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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.

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The Politics Mods.

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Sam Russell

Thomas__. wrote: »

She apologised to them but she didn't really mean it.

There is a lot of apologies floating about at the moment, like the Magdalene women, but it did not extend to those who were trapped in the Magdalene system but not actually in the laundries themselves, but worked in them as unpaid slave.

I have long help the view that apologies mean nothing unless wrapped up in a £5 note. No money as compo, then no apology - if it costs them nothing to apologise, then that is the value of the apology.

ancapailldorcha

Enzokk wrote: »

I hope my reply didn't come across as asking you for answers or defending her. I was more asking a general question on the interesting information you provided. I was wondering out loud why she shouldn't be held responsible and if there really is any evidence that would indicate that she isn't racist.

I can see how she is a very capable politician. She doesn't take any responsibility and she hides away when there is trouble only to resurface when it seems safe to do so.

Ah right.

She has a reputation as being a very capable administrator and operator. It's when she has to engage with the nonsense of Politics like interviews and such that she falls apart. In fairness, no politician will ever accept responsibility for any mistakes or wrongdoing, especially in this day and age. I'm an EU migrant so it's not like I'm a Conservative voter or anything by the way.

Ultimately though people voted Tory and by virtue/failure of FPTP they got in. I'm disappointed that the Lib Dems let so much of this slide though.

EdgeCase

Leroy42 wrote: »

This paragraph, to me at least, sums up the UK approach to Brexit.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-regional-specialities-eu-protect-trade-deal-europe-cheese-food-drink-wine-a8312171.html

They want to keep what they have, based on rules EU designed, but are not willing to give the same in return.

How in the name of ... do they think that's a reasonable negotiating position?
I would be personally rather annoyed if the EU were to allow itself to ridden over like that. It's absolute nonsense.

The sheer arrogance is mind boggling. Who do they think they are?!

Nody

EdgeCase wrote: »

How in the name of ... do they think that's a reasonable negotiating position?
I would be personally rather annoyed if the EU were to allow itself to ridden over like that. It's absolute nonsense.

The sheer arrogance is mind boggling. Who do they think they are?!

They are simply applying the Sovjet (and Putin) style of negotiation; what is ours is ours; everything else is up for negotiation. Honestly though I think they simply think they can use it as leverage when in practice it's a binary decision (either both support it or neither will) and both will look at enforcing "their" rules in their country. The problem for UK is that USA, Canada etc. are not happy with such geographical rules and will push for exclusions in any FTA and UK no longer as EU to back them up in those discussions. Hence I'd expect to see some of them at least ending up being sacrificed for FTAs. Not bigger once such as Cornish pasty or Scottish Whiskey but several of the less well known once I could see being excluded or small printed away.

Enzokk

Thomas__. wrote: »

I don't see that sort of behaviour as attributes to a capable politician in a positive light. It is exactly that what brings more people to become frustrated by politics and politicians, turning away from it and not going to vote anymore. Such 'two-faced' characters like she is one of many are the types which many people are fed up with, only serving their own interests and that is above all to remain in power no matter what.

Apart from the tabloids and the diehard Tories, there is an increase in opinions by readers on a UK media outlet that call for her resign. Not the first time, it goes on for a considerable time since she became PM and that is due to her failings in many ways, in Brexit, the NHS crisis, the recent Windrush scandal and above all the perceived lack of leadership on her own as leader of the Tory Party and as PM. In fact, she appears like a puppet haning on the strings others, much propably her own enemies from within her own party, are pulling the strings.

I don't know what sort of proof some people yet need to realise of what mindset May really is and frankly, the way the Windrush People are treated in the past eight years (one should really consider that time frame) which came legally to the UK as British subjects and are in fact British citizens, it is more than obvious that this is blatant racism. The way she handles this matter and more over the way she set up the way to have them treated that bad is for me more than enough proof of her racist mindset. She apologised to them but she didn't really mean it. She has no sense of humanity herself and that was proved by the way she handled the recent NHS crisis.

May is in many ways worse than Thatcher, in very many ways.

