Brexit discussion thread XIV (Please read OP before posting)

sondagefaux

A very interesting part of the 10 Downing Street statement:

Tony Connelly @tconnellyRTE
2/ ‘The U.K. has legally-binding agreements with vaccine suppliers and it would not expect the EU, as a friend and ally, to do anything to disrupt the fulfilment of these contracts.

This suggests the UK has negotiated contracts that require its vaccines suppliers to supply it with vaccine doses from production facilities in the EU, and expects these to be fulfilled even if it means the EU doesn't receive the vaccine supplies it has contracted for, and it cofirms that it regards the contracts, with best efforts clauses, as legally binding.

More evidence that the EU is as much within its rights to see its contracts as legally binding as the UK, and that Astra Zeneca has screwed up by signing conflicting contracts.

If this conflict continues (20 percent of the UK's supply of Astra Zeneca vaccine doses is set to be supplied from outside the UK), I can easily see the European Parliament refusing to consent to ratification of the trade agreement, the TCA, which is currently being provisionally applied.
The extension of the provisional application beyond the end of February, its current expiry date, needs to be jointly agreed by the UK and EU. The European Parliament wants until April to examine the treaty before voting on consent so provisional application will need to be extended to accommodate this.

Even before this row, I was a bit dubious about whether the EP would grant consent, although I was sure extending provisional application would be a certainty.

Now though?

yagan

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

Yes new account so put anything I say on the tip due to that or you could take your head out of your rear end for one second and look at what is actually happening. Or shall we just continue singing rebel songs and going on about 800 years for another 800 years......tedious nonsense.

Harsh reality is you will be waiting for a vaccine for months longer than your British cousin across the water and 'Ze Germans' and the EU mess is the cause of this. Dismiss reality if you want.

And please don't insult my intelligence by calling me a Daily Express Reader, it is a rag like most of the British press.

The UK takes our paid allotment and you're batting for them.

What other conclusion is there to come to?

AZ gave out allotment that we paid for the UK and we are totally in our right to defend ourselves for further theft.

Hurrache

hotmail.com wrote: »

This debacle has united Dublin and London governments which is a good thing to come out of this mess.

Having the same opinion on something doesn't unite a government.

sondagefaux

HalfAndHalf wrote: »

I stand corrected. Thanks.

Not on the fact it’s the icing on the monumental cock up cake of a week but on the article, I concede.

Now hopefully they’ll stop ****ing around and get us our goddam vaccines!

I agree. AstraZeneca should stop ****ing around and get us our goddam vaccines!

hotmail.com

Larbre34 wrote: »

So, President Van der Leyen now has to address how a) this confusion today happened, b) how the Brussels bureaucracy was so far behind the 8 ball when it came to contracting vaccines, c) how they were so late approving vaccines, d) how they were so late deploying vaccines, e) if and how the contract with Astra Zeneca gave that company the idea that they could completely take the piss with the deliverables.

Its not great.

She might get moved off I suspect after all this.

She isn't really that good is she?

Hurrache

yagan wrote: »

And here it is from the brand new account, ze germans blah blah blah.

proud Irish man my arse. More likely fully paid up Daily Express reader.

The poster doesn't even realise who the one country was that wouldn't allow us pay the loan back early without insisting on applying penalities for doing so.

hotmail.com

Hurrache wrote: »

Having the same opinion on something doesn't unite a government.

On this matter, both governments are united. The EU were wrong. Ursula needs to go.

mick087

Larbre34 wrote: »

So, President Van der Leyen now has to address how a) this confusion today happened, b) how the Brussels bureaucracy was so far behind the 8 ball when it came to contracting vaccines, c) how they were so late approving vaccines, d) how they were so late deploying vaccines, e) if and how the contract with Astra Zeneca gave that company the idea that they could completely take the piss with the deliverables.

Its not great.

Good questions that i to would like to know the answers to.

ancapailldorcha

Mod: No ad homina please. Below standard posts removed.

Hurrache

Larbre34 wrote: »

, c) how they were so late approving vaccines, d) how they were so late deploying vaccines,

mick087 wrote: »

Good questions that i to would like to know the answers to.

AZ didn't apply for approval until late enough, and they had to be asked, by both the EMA and the FDA for more clarification, the latter who still have yet to approve it.

