One of the most disconcerting aspects of modern British society is the lack of social responsibility. It is a pervasive trait that can be traced back to the creation of the Welfare State after World War Two, and the authoritarian rule that is associated with many aspects of socialist thinking.

The Welfare State effectively took away individual people’s responsibility for the society in which they were members, and placed it in the hands of the State. To pay for this, and to continue to pay for this Welfare State, it is necessary to maintain high taxation.

It is, perhaps useful to digress briefly to discuss the issue of taxation in more detail. The government has taken the rather patronising position that it can spend people’s own money more wisely. As a result of this, people want to feel the effect of the government spending their money wisely (such as on health-care and education). The problem is, this means that issues, such as ending famine in the Third World, are side-lined. In general, the government, by appropriating responsibility to itself, is expected to be responsible for all the woes that afflict society and the world. However, some charity (such as ending poverty) can only be undertaken effectively by individuals and not by the State; too many people slip through the cracks.

Paradoxically, this is an example of excessive individualism. The State, by removing individual responsibility for the woes of society, ensures that ordinary people are free from guilt; people can then concentrate on themselves, and themselves alone.

This brings me to my main point: the government, by appropriating social responsibility for itself has eroded the idea that individuals have to take an active role within this society. We have a society based on rights, but without the responsibility to complement them. This means that there is now a destructive ideology that all the problems of society have to be, and should be solved by government. The effect of this is ever increasing authoritarianism. It is only in this way that the State can solve everything that it is now expected to be responsible for (by its own actions through the foundation of the Welfare State).

What we need to do is to return to the idea of social responsibility. However, this cannot be achieved unless the government is willing to accept that it has to dismantle its spider-web of bureaucracy and interference in everyday and ordinary life.

If people keep hold of their own money, and are made aware of the fact that they are part of a society to which they owe something, people are more likely to take responsibility of their own for the problems that are prevalent all around us. This was the case in the nineteenth century when groups of people organised themselves into Friendly Societies in order to make everyone’s life better. Notably, these and similar organisation provided an almost national, but independent health-care and educational network.

It is time that we realised that ordinary people have the power to do good in the world as individuals in society; governments merely complicate this fact.

It’s very simple. The EU costs a lot of money and has no benefits. In a cost/benefit analysis, there are no benefits. The costs are billions of pounds per year, and more. My argument therefore will not focus on the costs, but demonstrate that there are no benefits.

Costs	Benefits
£5 billion per year cash, plus billions not in the budget (e.g. payments to the EU Overseas Aid budget and payments to the CAP), plus more billions of cash earnt from VAT. Tariff on external trade Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) Excessive regulation The overall costs to the UK economy have been estimated at £60 billion/year, or £1000/person (see below).	None.

What is the purpose of the EU?

Ask a different person, get a different answer. Not even the EU itself knows. I will go through all the answers I have heard, and debunk them.

1. Stopping Wars

“Internal cooperation prevents conflicts”, “Unity against an external threat”

The idea is that unifying Europe, either symbolically, or really unifying into a single state, would reduce the probability of war.

A single state would indeed stop wars between states, there being no separate states to war, but may encourage civil wars. However, it does not look like the EU will become a single state any time soon, and this would be a bad idea anyway: extending the power of a massively corrupt and unaccountable organisation would not be good for democracy.

As it exists at the moment, the EU has no effect on stopping wars. Rather like an anti-tiger pebble (”I don’t see any tigers. The pebble must be working”). Europe is rather different now compared to sixty years ago. Does anyone seriously believe that abolishing the EU, or the UK withdrawing from it, will increase the probability of war in Western Europe at all? The probability of war in Western Europe is practically zero. What would anyone gain from war? States have become more democratic, and people have realised that wars don’t make them better off, unlike trade, which does. Nowadays, we don’t have wars: we trade. Either way, the EU has no effect.

2. Common control over resources

The EU grew out of the European Coal and Steel Community, which was intended to establish common control over resources. Nowadays, people have realised governments should not be the major players in commerce. Resources should be privately controlled, not government controlled. And in the EU, they mostly are anyway. This argument is also out of date.

