have a grasp on how we leave the EU. Ripping up treaties and walking away is not a realistic proposition. Decades of political and regulatory integration will not be undone overnight, and not even in a few years. Anyone making the case that we can is someone who probably doesn't understand the complexity of EU regulation or the necessity for it. Leaving the EU does not mean we are free of international obligations in the way we trade with the world either.

Our side needs to be prepared and it needs to have good answers to difficult questions. This is why I have so relentlessly attacked Ukip which is still failing to answer the more nuanced questions with anything other than flimsy conjecture. Ukippers say it doesn't matter but it very much does.

The way the pro-EU camp will fight this is with scaremongering about trade and jobs. To engage in top-trumps arguments on trade and jobs is to immediately fall into the trap because it plays along with the lie that the EU is a trade organisation. It isn't.

From the beginning the EU has been a federalist, supranationalist project. "Ever closer union" is written into the DNA of the EU and the final destination is an EU superstate, with a flag, an anthem and army, complete with a president and foreign policy capable of starting wars of their own. Were the wording of the referendum entirely honest the question would be "Do wish to abolish Britain as a nation to become part of a United States of Europe?" It is fundamentally a question of who governs us and it's about democracy.

The scaremongers will repeat the old mantra of three million jobs depending on the EU. It cannot be said too often that those jobs depend on the single market, not the EU - and the EU is not the single market. It is entirely possible to be independent of the EU and still trade with the EU and Europe. They will bleat about us not having a seat at the top table, failing to recognise the EU is no longer the top table (if ever it was). Most regulation now originates at the international level, and if we leave the EU we get more influence since the EU presently negotiates on our behalf.

The warnings of economic disaster also do not stand up. For sure, there would be a major economic disaster were we to suddenly rip up the law that enacts the EU, but that is why we must not fall for this straw man and be able to point to a workable exit scenario that covers all the bases. The lack of such will be the Achilles heel of the exit campaign.

We have to recognise that leaving the EU is a long term process, not an event, and whichever solution is advocated it must be one that maintains access to the single market. That is the only scenario that will not scare the horses enough for us to win the referendum. The Ukip notion that we will suddenly switch over to trading with the rest of the world is not a serious argument, not least because we are always going to trade more with our neighbours, and as an argument, any half way informed Europhile will drive a horse and cart through it. And rightly so.

Our side needs to be very careful not to overstate the advantages to leaving because it will not lead to a miracle recovery or a bright new dawn and few (apart of from the Ukip obsessives) will believe it.  I certainly don't. Even outside of the EU we are a long way from real democracy, and anything the EU can do to us we are perfectly capable of doing to ourselves.

In the short to medium term leaving the EU will not mean we miraculously regain control of our borders nor will be be junking vast tranches of regulation or abolishing VAT. This pie in the sky stuff isn't going to happen. Nothing in policy and politics happens at the stroke of a pen and not all of our deep rooted problems can be blamed on the EU. Pretending otherwise is not a credible argument.

If we are going to win we must be reasonable, pragmatic and ready to respond with watertight arguments. The coming debate will see the pro-EU side enlisting big business to warn against "uncertainly" with grave consequences for pulling out. This is where the "Flexcit" plan comes into play as an off-the-shelf solution, seeing us join the EEA & EFTA. This means the day after we leave the EU, nothing whatsoever changes as far as industry is concerned, but we then have the power to start reasserting our sovereignty.

We might prefer more drastic and faster methods, but business and the public will need reassurances to vote the right way and these are the compromises we will have to make if we want to win. Leaving the EU is like turning a supertanker and we will have to do it in stages.

This does mean we will still have open borders, but we are then free to take the necessary domestic measures to reduce the pull factor for immigrants, while negotiating with the countries of origin to take measures in preventing the flow. Closing our borders in not a realistic option and nor would we want to. There are more nuanced and creative solutions.

Essentially the "little-Englander" Ukip approach to the debate (of pulling up the drawbridge and turning us into an island fortress) is not a vision we can sell. It has limited appeal and so do the sorts of people who push that line. They tend to be the "Mr Angry" ilk who are absolutely poisonous to speak with and horribly tiresome - the very reason I can't bring myself to join Ukip.