None of this is secret.

ujjjjjjjjj

Larbre34 wrote: »

So, President Van der Leyen now has to address how a) this confusion today happened, b) how the Brussels bureaucracy was so far behind the 8 ball when it came to contracting vaccines, c) how they were so late approving vaccines, d) how they were so late deploying vaccines, e) if and how the contract with Astra Zeneca gave that company the idea that they could completely take the piss with the deliverables.

Its not great.

Yup good sum up.

I think in relation to point E we may just have to consider that AZ is being fairly straight up about production issues in their Euro plants. They seem to have been pretty clear that they had issues in their UK plants but got this sorted as the UK had moved so much quicker and they of course are going to honour their UK contracts and they are really making great progress there. I have good experience of how the pharma industry works and it's bloody tricky much of this manufacturing and it's not just like making toy cars. Production has to get up to speed and you have batches produced, cultures etc and you need a constant flow etc etc. You don't just switch it on and to get volume through it has to be a flow but they can't do this without the EU giving it the green light. It may be easy to paint a picture of a big nasty pharma company pulling a fast one but I just don't think that is the case here. Pfizer also had to go around on delivery commitments as they needed to halt production to upgrade plants in progress. Didn't see a huge EU hissy fit there. I really think the political forces in the EU reacting to this are reacting badly due to the Brits being a step ahead and it's clouding decisions. Just look at the German regulator saying that they have doubts over using the AZ vaccine in over 65's - this was done to pressure a sea change from AZ - the EMA today said while yes they could do with more data to see if the AZ vaccine was working fine in over 65's there is no reason to suspect it won't work and we should push on. By the way vaccine trials are normally only carried out in younger healthier populations for obvious reasons so not having a lot of data in over 65's is not surprising. What I can't understand is the EU reaction - work with AZ, give them every possible assistance in helping to get production up to speed and get it moving, don't attack them. They want like us all to get this vaccine out to everyone ASAP. Help not hinder. AZ are not deliberating delaying things here but I really think have huge technically and logistical problems to get over. They got it sorted in the UK and they need to honour that contract, yes the EU were behind and they had obviously earmarked Euro plants to do this work. The reality is once the UK approved the vaccine the EURO regulators should have been on a plane to meet with their British counterparts and use their expertise and see could the EU have fast - tracked this thing through. Forget Brexit politics and nonsense and swallow your pride. The UK has a long history of medical expertise and world leading pharma so what, use it don't ignore it. This could have been done end of December and not end Jan and given AZ a month longer to get production moving in Europe. That is where we are folks and it isn't a great place to be.

HalfAndHalf

sondagefaux wrote: »

I agree. AstraZeneca should stop ****ing around and get us our goddam vaccines!

Well to be exact, Novasep should, they’re the ones that are producing it and have such small yields.

sondagefaux

HalfAndHalf wrote: »

Well to be exact, Novasep should, they’re the ones that are producing it and have such small yields.

Don't be blaming the subcontractors...

ujjjjjjjjj

yagan wrote: »

The UK takes our paid allotment and you're batting for them.

What other conclusion is there to come to?

AZ gave out allotment that we paid for the UK and we are totally in our right to defend ourselves for further theft.

If you want to for one minute just sit down and think about it you might find many other conclusions but of course if your default position is that the Brits are out to get us at every turn and steal everything well then fine........

I am not batting for the UK, just enviously looking at how they have managed their vaccine roleout and wondering how the EU has made such a horlicks of it. I look at Israel too with the same envy - what did they do - went to Pfizer well ahead of the EU threw money at them and committed to paying top dollar for vaccine and also agreed to help Pfizer with feedback data from their health system. Clever. And by the way pretty much anything we invest in this vaccine will be paid back in spades to stop the cash burn that our systems are experiencing at the moment with lockdown.

Swift decisive action was needed in handling the vaccine procurement and rollout no matter what the cost - the Brits and Israel did this, the EU dithered. For one minute take off your anti Brit hat put it to oneside and just say okay the EU messed up.

Hurrache

Are you also enviousness of them having the highest death rate in Europe due to them being having an absolutely abysmal government, a fact many citizens there agree with?

