It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
There was an interesting point about halfway through the article that, even if a great deal was offered by the EU, would Mrs May be able to accept it? The hardline handbangers may have some thoughts on the matter.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It might have helped if Labour had not set an arbitrary goal of 50% going to Uni, still it kept young people from being NEETs and thus kept the unemployment figures lower for a few years - and what politician of recent times has thought more than a few years ahead?
I was always wary of the 50%. It did look rather like Labour were trying to build yet another minority to appeal to - those who didn't go to Uni.
It also took no cognisance of the fact that UK industry needed a smaller percentage of the population at graduate level.
A good education is a great thing to have, but it is also nice to have a job to go to after you get educated and indebted by your education.
Having said that, No. 1 daughter is being interviewed for a Ph.D placement today.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
Germany, Belgium couldn't give a monkey's about spending 2% on defence. Still in NATO Even Turkey - just invaded its neighbour. Still a member of NATO. Hungary despite all the moaning and groaning from Brussels. Still in the EU. Israel, Iran - both in contravention of tonnes of regulations. Still in the UN.
Different orgs, different countries but the principle remains. Once you're part of the gravy train/golf club, there has to be a massive conscious effort to be booted out. Do you seriously think a bit of border fudging will do it ?
Because of the day job, my expectation is that we're going to run out of time to get it sorted before we Brexit so we tumble out onto WTO terms.
The biggest misnomer is 'Most Favoured Nation'
Now we have completed the Phase 1 talks even Barnet has said we will likely get a Canada style FTA
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
If, errr, you had been reading my posts, you would already know this.
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
It might have helped if Labour had not set an arbitrary goal of 50% going to Uni, still it kept young people from being NEETs and thus kept the unemployment figures lower for a few years - and what politician of recent times has thought more than a few years ahead?
I was always wary of the 50%. It did look rather like Labour were trying to build yet another minority to appeal to - those who didn't go to Uni.
It also took no cognisance of the fact that UK industry needed a smaller percentage of the population at graduate level.
A good education is a great thing to have, but it is also nice to have a job to go to after you get educated and indebted by your education.
Having said that, No. 1 daughter is being interviewed for a Ph.D placement today.
Best of luck to her!
Wish her well and hope it works out OK. Better than my granddaugher 1 anyway. Works as an assistant Ed Psych, and having trouble getting on the course to become a ‘proper’ one!
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
The problem remains the red lines Mrs May created in order to appease the Brexit loons in the right wing press and the Conservative party. As the article you link to states:
A comprehensive association agreement between the UK and EU would likely be subject to European Court of Justice arbitration. This would be a difficult pill to swallow for the Conservative party's staunch Leavers who want to be free of all European law after Brexit. An association agreement on goods and/or services would also require at least some degree of significant regulatory alignment between Britain and the EU, too.
Does this pass the Rees Mogg test? If it doesn't, will the PM summon up the political courage to put her country first? If she does, then we will get a sane, soft Brexit. But making investments now on the back of that happening would be brave.
Davis has been talking about common regulation in Vienna this morning.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
There was an interesting point about halfway through the article that, even if a great deal was offered by the EU, would Mrs May be able to accept it? The hardline handbangers may have some thoughts on the matter.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It is very reasonable - so 44% of our exports will be subject to standards which we don't have any input into, whereas previously we had influence over such standards.
.....and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
That will give some comfort* to Keith Daz Vaz in these dark times.....
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
So what you have actually said is exactly what I said. It is the EU that has the problem with WTO rules not the UK. And there is absolutely no requirement for the UK to have a customs border with Ireland if we have a separate treaty. But again that is not allowed by the EU.
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
The problem remains the red lines Mrs May created in order to appease the Brexit loons in the right wing press and the Conservative party. As the article you link to states:
A comprehensive association agreement between the UK and EU would likely be subject to European Court of Justice arbitration. This would be a difficult pill to swallow for the Conservative party's staunch Leavers who want to be free of all European law after Brexit. An association agreement on goods and/or services would also require at least some degree of significant regulatory alignment between Britain and the EU, too.
Does this pass the Rees Mogg test? If it doesn't, will the PM summon up the political courage to put her country first? If she does, then we will get a sane, soft Brexit. But making investments now on the back of that happening would be brave.
Davis has been talking about common regulation in Vienna this morning.
.....and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
That will give some comfort* to Keith Daz Vaz in these dark times.....
*Comfort, even?
Is that his canvassing line? "Do your whites pass the Vaz doorstep challenge?"
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
There was an interesting point about halfway through the article that, even if a great deal was offered by the EU, would Mrs May be able to accept it? The hardline handbangers may have some thoughts on the matter.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It is very reasonable - so 44% of our exports will be subject to standards which we don't have any input into, whereas previously we had influence over such standards.
BFD, as they say.
By your logic, 56% of our exports are subject to standards which we don't have any input into, omg how are we managing to function as an economy? I have faith in our world-class manufacturers, don't you?
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
So what you have actually said is exactly what I said. It is the EU that has the problem with WTO rules not the UK. And there is absolutely no requirement for the UK to have a customs border with Ireland if we have a separate treaty. But again that is not allowed by the EU.
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
It's allowed. We could sign a treaty with Ireland to treat the UK as Irish customs territory, similar to the treaty between France and Monaco.
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
You're kidding, right?
The ideology is of a proud, independent Britain, free of the EU shackles and able to make its way in the world unhindered by those pesky Brussels bureaucrats.
That is the ideology, perhaps more appropriate for the 17th Century, but which, in today's interconnected world, is pure fantasy.