We can only win the debate using skillfully crafted arguments. Mantras and conjecture is insufficient. We must show the opposition and the world that we still believe in international co-operation and freedom of trade and movement, and that we have better solutions to our problems than the EU.

Moreover, we must have broader ambitions than simply leaving the EU. Leaving the EU is not the end of the fight. Leaving the EU is only a milestone on the road to democracy, and just because we have shift the establishment from Brussels back to London it does not mean we have any greater control over our affairs. So we will need bigger ideas than the wholly negative premise of leaving the EU and sticking twos up to Europe.

That is why The Harrogate Agenda, a total revolution in the structure of UK governance, has been included in the Flexcit plan, not only as a deal sweetener, but also as a destination where government serves our interests and not those of an ever distant elite. It is a positive vision that makes leaving the EU more than a dull technical procedure and something that might inspire a movement that lives beyond the referendum campaign. If we leave the running of the campaign to the likes of the IEA and the Tory think-tank fraternity, they will waste the cash, lose the referendum and let the movement fall flat, as every campaign they have ever managed has.

In that respect, those who are serious about winning this referendum will be fighting on three fronts. We will have to deal with the underhanded lies of the pro-EU camp, the brain-capsizing ineptitude of the Ukip, and the selfish, self-absorbed right-wing think tank grandees who are neither use nor ornament. We can only win this if Eurosceptics up their game and start doing their homework - and most of all, do not allow the campaign to be hijacked by Westminster careerist campaigners who get paid either way. I don't know about you, but I would like to win.

Maybe you can hire... The B Team

We're only a few days into the EU referendum campaign for real but we're proving in spades the value of having the superior intellectual capital and why you need your ducks in a row before you go into the fight. Something Ukip never learned which is why they messed up their election campaign.

We've won every debate we entered on Twitter this week. Just a pity we're the only operation in the game. The kippers are floundering because they've done nothing but grunt about immigration for two years so they're no use at all. If we had the public money the europhile campaign does, us sceptics would have this referendum in the bag. 

The main reason we'll lose is because the media will use the eurosceptic B team as their go to guys - Carswell, Farage and Hannan. Thus far, the BBC haven't approached EUreferendum.com. Only the most influential and longest running eurosceptic blog there is. We do have our victories though.

An open letter to Airbus

Dear Airbus,

We don't tell you how to build aircraft so don't tell us how to run our country.

The EU is not the single market so the functioning of Airbus is not in any way affected by the UK leaving the EU. Most of the rules of the single market are made by global bodies. This you know full well. The same is true of the regulations with which you must comply.

To say you would reconsider investment in the UK in the event of Britain leaving the European Union ignores the fact that you already have, some time ago - not least by ending 100 years of aviation at Filton by closing the runway. This does not suggest to me a long term commitment to the UK.

Moreover, the repair jobs based at Bristol have been gradually outsourced to India over the last few years so please don't pretend you care about British jobs. We know that first and foremost you are a French company and you have been gradually pulling out for years, placing all the best jobs in Toulouse.

If it's labour costs that bother you, you should be glad we're leaving the EU. As to jobs, don't forget those jobs are heavily subsidised with OUR money. We CAN take our money elsewhere.

Meanwhile, our order for the A400M is worth less to us than the maintenance contracts for the C130. We can survive without it. And while we're on that subject, rather than pontificating on how we should run our democracy, how about you concentrate on making the A400M not fall out of the sky and killing all the crew - especially since our RAF men and women will be serving on them?

That's your business. Who governs us... is not.

Yours,

EU Referendum Group

Brexit: the Scottish question

Many firmly eurosceptic Tories think that if we quit the EU, we'll lose Scotland from the Union. This they tell me is why they will vote to stay in the EU.

I take the view that an independent Scotland would not be intolerable if we leave the EU. By now most eurosceptics appear to be settled on Efta as a solution or an interim negotiating platform, which retains our access to the single market. This makes sense. From the likes of Airbus and Deutsche Bank we've seen the usual hyperventilation about uncertainty, but retention of the single market cuts through all that.  Brexit makes very little difference to business as usual.