They're basically all in on everything, even underwriting pharmaceutical companies of any side effects if anything guess wrong, to try just get any sort of win.

The EU can't approve something until it's submitted for approval.

People with options like yours would be the first to whinge if there were side effects that the state body didn't have the full facts before hand.

HalfAndHalf

sondagefaux wrote: »

Don't be blaming the subcontractors...

Theres no issues in the other plants sure....

sondagefaux

Hurrache wrote: »

AZ didn't apply for approval until late enough, and they had to be asked, by both the EMA and the FDA for more clarification, the latter who still have yet to approve it.

None of this is secret.

There's nothing to stop any individual member state from giving emergency approval to vaccines without waiting for the EMA's decision.

In fact, the UK did just this for both the Pfizer and AZ vaccines, both approved by the UK while it was still under EU law during the transition period.

The EU27 have a gentleman's agreement that they won't do this, precisely to prevent the free-for-all rush to get vaccines first that we've now seen.

Hungary has broken ranks and is giving emergency approval to a Russian vaccine and a Chinese vaccine; that's Orbán for ya...

Although it looks like the Hungarian people aren't too keen.

Some polls suggest only seven percent of Hungarians would accept the Russian vaccine, while acceptance of the Chinese version has been measured as low as one percent by some surveys.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55747623

Hurrache

It's like the HPV vaccine rollout never happened [some posters furiously googling the **** out of it].

sondagefaux

HalfAndHalf wrote: »

Theres no issues in the other plants sure....

Whatever was happening in the UK in December, it had to be supplied from the Netherlands.

A relatively tiny nunber of doses to be sure, but evidence that it wasn't plain sailing in the UK either

ujjjjjjjjj

Hurrache wrote: »

Are you also enviousness of them having the biggest death rate in Europe?

Of course not.........................but really don't understand what this has to do with vaccine roleout and what we are discussing here. If you want me to say oh yes the Brits and Boris are a bunch of fools and have killed thousands, fine if you makes you happy I'll say that. But show me one government in Europe which has done a great job ? Through this entire mess there has been a nasty under current of 'larphing' at the Brits and I have had endless weird discussions with people where they seemed happy enough with how Covid was going in Ireland as long as we were better than the Brits and sure look at the mess over the water. yadda yadda yadda...for me they are nearest neighbour, yes we have had a checkered past but we share so much with them and really after all these years can we not just move on a bit. Through the entire Brexit issue (and like it or not folks they had a referendum which the UK government honoured....) there has been a blinkered view that anything Brexit is a disaster and anything EU is brilliant. Life just isn't that simple and the Irish government has one responsibility - put Irish people first. This vaccine mess is a simple example of there old historical baggage has got in the way and it's so pointless.

Has the UK made mistakes ? Yes.

Is it doing a better job of rolling out the vaccine ? Yes

Do Irish people have a right to question why the vaccines are so slow getting here ? Yes

Is the EU preforming well here ? No.

ancapailldorcha

Hurrache wrote: »

It's like the HPV vaccine rollout never happened [some posters furiously googling the **** out of it].

What happened?

yagan

yagan wrote: »

The UK takes our paid allotment and you're batting for them.

It's hard to know where this comes from. An Irexit party in Ireland could convene with all its members in Dublin's tiniest snug, and still have room to swing a cat. It is an entirely online phenomena.

I've been agnostic about the EU for a while now but am pleased with their pushiness on this. After all they are working on our behalf.

As for the general discussion, almost certainly driven by the tabloid or Tory yellow press, its all fairly unhinged. People are combing the contract for opt out clauses which don't make any sense to me. However its clear that we are going to take most of our news from English language newspapers, the US papers don't care that much as this isn't happening in Chicago, which means most Irish people who consume news online are driven by pro UK arguments.

Hurrache

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

What happened?

Very basically there were complaints that the vaccine (I think there were actually 2) was rushed out too quickly, not enough trials, many parents subsequently listing a lot of long term sIde affects on their children and advocacy groups were set up seeking compensation.

Much of it is still ongoing. And yet you have people complaining the AZ vaccine wasn't authorised for use quickly enough despite both the EMA and FDA unhappy with the initial data provided by AZ.

