I'm not so sure. For issues that matter to a smaller number of people a political union can help as there is a bigger and more diverse voice for that particular issue (AFAIK software patents are not happening in the EU).
If software patents get lobbied through a fully independent UK/GB/EN (whatever it ends up) government there will be less protest as there are less people to make a noise.
On the flip side I hope it makes people more politically active, if the EU isn't there to make the decision for you (in support or against) then it is left to the people of the independent country to influence their government.
Entering into that conversation whatever the issue can only help understanding and rational decisions.
> For issues that matter to a smaller number of people a political union can help as there is a bigger and more diverse voice for that particular issue
This reminds me of the old joke about regular expressions, which I'll paraphrase thus: Someone has a problem, and they say, hey, I'll just get the government to fix it! Now they have two problems.
The only reason why small groups of people with a common issue have to have a political voice is that big governments give out special privileges to people, so every interest group has to lobby to get the privileges given to them instead of someone else. But if governments couldn't give special privileges to anyone, then nobody would have to lobby for them.
"Harmonizing" of rules tends to take away rights from the general public - much more often than it does to give them.