Only in the minds of the EU fanatics like yourself who are so blinded by EU ideology that you cannot see any other way of existence.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
I think it's even simpler than that. Why would we bother to diverge from EU product regulations? It's simply not worth the hassle for the tiny, tiny number cases where there might be a reason to do so. In any case manufacturers aren't going to make special models just for the UK market, they'll meet EU regulations anyway. It's one of those 'illusions of sovereignty' issues identified by Cameron before the referendum; we might have voted ourselves a theoretical right to sell 2KW vacuum cleaners in the UK, but in practice it ain't gonna happen.
In legal terms, what I think we will end up with is a classic fudge which acknowledges that theoretical right but where we effectively accept that we won't exercise it.
The significance of the passage in the speech by Boris is that he recognises and accepts this (contrary to what some say, he is of course far from being an ideological zealot on anything). Boris is key to selling the deal to the party and to the public, which is why he's in a top job in the first place. DD will be on board, and probably Liam Fox; I think Theresa May is going to grind this one through.
Mr. Meeks, do you think the Conservatives should be ignoring the referendum result or seeking to reverse it? Even if you believe leaving the EU is horrendous, surely you can see the great danger of teaching the electorate that democracy doesn't count if the Establishment disagrees with the result?
No, as I have repeatedly said, the referendum result has to be implemented. It does not need to be implemented in accordance with a faith-based ideology, as it is at present.
I agree with your second point. But I also don't see that it is incompatible with democracy to ask people - "now that you see what is involved in leaving, the costs, the difficulties, the trade-offs etc, do you still want to do it?"
It's not incompatible with democracy. But to embark on another referendum requires some evidence that public opinion has meaningfully shifted. That evidence isn't there. Not yet, anyway.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
The problem remains the red lines Mrs May created in order to appease the Brexit loons in the right wing press and the Conservative party. As the article you link to states:
A comprehensive association agreement between the UK and EU would likely be subject to European Court of Justice arbitration. This would be a difficult pill to swallow for the Conservative party's staunch Leavers who want to be free of all European law after Brexit. An association agreement on goods and/or services would also require at least some degree of significant regulatory alignment between Britain and the EU, too.
Does this pass the Rees Mogg test? If it doesn't, will the PM summon up the political courage to put her country first? If she does, then we will get a sane, soft Brexit. But making investments now on the back of that happening would be brave.
Davis has been talking about common regulation in Vienna this morning.
The problem is what happens when there are disagreements. How do these get sorted without the ECJ playing a role? The other problem is trade deals - if we are regulatory aligned in key areas, that will shackle buccaneering Britain's ability to get agreements with third party countries.
All the problems that Brexit creates can be solved, but the red lines and the loons are constraints. May is going to have to revise the former and stand up to the latter if we are to get to the point of a least damaging Brexit.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
Mr. Meeks, do you think the Conservatives should be ignoring the referendum result or seeking to reverse it? Even if you believe leaving the EU is horrendous, surely you can see the great danger of teaching the electorate that democracy doesn't count if the Establishment disagrees with the result?
No, as I have repeatedly said, the referendum result has to be implemented. It does not need to be implemented in accordance with a faith-based ideology, as it is at present.
I agree with your second point. But I also don't see that it is incompatible with democracy to ask people - "now that you see what is involved in leaving, the costs, the difficulties, the trade-offs etc, do you still want to do it?"
It's not incompatible with democracy. But to embark on another referendum requires some evidence that public opinion has meaningfully shifted. That evidence isn't there. Not yet, anyway.
I don't believe it does. We have recent evidence that public opinion can shift dramatically when the reality of what is on offer is presented to them for consideration.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
There was an interesting point about halfway through the article that, even if a great deal was offered by the EU, would Mrs May be able to accept it? The hardline handbangers may have some thoughts on the matter.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It is very reasonable - so 44% of our exports will be subject to standards which we don't have any input into, whereas previously we had influence over such standards.
BFD, as they say.
By your logic, 56% of our exports are subject to standards which we don't have any input into, omg how are we managing to function as an economy? I have faith in our world-class manufacturers, don't you?
My logic says exactly that.
Whereas previously we had no control over 56% of our exports, we will now have no control of 100% of our exports.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
I think it's even simpler than that. Why would we bother to diverge from EU product regulations? It's simply not worth the hassle for the tiny, tiny number cases where there might be a reason to do so. In any case manufacturers aren't going to make special models just for the UK market, they'll meet EU regulations anyway. It's one of those 'illusions of sovereignty' issues identified by Cameron before the referendum; we might have voted ourselves a theoretical right to sell 2KW vacuum cleaners in the UK, but in practice it ain't gonna happen.
In legal terms, what I think we will end up with is a classic fudge which acknowledges that theoretical right but where we effectively accept that we won't exercise it.
The significance of the passage in the speech by Boris is that he recognises and accepts this (contrary to what some say, he is of course far from being an ideological zealot on anything). Boris is the public, which is why he's in a top job in the first place. DD will be on board, and probably Liam Fox; I think Theresa May is going to grind this one through.
This is correct.
Edit: but whisper it - if Lord Rennard is a PB reader/contributor, who's to say that JRM wouldn't be?
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
I think it's even simpler than that. Why would we bother to diverge from EU product regulations? It's simply not worth the hassle for the tiny, tiny number cases where there might be a reason to do so. In any case manufacturers aren't going to make special models just for the UK market, they'll meet EU regulations anyway. It's one of those 'illusions of sovereignty' issues identified by Cameron before the referendum; we might have voted ourselves a theoretical right to sell 2KW vacuum cleaners in the UK, but in practice it ain't gonna happen.
In legal terms, what I think we will end up with is a classic fudge which acknowledges that theoretical right but where we effectively accept that we won't exercise it.
The significance of the passage in the speech by Boris is that he recognises and accepts this (contrary to what some say, he is of course far from being an ideological zealot on anything). Boris is the public, which is why he's in a top job in the first place. DD will be on board, and probably Liam Fox; I think Theresa May is going to grind this one through.
This is correct.