Bandwagoning.

ujjjjjjjjj

Hurrache wrote: »

Are you also enviousness of them having the highest death rate in Europe due to them being having an absolutely abysmal government, a fact many citizens there agree with?

They're basically all in on everything, even underwriting pharmaceutical companies of any side effects if anything guess wrong, to try just get any sort of win.

The EU can't approve something until it's submitted for approval.

People with options like yours would be the first to whinge if there were side effects that the state body didn't have the full facts before hand.

It's normal practice for countries to indemnify pharma companies with products such as mass society vaccines. Countries all over the world do this and with any vaccine you get some side effects and pharma companies need to indemnify themselves - by the way the EMA approved the AZ vaccine today, so no evidence that the British regulators screwed up. The reason AZ didn't submit the vaccine for approval is that the EMA wanted information in a very particular format and treated it like any run of the mill medical approval (i.e no rush) and it took time. The British regulator looked at the urgency and importance and took raw data from AZ and made a quick decision on it. Yes arguably they took a chance here but it was a calculated risk weighed against the need for speed. I think they simply looked first at potential risky side effects and said look we ain't seeing anything and moved quickly. The EU didn't adapt and didn't move quickly enough.

I am not looking for some raise the Union Jack here but just an acceptance that perhaps the EU in comparison to the UK moved like molasses when they needed to move exceptionally quickly.

sondagefaux

SNIP. No silly nicknames please.

ujjjjjjjjj

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

Has the UK made mistakes ? Yes.

Is it doing a better job of rolling out the vaccine ? Yes

Do Irish people have a right to question why the vaccines are so slow getting here ? Yes

Is the EU preforming well here ? No.

It's a bit odd then that people are not supporting the EU to get batter, since this would in fact benefit the actual country they are living in. Offline I think support for the EU on this is pretty high. Online is a different matter.

iamnotme

Deleted User wrote: »

It's hard to know where this comes from. An Irexit party in Ireland could convene with all its members in Dublin's tiniest snug, and still have room to swing a cat. It is an entirely online phenomena.

I've been agnostic about the EU for a while now but am pleased with their pushiness on this. After all they are working on our behalf.

As for the general discussion, almost certainly driven by the tabloid or Tory yellow press, its all fairly unhinged. People are combing the contract for opt out clauses which don't make any sense to me. However its clear that we are going to take most of our news from English language newspapers, the US papers don't care that much as this isn't happening in Chicago, which means most Irish people who consume news online are driven by pro UK arguments.

Top story on BBC and Guardian. This is an EU fiasco, again. People here think the EU is infallible.

HalfAndHalf

[Deleted User] wrote: »

It's hard to know where this comes from. An Irexit party in Ireland could convene with all its members in Dublin's tiniest snug, and still have room to swing a cat. It is an entirely online phenomena.

I've been agnostic about the EU for a while now but am pleased with their pushiness on this. After all they are working on our behalf.

As for the general discussion, almost certainly driven by the tabloid or Tory yellow press, its all fairly unhinged. People are combing the contract for opt out clauses which don't make any sense to me. However its clear that we are going to take most of our news from English language newspapers, the US papers don't care that much as this isn't happening in Chicago, which means most Irish people who consume news online are driven by pro UK arguments.

Where I’ve taken the contract views from and some have been posted in the AV thread are from, you would assume notable Belgian Lawyers posting on Twitter that they think the release of the contract has done the EC no ta ours and strongly backs AZs stance.

Especially clause 5 and it’s subsections which state the EU negotiated priority supply from EU plants specifically for the EU’s initial order of 300 million doses. Subsection 5.4 then states that if the EU want their additional 100 million doses they can come from EU/U.K. or other country plants.

Shouting that they should come from the U.K. is all well and good but it isn’t in the contract.

iamnotme

iamnotme wrote: »

Top story on BBC and Guardian. This is an EU cock-up, again.

That's a non sequitur. That something is on The BBC and the Guardian doesn't mean that the EU cocked up.

sondagefaux

Kerfuffle over.

RTÉ News
@rtenews
The European Commission has said it will not invoke Article 16 of the Northern Ireland Protocol in relation to vaccine exports but "will consider using all instruments at its disposal".

Von Der Leyen owes Martin big time...