We don't have to accept the global standards. That's the default position, but it can be departed from if for a legitimate reason.
Well, actually we do need to adhere to global standards, at least if we want to sell stuff anywhere those standards are accepted...the same as anywhere. If we want to sell to India, we have to abide by Indian standards, same as how our banks operating in the US have to adhere to US standards. Same with the EU, if we want to trade there.
Problem being of course that we're told extensively down to every tiniest detail by the EU how ALL of our firms have to operate. Cue massive red tape, at huge expense for British businesses. A problem openly accepted by the Government. A British start up marketing company (as per the Newsnight economics special) wanting to sell to India has to sell to EU standards as well, which are by the way seriously bloated and therefore costly.
Add to the above that 1) Standards are increasingly going global anyway (ISO, for example, which funnily enough is based in.....Switzerland) and 2) we don't really have any influence in the EU anyway and the whole remain case (on this point anyway) just falls apart.
Feel free to check that exists by getting 'The Law and Policy of the World Trade Organisation' by Peter Van Den Bossche out from the library.
I gave an empirical study of how most EU trade laws are covered by international bodies (and as per above...) and you respond with an academic textbook. I'm not convinced.
I'd also question your view that Norway has more say than we do... they have an individual voice, but who's going to listen to that? Then who's going to listen to the common view of the EU? When does the EU hold common positions we disagree with when trying to shape international standards? Isn't it only a problem if we don't get what we want?
You say "the common view of the EU". What exactly is that? The problem is because it keeps getting bigger and bigger (6 countries to 28+ today) the EU now covers such a vast swathe of peoples/cultures/histories/languages, heck they're even going into Asia when Turkey joins. There is no common view across 742 million people (soon to be 800m+ when Turkey joins). Perhaps that's why nationalism is on the rise across the continent, French winemakers are hijacking Spanish wine tankers, Greece is mired in a depression (it's lost a quarter of its GDP since 2007), Italy's banking system is headed for a meltdown, a wider Euro crises 2 is on the horizon, and the list goes on.