We could all agree that Loretta the UK has the *right* to diverge, even if it won't diverge because it makes no sense?
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
So what you have actually said is exactly what I said. It is the EU that has the problem with WTO rules not the UK. And there is absolutely no requirement for the UK to have a customs border with Ireland if we have a separate treaty. But again that is not allowed by the EU.
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
The problem is that the EU has external land borders with a number of third party countries, the UK has only one external land border - with the EU. If there is no agreement with the UK, WTO rules state that the EU has to treat the UK border in the same way it treats its other, non-agreement land borders.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It is very reasonable - so 44% of our exports will be subject to standards which we don't have any input into, whereas previously we had influence over such standards.
BFD, as they say.
By your logic, 56% of our exports are subject to standards which we don't have any input into, omg how are we managing to function as an economy? I have faith in our world-class manufacturers, don't you?
My logic says exactly that.
Whereas previously we had no control over 56% of our exports, we will now have no control of 100% of our exports.
A big win.
I would have thought that as we've been busily influencing EU regulations for forty odd years, that our exports to the EU would dominate those elsewhere, or at least be showing a rising trend, as our plucky diplomats bend Johnny Foreigner to our will.
However, there appears to be no sign that this is the case, rather a mild decline from more than half in '99 to less than half now.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
The problem remains the red lines Mrs May created in order to appease the Brexit loons in the right wing press and the Conservative party. As the article you link to states:
A comprehensive association agreement between the UK and EU would likely be subject to European Court of Justice arbitration. This would be a difficult pill to swallow for the Conservative party's staunch Leavers who want to be free of all European law after Brexit. An association agreement on goods and/or services would also require at least some degree of significant regulatory alignment between Britain and the EU, too.
Does this pass the Rees Mogg test? If it doesn't, will the PM summon up the political courage to put her country first? If she does, then we will get a sane, soft Brexit. But making investments now on the back of that happening would be brave.
Davis has been talking about common regulation in Vienna this morning.
The problem is what happens when there are disagreements. How do these get sorted without the ECJ playing a role? The other problem is trade deals - if we are regulatory aligned in key areas, that will shackle buccaneering Britain's ability to get agreements with third party countries.
All the problems that Brexit creates can be solved, but the red lines and the loons are constraints. May is going to have to revise the former and stand up to the latter if we are to get to the point of a least damaging Brexit.
One would think no one could ever have a trade agreement anywhere in the world without the ECJ playing a role.
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
Well of course noone is noticing Richard, David Davis is chuntering on about "How it won't quite be as bad as Mad Max" and Theresa May is announcing a review into tuition fees - even though she's planning on keeping them pretty much as is.
That's why I pointed to the remarks on washing machines by Boris.
If I want to sell to the US, I must meet their standards. Ditto China. Ditto the EU. I don't _need_ a treaty to make me do so. This is, I think, Johnson's position. It seems reasonable.
It is very reasonable - so 44% of our exports will be subject to standards which we don't have any input into, whereas previously we had influence over such standards.
BFD, as they say.
By your logic, 56% of our exports are subject to standards which we don't have any input into, omg how are we managing to function as an economy? I have faith in our world-class manufacturers, don't you?
My logic says exactly that.
Whereas previously we had no control over 56% of our exports, we will now have no control of 100% of our exports.
A big win.
I would have thought that as we've been busily influencing EU regulations for forty odd years, that our exports to the EU would dominate those elsewhere, or at least be showing a rising trend, as our plucky diplomats bend Johnny Foreigner to our will.
However, there appears to be no sign that this is the case, rather a mild decline from more than half in '99 to less than half now.
Yes good point. Although I've no idea how, given our membership of the EU, we managed to increase exports to the RoW. Spooky, eh?
Plus another good plan is to jettison influence over that less than half part of our exports. Because I'm sure that in 10-20 years time it might be down to 30-40%.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
So what you have actually said is exactly what I said. It is the EU that has the problem with WTO rules not the UK. And there is absolutely no requirement for the UK to have a customs border with Ireland if we have a separate treaty. But again that is not allowed by the EU.
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
The problem is that the EU has external land borders with a number of third party countries, the UK has only one external land border - with the EU. If there is no agreement with the UK, WTO rules state that the EU has to treat the UK border in the same way it treats its other, non-agreement land borders.
So again the problem is the EU not the WTO which is what I have been saying. Note I have not said it is not a major problem, just arguing with TSE's false claims that it is a WTO problem not an EU problem.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems.
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
So again the problem is the EU not the WTO which is what I have been saying. Note I have not said it is not a major problem, just arguing with TSE's false claims that it is a WTO problem not an EU problem.
It's only an EU problem to the extent that if the EU didn't exist, and if Ireland wasn't a member of it, then we would have more leverage to impose a solution to suit the UK.
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
You're kidding, right?
The ideology is of a proud, independent Britain, free of the EU shackles and able to make its way in the world unhindered by those pesky Brussels bureaucrats.
That is the ideology, perhaps more appropriate for the 17th Century, but which, in today's interconnected world, is pure fantasy.
Only in the minds of the EU fanatics like yourself who are so blinded by EU ideology that you cannot see any other way of existence.
I get the point we are an interconnected world. I don't see how the EU in its current construct - flag, anthem, president - is our only hope of being interconnected.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
Is the Gaelic Language Act stupid? Is the Welsh Language Act stupid?
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
You're kidding, right?
The ideology is of a proud, independent Britain, free of the EU shackles and able to make its way in the world unhindered by those pesky Brussels bureaucrats.
That is the ideology, perhaps more appropriate for the 17th Century, but which, in today's interconnected world, is pure fantasy.
Only in the minds of the EU fanatics like yourself who are so blinded by EU ideology that you cannot see any other way of existence.
I get the point we are an interconnected world. I don't see how the EU in its current construct - flag, anthem, president - is our only hope of being interconnected.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems.