I didn't mean it in a positive way. What I meant was she was skilled at playing the politics game and has risen to the top. The history books will judge her in the future but right now she is arguably vying for the spot as the worst PM with David Cameron. That is not someone who is capable in a positive light, that is someone that plays the game to rise to the top but is found out when the pressure is on.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Ah right.

She has a reputation as being a very capable administrator and operator. It's when she has to engage with the nonsense of Politics like interviews and such that she falls apart. In fairness, no politician will ever accept responsibility for any mistakes or wrongdoing, especially in this day and age. I'm an EU migrant so it's not like I'm a Conservative voter or anything by the way.

Ultimately though people voted Tory and by virtue/failure of FPTP they got in. I'm disappointed that the Lib Dems let so much of this slide though.

She seemed to do quite well in the clip in this Question Time episode from 2004 though.

https://twitter.com/DavidLammy/status/986977664731942912

I wish politicians would follow their own rhetoric sometimes.

ArmaniJeanss

Telegraph leading with a big story that EU/UK negotiations have hit a huge stumbling block with the UKs 3 border proposals being rejected.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/04/19/exclusive-eu-rejects-theresa-mays-brexit-irish-border-solution/

The EU has comprehensively rejected British proposals for avoiding a hard border in Northern Ireland in a move which will cast serious doubt on the UK’s ability to leave the customs union, The Telegraph has learned.
Senior EU diplomatic sources said that Mrs May’s plan for avoiding a hard border in Northern Ireland was subjected to a “systematic and forensic annihilation” this week at a meeting between senior EU officials and Olly Robbins, the UK’s lead Brexit negotiator.

“It was a detailed and forensic rebuttal,” added the source who was directly briefed on the meeting in Brussels on Wednesday. “It was made clear that none of the UK’s customs options will work. None of them.”

...continues behind paywall.

Econ_

Who would have ever guessed?

Professor Moriarty

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Telegraph leading with a big story that EU/UK negotiations have hit a huge stumbling block with the UKs 3 border proposals being rejected.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/04/19/exclusive-eu-rejects-theresa-mays-brexit-irish-border-solution/

The EU has comprehensively rejected British proposals for avoiding a hard border in Northern Ireland in a move which will cast serious doubt on the UK’s ability to leave the customs union, The Telegraph has learned.
Senior EU diplomatic sources said that Mrs May’s plan for avoiding a hard border in Northern Ireland was subjected to a “systematic and forensic annihilation” this week at a meeting between senior EU officials and Olly Robbins, the UK’s lead Brexit negotiator.

“It was a detailed and forensic rebuttal,” added the source who was directly briefed on the meeting in Brussels on Wednesday. “It was made clear that none of the UK’s customs options will work. None of them.”

...continues behind paywall.

The headline points to the UK staying in the Customs Union:

Exclusive: EU rejects Theresa May's Brexit Irish border solution as doubts grow over whether UK can leave customs union

Asa Bennett, an ardent Brexiteer, floated the same thought last week in The Telegraph. Despite the constant drumbeat of Brexity rhetoric, it might be that the Tories, via their rag, are quietly beginning to soften the Leavers up so that they can wrap their heads around the idea.

Capt'n Midnight

This should clear up any confusion about what Brexit was for and how future immigration policy will go.

The UK has a more "welcoming" attitude to immigrants than any country in the EU, Michael Gove has claimed.

And he hit back at claims the voters who backed Brexit in the 2016 EU referendum were motivated by what he called "darker feelings" about immigration and had led to an increase in racism.
...
"The British people have a robust and pragmatic and liberal approach. They want to welcome people here who want to work."

Capt'n Midnight

Anthracite wrote: »

I presume the invisible border IT project they are working on is on-budget and will be delivered within the year?

Yeah, about that ...

Compare it to the pre-existing customs upgrade which was in progress before Brexit, It's going badly, and it wasn't due till after Brexit. And the new volumes are way higher than panned. Moving the deadline of a big software project forward while you still don't have a clear of how the requirements have changed is a recipe for disaster.

Throwing extra resources at IT megaprojects is like expecting nine women to deliver a baby in a month.

And that upgrade is just for the normal declared stuff at ferry ports. 400 border crossings with deprived areas on both sides , people with dual nationality too, and they are proposing what is more or less a honesty system in places where Cash for Ash / Burn to Earn is a thing.