3. A single currency

Whether we should join the Euro or not is not a simple topic (I want a fixed money supply, with a mint but no central bank, so I don’t want to join the Euro because it is just like our current currency, but we wouldn’t control the central bank). I shall only say that states which did not join have performed better since. We are not members of the Euro at the moment, so leaving the EU would not affect us in this respect.

4. “Economic stability”, “Economic security”

I do not see how the EU is supposed to contribute to economic stability. This argument seems to be rather like the argument that the EU prevents wars. Does anyone really think people will become uncertain about the UK economy if we leave the EU? We trade comfortably with the rest of the world already.

5. “Political cohesion”

Another vague advantage. What exactly is “political cohesion” and what’s good about it? Could we have an example?

6. A “counterbalance to US power”, “Participation in an emerging political bloc”

Do you mean an economic or military counterbalance?

If you mean an economic counterbalance, then I respond that this is not necessary. People who use phrases like “the EU should be a major player in world economics” don’t understand economics. Commerce is performed by individuals and companies, not states or blocs of states. It makes no difference whether those individuals and companies are in a single country, a group of countries, or a super-state. Governments should not be “players” in economics: they should leave that to private individuals and companies. It makes no difference to trade whether it occurs within or across arbitrary lines on a map.

Why exactly do we need to “counterbalance” the US economy? What do you mean by “counterbalance”? Governments should want to improve the wealth of their citizens. It just doesn’t matter how much people in America earn compared to people in Europe. And how does the EU function as this “counterbalance”? It doesn’t, because the phrase is meaningless.

If you mean a military counterbalance, then why do you want this? To rival the US or China as a superpower, the cost would require pooling of resources: you would need a single European army.

Why would you want to be a superpower? How would a more powerful army improve the life of people in the UK? Europe and the UK have been entirely unaffected by America’s dominance. Nowadays armies are merely for defence. “Political blocs” are increasingly irrelevant to peoples’ lives, and rightly so: trade is what improves people’s lives.

7. A single foreign policy

This would entail a foreign policy which sometimes does not benefit the UK, and sometimes does. If it did, we would have done it anyway, and if it didn’t, we would be better off without a single foreign policy.

“A single foreign policy” is often construed to mean we would have more negotiating clout as one bloc. But why would this be the case? It wouldn’t.

8. Free movement of the factors of production

Labour and capital are free to move within the EU (land isn’t, obviously).

Capital flows could be allowed without EU membership: allowing free trade doesn’t require membership of an organisation costing billions of pounds. The UK would just abolish all taxes on imports and exports because this would be in the interests of UK citizens. Other countries will realise it is in the interests of their citizens to also abolish all taxes on international trade.

Concerning immigration to the UK, I will argue in another post that control of immigration (i.e. not free movement of labour) is necessary to reduce the UK population, and that we should aim to do this. It is in Britain’s interest to only allow as much immigration as emigration, and pick the most skilled workers.

Concerning emigration, this should be left up to other countries. They will do what is in their interests.

9. Free movement of tourists

Free movement of tourists to and from the UK can be established without membership of the EU. It is already possible to travel to many countries outside the EU without applying for a visa in advance - why should it be any different when we are not a member of the EU?

10. “Harmonisation” or consistent regulations

Having the same regulations in EU states is unnecessary, as shown by trade with countries outside the EU proceeding just fine. If country A has a regulation, then it is the responsibility of firm in country B to conform to that regulation if it wants to sell in country A. There is no need to for country B to have the regulation as well.

11. The CAP ensures self-sufficiency.

This is unnecessary. If there really was a war (!), it would not be difficult to grow enough food to survive, assuming that the population density is not too high. It is the responsibility of governments to ensure it does not get too high. In any case, if there really was a war (!), and even assuming it was not a war within Europe (!), we would not be able to rely on importing food from within Europe. Britain is an island, and this has always protected us. We will need enough space to grow our own food whether we are members of the EU or not. In the mean time, we should buy our food from wherever it is cheapest, just like we should buy everything else.

