How the EU gives us Freedom

I want to talk about freedom for a moment.

These days I live and work very happily in China. But living in China I live at the pleasure of the government, my rights to stay, work, own property, even marry or have children are all at their discretion and can be taken from me at any time. Even when they let me I need to pay my way, and wade through oceans of bureaucracy. The same would be true if I lived in Russia, India, and even the US or Canada or Australia, albeit in more subtle ways.

In the EU I have freedom.

A boy from Edinburgh could go on holiday to Austria, fall in Love with a girl from Amsterdam, get married on a Greek island, move to Berlin and get a job and a house, and raise a family. All without ever asking permission of bureaucrats and living under fear those rights could be revoked. That is what being part of the EU gives all of us.

The Leave campaign talk about freedom a lot, the freedom to control the rules of finance and trade, set our own laws, close our borders, etc. All those are types of freedom I suppose. But I am not rich enough or powerful enough to ever really influence those things one way or another, so I care less about those freedoms. What I care about is the freedom to live my life as I choose, the freedom to travel, live, work and love where I choose. That is the freedom the EU gives me. And it gives to you.

Even if you care about nothing else vote to stay, and vote for that freedom.