The only way the pro-EU forces can then win is to continue their deception that the EU is the single market. This is their only ace. We have two years with which to educate the public that much of the rules that govern the single market come from global bodies from the WTO to UNECE. As an independent nation we can influence the rules before they get anywhere near the EU. And so could Scotland.

Efta is an intergovernmental alliance rather than a supranational project, so Scotland would massively benefit if it did leave the Union.  For starters it could have many of the benefits that Iceland and Norway enjoys and also a seat at the NAFO and other bodies in the Nordic trade circle. Without such influence over things like Scottish fishing waters, there is very little point in leaving the Union but staying in the EU.

As an independent nation. Scotland would then have a voice and would probably have more to say at the top table on some issues than we do. It has a much stronger voice as a nation within a community of nations than a single bloc like the EU. Giving Scotland all the adult responsibilities that come with independence means reality will soon dampen some of the SNP's more, shall we say, ambitious ideas. It is likely the SNP would be thrown out of office post independence anyway.

Nothing will ever change the fact that Scotland is intimately intertwined with England and Wales so we have little to fear. Even as an independent state, London can still hold sway with Edinburgh. Without London, Scotland would be a weak voice in the EU and there is little to be said for Scotland rejoining if it has all the advantages of Efta. It's a gamble but as a partner nation in Efta with the remainder of the UK, we have a chance at shaping the world in ways we can't while the EU negotiates on our behalf. So what we should be saying to Scotland is give us our freedom from the EU and we'll give you yours. If then Scotland wishes to remain part of the Union and see where our independent future takes us, I'm good with that too.

Farage has to go. He's a disaster.

Iain Martin in The Telegraph:

To stand any chance in the referendum that is coming, the Out campaign should calmly distance itself from that rag-tag of Ukip MEPs, and the warring Ukip leadership, and hope that the party’s 3.8 million voters turn up regardless. Moderate voices from business and beyond should be deployed urgently who can counter the wave of pro-EU propaganda about to be unleashed on middle-ground voters. If that cannot be done, if the Eurosceptic cause cannot be decontaminated, then the Out campaign should prepare to get thrashed. 

Everyone sees it but Farage. Failure seems inevitable now Farage has gone full Galloway. I've spent months trying to reach these people but we cannot do business with "Liblabcon/EUSSR" headbangers. We've tried. Their cult comes first.

The Kipper line is that there will be no referendum and if there is, they'll lose it, so they carry on marching behind Farage in the rather optimistic delusion they'll eventually take power. As far as they're concerned the referendum will be "rigged" so we can't possibly win it, so in the kipper mind there is no fault attached to losing it - even if they're utterly repellent.

Up to now I've never seen round 1 as winnable, just an opportunity to put the issue front and centre and build up an alliance of experienced and knowledgeable campaigners who can be put to use in any future treaty referendum. That's when we'll see a huge swing against the EU, but that can only happen if we lose this referendum well. Farage seems absolutely determined it should be a wipe-out and lose as badly as possible. I've said it before and I'll say it again - Ukip is the most malevolent force in British politics.

A determination to lose

The last twenty four hours have proven to me that the Cult of Farage is as strong as ever. The Kippers are certain that their man is a referendum winner and they will back him all the way. So we'll have Farage front and centre on all the BBC shows, insulting the audience, making speeches up on the spot, getting the arguments wrong and mouthing off about HIV infected foreigners. He will turn the referendum into a left vs right debate and he will lose as he alienates just about every marginal voters we need to win.

Farage has even become convinced of his own infallibility claiming that "You’ve got a situation where a party leader has more support than he’s ever had by a monster margin. There was a leadership election four months ago, and it was uncontested. My support is stronger now than it was then”.

He has a mandate for sure, but a mandate from kippers. ie not 87% of the electorate.

