Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

We in People Before Profit want absolutely nothing to do with some of the vile and racist forces that are campaigning for an exit from the European Union in Britain, some of whom have stoked up the sort of racist conditions and sentiment that took the life of Labour MP, Jo Cox. We must all dissociate ourselves from that. Having said that, I disagree with the consensus in the House that the way to deal with the virulent rise of racism, prejudice, islamophobia and the growth of far right forces in Europe is to stay in the European Union in the hope of reforming it. Is it not the case that the European Union is the architect of its own crisis and that it has caused the problems that have now produced such widespread disaffection? This is summed up by the comments by Jean-Claude Juncker in January 2015, when the Syriza government was first elected, that, "To suggest that everything is going to change because there is a new government in Athens is to mistake dreams for reality... There can be no democratic choice against the European treaties."

Is the problem not fundamentally that the leaders of the European Union are saying democracy has gone out the window with the European Union and that that has been compounded with the disgusting racist fortress-Europe policy that has led to the deaths of thousands of people trying to get into Europe? While Europe parades as a beacon of progress, in fact, its own racists policies vis-à-visdesperate people fleeing from Syria involves throwing them back to the Turkish Government, which is now shooting them. Last week, Syrian refugees were shot. Europe has signed an agreement with Turkey to allow that to happen and it is throwing those desperate people back to Turkey to allow it to shoot them. Is it those misguided undemocratic fortress-Europe policies and austerity policies that have created the crisis that is now consuming us? In that context, would we be better off supporting not Brexit but the left exit campaign of saying we want European internationalism - in fact, we want comprehensive internationalism that goes beyond the boundaries of Europe - if we are to undermine and defeat the dangerous forces of racism and the far right that the European Union itself has helped to stoke up?

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