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
As you say - both have some wrinkles to iron out but nothing that will cause the earth to stop rotating.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
Nope. If it is written into a treaty then the WTO have no say over it. It is the EU who could not allow it. And from their point of view understandably so.
Professor O’Donoghue explains that “the harder the Brexit, the harder the border.”
At what she calls the “very extreme” end of the spectrum is a hard border where the UK leaves with no deal and has to default to World Trade Organisation rules.
If the UK defaults to WTO rules (using copied-and-pasted versions of the EU’s tariffs in the short term), the EU would still have to maintain its side of the border. That would require check goods coming into Ireland from the UK.
That’s because the EU’s existence as a free trade area depends on its ability to demonstrate to the WTO that it can control its external borders properly.
The UK also has to honour its obligations to implement World Trade Organisation rules – that means putting in place a customs border if the UK leaves the EU Customs Union.
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
The problem is that the EU has external land borders with a number of third party countries, the UK has only one external land border - with the EU. If there is no agreement with the UK, WTO rules state that the EU has to treat the UK border in the same way it treats its other, non-agreement land borders.
So again the problem is the EU not the WTO which is what I have been saying. Note I have not said it is not a major problem, just arguing with TSE's false claims that it is a WTO problem not an EU problem.
Yep, I guess you could say that the problem is the EU abiding by the provisions of the treaties it has signed up to.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
Is the Gaelic Language Act stupid? Is the Welsh Language Act stupid?
It is stupid - there are more people that speak Polish than Oirish in Ulster.
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
You're kidding, right?
The ideology is of a proud, independent Britain, free of the EU shackles and able to make its way in the world unhindered by those pesky Brussels bureaucrats.
That is the ideology, perhaps more appropriate for the 17th Century, but which, in today's interconnected world, is pure fantasy.
Only in the minds of the EU fanatics like yourself who are so blinded by EU ideology that you cannot see any other way of existence.
I get the point we are an interconnected world. I don't see how the EU in its current construct - flag, anthem, president - is our only hope of being interconnected.
So you break the deepest and most substantial connection in search of other unidentified and possibly non-existent possible connections. Hmm.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
The problem remains the red lines Mrs May created in order to appease the Brexit loons in the right wing press and the Conservative party. As the article you link to states:
A EU, too.
Does this pass the Rees Mogg test? If it doesn't, will the PM summon up the political courage to put her country first? If she does, then we will get a sane, soft Brexit. But making investments now on the back of that happening would be brave.
Davis has been talking about common regulation in Vienna this morning.
The problem is what happens when there are disagreements. How do these get sorted without the ECJ playing a role? The other problem is trade deals - if we are regulatory aligned in key areas, that will shackle buccaneering Britain's ability to get agreements with third party countries.
All the problems that Brexit creates can be solved, but the red lines and the loons are constraints. May is going to have to revise the former and stand up to the latter if we are to get to the point of a least damaging Brexit.
One would think no one could ever have a trade agreement anywhere in the world without the ECJ playing a role.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems.
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
I would add a third problem: Dr Liam Fox. His first job should be to replicate the existing FTAs the EU has. Instead he's managed to piss off two of the EUs top five FTA countries (Korea and Switzerland).
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems.
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
I had a chat with a VW executive last week, I was staggered to hear that VW produced 6 million cars last year, of which 210,000 were sold in the UK (about 3% of their sales) -
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
I'm not quite sure what the Irish language proposals have to do with the post Brexit Irish border situation, apart from the 'up Hard Brexit, down with the GFA' DUP being quite content with the current power-sharing impasse.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
Is the Gaelic Language Act stupid? Is the Welsh Language Act stupid?
I know nothing of the former, but the latter, yes. Welsh is a waste of time and energy.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
I'm not quite sure what the Irish language proposals have to do with the post Brexit Irish border situation, apart from the 'up Hard Brexit, down with the GFA' DUP being quite content with the current power-sharing impasse.
The SNP have wasted a ton of money on their novelty road and rail signs up and down Scotland.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems
To use Boris Johnson's phrase, you seem to see Brexit as a teleological construction. You start from the premise that the UK shouldn't have any political integration with the rest of Europe, and work backwards from there, regardless of what your own judgement tells you about other countries who you are able to analyse with more detachment.
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
European political integration is certainly ideological. It's not a pragmatic tidying up exercise.
It could be argued to be a tidying up exercise that's been on the back-burner for 1500+ years?
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
It is not really the case that PR for European Elections was forced on us in 1999, as it was the policy of the Labour Party to use PR for these elections following the Plant Commission’s recommendations and agreement to implement this was part of the ‘Cook-Maclennan agreement’ concluded by Labour and the Liberal Democrats in early 1997 prior to the General Election of that year. There was then some doubt as to whether or not Labour would stick to this agreement for 1999 but Paddy Ashdown was very tough in holding Tony Blair to this in the period of the Joint Consultative Committee between the Labour Government and the Liberal Democrats which lasted for two years after 1997. More of the background to this is included in my recently published memoir ‘Winning Here’.
With respect, that's an interpretation that bears little relation to the dynamics of the time.
Ashdown might well have been as tough as he could but against a Labour majority of over 150, he had virtually no leverage at all. Labour stuck to the agreement because it suited Blair's perception of his and Labour's interests.
To put it another way, suppose Blair had reneged on the deal. What would have been the consequences? The Lib Dems walk out of the joint committees. So what?
I remember feeling wholly politically impotent in the period from 1997-2005.
If felt like a Lab-LD pact had permanently locked up the country's politics in an enduring centre-left coalition, and Conservatism was all over.
No doubt many on the Left felt the same, which led to hubris.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
Financial services is one of the biggies - Amundi's view
My view is that there are two difficult Brexit problems.