Hurrache

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Telegraph leading with a big story that EU/UK negotiations have hit a huge stumbling block with the UKs 3 border proposals being rejected.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/04/19/exclusive-eu-rejects-theresa-mays-brexit-irish-border-solution/.

Screen grab of the story here
https://twitter.com/gavreilly/status/987088741914333190?s=19

fash

Article available in full here:
https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-daily-telegraph/20180420/281543701520989
Stand out quotes from the article:
"The EU's Northern Ireland gamble is more proof that it is not a liberal trading bloc but an authoritarian political project... It is revealing that an EU Ambassador he would like to know how to open up a business in Ireland after Brexit because under the British plan, he would be rolling in cash. That is rather the point. The British have sought to build a future that is light on rules and enriched both sides. Its perspective is pro-business. The EU by contrast is motivated by politics. It wants to humiliate us, to bind us to its regulations in perpetuity"

I would note that the ambassador's joke to open a business was "because it is going to be a great business if there are no customs controls".
It would appear that the journalist is in favour of criminal activity and believes encouraging that is precisely the point of Brexit/ their suggested solution to NI.

Enzokk

Fascinating how the same story from the same reporter for me reads differently depending where you read it. From the twitter link from Gavan Reilly the story reads about how the proposals from the UK cannot work for the EU on the border. They have been rebutted and the reasons given why and the UK must come back with proposals that can work. The joke by the ambassador is to show why it cannot work, because NI will both be inside and outside the EU customs union and with both a border and no border in Ireland to the UK it would be easy to make money by transporting goods without tariffs.

Then you have the pressreader link by fash from the same reporter. Here there is more detail that Michel Barnier has suspended trade talks I would assume due to the border issue. But there is more personal comment as well it seems from the reporter in this story. The same joke is there but now we have a comment on it,

It is revealing that an EU ambassador joked he would like to know how to set up a business in Ireland after Brexit because, under the British plan, he would be rolling in cash. That is rather the point. The UK has sought through talks to build a future that is light on rules and enriches both sides. Its perspective is pro-business. The EU, by contrast, is motivated by politics. It wants to humiliate us, to bind us to its regulations in perpetuity.

So just in case we thought the Telegraph was seeing the light we see that it is in fact not so. The EU has shattered the dreams of Brexit UK that would have enriched both sides. This would have been done with light rules, which still leaves so many questions but when you just read it without thinking it actually makes sense. Why is the EU being unreasonable here when it is in their interest? With just a few rules (is this more or less than right now though, its not clear) both countries can be happy apparently.

The writer continues,

In which case, the Remainer case continues, is there really any point to leaving the EU at all? This is the endgame for the EU – to make the process of leaving so expensive, so complicated and so diluted that Britain declares to the world that it was wrong even to try and, please, “can we stay put?” This would, of course, be a reversal of the democratic verdict of the 2016 referendum and nothing less than a national humiliation.

Theresa May has to tell the EU that Northern Ireland is not a pawn in its game. She must stand up to the EU and make it clear that Britain seeks a border that is as open as possible, that helps sustain the peace process and which upholds the territorial integrity of the UK. She must come up with a solution, not a fudge.

Three highlighted areas, firstly the EU's endgame is to get the best deal possible. If the UK wants to have its own trade deals then the EU will work to get the best deal possible within those parameters. Following that is the emotive phrase, national humiliation. Is it any wonder we see people sticking to a opinion that seems so unreasonable? If they move from wanting Brexit they will be humiliated. Not only themselves personally but everyone else, including the queen will have this over their heads for the rest of their lives. They will not be able to look another person in the eye due to the humiliation.

The third highlighted paragraph says it all really. NI is not a pawn to be used, the threats that the GFA can be discarded as it's not the same I suppose, but in any case the PM should now tell the EU the UK wants the following.

Open Border,
Retains the GFA
No borders between the UK nations
Still allows UKs own trade deals
It cannot be a fudge.

This is what the proposals were that the EU shot down. They were trying to have all that cake and eat it. It seems that it is beyond the comprehension of the journalist to see this.

Peregrinus

Thanks, fash, and thanks, Enzokk. The link to the full article is useful, and reading the full article casts a very different light than reading just the extracts that I have seen so far. And Enzokk's analysis of the article is brilliant.

