Take Britain out of the EU
- Thread starter Blew it
- Start date
That would make my 250W pedelec illegal as we would no longer recognise EU type approval.
UK laws say maximum of 200W
UK laws say maximum of 200W
There would be absolutely nothing to stop the UK allowing 500W and throttle control if the Government wanted.
Colin
I've never understood why there are calls to get out of Europe, we've never properly joined in the first place.
As usual, all the British have done is moaned and groaned, refused to take part in things, constantly demanded renegotiation and special deals, insulted our EU fellow members via the media and generally been very bad neighbours.
I still hear people saying "thank goodness we didn't adopt the Euro", not realising that if we had supported it by merging in the pound sterling, the resulting currency of 460 million people could have been a dominant one in the world.
I've long been ashamed of Britain and refuse to refer to myself as British. I'm English and also a citizen of Europe and am proud to be the latter.
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As usual, all the British have done is moaned and groaned, refused to take part in things, constantly demanded renegotiation and special deals, insulted our EU fellow members via the media and generally been very bad neighbours.
I still hear people saying "thank goodness we didn't adopt the Euro", not realising that if we had supported it by merging in the pound sterling, the resulting currency of 460 million people could have been a dominant one in the world.
I've long been ashamed of Britain and refuse to refer to myself as British. I'm English and also a citizen of Europe and am proud to be the latter.
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I campaigned and voted to leave the EEC in the referendum, when we still had good trade relations with Australia, New Zealand, Canada.
However, once the vote went to stay in the EEC the only sensible thing to do was to immediately take a leading role and get things organised to suit us. We didn't under Callaghan and then Thatcher ruined any good feelings between us and the rest of Europe. They are the two people responsible for being "bad neighbours". Quite naturally the other countries did what they wanted, dragging a screaming, protesting British Government along behind them, and it was this that led to the bad relations between the British public and the media with the rest of Europe.
We should have got out when we had the chance, but I fear it is probably too late now.
Colin
Completely agree on the main source of the troubles Colin, but we can hardly have been regarded as keen on the European project at any point, in the way France and Germany were for example.
If we had been as keen as them at the outset, the position of Europe in the world would have been far better than it is currently. As ever, united we stand, divided we fall.
We are facing a future world of large advanced nations and cannot afford to be separate, standing alone as a tiddler and hoping to maintain high standards of living.
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That was down to the lasting feeling in this country during the early days of the EEC (and still persists to an extent today) that we saved France in the war and beat Germany and now they wanted to have some control of this country. Damned cheek I call it, sir.
I think we would have happily joined Holland and the other smaller countries, but we had the Commonwealth to trade with and didn't need Europe to the extent that the Europeans didAlong with the fact that De Gaulle was strongly against us joining on our terms, by the time we did join those two had the whole thing pretty much sown up for the benefit of the existing community and not us.
When the EC had 15 members it could, and should have been a success if all the countries then had pulled together. They didn't agree to do that and that wasn't just the British government's fault. The Community has now got far too large and unwieldy and will eventually tear itself apart.
Colin
+1. Fully agree. Probably too late to escape now, but thanks be that we've still got our currency.That was down to the lasting feeling in this country during the early days of the EEC (and still persists to an extent today) that we saved France in the war and beat Germany and now they wanted to have some control of this country. Damned cheek I call it, sir.
Along with the fact that De Gaulle was strongly against us joining on our terms, by the time we did join those two had the whole thing pretty much sown up for the benefit of the existing community and not us.
When the EC had 15 members it could, and should have been a success if all the countries then had pulled together. They didn't agree to do that and that wasn't just the British government's fault. The Community has now got far too large and unwieldy and will eventually tear itself apart.
Colin
Clive
The problem we caused you've nicely summed up Colin. The Treaty of Rome was one of equals, but because we persisted in the delusion that we won the war (rather than the Americans and Russians), we thought we should be an Orwellian equal, more equal than others. It was because of that unreasonable attitude that de Gaulle objected to our membership. Great statesman that he was, he could clearly see how disruptive we would be to the enterprise, and he's been proved very right of course.
Very much agreed Colin, the enlargement to include an eastern block so strongly promoted by John Major was either political stupidity or a concealed spoiler intended to damage. Certainly the seeds of destruction have been sown by that, but it is way into the future and the situation may yet be recoverable.
What would have been much better was for the former Warsaw Pact countries to have formed their own economic block. With many using the Cyrillic alphabet, Russian Orthodox in religion and having many Russian born citizens, they could have been a buffer zone, friendly trading partners with both Europe and Russia and leaving Russia feeling less threatened by Western proximity.
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I'm all for leaving the EU. All it seems to do is eat up billions of pounds of OUR money and give us loads of unnecessary expense and ridiculous laws back in return. There's hardly an area of our life that is not now interfered with or restricted thanks to European laws. God help us if we get the single currency and join a federal Europe superstate..it's heading that way and we can't trust these politicians to give us a referendum, assuming they don't just decide to scrap parliament all together eventually.
I have no problem at all with Europe and maintaining close relations with our European neighbour countries, but I think it should be on terms that maintains our independence and puts British interests first. We should follow Norway's example they have negotiated their own agreements with EU but are not members.
Back on topic (for this forum)
I'd rather we became the 51st state of the USA (I've heard rumours that we did get an invitation). Far from perfect but they recovered from the recession far quicker than the UK or Europe. AND THIS IS THE BEST BIT FOR US... 350W for e-bikes - but you have to be 16 instead of 14 which kinda makes sense to me. Despite passing my cycling proficiency I was still pretty reckless at the age of 14.
I'd rather we became the 51st state of the USA (I've heard rumours that we did get an invitation). Far from perfect but they recovered from the recession far quicker than the UK or Europe. AND THIS IS THE BEST BIT FOR US... 350W for e-bikes - but you have to be 16 instead of 14 which kinda makes sense to me. Despite passing my cycling proficiency I was still pretty reckless at the age of 14.
You'll find that depends on the State. Although there is a Federal e-bike law, State law overrules Federal in the USA and there are many variants. Federal law says 700 watts and 20 mph, but States vary power from 400 to 1000 or more watts and speed limits vary. Two States totally ban e-bikes, so you might not be so happy if living in one of those.
I am opposed to a lower age limit, most of the world and even legalistic Europe has none. The whole point of e-bikes is that they are bicycles with bicycle like performance, so not motor vehicles. There's no lower age limit for bicycles so none is necessary for e-bikes, as most of the world shows.
Our UK lower age limit was brought in for the silliest of reasons, the increase of the assist speed limit from 12 to 15 mph, as if that 3 mph would make any difference. Even more daft is that the lower age limit is specified not in the e-bike regulations but in motor vehicle law, an area that's not supposed to apply to legal e-bikes (Road Traffic Act 1988).
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