00:00Well, as ever with the European Union, it's all about expansion, expansion of powers,
00:04expansion of size, expansion of open borders. We know that there've been accession conferences
00:11with candidate countries like Ukraine, Montenegro, Moldova and Albania in terms of EU expansion.
00:21But another country is set to have an EU referendum, I think is going to make some
00:26in Brussels a bit nervous because Iceland is having a referendum this week, the 29th of August.
00:34Now, this will be a referendum on whether they want to revive membership talks. So this isn't
00:40about the country joining the European Union straight away. It's about whether they want
00:46to open talks to potentially join the EU. Now, you've seen the government in Iceland who are
00:52back in a yes vote. They've had to warn the EU not to get involved in this, the EU Commission
00:59not to
01:00intervene, which shows you just what the instincts of Brussels are nowadays. And the leader of Iceland's
01:08largest opposition party also urging European politicians to stay out of it. With the quote
01:15there, it's extremely important that this decision in August will be left to the Icelandic nation and
01:21saying people should just let Icelanders go through this without foreign interference, pointing out
01:28that independence is emotional for Icelanders. Now, what I would suggest is going to make some people
01:35pretty nervous is just how close this currently is looking like. And some polls do have the yes side
01:43in the lead. You can see their lead in 53 to 47. But what is pretty astonishing is that there
01:51was a
01:51Gallup poll conducted recently where you can see here it was actually a dead heat, a total knife edge
01:58vote, a complete split of 46 yes, 46 no to talks on joining the European Union and 8% undecided.
02:10So
02:10clearly it will be that 8% essentially depending on which way it swings, which will in the end decide
02:17the outcome of this referendum that looks to be pretty close indeed. But please do let me know
02:24your thoughts on that in the comments below. Please do whack this video a quick thumbs up and of course,
02:28as ever. Cheers for watching.
