Vote leave to benefit from a world of opportunity Telegraph View

There is no doubt that since 1973, the country has prospered. Indeed, we joined the Common Market because we thought it was the answer to the economic malaise that had led to Britain being dubbed “the sick man of Europe”.

But all industrialised countries are wealthier than they were then, not just those in Europe. Arguably, the economic and financial changes wrought during the 1980s, together with the decline of trade union power, contributed far more to our GDP growth than membership of the Common Market.

Is it seriously being suggested that had we continued to function as an independent nation for the past 43 years like, say, Australia or Japan, we would today be the impoverished off-shore neighbour of a continental powerhouse? We cannot be sure; but there is no reason to believe so.

We are told membership is essential because it provides access to a market of 500 million people; yet there is a market of six billion people beyond its borders and nothing would stop us continuing to trade with Europe anyway. Other non-EU countries trade more with the single market than we do but don’t have to pay into the EU budget for the privilege of doing so.

A world of opportunity is waiting for a fully independent Britain. This country is a leading economic power, its language is global, its laws are trusted and its reputation for fair dealing is second to none. To say we cannot thrive free of the EU’s constraints is defeatist and flies in the face of this country’s great mercantile traditions.

But while the economic rationale for membership was the key argument behind the movement to take us into the Common Market, there were other motivations, too. After the Second World War and the end of Britain’s role as a colonial power, the country was politically and diplomatically adrift. Its predicament was summed up by the US secretary of state Dean Acheson with the phrase: “Great Britain has lost an empire and has not yet found a

role.”

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Our last chance to escape from the disaster movie unfolding across Europe: RICHARD LITTLEJOHN on the stark choice facing Britain in Thursday's referendum

 

David Cameron,  Prime Minsiter of Great Britain 2010 -2016

 

The sun will come up on Friday morning whatever the result of the referendum.  But 

 Leave or Remain, Britain will never be the same country again.

We face a stark choice. Do we vote to become once more the ultimate masters of our own destiny, with the power to make our laws and control our own borders?

Or do we conclude that we are incapable of running our own affairs and are better off as a meek dependency of an ever-expanding European superstate?

That's the nub of the argument, not the wildly alarmist horror stories which have characterised the risible propaganda pumped out by Remain. This has always been about democracy and self-determination, not money. You can't put a price on independence and national sovereignty.

Only a fool would predict the result with any certainty, even at this late stage. But if Remain prevails, we will have missed an historic opportunity to escape from the disaster movie unfolding across Europe. The EU has brought economic ruin to some member states and condemned a generation of young people to a lifetime of unemployment.

Angela Merkel's suicidal, unilateral decision to invite millions of Middle Eastern and North African migrants to take advantage of Europe's open borders and advanced welfare systems will have cultural and demographic repercussions for decades to come.

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George Soros: EU exit risks 'black Friday' , The Guardian and MSN. More scare tactics from the Remain Campaign

 

George Soros, the man who nearly banhkrupted Great Britain in 1992,

The world’s most famous currency speculator has warned that a vote on Thursday for Britain to leave the EU would trigger a bigger and more damaging fall for sterling than the day he forced Britain out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism almost a quarter of a century ago.

George Soros, writing in the Guardian, said a Brexit vote would spark a ‘black Friday’ for the UK, but the devaluation of sterling would bring none of the benefits to the economy that it enjoyed after it dropped out of the ERM on 16 September 1992 – Black Wednesday.

He said that, as in 1992, there would be big financial gains for speculators who had bet on the UK leaving the EU but that such an outcome would leave “most voters considerably poorer”.

Soros said that unlike after Black Wednesday, there was little scope for a cut in interest rates, the UK was running a much larger current account deficit, and exporters would be unable to exploit the benefits of a cheaper pound due to the uncertainty caused by a vote to leave the EU.

“Sterling is almost ­certain to fall steeply and quickly if leave wins the referendum,” Soros said. “I would expect this devaluation to be bigger and also more disruptive than the 15% ­devaluation that occurred in September 1992, when I was fortunate enough to make a ­substantial profit for my hedge fund investors at the expense of the Bank of England and the British government.”

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Remain’s models are built on poor foundations Roger Bootle, Telegraph and MSN

The Treasury, and some other bodies, have subjected the Brexit option to trial by macro-economic model. Various assumptions were fed into a series of equations which, on the basis of past experience drawn from a number of countries, are supposed to embody wisdom about how the key economic variables will respond. 

The model whirred and then spewed out forecasts for our post-Brexit future.
These methods are unsuitable for assessing the impact of such a seismic politico-economic event. Moreover, the assumptions that have been plugged into the models have typically been bizarre. For instance, the Treasury study assumed no regulatory changes. 

The Treasury's models made some surprising assumptions

Equally, it assumed we would not be able to do any new trade deals with the EU or anyone else. Nevertheless, we would continue to impose the EU’s tariff on imports from the rest of the world. No wonder this exercise concluded Brexit would cause an economic loss from reduced trade.

This conclusion derives further loss from lower investment and even weaker productivity growth. But if trade does not fall, there is no reason for these effects to occur.

To these trade-related effects is added the impact of uncertainty, which will supposedly persuade people and companies to defer spending. Yet if there is a loss of confidence after Brexit, the responsibility for this will rest with the Prime Minister and Chancellor for spreading pessimism about our prospects outside the EU.

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