nav[aria-label="Primary Navigation"] { padding: 0; & ul { list-style: none; width: 100%; display: flex; flex-direction: row; justify-content: start; align-items: start; gap: 30px; padding: 0; & li { margin: 0; } & ul li { list-style: none; } } }

Child Item

Brexit discussion thread III

ancapailldorcha

This thread is for discussing the departure of the UK from the EU. I will move some posts over shortly.

New posters, please read the forum charter before posting.

Regards,

The Politics Mods.

Find more posts tagged with

Quick Links

Comments

farmchoice

Skedaddle wrote: »

There's a huge disconnect between what Tory hardliners want and what the UK electorate seems to have voted for. I would have my doubts, based on being quite familiar with British consumer culture, that they would be very happy with the notion of any old random junk being stocked on the basis of 'buyer beware'.

The average person over there expects a lot of regulation, which is why there's a big audience for programmes like Watchdog on BBC.

There's also huge support for and pride taken in social achievements like the NHS, even by people on the right of centre.

If Brexit pushes the UK out into some kind of ultra-libritarian economic dystopia, I suspect there'll be political hell to pay over the next few years.

My view of the main stream of English and British politics in general is that it's somewhere in the centre, not dramatically unlike Ireland on most issues. People want some degree of decent social services but don't want to be overtaxed either, so there's a balance struck.

There's a definite attempt to dismantle the post-war progressive society that was built in the UK, and it's actually a parallel issue to Brexit, which is only the vehicle by which it will be achieved. I just see Brexit being used as a Trojan horse for a some very nasty policies that were never voted for by the UK electorate.

surely to Christ thats why it wont happen? surly scene will prevail and the great British public will not allow themselves to be driven off a cliff because the lunatic faction of the tory party want to have their very own ''charge of the light brigade''.

personally i think corbyn know this and he is happy to let things go as they are because he needs the public to become aware of the reality before he moves to put a stop to it.

Skedaddle

Well, it could easily happen : look at the United States.

It's the same thing - whip up fear of 'the others' and get your agenda through.

I'm surprised at the British public to be honest. I always thought they had more sense and ability to analyse, critique and probe for facts than this. It's disappointing to see them being sucked into this vortex.

There's a dire need to get down to the facts, figures and reality.

Leroy42

But they are being sold this as if they are taking back control. And you can be sure that whatever reductions in standards (lets say in terms of workers rights or health & safety) will be sold as getting UK back competitive again, and need to put one over on the nasty EU.

Leroy42

farmchoice wrote: »

surely to Christ thats why it wont happen? surly scene will prevail and the great British public will not allow themselves to be driven off a cliff because the lunatic faction of the tory party want to have their very own ''charge of the light brigade''.

personally i think corbyn know this and he is happy to let things go as they are because he needs the public to become aware of the reality before he moves to put a stop to it.

Yeah, keep telling yourself that Corbyn is going to ride to the rescue. Wasn't May going sort everything out as well?

Corbyn should be standing up now to demand a stop to the madness, but it seems he is quite happy to simply let things crash around them on the basis that surely he will win if everything is in ruins.

What kind of leadership is that?

Skedaddle

They already had control - they were one of the most powerful members of the EU and also had access to the world markets.

Trading from within the EU is actually an incredibly privileged position. You've got the whole EU market and also the weight of the entire EU economy to use as leverage in trade deals. Yet, the media in the UK, and I would include venerable publications in print and even the BBC, allowed people to claim that there was a dichotomy between EU trade and Global Trade as if the two were completely incompatible, when they actually work hand-in-glove.

Opinions and nonsense is circulating, unchallenged, as fact and people aren't being challenged to provide evidence to back up some of the ludicrous claims they've been making.

Brexit is built on a pack of lies and no facts and I think the British people have been conned, very badly.

Hopefully it's not too late and they don't just sail off the cliff economically. However, I'm not seeing all that much evidence of any 'snapping back to reality' in the political sphere.

If the DUP really cared about NI and its people, peace and the economic prosperity of the region, they would pull the plug now before this thing destroys them. The most patriotic thing they could do right now would be to save the UK from its own tabloids.