In an article for The Sunday Times, Godfrey Bloom — the former Ukip MEP said the “out” campaign would lose the referendum if Farage was at the helm because he was not popular enough outside his own party. Douglas Carswell expressed concern about claims that Farage would now be “more autocratic” and face down his internal critics. He said that Farage's leadership could hurt Eurosceptic hopes. That's nothing we've not been saying for over a year. Farage's closest friends, colleagues and enemies are all telling him the same thing. If this isn't a bunker mentality I don't know what is. It has a ring of Downfall to it. Farage is becoming the new George Galloway.

We can only hope he jumps the shark soon and goes into self-destruct because if that man is the Brexit spokesman on Question Time then it's game over, for real. We only have a fighting chance if Ukip does not own the campaign. If Farage does not go, then Carswell will have to step up to the plate and hurt the party by quitting. If he believes in the importance of this referendum he will have to fall on his sword.

Kippers have been hammering the message all day that Ukip got 4m votes and that we are only be having a referendum because of Nigel Farage. Now they are determined to go down with the captain. Twenty years it took to build the party to what it is, to give us a shot at leaving the EU - but in the final analysis, Nigel Farage will be the man who blows it for Britain. Europhiles must be loving every minute of this.

Question Time: ducking the debate

Watching BBC Question Time, we get the distinct impression that Farage will help Ukip limp along until September while it gets its act together for some kind of leadership contest, in which Farage will probably let the other contenders make fools of themselves and resume his role, given that the gang of clowns he appointed to senior roles could not possibly replace him. That was always a possibility.

One thing we saw was Farage having a pretty easy ride of it. The thing is, Farage is now the useful idiot the establishment needs. He will make the worst possible case for Brexit, using decades old arguments, which are now beyond relevance, dragging immigration into the debate - which is what lost winnable seats for Ukip in the general election.

He trots out the same old baloney about a European army and and "taking back control of our borders", and it's precisely the sort of easy hit arguments the europhiles are prepared to face down, and Farage will walk right into it.

In many respects, the political establishment couldn't ask for a better opponent. He has been anointed by the BBC as the official spokesman for the Brexit campaign even though he has precisely no mandate to do that. For those eurosceptics like me who want this to be about bigger issues of governance, democracy, sovereignty and human rights reform, Farage is the very worst possible spokesman.

Never will you hear it said that free movement of people and trade is the benefit of the single market and the EEA, not the EU. Nobody will even make the distinction. Farage won't make this case because he's barely aware of the distinction even as an MEP. As it happens the majority of British MPs and MEP's don't know the difference.

This does raise the question of whether anyone in Ukip would be any better and the answer is categorically not (since they're all mouth-breathing losers), but in any case, the squabbling will continue for sometime within Ukip and that will sadly equate Brexit with Ukip - and will show just how much the campaign is in disarray. When the only other "assets" we have are the likes of Matthew Elliott, Dan Hannan, Bill Cash, John Redwood, Dominic Cummings and Business For Britain, the chances of winning look remote.

None of them will appreciate that the debate has been framed between the status quo and the narrow little Englander vision and they will only speak within those narrow parameters, with perhaps only Hannan preaching a more liberal view but in essence getting all the arguments wrong because he's a shallow individual and impenetrably thick.

One thing is clear, we are not going to get an honest debate about the EU, or even about what the EU is from either side, and ignorance will be considered a virtue. You might well ask why I'm even bothering. Given how bleak it looks today, I really don't know. I guess I'm just not one for going down without a fight, even if my allies are my enemies.

UKIP: Rochester ruminations

I think the political quote of the week comes from the anonymous pundit who reported of Rochester and Strood: "Labour suffer crushing defeat by losing safe Conservative seat to Ukip". But he only just caps Mr Eugenides, who tweets: "Stupid woman tweets photo of white van and flags, resigns. Stupid man calls for compulsory repatriation of legal EU residents, is elected".

Turnout is reported at 50.67 percent, against 51.13 percent at Clacton. Reckless thus came in with 16,867 votes, representing 22.5 percent of the electorate - one in five of the voting public. This is significantly down on Clacton where Carswell took 30.5 percent of the popular vote. We are seeing  yet another failure of the Angry Party to set the election on fire.