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
I would add a third problem: Dr Liam Fox. His first job should be to replicate the existing FTAs the EU has. Instead he's managed to piss off two of the EUs top five FTA countries (Korea and Switzerland).
He seems to have a habit of pissing people off in general.
.....and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
That will give some comfort* to Keith Daz Vaz in these dark times.....
*Comfort, even?
Is that his canvassing line? "Do your whites pass the Vaz doorstep challenge?"
It's incredible to think that for all these years, some small, dormant part of my brain has been employed in remembering the Daz challenge. And that after... two decades? it's finally been awoken by this post.
UKIP are alive and well on the back benches of the Conservative Party. The old independent party may as well wind itself up as its current leader Mr Rees-Mogg is ineligible by means of not being stupid of actually formally being their leader.
With just over a year to go absolutely nothing is settled with Brexit, and in a few weeks big industrials are threatening to pull the plug because they can't risk hard Brexit which is the default action for no deal. And we can't get a deal when the cabinet can't agree on what it wants.
UKIP the party is defunct. But UKIP the idea is bigger than ever.
Mr. Meeks, do you think the Conservatives should be ignoring the referendum result or seeking to reverse it? Even if you believe leaving the EU is horrendous, surely you can see the great danger of teaching the electorate that democracy doesn't count if the Establishment disagrees with the result?
No, as I have repeatedly said, the referendum result has to be implemented. It does not need to be implemented in accordance with a faith-based ideology, as it is at present.
I agree with your second point. But I also don't see that it is incompatible with democracy to ask people - "now that you see what is involved in leaving, the costs, the difficulties, the trade-offs etc, do you still want to do it?"
It's not incompatible with democracy. But to embark on another referendum requires some evidence that public opinion has meaningfully shifted. That evidence isn't there. Not yet, anyway.
I don't believe it does. We have recent evidence that public opinion can shift dramatically when the reality of what is on offer is presented to them for consideration.
The public are suffering from a false consciousness. They only need all good Europeans to restlessly carry out the Lord's work on their doorsteps to see the error of their ways.
Mr. Meeks, do you think the Conservatives should be ignoring the referendum result or seeking to reverse it? Even if you believe leaving the EU is horrendous, surely you can see the great danger of teaching the electorate that democracy doesn't count if the Establishment disagrees with the result?
No, as I have repeatedly said, the referendum result has to be implemented. It does not need to be implemented in accordance with a faith-based ideology, as it is at present.
I agree with your second point. But I also don't see that it is incompatible with democracy to ask people - "now that you see what is involved in leaving, the costs, the difficulties, the trade-offs etc, do you still want to do it?"
It's not incompatible with democracy. But to embark on another referendum requires some evidence that public opinion has meaningfully shifted. That evidence isn't there. Not yet, anyway.
I don't believe it does. We have recent evidence that public opinion can shift dramatically when the reality of what is on offer is presented to them for consideration.
The public are suffering from a false consciousness. They only need all good Europeans to restlessly carry out the Lord's work on their doorsteps to see the error of their ways.
If the UK doesn't want a hard border and the Irish don't want a hard border, and the UK and the Irish are comfy with localised trade crossing the border unchecked, what's the problem?
Brussels.
Exactly.
Nope, it is WTO rules.
If we sign an agreement with Ireland then the WTO won't be interested. But Brussels won't allow that.
People seem to insist on making the Irish border a big issue. It's not.
There are bits of Germany that are inside Switzerland. There's a bit of Italy that's inside Switzerland. Solutions were found. And will be found here, because the price of not finding a solution is too high.
These are much, much harder problems to solve than the Irish border.
The Irish border is a hard *political* problem because all of the obvious solutions are unacceptable in various ways to various groups.
Or one of the groups has a bunch of stupid proposals for Oirish language that nobody speaks that it has inserted into the negotiations specifically to spike them.
I'm not quite sure what the Irish language proposals have to do with the post Brexit Irish border situation, apart from the 'up Hard Brexit, down with the GFA' DUP being quite content with the current power-sharing impasse.
The SNP have wasted a ton of money on their novelty road and rail signs up and down Scotland.
You mean carrying on with the legislation set up by the SLab/LD government, & supported by the SCons before they became semi-deranged?
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
As far as I can tell things are proceeding as is normal when negotiating with the EU. Everything is up in the air, doom-mongers are mongering doom, and a deal will be almost certainly be struck at the 11th hour.
David Davis appears to be making a case for Remaining. Everything will be the same, it’s just that when it comes tom a vote we won’t have one!
I get the impression that DD now thinks this entire Brexit lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. You can't blame him - the poor man seems to be putting in a lot of work for negligibly outcome. I suspect in hindsight the vast majority of Leavers would like to, if not abandon Brexit, certainly go about it a lot differently.
Don't forget: Brexit = Communism.
The idea is fantastic, just that no one is able to put it into practice.
Except, Communism was an idealogy. Brexit is an escape from an idealogy - the great European superstate. One where escape is so difficult because those responsible for the idealogy have been making it impossible to try and escape for decades. In their sly little undemocratic ways.
One day, these same people bitching about Brexit will accept some responsibility for being the cause of that same Brexit.
Yeah, right, of course they will. When Hell starts getting a bit nippy.
Meanwhile, we keep digging tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry.....
You're kidding, right?
The ideology is of a proud, independent Britain, free of the EU shackles and able to make its way in the world unhindered by those pesky Brussels bureaucrats.
That is the ideology, perhaps more appropriate for the 17th Century, but which, in today's interconnected world, is pure fantasy.
Only in the minds of the EU fanatics like yourself who are so blinded by EU ideology that you cannot see any other way of existence.
I don't agree, actually.