Leroy42

On the failure of the media that Skedaddle mentions (and at the risk of sounding like last nights QT was the only program I have ever seen) Grayling was not even questioned about his assertion that there would be no checks at Dover. It was just taken as something that was possible.

No debate, no discussion. He was simply allowed claim that there would be no truck parks because they wouldn't check anything. It was bizarre that a minister was allowed to state government policy and not even be asked what it meant.

That of course is just the latest example. Only this week, Farage was claiming that a deal with the US would be done in 48 hours. Sure, but what sort of deal.

And the hypocrisy of the likes of the Express etc to claim Corbyn is a traitor or soft on Russia because he had the audacity to question the basis of the intelligence for the Russia attack, yet these are the very same people that are happy to claim that the civil service reports are all fake and the CS are working against the government.

Professor Moriarty

Leroy42 wrote: »

On the failure of the media that Skedaddle mentions (and at the risk of sounding like last nights QT was the only program I have ever seen) Grayling was not even questioned about his assertion that there would be no checks at Dover. It was just taken as something that was possible.

No debate, no discussion. He was simply allowed claim that there would be no truck parks because they wouldn't check anything. It was bizarre that a minister was allowed to state government policy and not even be asked what it meant.

That of course is just the latest example. Only this week, Farage was claiming that a deal with the US would be done in 48 hours. Sure, but what sort of deal.

And the hypocrisy of the likes of the Express etc to claim Corbyn is a traitor or soft on Russia because he had the audacity to question the basis of the intelligence for the Russia attack, yet these are the very same people that are happy to claim that the civil service reports are all fake and the CS are working against the government.

Farage lies. Over and over again. And the Express, Telegraph and Mail publish his lies and other lies. Nothing he or they say should be taken seriously. Those who believe the lies are lost anyway.

Skedaddle

I think the problem is that the UK and US have crossed into a paradigm where facts and opinions are the same thing.

They need to remember that while everyone's entitled to their opinion, they are not entitled to their own facts.

Robust, no-nonsense, independent, journalism plays an incredibly important role in democracies and in those two that is sorely missing at the moment.

It's not about taking sides, it's about finding the truth and demanding rational explanations.

Sam Russell

Leroy42 wrote: »

No debate, no discussion. He was simply allowed claim that there would be no truck parks because they wouldn't check anything. It was bizarre that a minister was allowed to state government policy and not even be asked what it meant.

The checks will be on the French side and the queues will be on the UK side, because the ships will not be allowed to load if they cannot unload. It is the EU that will check imports into the EU, nothing the UK can do about that.

Letting trucks into the UK unchecked might work for a while, but eventuality all trucks available will be parked up the M2 trying to get out. Then there is the question of HGV licences, how is that going to be dealt with? UK licences will expire when the UK leaves the EU, what then?

Doomed, doomed, I tell you they are doomed.

Skedaddle

The French checks may still be in the UK as the juxtaposed border controls are a bilateral agreement between the two that don't really get impacted by this. It's the rules of the border that change.

Either way, you're going to have huge queues in both directions as trade will still have to somehow go on.

From a logistical point of view, you can't really let trucks into France and have then choke up inside the ports. That's why you have to have the checks in the UK for France and France for the UK. Otherwise, it would become impossible and you'd have trucks stuck on ferries.

The problem is where are they going to do all these checks? The infrastructure in place is deigned for current needs, not checking every single vehicle. How are they going to build all that and recruit and train the necessary staff by next year?

There isn't really a precedent for this level of disruption. Most borders are either very old and have evolved, or have come about in quite conflicted areas of the world without much trade anyway. The sheer volume of goods that move across those borders and the level of integration of the economies will make any kind of checking like that extremely logistically difficult.

What's being proposed is just incredibly disruptive and can't but have economic consequences.

This stuff is all fine and well in some right wing politician's imagination. Implementing it will just be absolutely chaos.

It's a bit like asking someone to unscramble an egg.