If you have heard more claimed justifications for the existence of the EU, please add them to the comments.

Costs of the EU

• The EU is essentially a protectionist, anti-free-trade, anti-globalisation organisation. It is a hangover from before the 1980s, when policy-makers finally realised that production should be left to the market. Rather than facilitating trade, it makes it harder. It puts ring around an arbitrary group of countries: The external tariff on all imports from outside the EU increases living costs for people in the EU. It stops goods being made in countries which may have a comparative advantage in them, both inside and outside the EU. It causes allocative inefficiency. The EU should have nothing to do with commerce. Free trade requires the absence of subsidies, tariffs and treaties. We should trade with everyone, not just other members of the EU.

• The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) costs billions of pounds subsidising European farms. This drives up food prices for people (hitting the poorest most), prevents food being grown where it is most efficient (i.e. outside the EU), and stunts growth in countries outside the EU (e.g. in Africa). All subsidies should be abolished: abolishing or withdrawing from the EU is a good step towards this.

• The Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) allows overfishing. The UK should instead extend property rights: they should auction fishing rights in UK waters to private companies (with a requirement for environmental responsibility and prevention of overfishing), for them to sell on to fishermen from any country.

• Excessive regulation for no good reason is estimated to stunt growth by tens of billions of pounds per year (see below).

• Europeanisation of our law: erosion of protections of liberty such as habeas corpus and presumption of innocence.

There are other colossal problems with the EU. The staggering, almost unbelievable scale of fraud, the wasted money on projects such as the “Galileo” satellites, the cost of maintaining a pointless parliament building in Strasbourg. However, none of these are important to my argument. Even if they could be fixed (I believe the EU is unreformable), the EU would still serve no purpose and would therefore be a waste of money.

You may have noticed that I have not mentioned loss of political sovereignty and “threats to our cultural identity”. I do not need to. I do not need to labour the disadvantages of the EU because any disadvantage outweighs no advantages.

Could the UK withdraw from the EU?

Of course it could, and those who claim it would be impossible are merely creating fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) in the minds of the public. It would be easy. The European Communities Act would be repealed. The UK would stop paying money to the EU, and that would be it.

Money

Membership of the EU costs the UK at least £5 billion cash per year, not counting other costs such as bureaucracy (valued at billions). At present the UK spends £42.5 billion on secondary schools. £5 billion would fund hundreds of pounds more per pupil. If Gordon Brown really wants to bring state spending on education up to the levels of private spending, withdrawing from the EU and spending the money on something that does any good would be a start.

The Bruges Group (I recommend you read their report in full) calculates that membership stunts economic growth by a staggering £60.1 billion per year (”How much does the European Union cost Britain?”, 2007), including costs of over-regulation and CAP. Withdrawing from the EU would make everyone in the UK an average of £1000 richer per year. Even if you doubt these costs, you must concede that any cost is too much for an organisation with no benefits.

The EU is entirely pointless. It has no purpose. There are no advantages to membership. It does nothing that the UK government could not do without expensive membership. It is money down the drain, and we should withdraw immediately.

Chairman: James Wallis

Michaelmas 2007 is going to be a very exciting term with a range of interesting speakers visiting the Association. Our speaker meetings are free to all and everyone is more than welcome. Please sign up to the mailing list to receive regular updates.

The term-card is available as a PDF.

