Our membership in the EU still matters!

I’ve noticed that lately, the Guardian has strengthened the virtual voice of some Eurosceptics by allowing them to blog on their comment is free website. This week alone, two of the contributors were an MEP from the UK Independence Party (whose role is an oxymoron in itself) and a senior figure from the Europhobe think tank Open Europe. That is, of course, the Guardian’s prerogative. But it reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend a couple of days ago. In between a couple of pints she laid out the question: If we left the EU now, would it really matter?

After two years in this country, I really get the island mentality. As much as I would like to change it, it seems that a lot of even my most pro-European friends simply still think of “Europe” when they talk about the continent. And after 60 years of peace and 36 years of membership of the European Union, I can also understand why the benefits of this membership are sometimes taken for granted. So what would change if the UK left the EU (as Cameron’s Conservatives still sometimes threaten to do?)

The 1.6 million British citizens who currently live in another EU country would lose their right to do so. The 7,000 British students who take part in the ERASMUS exchange every year would no longer be entitled to participate in it. The rules of the single market, which is Britain’s best hope to find a way out of the current recession, would no longer be co-decided by a British Government. The 50 million visits made by the British to the continent every year would become difficult and more expensive.

Not only the rest of Europe, but also the US would probably look at the UK with some bewilderment. The role of being the bridge between Europe and the US would no longer suit a country that quite frankly would have affronted and rejected its neighbours by leaving the Union. And while the times of the British Empire are simply over and will not be won back by a trip into isolation, this isolation would certainly weaken the UK’s role in the world.

Britain does not only play an important part in Europe, it also is an important part of it. Europe is not about living next to each other, it’s about living together. As long as this idea is alive, membership in the European Union still matters. We should remember that for the upcoming European Elections on 4th June.

The problem with politicial jokes

On International Women's Day I was proud to be out canvassing with our great Labour candidate for the mayoral election in Doncaster, Sandra Holland. That election falls on the same day as the European elections in which I am a candidate. Women will make up half of the Labour Euro candidates this year. Contrast that with the number of women Conservative MEPs: two after the 2004 election, down to one now, and she is standing down in June!

This weekend, events took place across Europe as part of the Party of European Socialists' day of action for gender equality. To coincide with International Women's Day it was a chance to highlight the common issues that we will be campaigning on in the run up to the European Elections on 4^th June.

The Party of European Socialists manifesto http://www.pes.org/downloads/PES-Manifest_EN.pdf , highlights important issues like human trafficking and sexual exploitation that blight our society and can only be addressed at the European level. Only the PES manifesto, not those of the Conservative or Liberal groups, specifically addresses gender equality issues.

I am relishing this opportunity to contrast our agenda with the record of the UK Independence Party's Godfrey Bloom, one of Yorkshire's MEPs. On being nominated by his UKIP colleagues to sit on the Women’s Committee in the European Parliament, he said; "I just don't think they clean behind the fridge enough". He added; "I am here to represent Yorkshire women who always have dinner on the table when you get home. I am going to promote men's rights", and pointed out that “no self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would employ a lady of childbearing years.”

As they say, the problem with political jokes is that sometimes they get elected. But we cannot afford for the political needs of women to be treated as a joke.

David Cameron can't be allowed to position himself as the family-friendly party leader on the side of women. We cannot allow the Tories back into government to fulfil their pledge to withdraw Britain from the European Social Chapter, so undermining the legal framework which protects maternity and paternity rights, the status of part-time and fixed-term workers, and gender equality legislation. We must call them on it.

We will have no excuses if that “nice”, free market and eurosceptic Mr Cameron is allowed to sneak into Downing Street without women knowing what the Tory agenda would really mean for them. There are lots of women voters still to talk to. We have plenty of work to do.