EU seeks to punish UK for Brexit vote

UK Prime Minister Theresa May has outlined her plans for withdrawing the country from the European Union and said that Britain will leave the bloc’s single market in order to restrict immigration. She has also pointed out that a final Brexit deal would be placed before the parliament for approval. Press TV has spoken to Tony Gosling, investigative journalist, as well as Mark Thornton, senior fellow at the Mises Institute, to discuss what a hard Brexit would mean for the country.

Tony Gosling believes that it was a good move by Theresa May to “bite the bullet” and say that the country needs to get out of the EU single market, because the European Union negotiators will make things as difficult as they can for Britain.  

He said the EU is not really “an alliance of friends” and likened the entity to a kind of cult which would give “a bad time” to whoever decides to withdraw from it.

According to Gosling, the EU is bent on giving Britain a tough punishment, so that it does not set an example for other EU countries which might want to follow in its footsteps.  

The analyst noted the EU has “no interest in democracy” and it actually takes constant advantage of media to remain in control.

“So it just seems to me we have got a ratchet system effectively going on with the EU. What they have said is that they are going to only allow slower and slower integration into a political union controlled by the unelected European Commission. Now, of course, anybody that has any kind of idea of what democracy should be is dead against that,” he said.

Gosling also argued that the whole point of the European integration has been “political” meant to “bamboozle” the European countries into getting closer, from which there would be no turning back.

Gosling said Brexit vote was the first time British people were questioned about this integration to which they said “No” because they could remember what life in Britain was like before the EU owing to very strong industry and export sectors. 

The analyst further noted that ever since Britain has joined the European Union, it has faced a “horrendous trade deficit.”

“When the single market was introduced in 1992, that is to say effectively our government has got no control over goods and services moving around within the European Union. One of the pernicious things that came in 92 … [was that] the government was not able to protect British industry and we have seen a hemorrhaging both in terms of ownership and in terms of moving factories out of the country ever since,” he explained.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Gosling dismissed the European Parliament as a “theatrical shadow play,” whose members have “very little real power.”

He added that it is a wonderful “gravy train” but its members can only slow down laws that are put forward by the “unelected” European Commission.

The analyst opined that the EU was basically designed by the United States because it did not like the fact that it had to contact 30 or so different embassies to get anything done.

He concluded by saying that most European countries would be very glad to see Britain leave the bloc, mainly because it was seen across the EU as a “Trojan Horse” for US foreign policy.  

Meanwhile, the other panelist on the program, Mark Thornton maintained that Theresa May is trying to slow down the process of leaving the European Union with such statements.

He recommended that May simply extract Britain from the European Union and establish negotiations for trade only afterwards, because in that case, the Europeans wound not have any say in the whole matter and it could be done much quicker.

“And if Britain adopts free trade on its own, they will encourage the Europeans to come to the table and to give free trade arrangements between the two countries. That is the way I think she should go: get it done, cut the ties and negotiate one thing at a time because if you try to negotiate everything you are going to get nothing except delay,” he stated.

The analyst further denounced the “awful” war policies of the US and the UK, arguing that London should stop following Washington in terms of foreign policy.  

Thornton further pointed out to Britain’s other trade alternatives and recommended that it adopt a free trade policy with the rest of the world, particularly China and South Korea.

“The EU is not a free trade thing. It cost people in the UK 5,000 dollars a year and so any of the costs associated with leaving the EU are going to be made up very quickly if the UK agrees with free trade where the UK will not tax anybody’s exports, and will announce a free trade zone and no corporate income tax,” he said in conclusion.

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