I think Topping is largely indifferent to the EU. He just has a fairly purist capitalist approach, wants to make money, and is trollmania to those he perceives get in the way of that.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Totally agree. I think the same applies in a number of important areas. The ECJ red line is a huge obstacle that should be just rubbed away. But Rees Mogg & co just wouldn’t countenance it and they seem to have a veto currently.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
It's because the ECJ is more symbolic than real. Probably 90% of areas over which it has jurisdiction don't have a problem with it and just want a determination binding on the parties (via national enforcement). In that respect it is no different to the International Court of Arbitration which is uncontroversial.
It's that 10%. Ultimately I think we will get a deal that excludes that 10% and takes a lot of the rest - but can TMay sell it? The line will be "we have renounced ECJ jurisdiction on a range of important matters, including immigration and domestic security arrangements"
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
If, errr, you had been reading my posts, you would already know this.
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
Brexit is going to be fine. We will have wins in agriculture/fisheries, and in future regulation of services, we will save some budgetary contributions, and I suspect the new immigration regime will command public consent too.
The issue is in building our new trade relationships/network, and projecting our soft/hard power globally. I think that's a 5-15 year global job, and the Government is mainly focussed on a 1-5 year European job at present, and leaving the rest to Fox and Boris.
UKIP are alive and well on the back benches of the Conservative Party. The old independent party may as well wind itself up as its current leader Mr Rees-Mogg is ineligible by means of not being stupid of actually formally being their leader.
With just over a year to go absolutely nothing is settled with Brexit, and in a few weeks big industrials are threatening to pull the plug because they can't risk hard Brexit which is the default action for no deal. And we can't get a deal when the cabinet can't agree on what it wants.
UKIP the party is defunct. But UKIP the idea is bigger than ever.
Phase 1 of the Brexit talks was actually settled before Christmas and that was the most difficult bit.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
If, errr, you had been reading my posts, you would already know this.
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
Brexit is going to be fine. We will have wins in agriculture/fisheries, and in future regulation of services, we will save some budgetary contributions, and I suspect the new immigration regime will command public consent too.
The issue is in building our new trade relationships/network, and projecting our soft/hard power globally. I think that's a 5-15 year global job, and the Government is mainly focussed on a 1-5 year European job at present, and leaving the rest to Fox and Boris.
Who both can't handle it.
The funny bit is that there are lots of financially literate (and I mean genuinely financially literate) Conservative MPs with internationalist outlooks. Unfortunately, due to Mrs May's need to shore up her own position by finding roles for rivals, these people have been left on the backbenches.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Totally agree. I think the same applies in a number of important areas. The ECJ red line is a huge obstacle that should be just rubbed away. But Rees Mogg & co just wouldn’t countenance it and they seem to have a veto currently.
Perhaps she could hold an early election to diminish their influence? Pretty much whatever the result it would... although she probably doesn't want a Labour govt implementing Brexit, backed by some Remainer Tory MPs.
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
If, errr, you had been reading my posts, you would already know this.
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
Brexit is going to be fine. We will have wins in agriculture/fisheries, and in future regulation of services, we will save some budgetary contributions, and I suspect the new immigration regime will command public consent too.
The issue is in building our new trade relationships/network, and projecting our soft/hard power globally. I think that's a 5-15 year global job, and the Government is mainly focussed on a 1-5 year European job at present, and leaving the rest to Fox and Boris.
Who both can't handle it.
The funny bit is that there are lots of financially literate (and I mean genuinely financially literate) Conservative MPs with internationalist outlooks. Unfortunately, due to Mrs May's need to shore up her own position by finding roles for rivals, these people have been left on the backbenches.
The question is, if our new relationship is a long term job (a statement with which I degree) do we really want the government focussing on it now?
I would be quite happy with them laying the groundwork, in a way that let us agree our deal with the EU, and come to it after.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Agreed. The key is making sure that the scope of its jurisdiction is narrowly defined. We would not want their jurisdiction over European Medicines to be used to determine the rights of employment in that industry, for example. Or to determine what medicines are compatible with some contrived human right. Or to allow them to determine how the NHS spends its money etc etc. But this really should not be beyond the wit of the Civil Service.
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Agreed.
And once that principle is conceded it can be applied in other areas.
In fact if we applied it in enough areas we'd hardly notice we have left.
Ah, yes, but that's just one species of ichneumon. Fascinating, none the less. Incidentally, Darwin saw the ichneumons as an argument against a "creator":
Charles Darwin found the example of the Ichneumonidae so troubling that it contributed to his increasing doubts about the nature and existence of a Creator. In an 1860 letter to the American naturalist Asa Gray, Darwin wrote:
"I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice."
I find it interesting to read over and over here that the UKIP vote might go to the Tories and somehow poison them. The party which is actually offering a full on retro-view is the Labour party. They want 1970's nationalisations, trades unions and to attack the evil City.
At the last election, UKIP votes were split but more went red than blue - because, if the assumption is its oldies hankering after the past is true, then it is Corbyn who is the living embodiment of this, not May.
The Great Age of the Fifties (UKIP) is dead. Long live the Great Age of the Seventies (Labour).
1950s? The EU is a 1950s throwback, having its origins in the 1958 Treaty of Rome (or even the 1951 Treaty of Paris if you prefer!).
Ummm: there are hundreds of good arguments against the EU (and I've used many of them myself). But on that basis, the United Kingdom is a throwback to 1603*.
* Or 1066 or the 1200s or 1708 or any number of other justifiable dates.
Yeah, yeah! I know! But it's normally REMAINERs wot bang on about "going back to the 1950s"!
It's very odd, the financial markets have noticed what's going on, but journalists, political pundits, the opposition parties, and most of those posting here haven't.
Guys and gals, the Brexit negotiations are going remarkably well, much better than seemed possible even three months ago. We're going to get a good deal, and the cherries will be picked. It's now even looking extremely likely that there will be fairly seamless deal for the City.
and at the short bit in Boris' speech about regulatory alignment on washing machines (titter ye not, this is very significant in domestic political terms).
