Let’s get rid of EU austerity

The EU preaches austerity to its member states yet is itself a spendthrift organisation. The UK is meant to adhere to the 3% maximum budget deficit the EU seeks to enforce on Euro members, though all the last 3 different governments have broken the EU limit. Meanwhile the EU insists on us sending more and more tax revenue to them as they think they can spend it better than we can, usually outside our own country.

The EU sees no contradiction between telling us we need to cut our spending and raise our taxes, and demanding we send them more money to spend.Out of the EU we would be able to choose our own budget deficit level without need to report in to the EU. More importantly we will get our £15 billion back that we send to them to spend. Around £5bn of this is spent by them in the UK and the rest is spent in other countries.

The Leave campaign has made clear we would want to pay farmers, universities and others the same sums as they get today from the EU out of the money we get back. That leaves us £10 bn to spend. We could banish austerity in the private sector with tax cuts, or spend more in the public sector to give more of a real boost to spending than recent budgets have allowed. I am working on a suitable package. This is your opportunity to influence it. What balance of tax cuts and spending increases would you like? What are your priorities?

This could be one of the clinchers for the referendum. Many people would like the public finances to allow more for good purposes.Getting our money back from the EU would allow us to banish austerity and run our own affairs.