Dr Irwin Stelzer Dr Stelzer is an American economist, and the US economic and business correspondent for the Sunday Times. He has had a distinguished career in business and academia, and we are very pleased to welcome him to Cambridge. He will be ready to answer your questions! Wednesday 10th October, 7.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

Douglas Murray Douglas Murray is a journalist and political writer, and director of the Centre for Social Cohesion, a think tank. His latest book ‘Neoconservatism: Why We Need It’ was met with considerable critical acclaim, and he is a charismatic speaker with some challenging opinions. Tuesday 16th October, 8.30pm, Bennet Room, Clare

Andrew Rosindell MP Andrew Rosindell is Conservative MP for Romford, and Shadow Minister for Home Affairs. He had a great deal of experience in the Young Conservative organisation in the 1980s and early 1990s, and was appointed Shadow Minister for Home Affairs in July 2007. Wednesday 24th October, 7.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

The Rt. Hon. The Lord Walker of Worcester Tuesday 6th November, 7.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

Dr Madsen Pirie Dr Pirie is President of the Adam Smith Institute, Britain’s leading free market think-tank. In the past he has taught philosophy and logic and worked for the US House of Representatives. He is also the author of several books and has recently branched out into children’s science fiction. Wednesday 7th November, 7.30pm, Venue TBC

Brooks Newmark MP Brooks Newmark is Conservative MP for Braintree in Essex. He has had a distinguished career in business and finance. He serves on the Treasury Select Committee and the Science and Technology Select Committee, and he is co-Chairman of the Party’s ‘Women2Win’ Campaign. Friday 16th November, 7.30pm, Venue TBC

The Rt. Hon. Michael Howard QC MP Michael Howard needs no introduction, having served as Home Secretary under John Major, and led the party during the 2005 election. He has vast experience in British politics, both in government and opposition, and is CUCA’s President. He is an excellent speaker, and sure to draw a crowd! Tuesday 20th November, 7.30pm, Venue TBC

Our speakers usually stay for dinner with the committee after the event. There is a limited number of places avaliable to ordinary members. If you would like the chance to join a speaker for dinner please email

CUCA Social Events
CUCA also puts on exciting socials. These are always fantastic occasions - a great way to meet new people as well as socialise with friends.

Freshers’ Gin and Tonic Party (Casual) If you are new to Cambridge and want to find out about CUCA, this is the event for you. Free Gin and Tonics all evening. There is no dress code and the event is absolutely free to Freshers. Just rock up whenever you can and find out what CUCA is all about. Members also welcome. Monday 8th October, 8.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

Port and Cheese Party I (Black Tie) A splendid black tie event with huge amount of Port and fantastic cheese on offer. These types of event always sell out quickly, so reserve your place early. An email will be sent out when tickets are first available. (Cost: £5 for members; £7 for non-members) Sunday 28th October, 8.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

Port and Cheese Party II (Black Tie) Just one Port and Cheese Party in the term would hardly be enough! As good as the first one and almost certainly a trip to Life after it’s over. Remember - book early to avoid disappointment - places are limited! (Cost: £5 for members; £7 for non-members) Sunday 11th November, 8.30pm, Bateman Room, Caius

The Chairman’s Dinner (White or Black Tie) Speical Guest: Jeremy Hunt MP The highlight of the term - a fantastic white/black tie dinner to celebrate the Chairman’s term of office in style and welcome his successor, which a speech from our guest Conservative MP Jeremy Hunt. (Cost: TBC) Thursday 22nd November, 7pm, Emmanuel Old Library
http://anotherfoodblog.com/?p=1785

CUCA Policy Pub Meets
CUCA also holds policy discussion meetings over a few drinks in the pub. If you would like to suggest a topic to discuss, email .

Officers

CHAIRMAN: James Wallis
(Gonville and Caius College)

VICE-CHAIRMAN: Julian Arndts
(Trinty College)

JUNIOR TREASURER: Joshua Sutton
(Christ’s College)

CAMPAIGNS OFFICER: R. Valentine Stewart
(Gonville and Caius College)

SECRETARY: Mark Browne
(Downing College)

REGISTRAR: Timothy Gardiner BA
(Gonville & Caius College)
(Former Chairman (Lent 2007)

Committee

Hugo Hadlow
(St. John’s College)

Charlotte Phelps
(Trinity Hall)

Laura Phelps
(Homerton College)

Bezhan Salehy
(Selwyn College),
Former Chairman (Easter 2007)

Shamir Shah
(Downing College)

James Sharpe
(Fitzwilliam College)

Murali Vadivelu
(St John’s College)