That Ukip was going to win, though, has not been in doubt for some time, which means "death camp" Reckless the Repatriater is briefly returned as MP - albeit the indications are that the margin will not be as great as some expect. 

His tenure will perhaps last only until the general election. But his move to Ukip will bring no tears from Peter Oborne. He describes the Repatriater as "a brutish and low-grade specimen who ought not have been permitted to stand in the Conservative interest". His defection to Ukip nearly two months ago, Oborne adds, "reflected well on David Cameron's Conservative Party, making it a better place".

Interestingly, Reckless will be addressing the Bruges Group annual conference in London on Saturday. He was invited while he was still a Conservative MP and, if he turns up, will be able to put his views on his change of heart to a discerning audience. 

By coincidence, this will be followed on the Monday by Owen Paterson, who is planning a major speech on the EU. Oborne expects Mr Paterson "to develop the argument that Britain's future lies outside Europe", and that may well be the case. 

If Mr Paterson goes further and outlines details of how we should go about leaving the EU, he will be ramping up the pressure on UKIP which, after 20 years of existence, is still unable to deliver a coherent (or any) EU exit plan. 

And, trailing in the wake of the Guardian, which led the fray in noting the great UKIP policy vacuum, we now see the Telegraph picking up the same thread. "The party can no longer get away with simply behaving like the outsiders of British politics", the paper says, "free to dish out criticism but outraged when it is directed towards them". It adds: "Over the next few months, their policies on every issue should be subjected to the closest possible scrutiny".

This is an interesting observation. We have been known to remark the Ukip supporters, uniquely, seem to believe that their party should be immune from criticism. Now, the Telegraph lends its way to a counter view. 

Meanwhile, we are being regaled with rumours of additional Conservative MPs deserting to the policy-free UKIP, maybe attracted by the relief of not having to remember what your party's policies actually are. 

However, we are now past the six month cut-off, which means there will be no more by-elections this side of the general. Any MPs who do jump ship and follow the Carswell-Reckless model in resigning their seats are likely to be out in the cold until May – or even longer – reduced to burning their rosettes. 

At least, now, we are spared the sight of prancing politicians and prattling pundits giving us the benefit of their ignorance. Instead, we can revel in Mr Kelner's claim that other parties haven't a clue how to beat Ukip – until Monday, that is, when we may get an illustration of how policy trumps vacuum.

UKIP: more foot-in-mouth from Reckless

The fun started when ITV's Meridian asked Mark Reckless what would happen to EU migrants already living and working in Britain if the UK chose to leave the EU in a future referendum. His answers made it to the front page of the Telegraph and most of the other legacy media, after his comments were interpreted as an intention to deport EU migrants once we had left the EU.

Complete Bastard rightly posits that this is what happens when a political party goes public without having worked out its policies in advance. Then, without an established "line to take" and message discipline, it is easy for a motor-mouth candidate like Reckless to go off the rails – as he did with Libya, making unforced errors which then dominate the headlines. 

And this really is UKIP's problem which, compounded by the profound ignorance displayed by spokespeople and candidates alike, means that they are constantly suffering from foot-in-mouth disease. 

From the outset, the very idea of repatriating migrants who had exercised their rights of freedom of movement or establishment, under the EU treaties, is a clear breach of the international law doctrine of "acquired rights".

This is dealt with admirably in a Parliamentary briefing note and is so well established - having been formally evaluated by the International Law Commission in 1959 – that it has now taken on the status of customary law. 

No one who had made any serious attempt to inform themselves of the state of art could possibly have made such fools of themselves. It is the rank amateurism of the man that rankles– a man at the cutting edge of the debate who is so ill-informed that he can offer in the name of his party a clear breach of international law as a serious policy suggestion. 

Only later, via the Guardian, amongst others, do we get the official line from a "Ukip spokesman", disowning their own candidate, having to admit on the eve of the Rochester by-election that the 2.8million EU nationals living and working in Britain would be given the right to stay in the UK after an EU exit. 

"Ukip's position on migration is entirely clear", says the spokesman. "We need to sort out our borders, and we cannot do so whilst we remain in the European Union. Those who are in this country lawfully, such as those from EU nations, would have the right to remain".

