Quotes About EU

People feel that the EU is heading in a direction that they never signed up to. They resent the interference in our national life by what they see as unnecessary rules and regulation. And they wonder what the point of it all is. Put simply, many ask 'why can't we just have what we voted to join - a common market?'

For years, we have been asking the E.U. to create something similar to the Russia-NATO council. Not in order to simply exchange opinions and work out recommendations, but to make decisions.

What I cannot stand in the behaviour of the E.U. with regard to Great Britain is blackmail, constant threat.

Britain outside the E.U. would be less able to respond with the speed and strength we need to tackle complex and growing cross-border threats to all our communities.

From protecting consumers to establishing common standards and promoting free trade, the E.U. plays a central role. And nation states alone cannot tackle common threats such as climate change without the co-ordination that the E.U. and other supranational institutions provide.

Personally, I would prefer Britain to remain within a more flexible E.U., with access to the single market but without the excessive regulation or constant efforts to direct social, justice, or foreign policy. But if that's not possible, I believe this country could - and should - thrive outside the E.U.

The European powers make it clear that they do not want a Muslim state, Turkey, in the European Union and are not happy about having a second Muslim state, Bosnia, on the European continent.

It's time to recognize that the EU is beyond reform and deserves to be put out of its misery.

I want to highlight that Italy, every year, sends 6 billion euros in cash to Brussels. I cannot give these 6 billion euros to Brussels and then let them damage us on the fronts of agriculture, migration, fishing, commerce and finance. Why am I giving 6 billion to receive nothing in return?

I have met people who have received E.U. funding and regretted it.

Europe is a much more complex historical, cultural, and geographical concept than is envisaged in the reduced approach by the European Union.

Since the E.U. referendum I've been keen to know more and be a bit more active. It highlighted how important politics is to our lives.

One of the greatest political delusions of our age was the idea that holding a referendum on our E.U. membership would settle the argument once and for all.

As David Cameron so brutally found out in 2015-16, there is limited appetite in Brussels to be helpful or flexible towards Britain.

Indeed, if all of humankind could cooperate, trade and work together as the nations of the EU have done, then there would be more peace, prosperity and progress on this earth.

Free from the shackles of the E.U. - and an automatic right of entry for their citizens, with or without work - we will be able to give the type of preference to brilliant scientists, academics and highly-skilled workers that we want to see more of.

From teaching, the NHS and social care, to cleaning and building, the U.K. economy depends heavily on E.U. workers. Under a Canada-style deal for the U.K./E.U., the ability for E.U. workers to live and work freely in the U.K. would stop.

We came to see the benefits for working people of common employment rights, guaranteed throughout the EU to prevent a race to the bottom. We worked together in practical ways to make cleaner beaches, protect the environment and ensure consumer rights.

The U.K. and Ireland are like-minded on E.U. matters, and the process of working together in Brussels has built an immense store of knowledge, personal relationships, and trust between our governments.

From Nato to the U.N. and the E.U., the generation that lived through the first half of the 20th century knew they needed to create a new world order. An order with rules and institutions which, however imperfect, could act both as constraints on individual countries going rogue and as catalysts for co-operation for mutual benefit.

Having decisions made not in midnight deals but in the light of objective evidence and after consulting those who will be affected should itself provide some reassurance that the EU is trying to reform itself.

Like so many of my generation and those younger, I have spent most of my life in the E.U., and my instincts were naturally for reform from within.

Whether we are in or out of the E.U., we must deliver reform at home in order to compete abroad in the 21st century.

If anyone in the E.U. thinks Italy should keep being a landing point and refugee camp, they have misunderstood.