Actually, ALL the main parties (Conservatives, Labour and Lib Dems) are fighting to stay in Europe. However, all 3 parties have given "free rein" for individual MPs to campaign for brexit. So tories that want to leave are attacking tories that want to stay, labour MPs that want to leave are taking advantage of the situation to take pot-shots at tories, etc. BTW, the Greens are campaigning to stay in too. You can see the full list of groups on both sides of the debate here (note the overwhelmingly larger number of pro-remain groups over pro-brexit groups!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campa...om_European_Union_membership_referendum,_2016
Basically, it is in brexit's interest to stir things up and make the situation sound as disharmonious as possible, because fights get much much more media coverage than people agreeing with each other! (It's a bit like the US elections, where Trump makes some new nonsensical statement on a daily basis which wins him another round of headlines)
Also, as an independent study today showed, the media are biased towards brexit because of the bias of their owners, so it may sound as if the two "sides" of the argument are equally strong or even that brexit has a better "case". Also, since the BBC and other institutions are required to provide "balanced" coverage, they're forced to ALWAYS put a Brexiter up against a Remainer no matter what the story.
The other issue is that many people who "hate the tories" are presenting the referendum as an opportunity to stick the boot into them by voting "against" the government - that's like somebody who doesn't like biscuits protesting by going on hunger strike.
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As for the decision itself, well there are dozens of benefits of remaining, and virtually no benefits of leaving (though you wouldn't guess it from the media coverage).
When you dig into it, you find that the arguments always go along the same lines (one of two patterns):
PATTERN 1:
"Remain" camp brings forward a survey, report, white paper or expert in a particular field to provide fact-based data as to why leaving would be worse than staying. Brexit camp rebuffs immediately, by attacking one of:
A) The motive of the person/group behind the report (never mind that in most cases it's their JOB to provide that kind of analysis; in other words, it would be the worst possible advert for their competence if they made up porkies)
B) The "factual" nature of the report: brexit claim that "facts" are "opinions" and present a "counter opinion". Much like the people who claim that global warming doesn't exist claim that their "opinion" is as valid as the thousands of scientists who present reams of data to support the fact that it does
C) The validity of the data point itself as a consideration for remain/brexit decision-making
PATTERN 2:
"Brexit" camp make something up, quite often literally out of thin air, that doesn't stand up to fact checking. This is pointed out, often with very deep, comprehensive analysis, yet they continue to lean on the made up "fact" or "statistic" going forward.
For example, the supposed figure of £350 million a week being diverted to Brussels. That figure doesn't actually take into account:
- The value of the rebate (lots of cash is returned to the UK each week thanks to its membership of the EU)
- The value of what the UK gets for its £350 million (brexit attribute a £0 value to this when discussing the £350 million figure)
- The value of the UK being in the EU (brexit also attribute a £0 value to this when discussing the £350 million figure)
The brexit side have been called on this time and time again, dozens if not hundreds of times so far, yet they continue to repeat the figure. Why? Because in an age of near-zero attention spans, people aren't studying the issue sufficiently to be able to debunk such spurious claims.
Another example: Boris Johnson mentioned just the other day that the EU banned bananas being sold in bunches of more than 3. It takes 30s in a supermarket to debunk that notion.
What does the UK get out of being in Europe?
- Visa free travel across Europe
- Relatively strong currency
- More stable, harmonious relations with its neighbours and participation in collective defense arrangements
- Cheaper mobile roaming fees (soon to be abolished entirely across the EU)
- Better worker protection
- Stronger human rights (even if the UK's trying to wriggle out of this particular directive, that's a separate exercise from remain/brexit)
- Right to live and work in any other EU country
- Right to study in any other EU country (more and more important as the price of being a "home" student shoots up; many EU countries still have subsidised or free university education, and the number of UK citizens studying in other EU countries is shooting up as a result)
- Some say over the future political/economic/legal future of Europe (if the UK leaves it will still be subject to a mass of red tape, like Norway is, only without any say over it)
- Membership of a massive trading block, benefitting from trade agreements negotiated on a pan-European basis
- Free medical care in other EU countries with the European Health Insurance Card
- Over 100,000 trained medical staff from other EU nations boosting the ranks of the NHS (it would be a nightmare visa scenario if the UK left the EU)
- (That's just off the top of my head - I'm sure there could be another hundred bullets here)
Basically, if you never ever plan to leave the UK for the rest of your life (even to go on holiday) AND you don't have savings that could be eroded by another economic crash, AND nobody in your family or your extended family might benefit from any of the above points, AND you're old (because a recession is going to hurt growth which will affect pension and job prospects) then MAYBE just maybe brexit could be tempting.
In every other circumstance - and regardless of how much you might personally hate/loathe Cameron and the tories - the only LOGICAL decision is to vote remain.
In short, the EU referendum vote should be a reasoned choice, not a protest vote against the government of the day. The latter won't be around very long (in the grand scheme of things) but a vote to leave will hurt the UK for many generations to come.