However, even now, Reckless doesn't seem to have a grip on the issue, apparently saying that people already in Britain "would be issued with work permits and nobody would be deported". Thereby, he seems unaware that even issuing "permits" would be a breach of law, making an absolute "right" conditional on an administrative procedure. 

That brought Farage into play, telling the BBC, "When we invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty which sets us off on a two-year negotiation to leave the EU, part of that renegotiations is what happens to retired people from Britain living on the Costa del Sol and what happens to people from Warsaw living in London".

"Let me make this clear", he added, "during our divorce negotiations, even if the EU was to behave badly and say [British] people living in Spain were to be threatened with not being there, we would maintain the line that we believe in the rule of law, we believe in British justice and we believe that anyone who has come to Britain legally has the right to remain".

 Nevertheless, this does not even begin to address the fatuity of the broader Ukip response. The ritualistic offering that we cannot "sort out our borders" whilst we remain in the EU is getting to sound a little tired, although none of the media seem to asking whether leaving the EU, per sewould be enough to solve the problem.

This is the distinction between necessary and sufficient, with Ukip failing to appreciate the difference. On the other hand, implementing controls already permitted by EU law, addressing ECHR issues, dealing with drivers of migration, in terms of reducing "push" and "pull" factors, and then improving the lamentably poor administration of migration control, would doubtless yield greater dividends than the incoherence of a party which, to this day, can't even get its act together on an EU exit plan. 

The point, of course, is that dealing with immigration in a post-EU Britain demands a considered policy response. So far, all UKIP have been able to do is play around with the idea of an Australian points-based quota system.

This, as an intelligent policy response, does not qualify. Britain is so different is so many ways from Australia that only a leap of imagination into the abyss could suggest it is of any utility. This country with its larger, more diverse economy, on the edge of a continental land mass, demands an entirely different response to a huge, under-populated land mass. Not least, this country has to deal with nearly 33 million visitors, against Australia's seven million, the greater number making the tracking of illegal immigrants that much harder.

All that UKIP has managed to achieve from this imbroglio, therefore, is to tell the voters that there is nothing it can do about the migrants already in place, with nothing to suggest that they know how to deal with migrants yet to come.

Unsurprisingly, therefore, the controversy lasted long enough for the BBC evening news remarking on the 6pm news that the policy gap is showing once more. But then, as Complete Bastard points out, this is UKIP. The only way there isn't going to be a policy gap is to rebuild the party from scratch.

World trade: a catalogue of failure

Following on from Siemens propaganda over the weekend, where the happy Mr Maier was telling us how good the EU was for business, the European Commission has issued a press release telling us exactly the opposite.

This mea culpa, however, isn't exactly transparent – one has to read into the title which hides its light under a substantial bushel: "the 11th report on potentially trade-restrictive measures identified in the context of the financial and economic crisis". What it conceals is the catalogue of failure of the entire global trading system. 

In the 13 months covered by the report, we are told, G20 members and other key EU trading partners adopted a total of 170 new trade-unfriendly measures. The countries that have adopted the most such measures, by the way, were Russia, China, India and Indonesia. 

At the same time, only 12 pre-existing trade barriers have been removed. This means that hundreds of protectionist measures adopted since the beginning of the economic downturn continue to hamper world trade, despite the G20 commitment to easing barriers. 

This is very much a hidden failure, though. Twenty years ago, at the inception of the WTO, replacing the GATT, tariffs were still very much the issue. Then European levels typically at 20 percent. But now, with levels in the order of five percent, one might think that the problem was over (or diminishing). 

Indeed, while the process of reducing tariffs globally has been considered a successes, it has also been described as like draining a swamp. The lower water level has revealed all the snags and stumps of non-tariff barriers that still have to be cleared away. 

After thirty years of swamp draining, the stumps have started to grow. Observers are thus notingthat decades of ever tighter regulation of goods - most of which was adopted for purely domestic policy aims - have escalated regulatory protection. 