Water John

JRM et al, are the political descendants of Trevelyan. A rolling back of the Social State on Post WW2 is their ultimate aim.

ancapailldorcha

This from Jacob Rees-Mogg is disheartening:

https://twitter.com/politicshome/status/974375179555045376?s=20

flutered

Leroy42 wrote: »

Just to follow up on what Grayling stated during QT last night;

This must be possible, otherwise they wouldn't be suggesting it (the non enforcement, not the non-disclosure). I assume they are doing this to try to alleviate any delays due to Brexit border checks, but what practical impact could it have?

I assume the EU would then need to check every shipment arriving from the UK, so are the simply trying to shift the problem further down the line?
As isn't this acceptable? I mean, it is the EU issue to police what comes in I would have thought

perhaps the brexiteers think by not having any border controls with the eu, that the eu will recipitate

Water John

They simply want to blame the queues on the EU.

Christy42

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

This from Jacob Rees-Mogg is disheartening:

https://twitter.com/politicshome/status/974375179555045376?s=20

He is not suggesting that Ireland leave the EU. He is saying it is equally valid as cutting off the NI from UK regs and forcing it to deal with EU regs. He is not expecting it to happen or putting it forward as a proper solution.

However he does not go on to suggest a serious solution. Just dismissing the EU one and being entirely unhelpful. I feel either a hard border comes in or the UK agrees to follow EU regs temporarily (if that happened I would expect the temporary bit to be forgotten and they remain in the EU in all but name).

flutered

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

The UK Government warned the electorate that Brexit would make them 3-6% poorer before the vote. (I think this is low, given the kind of Brexit they are going for it is more like 5-15%, but anyhow...) Surveys show that Leave voters don't care, and that even if a family member loses their job as a result, they still want to Brexit.

So saying now that they shouldn't Brexit because it will make them poorer is too late - they know, they don't care. Brexit is not about money.

brexit is not about money, to the top monied torys, their financier friends and the monied newspaper barons, plus the folks that redmond told to put their money outside the uk, it is all about money, much, much money

flutered

Tropheus wrote: »

Looking at the headlines over the past couple of days, May must be delighted she has the nerve gas attack to distract from the shambles that is Brexit. Nothing like a threat of war (no matter how vague) to improve a British PMs rating in the poles.

the fact that she turned down a russian request for a u.n. invistegation has not bee questioned.https://evolvepolitics.com/tories-block-draft-un-security-council-statement-calling-for-urgent-and-civilized-investigation-into-skripal-poisoning-attack/

jobbridge4life

Christy42 wrote: »

He is not suggesting that Ireland leave the EU. He is saying it is equally valid as cutting off the NI from UK regs and forcing it to deal with EU regs. He is not expecting it to happen or putting it forward as a proper solution.

Except it isn't. Not even remotely.

We have had countless EU referendums, all of which (after some back and forth) we have ultimately approved through democratic referendums. Not to mention that Northern Ireland is a part of Ireland that without violent and genocidal colonization would be firmly part of the Republic.

He, a supposed liege of the British traditional set, might do well to remember that referendums have no place in the British constitutional tradition. He might also be better off to recall that the question of exiting the EU was kept distinctly separate from exiting the CU and SM by no less than a number of the Brexit heavy hitters.

Christy42 wrote: »

However he does not go on to suggest a serious solution. Just dismissing the EU one and being entirely unhelpful. I feel either a hard border comes in or the UK agrees to follow EU regs temporarily (if that happened I would expect the temporary bit to be forgotten and they remain in the EU in all but name).

He can't suggest any alternatives because none exist. As has been repeatedly confirmed and most lately by MPs themselves. Also worth remembering that the UK has already requested (begged) for a transitional arrangement. Do you expect this to last indefinitely?

Junkyard Tom

Christy42 wrote: »

He is saying it is equally valid as cutting off the NI from UK regs and forcing it to deal with EU regs

False equivalence.

Christy42

Junkyard Tom wrote: »

False equivalence.

I agree. It just bugged me that the headline was wrong!

