[Margaret Pilkington]

Rena, it was worth waiting for...and I hope your computer problems stay sorted.

No, we are not self sufficient, but that does not mean we have to go 'cap in hand' to the EU...and yes of course the rich man is always going to buy more than a poor man...but he is always always going to be on the lookout for a competitive price......and I beleive that the EU can prevent us from providing a competitive price by increasing the amount of red tape that businesses have to wade through.
The EU has also been seen to be biased in favour of nations other than the UK when we have been looking to participate in trade deals........Siemens got subsidies that made their rolling stock more competitive than Bombardier which produces similar products in this country(that is only one example...I am sure there are many more).

Now this club we are in.....if it seeks to use such underhand tactics, then we have to ask why we are in it...and whether the benefits are really worth the costs (personally I don't think they are).
I think that there is a general continental dislike of the UK.......I think that they see us as upstarts... the French cherry pick which rules they will follow and which they won't and seem to get away with it...whereas the Brits follow the EU rules to the letter.

As for still having to contribute as being a part member and having no say in what happens...well as far as I can see we have made absolutely NO impact on any of the votes we have made in the past(none of them went in our favour....this is because we are a small country so influence is negligible)...so there will be no change there at all.

Yes, you are right...we can go it alone. No-one says that this is going to be easy, but at least we will not be dictated to by the unelected bureaucrats in Brussels...as to what we can do.....who we can employ, on what terms we can employ.
Maybe we could even have our own bill of rights which will allow us to deport those who come here and commit crimes......other countries within the EU seem to manage to do this but for some reason we can't.

I never wanted to be in the EU.....and this our last chance to determine our own destiny.
The so called 'deal' that our esteemed PM had managed to get out of the snakes in the EU is worth less than a sheet of used Bronco toilet paper.......and believe me whether we vote to stay in or come out....you can guarantee those over on the continent will poo on us from a great height for having the audacity to even think of confronting the sclerotic, bloated, corrupt organisation.

Now, I need to go and have a lie down and let my blood pressure come back down to normal levels...right now it has a yellow duster in its hands and is knocking cobwebs off the ceiling.