Methinks it's time to start moving back into UK small-caps, which are undervalued on any scenario other than a no-deal crash-out (or a Corbyn government, of course). (This is not investment advice, DYOR, etc etc).
If, errr, you had been reading my posts, you would already know this.
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
Brexit is going to be fine. We will have wins in agriculture/fisheries, and in future regulation of services, we will save some budgetary contributions, and I suspect the new immigration regime will command public consent too.
The issue is in building our new trade relationships/network, and projecting our soft/hard power globally. I think that's a 5-15 year global job, and the Government is mainly focussed on a 1-5 year European job at present, and leaving the rest to Fox and Boris.
Who both can't handle it.
The funny bit is that there are lots of financially literate (and I mean genuinely financially literate) Conservative MPs with internationalist outlooks. Unfortunately, due to Mrs May's need to shore up her own position by finding roles for rivals, these people have been left on the backbenches.
If this was introduced, the effect on Con and Lab would be minor - less than a 10% change. The Lib Dems, however, would see three-quarters of their peers wiped out.
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Totally agree. I think the same applies in a number of important areas. The ECJ red line is a huge obstacle that should be just rubbed away. But Rees Mogg & co just wouldn’t countenance it and they seem to have a veto currently.
Perhaps she could hold an early election to diminish their influence? Pretty much whatever the result it would... although she probably doesn't want a Labour govt implementing Brexit, backed by some Remainer Tory MPs.
Given Corbyn's position on Brexit is virtually indistinguishable from May's a Corbyn government really would not change much on that front, Remainer Tory MPs may ally with Umunna etc but not with Corbyn and McDonnell
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Totally agree. I think the same applies in a number of important areas. The ECJ red line is a huge obstacle that should be just rubbed away. But Rees Mogg & co just wouldn’t countenance it and they seem to have a veto currently.
Perhaps she could hold an early election to diminish their influence? Pretty much whatever the result it would... although she probably doesn't want a Labour govt implementing Brexit, backed by some Remainer Tory MPs.
Given Corbyn's position on Brexit is virtually indistinguishable from May's a Corbyn government really would not change much on that front, Remainer Tory MPs may ally with Umunna etc but not with Corbyn and McDonnell
I think there are/would be some differences (Labour haven't really got a fixed position as far as I can see - but would basically go for a softer Brexit I think).
Remainer Tory MPs wouldn't support Corbyn of course, but I think they would vote in favour of his Brexit bill as opposed to crashing out with no deal.
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
We can get a trade agreement with the EU without the ECJ playing a role. The problem is the damage such a deal would do to the UK economy. If we want the kind of association agreement that Mr Nabavi is talking about, we do have to accept a role for the ECJ.
I've always found this fixation with the ECJ odd, because if there's one area where can "pick and choose" it's ECJ jurisdiction. We accept rulings of the NATO Court, but we don't allow the NATO Court to determine the voting franchise in the UK. We accept rulings from unelected ITU bureaucrats, and allow it overrule UK law. But only in its incredibly narrow area of expertise: i.e. how telephone numbers work.
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
Totally agree. I think the same applies in a number of important areas. The ECJ red line is a huge obstacle that should be just rubbed away. But Rees Mogg & co just wouldn’t countenance it and they seem to have a veto currently.
Perhaps she could hold an early election to diminish their influence? Pretty much whatever the result it would... although she probably doesn't want a Labour govt implementing Brexit, backed by some Remainer Tory MPs.
Given Corbyn's position on Brexit is virtually indistinguishable from May's a Corbyn government really would not change much on that front, Remainer Tory MPs may ally with Umunna etc but not with Corbyn and McDonnell
I think there are/would be some differences (Labour haven't really got a fixed position as far as I can see - but would basically go for a softer Brexit I think).
Remainer Tory MPs wouldn't support Corbyn of course, but I think they would vote in favour of his Brexit bill as opposed to crashing out with no deal.
May backs leaving the EU, leaving the single market and ending free movement as does Corbyn.
May backs leaving the current Customs Union, Corbyn wants to replace the current Customs Union with a new Customs Union.
As I said there is not a cigarette paper between them on Brexit and both are closer to each other than the likes of Redwood, Rees-Mogg, Soubry and Umunna.
So there is no point Remainer Tory MPs voting for a Corbyn Brexit 'deal' as it will inevitably replicate a May Brexit 'deal' almost word for word!
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
May backs leaving the EU, leaving the single market and ending free movement as does Corbyn.
May backs leaving the current Customs Union, Corbyn wants to replace the current Customs Union with a new Customs Union.
As I said there is not a cigarette paper between them on Brexit and both are closer to each other than the likes of Redwood, Rees-Mogg, Soubry and Umunna.
So there is no point Remainer Tory MPs voting for a Corbyn Brexit 'deal' as it will inevitably replicate a May Brexit 'deal' almost word for word!
The main difference between a Corbyn Brexit and a May Brexit would I think be about state aid rules. Corbyn would want full freedom to be able to waste taxpayers' money propping up failing industries. That would be a red line for the EU, so a Corbyn Brexit might well end up as a harder Brexit than we'll get under May. In addition Corbyn would want to destroy the City, which again points to a harder Brexit than hopefully we'll actually get.
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
This is the key point that David Davis' speech doesn't quite address. In effect he is saying Canada can be made to look like Norway. It can't. They are different beasts. Maybe the government can finesse it. By pretending Canada is equivalent to Norway we get the real Norway without anyone noticing. Vassal state it is?
The strange thing is that UKIP are on roughly double their share at the last election in most polls. Of course they only contested about 45% of seats.
Good news for Labour then; their vote tended to increase more in seats where UKIP didn't stand last year.
