The EU: An electoral black hole

The NHS is as a symbol of labour’s legacy is as we all know something that they love to hang an election campaign on. However this election won’t be defined by Labour’s unending pledges to rescue our NHS or indeed the Tories’ similar ode to continue with a balanced ‘economic plan.’ It will be remembered as the election that saw the electorate even more divided than the last and most likely propelled forward an agenda of electoral reform. We will also remember this election as UKIP’s rise.

It is no surprise to me that an anti-EU party like UKIP have come to the fore this election, no surprise at all. Every established party has shied away from questions surrounding the EU and our membership thereof; what membership means for the medium-sized business owner for example, or the average ‘bricky.’ This vacuum of ignorance left by political classes, as Nigel Farage likes to call his opponents, has meant that UKIP’s brand of regressive politics can flourish.  Although the public somehow feel and sense the EU and its impact on them, the sad fact is they don’t understand the extent to which it determines domestic policy. 

One of Labour’s election pledges is to repeal parts of the Health and Social Care Act 2012 in order to prevent, as Andy Burnham said this week, ‘a supermarket NHS,’ type scenario. Well unfortunately for Andy and According to Norman Warner the Health Minister of State in the Lords, in order to repeal the bill to the extent that, excludes the possibility of putting out to tender contracts to outside providers, the NHS would need another ‘top down reorganisation.’ And no one wants that Andy. This is due to the fact that under EU competition law there can be no barriers to competition unless the sector can be proven to be operating under the legal principle of solidarity. In lemans terms, if you open the capitalistic can of worms then you cannot bloody well close it again.

Another of Labour’s pledges was on immigration, indeed Ed carved it into granite this week he’s that serious about it. Of course he wasn’t daft enough to lay any targets because they will never be met. Now although Immigration may not concern many voters, it does concern a whopping 57% of us according to Migration Watch’s latest poll and until very recently the main parties, have shied away from connecting EU membership and immigration levels publicly. The working population have identified this vacuum in the political conversation. I feel has somehow been multilaterally deemed as an uncouth topic of discussion and leaned on the shoulders of a welcoming Nigel Farage. The discussions in and around immigration, despite being tarred with the ‘racist’ brush, I have found to be more nuanced than just a mob like, divisive shouting match. A recent research paper from Dustmann et al, found that for every 1% increase in the number of migrants to the UK of working age, a 0.6% depressesion in the wages of the poorest 5% workers occurred. However, overall immigration didn’t affect average wages and indeed lead to an increase in the wages of the high end earners.

So whilst the main parties have shied away from questions surrounding the EU, they have failed to acknowledge this narrative which is a reality for our nations working poor, the cause is quite frankly irrelevant. The working poor are getting poorer and the wealthiest are living it up. I’m not sure anyone really believes that after May 7^th this will alter.