Enzokk

farmchoice wrote: »

a few weeks ago pascal lamy give evidence to hilary benns committee. it was during the discussions on what WTO terms meant and how it works.

jacob rees mogg put forward the proposition that the UK could simply not bother to enforce a border.
he put it lamy that there was nothing in the WTO terms to stop them.

lamy agreed that this was possiblein theory but only if the UK has a 0% tarrif on all goods entering the uk, everything bar exception.

rees mogg agreed and suggested that this was a fine idea and the ultimate free trade agreement and would be better for the poor in particular.

lamy pointed out that there would be the issue of standards and regulations on goods, childern's toys for example.
rees mogg didn't see the problem. buyer beware.

i found this very reveling as to what rees mogg and his ilk actually believe in. up to that point i thought he was more of an attention seeker and deluded little englender than anything else.
but they do have a type of economic policy it appears to be a return to 19th century laissez faire economics in its truest form.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

This from Jacob Rees-Mogg is disheartening:

https://twitter.com/politicshome/status/974375179555045376?s=20

The more you learn about him the more it scares me. It seems that him and his ERG group are out to control the narrative via the "biased" media. It takes some courage to call the media biased when you have The Sun, The Daily Mail and The Telegraph on your side. They are not content though, they want to force the BBC and Channel 4 News to stop reporting the truth and only report it the way they see it. I think it is working with the BBC, which is scary.

The conversation is one of hundreds of WhatsApp messages seen by BuzzFeed News that reveal the inner workings of the most influential lobbying force in British politics. Led by Jacob Rees-Mogg, the ERG has around 70 supporters on the Tory back benches and at least a dozen more sympathetic MPs in government. It dominates the Conservative party and has profoundly influenced Theresa May’s Brexit policy.

The huge leak — a major embarrassment for a group that prefers to operate out of the public view — reveals that, in addition to its extensive parliamentary and political manoeuvring, the ERG has waged a vigorous, nimble media campaign to shape the national conversation about Brexit.

The conversations reveal how an informal network of passionate, determined backbench MPs, with the support of only one paid researcher – his salary is funded by public money – and a free messaging app have worked the British media to make their case for a hard Brexit and push back against the Remainers they believe are trying to undermine the vote to leave the EU.

These Leaked WhatsApp Chats Reveal Just How Brexiteer Tories Fight The "Smeary" BBC

Capt'n Midnight

Every minute longer it takes to screen a truck at peak time means another 10 miles of queuing for crossing the channel.
A 4 minute check means 5 hours of queuing. And if you are paying drivers that adds up.

And that's before you include the checks on the EU side.

Havockk

Enzokk wrote: »

The more you learn about him the more it scares me. It seems that him and his ERG group are out to control the narrative via the "biased" media. It takes some courage to call the media biased when you have The Sun, The Daily Mail and The Telegraph on your side. They are not content though, they want to force the BBC and Channel 4 News to stop reporting the truth and only report it the way they see it. I think it is working with the BBC, which is scary.

These Leaked WhatsApp Chats Reveal Just How Brexiteer Tories Fight The "Smeary" BBC

This is more and more like a bloodless coup.

Nitrogan

A hard border with NI looks inevitable at this stage.
I'm still convinced that a majority in the UK will want to abort Brexit or rejoin the EU in the future. The question is how long it will take for that rump of older anti-EU voters to pass on or become outnumbered by new younger voters whose life choices are damaged by Brexit.
Once border posts and all the required bureacratic systems go into place it will be a little harder to go back to the way it is now and waste an unmerciful fortune in costs.
Another vote before anything is signed off is the only hope to save everyone from a terrible mistake.

Water John

A fine long queue, every time they go to and from their apartment in Spain and when they go for their sun holiday would let them know how, the shoe will begin to pinch.

Sam Russell

Water John wrote: »

A fine long queue, every time they go to and from their apartment in Spain and when they go for their sun holiday would let them know how, the shoe will begin to pinch.

Plus the roaming charges, and the need to get medical insurance to supplement the cancelled E111 card, and the re-imposition of credit card charges for purchases. Not to mention the removal of the work-time directive, etc. etc.

Chlorinated chicken anyone?

CelticRambler

Water John wrote: »

A fine long queue, every time they go to and from their apartment in Spain and when they go for their sun holiday would let them know how, the shoe will begin to pinch.

That's an awfully simplistic view of the world! The last time I arrived in France (travelling from Dublin) it took over an hour to get past the customs kiosk - and that was at a teeny two-flights a day airport. Border queues and customs won't change the mind of an ordinary Joe Bloggs Brexit voter, who probably doesn't leave the country more than once or twice a year anyway.