Labour got about 20% of former UKIP voters and the Tories 50%
Yes, former UKIP voters. But of wannabe 2017 UKIP voters (that is, people who told opinion pollsters they would vote UKIP if they had the opportunity), it appears they broke in Labour's favour in seats where no UKIP candidate was on offer.
Comments
Byyeeee!
In fact the only bit of Brexit that truly looks car crash-like is the DfIT.
BFD, as they say.
DazVaz in these dark times.....*Comfort, even?
Trying to blame the WTO when the issue is actually the EU is a typical Remainer tactic.
That means nothing to me .
In legal terms, what I think we will end up with is a classic fudge which acknowledges that theoretical right but where we effectively accept that we won't exercise it.
The significance of the passage in the speech by Boris is that he recognises and accepts this (contrary to what some say, he is of course far from being an ideological zealot on anything). Boris is key to selling the deal to the party and to the public, which is why he's in a top job in the first place. DD will be on board, and probably Liam Fox; I think Theresa May is going to grind this one through.
All the problems that Brexit creates can be solved, but the red lines and the loons are constraints. May is going to have to revise the former and stand up to the latter if we are to get to the point of a least damaging Brexit.
https://www.fnlondon.com/articles/pound-will-be-worth-less-than-euro-says-europes-largest-fund-manager-20180219
Whereas previously we had no control over 56% of our exports, we will now have no control of 100% of our exports.
A big win.
https://twitter.com/soapachu/status/965609583522799617
Edit: but whisper it - if Lord Rennard is a PB reader/contributor, who's to say that JRM wouldn't be?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/15/number-european-union-workers-britain-rises
Easy.
However, there appears to be no sign that this is the case, rather a mild decline from more than half in '99 to less than half now.
"Ex-UKIP leader Henry Bolton back with girlfriend Jo Marney"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-43126318
"Rotherham child sex abuse: Inquiry finds 100 more potential victims"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-43126804
Plus another good plan is to jettison influence over that less than half part of our exports. Because I'm sure that in 10-20 years time it might be down to 30-40%.
/SickMode
The first, as you say, is Financial Services. Currently, under the Single Passport, a UK firm can sell financial services products direct to French consumers, while regulated by the FSA in London. (My old fund management business had been very successful at selling to French and Swedish consumers.) I think we are still some way away from a system that allows the same degree of access for British firms to the EU, which is not good for small fund managers. For larger banks, I think so long as there are properly capitalised EU subsidiaries of the parent, then there will be a sensible compromise.
The second is about Rules of Origin, and FTAs with third parties. Imagine that we sign a free trade deal with Korea (Republic of), and have an FTA with the EU. This means that we can sell Aston Martins into Korea without tariffs, as now, right? Unfortunately not. As the Aston Martin is likely to have (say) 40% UK content, 40% EU content, and 20% RoW content, then it fails to be British (or EU) enough to pass the Rules of Origin test to be sold duty free into the Korean market. In time this will, no doubt, be solved. But in the near term, this is the major negative from leaving the Customs Union.
SF simply throwing sand in the gearbox as usual.
I had a chat with a VW executive last week, I was staggered to hear that VW produced 6 million cars last year, of which 210,000 were sold in the UK (about 3% of their sales) -
Joining the European Medicines Agency, and allowing the ECJ jurisdiction in that narrow area seems acceptable (and cost efficient) to me.
If felt like a Lab-LD pact had permanently locked up the country's politics in an enduring centre-left coalition, and Conservatism was all over.
No doubt many on the Left felt the same, which led to hubris.
What a waste.
With just over a year to go absolutely nothing is settled with Brexit, and in a few weeks big industrials are threatening to pull the plug because they can't risk hard Brexit which is the default action for no deal. And we can't get a deal when the cabinet can't agree on what it wants.
UKIP the party is defunct. But UKIP the idea is bigger than ever.
I think Topping is largely indifferent to the EU. He just has a fairly purist capitalist approach, wants to make money, and is trollmania to those he perceives get in the way of that.
It's that 10%. Ultimately I think we will get a deal that excludes that 10% and takes a lot of the rest - but can TMay sell it? The line will be "we have renounced ECJ jurisdiction on a range of important matters, including immigration and domestic security arrangements"
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/14/science/a-wasp-that-turns-a-spider-into-the-walking-dead.html
https://twitter.com/GaspardWinckler/status/965894760568442880
The issue is in building our new trade relationships/network, and projecting our soft/hard power globally. I think that's a 5-15 year global job, and the Government is mainly focussed on a 1-5 year European job at present, and leaving the rest to Fox and Boris.
Who both can't handle it.
Completion of that enabled FTA talks to begin
Pretty much whatever the result it would... although she probably doesn't want a Labour govt implementing Brexit, backed by some Remainer Tory MPs.
I would be quite happy with them laying the groundwork, in a way that let us agree our deal with the EU, and come to it after.
And once that principle is conceded it can be applied in other areas.
In fact if we applied it in enough areas we'd hardly notice we have left.
Charles Darwin found the example of the Ichneumonidae so troubling that it contributed to his increasing doubts about the nature and existence of a Creator. In an 1860 letter to the American naturalist Asa Gray, Darwin wrote:
"I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ichneumonidae
https://twitter.com/ParlyApp/status/965931442839703552
https://www.twitter.com/SamuelMarcLowe/status/965671868056457216
https://twitter.com/harrydcarr/status/965883299498483712
Remainer Tory MPs wouldn't support Corbyn of course, but I think they would vote in favour of his Brexit bill as opposed to crashing out with no deal.
May backs leaving the current Customs Union, Corbyn wants to replace the current Customs Union with a new Customs Union.
As I said there is not a cigarette paper between them on Brexit and both are closer to each other than the likes of Redwood, Rees-Mogg, Soubry and Umunna.
So there is no point Remainer Tory MPs voting for a Corbyn Brexit 'deal' as it will inevitably replicate a May Brexit 'deal' almost word for word!