By Tim Montgomerie
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Earlier today MPs Bernard Jenkin and Bill Cash launched a paper entitled "The EU single market
– is it worth it?". You can read a PDF of it here.
The paper busts a number of myths about our relationship with the EU, including "MYTH 2" – “Three
million jobs depend on our trade with the EU”.
Cash and Jenkin write:
"This myth is
intended to suggest that there would be substantial loss of jobs if we were not
in the EU ‘single market’.
However, if UK
business and commerce were to be relieved of the burdens and costs of EU single
market regulations, the UK could expand its economy more quickly and recover some
of the 2 million skilled jobs which have been lost to Germany, France and other
parts of the European Union.
Our earnings
from the EU are in structural decline, but our overseas earnings from beyond
the EU are growing. Non-EU exports
of goods and services amounted to 56% of all UK overseas earnings in 2011. The UK now enjoys a trading surplus
with the rest of the world of £17.1bn, compared a deficit of £46bn with the other 26 states of the EU.
This is despite the distorting effect of the EU single market in favour of
trade with our EU partners. The UK
economy is also highly dependent upon imports. Membership
of the ‘single market’ increases the cost of imports from the rest of the
world. These imports over the last 10 years have so far grown 80% faster than our
imports from the EU. Given these trends, the UK economy must be free to adapt.
Non-EU
exporters to the EU, the US and China, for example, export to the EU and cope
with EU tariff barriers and they have increased their trade with the EU by more
than the UK has since the ‘single market was established. They do not pay any contribution to the
EU, nor are they bound to comply with the EU regulations in their own domestic
and non-EU export markets. Being outside the ‘single market, Switzerland
exports three times more goods per head of the population to the EU than does
the United Kingdom."