Campaign for an Independent Britain
www.FreeBritain.org.uk
NEWS RELEASE
Release time: immediate
UK has a brighter future outside the European Union
“Britain is more than a star on somebody else’s flag” –
Mark Reckless MP at CIB London rally
Leaving the European Union would open up a wealth of new trading opportunities for Britain with the rising economies of Asia and Africa, according to speakers at an anti-EU rally held on Saturday (April 2) by the cross-party Campaign for an Independent Britain (CIB).
Conservative MP Mark Reckless, lawyer Dele Ogun, economist Ian Milne and newspaper columnist Patrick O’Flynn each expressed strong support for CIB’s policy of repealing the European Communities Act 1972 and taking Britain out of the EU.
Opening the rally, CIB Chairman George West said: “The government continues its predecessor’s refusal to conduct a cost/benefit analysis of Britain’s EU membership. They say the benefits of the EU are obvious. We say the disadvantages and horrendous costs of membership are perfectly obvious to the British people. Euro-fanatic British politicians want us to think of ourselves as Europeans, citizens of the EU, first and foremost. Our clear answer to them is that this is never, ever going to happen.”
Dele Ogun said that bureaucrats and international bankers – backed by “dreamers and One-World idealists” – wanted to impose political union on both Europe and Africa, and would stop at nothing to achieve their aims. The African Union (AU), which until recently was headed by Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, was modeled closely on the EU, Mr Ogun said, with “an African Parliament, an African Central Bank and an African Court of Justice, all administered by an African Commission. Sound familiar?”
Mark Reckless MP said that the most prosperous and successful economies in Europe were Switzerland and Norway – “both independent self-governing nations outside the EU”. These countries were able to trade with the EU but were not subject to the mountain of EU regulations or costs. Belonging to the EU had dragged Britain down and even though we had opted out of the single European currency – the Euro – we still had to subsidize the debt-laden Eurozone.
“Britain is more than a star on somebody else’s flag”, Mr Reckless told the rally. “Our future prosperity demands that we govern ourselves.”
Ian Milne, who runs the think-tank Global Britain, said that the EU was “a failing regional bloc” whose “one size fits all” policies would continue to stifle economic growth and innovation. We should look instead to “an organisation of 55 independent, democratic countries that already account for over a third of global GDP and 40% of the world’s labour force – an organisation that Britain formed – the Commonwealth”. The Commonwealth was, he said, “a voluntary association of sovereign independent states – in other words the exact opposite of the EU – and we invented it!”
The Commonwealth market, Mr Milne explained, was nine times greater than that of the EU, yet successive British governments had neglected it, choosing instead to “fling billions of pounds into the bottomless pit of the European Union”. In fact the annual cost to the UK of belonging to the EU was 4,000 times more than the cost of belonging to the Commonwealth!
Daily Express columnist Patrick O’Flynn praised the CIB as “courageous battlers against the Brussels empire” and said that due to CIB’s tireless work over the past four decades Britain had become “an anti-EU country”, as letters from Daily Express readers showed. Almost 400,000 readers had signed up to endorse the newspaper’s “Get Britain out of the EU” campaign – more than the entire membership of the Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Labour parties combined.
However, he added, other than the Express, anti-EU campaigners were still operating “in an overwhelmingly hostile media environment”. The media, and especially the BBC, were strongly pro-EU and therefore unrepresentative of the British people.
David Cameron had promised to “repatriate sovereignty” but this was “nothing more than a fantasy”, Mr O’Flynn said. “There is only one direction that sovereignty goes, and that’s from Britain to Brussels.” He said it was likely that Labour leader Ed Milliband would try to outflank the Conservatives before the next general election by offering the British people a referendum on EU membership. CIB and the entire anti-EU movement had to start preparing now, so that we are ready if a referendum comes.
Mr O’Flynn promised that the Express, the first newspaper to explicitly call for British withdrawal from the EU, would stand firm in its policy. “The Express is back where it belongs – fighting for an independent Britain.” And, he added, “you can count on us –we’re in this for the long haul.”
He said he was reminded of the Gloria Gaynor song “I will survive”, particularly the chorus which he felt summed up what should be Britain’s attitude to the EU: “Go on now go, walk out the door, just turn around now, ‘cos you’re not welcome any more..”
-ENDS
Editor’s note: The Campaign for an Independent Britain (CIB) is a cross-party organisation campaigning for British sovereignty and democracy. CIB committee members include Conservative MPs Philip Hollobone and Mark Reckless, and former Labour MP Nigel Spearing.
Press contacts – Campaign for an Independent Britain:
George West, CIB Chairman, Tel: 0116 287 4622, Email: GeorgeC.West@talktalk.net,
Andy Smith, CIB Press Officer, Tel: 07737 271676, email: press@eurosceptic.org.uk
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