Similarly, a few hundred companies moving their HQ to other EU countries, taking a few hundred management jobs with them, or other EU-based companies opting to not invest in a new UK factory or office is going to pass unnoticed by the average Joe.

There are two things that'll hit home:
(significantly) higher prices for day-to-day purchases, due to a fall in the value of sterling coupled with reduced supply because importers can't get freight shipped reliably from European distributors;
and an insidious breakdown of the community spirit that makes Britain British, as exporting businesses shed jobs, and EU migrants go home, taking their families with them, all of which will drain money from the local economy, putting "native" service businesses under strain, hence more job losses.

The first of those could come quite quickly, and would undoubtedly be blamed on the big bad EU punishing Britain for leaving; the second will take a lot longer - maybe up to ten years - and will be a lot more difficult to tie in to the decision to leave.

So all-in-all, Joe Bloggs will have lost his job, won't be able to afford anything other than chlorine-flavoured pot noodles, and be living in a town full of boarded-up shops, but will still be proud to be British, still look back at the Good Ol' Days of the Empire and delight in telling the story of how he gave the EU a good kicking.

Econ_

Nitrogan wrote: »

A hard border with NI looks inevitable at this stage.

It's not inevitable, imo. Not at all.

A transition period will be 90% agreed with UK this month but the EU will insist that it will be ultimately be dependent on the UK agreeing to some form of legally binding text that operationalises what they signed up to in December, ie. no hard border in Ireland. - https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/mar/16/irish-border-remains-a-brexit-hurdle-say-eu-sources?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

This is a clever strategy from the EU. Very clever.

May will take that back to the UK; Transition is agreed but is dependent on solution to Irish border by the Autumn.

This time period will coincide with a vote on Anna Soubry's amendment that would compel the government into negotiating a customs union with the EU.

By many accounts, there is already a large support for the amendment in parliament. The EU will now have created a scenario where the certainty of business will be dependent on the bill - because transition won't go ahead unless Irish border solution is found. This adds to the other, less immediate, sensible reasons to stay in a CU with the EU and gives the bill a higher chance of passing.

And if that bill passes - the Brexiteers will have lost their 'let's strike trade deals with the rest of the world' BS, because they will be tied to the EU's common external tariff.

The debate would then naturally shift to retaining access to the single market.

And then - 'what's the point in leaving again?'

Looking at things right now, I can see a path for remain. And I suppose if Brexit was ever going to be reversed, it was always going to be through a long game; a step by step shifting of position back to the status quo.

Not guaranteed by any means, they may still leave. But I think the chances of them leaving on hard terms are much less likely.

trellheim

Looking at things right now, I can see a path for remain. And I suppose if Brexit was ever going to be reversed, it was always going to be through a long game; a step by step shifting of position back to the status quo.

As someone who wishes they would remain I cannot see at the moment how the Commons would majority vote to reverse the Article 50 process - and that is ALL that matters here. There is almost exactly 1 year to the crash out and there is NO transition agreed, nothing at all ( never mind the post-transition agreement FTA ) ( PS the EU revised it the other day again fk sake )

Right now its the hardest of hard exits.

Experience_day

I think its hard for us to have a full grasp of why Britain voted for Brexit. I spent considerable time across there as much as here, and there are factors that we are lucky enough not to be afflicted with.

One of which is the idea of the EU overstepping its remit and the chain of command. The commission has become very heavy in its bureaucracy and there is a strong feeling (not just from the Brits) of a lack of accountability.

I think this is deliberately whipped by some into being antieuropean rather than just anti EU.

And obviously the issue around migration played a huge part..

Britain has "enjoyed" a substantial amount of immigration, I know we think of ourselves as open but entire communities have been reshaped in the UK, with very very little oversight. There are swathes of non EU migration and considerable amounts of EU migration.

From people i know in the UK the vote was for a wake up call to the government that things were not rosy. Not about going back to a rule Britannia situation. They have already achieved that by making English the lingua franca...

I think it's a unfortunate situation for all to be in, but at the same time, not everything in life should be about economics...