As a result, these "Non-Tariff Measures" (NTMs) – or, alternatively, technical barriers to trade (TBTs) - have become more important than tariffs. By way of background, we see that in 1995, the WTO received 386 formal notifications (complaints) of TBTs. By 2013, this had risen to 2,137 (see chart below). 

Putting clothes on this, we see the Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders (SMMT)complaining that non-tariff barriers such as different regulations and standards add over 20 percent to the cost of trading between the EU and US. Trade barriers have replaced tariffs. 

Any which way you look at them, the data suggest that restrictive measures are increasing: trade is still a long way from free and, since the global crisis of 2008, is becoming even less so. The great experiment in "free trade", of which the EU is a central part, has indeed been an almost unremitting failure. 

This puts to bed all this "motherhood and apple pie" rhetoric about free trade. We can waffle all we like about free trade areas, WTO and all the rest. Decades of labour and millions of man-hours (and not a few women hours) have simply changed the nature of the barriers which businesses encounter. 

Interestingly – or perhaps appallingly – we don't even know how to measure trade properly, or assess the impact of trade flows. 

For instance, ONS published the definitive trade statistics for 2013 recently, with much made of the trading deficit with the EU, running at £66 billion. This is out of a total deficit in goods running at £110 billion – a disastrous performance until one adds in services, whence the deficit drops to £33 billion. 

Now here's the thing. Trade in goods is geographically rooted. We can tell where our deficits in goods come from, but that is not the case with services. Much of the foreign currency which is gained from trade which qualifies as "exports" of services is earned in the City. But then international tourism also goes in that bag, so it gets extremely difficult to pin a flag on the money. 

As long as we keep goods and services in separate boxes, though, we can moan about the imbalance of, say, car sales as between the UK and Germany. But are services and goods so unrelated? It is said of Ford that they make no money out of assembling cars. Their profit comes from financing the sales, selling high-priced loans to eager buyers to let them drive their showroom-fresh dreams out of er… the showrooms.

Cars, in this context, are just the mechanism for selling loans. That makes them part of the financial services industry, at which the UK excels. While the Germans make their money screwing nuts onto bolts, we could be making more by lending their customers the money to buy them. We could, but we just don't know.

Then there is the nature of the automotive industry itself. It accounts for four percent of our GDP (£60.5 billion) and currently provides employment for more than 700,000 people in the UK.

But the thing to appreciate is that it is an automotive industry – it sells components as well as cars. The UK produced 1.6 million cars and commercial vehicles but it sold almost 2.6 million engines in 2013. And about 75 percent of components production is exported to mainland Europe.

Then, according to statistics collected by the SMMT in 2013, 2.3m new cars were registered on UK roads and we built 1.5m cars, of which 1.2m were exported. That left us to import about 2m cars. But that doesn't tell the whole story. We are the second largest premium vehicle manufacturer after Germany, so the average per car came to £20,600, while the average value of imported cars was £13,000. We exported, in value terms £24.4bn and imported £24.7bn - the deficit only £0.3bn.

Now we factor in the components, and here it gets doubly interesting. The European manufacturing industry works at a regional level. For UK-built cars, about 35 percent of components are sourced from other EU countries. But, since about £5bn-worth of UK-produced components are exported – with 75 percent to EU countries - some components come back to us, built into assembled cars. Others are exported to other countries. German cars become vehicles - so to speak - for British exports.

And that's the real reason why the industry is so nervous about the UK leaving the EU. The supply chain is so complex that no one really understands it. And with a totally integrated industry - much of it working on a "just-in-time" basis - disruption of the supply chain engendered by the loss of the single market would bring the industry to a halt, Europe-wide.

What this isn't about, therefore, is relative trading disparity. We don't know how to measure trade, we're not measuring it properly and we don't really know where it is all going. And, in terms of trying to improve trade, we're not really much better off there, either.

It seems to me, in fact, that we have a long way to go before we even begin to understand how the system really works. And as long as we have so many parties churning out their dogmas, we're not even making a start. What we mustn't do, though, is put a dirty great spanner in the works. We must be able to assure industry that, when we leave, the goods will keep flowing.