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Wednesday 22 June 2016

A Game of Two Halves. Should We Stay or Should We Go?

It's been a shit campaign hasn't it? It was never going to be thrills and spills but I never thought it would be as turgid as it turned out to be.  Then again I didn't think it was going to be almost exclusively a Tory tag team match between Cameron/Osborne and Farage/Johnson/Gove with most of the Tory press acting as cheerleaders.  It felt a bit like a party I hadn't been invited to, thank goodness and also thank goodness it will be over tomorrow night.  

I'm going down to get my vote in early tomorrow morning before work.  I seriously thought about abstaining but I'm in folks. 

Why?  At the start of the campaign I just had a hunch that it was in the best interests of the British people and I've heard nothing to change my mind.  If anything my view has hardened. Not because I've been inspired by the remain campaign camp but more because of the leave campaign.  From their pronouncements that leaving the EU will mean more money being available to spend on public services to how terrible it is the influx of EU economic migrants have kept wages down.   Like the Tories really care about public services and higher wages being paid by British businesses.  

Sickening of all was their "reclaim our  borders" mantra and the way they deliberately played on people's ignorance and prejudices by blurring the lines between EU Economic and non EU humanitarian and (admittedly) illegal migration.  I will never forgive them for that.  

Not that I was impressed by most of what the Remain camp's campaign, for example the veiled threat And pretty much all the business leaders say we should remain including double billionaires Richard Branson and Alan Sugar.  What, so we can have more austerity measures?

Labour were shit of course although Jeremy Corbyn eventually told it how it is (for most of us anyway).  That said, as helpfully pointed out by The Express and The Telegraph he really should have supported Brexit.  Really, who cares? 

Do I trust the EU more than this Tory government?  I'm not sure but it sometimes feels like the EU is the only thing able to stop the Tories from riding rough shod over anybody other than the rich and powerful.  Actually, maybe I'm being a bit niece (I've been accused of worse) but yes I do.  

I accept that if the country votes to remain we will continue to have problems with bureaucracy, waste, accountability and economic migration but on the other hand if the country votes to leave we will have problems with with bureaucracy, waste, accountability and economic migration.   The outers say the EU is bad because the British don't have enough say how it's run.  Really?  Don't we have MEP's?  

Of course the idea is that if we leave because of our democracy we can all have more say about who decides things on our behalf.  It really is about time to dispel this myth that we all have a say over who governs the UK.  Our electoral system is broken.  In our first past the post system only those voting in marginal constituencies have any say in our General Elections.  I wasn't swayed by the outers anti-democratic EU card.

Yeah, totally uninspiring.  I know my reasons for remaining in the EU are not very good and maybe it would be better to leave the EU but to some it up it all just felt like I was being conned and I just decided the outers were trying to con me more than the inners.

Yep, stay in, reform blah blah blah.

Anyway, as many people know I'm a betting man and I love to make a prediction.  I made the mistake of going against my gut instinct at the last General Election but I'm not falling for that again.  The last time I looked the polls were very close but I think they've got it wrong.  I'm going for a relatively easy win for Remain, 55% to 45%.

You heard it here first and Friday's Euro lottery numbers will be ............

Do I really care? Actually, not really.

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