I am traveling through Europe at the moment. I have been to France, Spain and Italy, all very nice countrys with their own individual cultures and customs. The people in all of these countries like the people in every other European country are proud of their countries and very patriotic. I have seen far more flags hanging outside the houses than I see every day in Scotland or England for that matter. These people are very proud of the fact that they live in independent countries within the family of the European Union.
There is a constant debate going on in Scotland at the moment by people who just can’t accept the fact that the majority of people who voted in last Week’s referendum wished to continue to be part of that family of nations. They keep making unsubstantiated statements like “I do not want to leave one union ,only to find that I do not have independence within another union” or that “I do not want to be part of the EU because it is undemocratic” or “I do not want to be ruled by unelected commissioners” All of these statements are nonsense .
Firstly ,every country in the EU is in its own right independent, unless ,like Scotland it is already part on a Union ,the host country of which it is a member. Every single one of these countries can at any time and with the democratic consensus of its people, leave the EU. No one forces them to be a member. The UK has just done that.
Next , the EU has one of the most democratic systems on the planet and its systems exist for the sole benefit of its citizens.
The favourite of the less able to think critics is the commissioner system as everyone seems to think that as unelected officials, they are responsible for making laws. Well nothing could be further from the truth. There are 28 countries in the EU and each one of them through their elected representatives are entitled to choose a commissioner so there is 28 commissioners. The job of a commissioner is to investigate and to suggest/advise on matters of law/ concern and to do this they all have committees. They are each given an area of responsibility for example the European Human rights act. It is their responsibility to take evidence from all the different countries regarding their particular remit. They all meet once a week and decide on what to take forward to the next stage, and this is the important bit because the next stage is to put this research before the elected members of the European parliament and also to each of the 28 members, independent parliaments. Now if that is not democracy working then I do not know what is.
Now it would appear that a lot of this misinformed criticism comes from the left leaning element of the independence movement and I have to wonder at the logic behind some of this criticism as it was this attitude and the fact that quite a lot of these people did not vote to remain that could have seen us here in Scotland without the fantastic majority we did actually get ,to remain and therefore deprive us of the opportunity we now have to go once again for independence and instead leave us to languish in the clutches of a real undemocratic state , the UK.
One thing these left wing opponents of being (as they erroneously call it) in an undemocratic union might like to reflect on is that no doubt many of them are in trade unions who have the most undemocratic voting systems of any union on the planet.
So I will always be an independent Scot I will do what I can to achieve this independence of my country . I will not stoop to the depths of depravity and Xenophobia exhibited by groups like Britain First. I will welcome people to this country as people from all over the World have welcomed Scots who have managed to make their mark on these countrys.
I am a proud Scot and a proud European