Couple of thoughts from me:

1. It's very striking that the article so openly blends reportage of an exclusive story, and editorial comment on its implications - and that in a page 1 lead. In the good old days a newspaper with pretensions to quality like the Telegraph was careful to distinguish factual news reportage from the opinions of a columnist, or even the opinions of the editor. Mixing them like this is extraordinary.

2. Although the article fulminates against the EU, I think it's actually an attempt to undermine the British government's position.

3. The British government's position, as I see it, is that the fleshing out, and writing into the Withdrawal Agreement, of the UK's backstop commitment of "full regulatory alignment" in NI is acutely embarassing to them, and highlights the contraditions inherent in their own red lines. Therefore, they have said that "no UK government could accept this". But, rather than propose a version of the backstop that they think a UK government could accept, they have preferred to focus attention on measures which will avoid having the backstop apply at all.

4. These are (a) a super duper trade deal, or (b) magical border technology, but they have to be a deal, or technology, which the EU is satisfied with. It's widely believed that the UK will be unable to propose either a deal or functional technology that will satisfy the EU.

5. Even if that's true, though, the super deal/magic technology are still politically useful. So long as the UK government talking about these, they can maintain that there is no need/will be no need for the backstop, and therefore they don't have to engage with the details of the backstop.

6. They can, thefefore, continue to maintain that they will not agree with the EU-proposed backstop until, true to form, at the last possible minute they cave and accept it. This will be in about September of this year. Then they move to saying that, even though they have accepted that it will be in the Withdrawal Agreement, this doesn't matter because they don't accept that the backstop will ever actually come into effect because, before it is due to do so (in January 2021, on the current timetable), the UK and the EU will have reached agreement on the deal/the technology which make a backstop unnecessary.

7. They can keep up this line until January 2021. Or so they hope, anyway.

8. Except that they can't keep it up if, at some point before that, they stop talking to the EU about the deal/the technology. At that point they have to accept that the backstop is now the only show in town.

9. In short, the UK government doesn't really care whether the talks about the deal/the technology are, or can be, successful. All it cares about is that the talks keep going.

10. The Telegraph article is an attempt to sabotage talks on this point, by emphasising that the EU is never going to agree to the UK's proposals. If the talks stop before September of this year, the UK government can't sign up to a withdrawal agreement with the backstop in it, and still claim that it doesn't matter because the backstop will never take effect. So they'll be forced either to agree that the backstop will take effect, which may provoke a rebellion from the DUP or ultra-Brexiter backbenchers or both, or to reject the Withdrawal Agreement and aim for a no-deal Brexit, which will provoke a rebellion from everybody who is not actually certifiably insane. Either is likely to bring down May.

Thomas__.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Enzokk wrote: »

I hope my reply didn't come across as asking you for answers or defending her. I was more asking a general question on the interesting information you provided. I was wondering out loud why she shouldn't be held responsible and if there really is any evidence that would indicate that she isn't racist.

I can see how she is a very capable politician. She doesn't take any responsibility and she hides away when there is trouble only to resurface when it seems safe to do so.

Ah right.

She has a reputation as being a very capable administrator and operator. It's when she has to engage with the nonsense of Politics like interviews and such that she falls apart. In fairness, no politician will ever accept responsibility for any mistakes or wrongdoing, especially in this day and age. I'm an EU migrant so it's not like I'm a Conservative voter or anything by the way.

Ultimately though people voted Tory and by virtue/failure of FPTP they got in. I'm disappointed that the Lib Dems let so much of this slide though.

Me too, as the LibDems would be the only real alternative in this current situation where the govt and Labour as the bigger opposition party are both pro-Brexit. Pity that many voters still punish the LibDems for their commitment as junior coalition partner in Camerons govt.

Thomas__.

EdgeCase wrote: »

Leroy42 wrote: »

This paragraph, to me at least, sums up the UK approach to Brexit.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-regional-specialities-eu-protect-trade-deal-europe-cheese-food-drink-wine-a8312171.html

They want to keep what they have, based on rules EU designed, but are not willing to give the same in return.

How in the name of ... do they think that's a reasonable negotiating position?
I would be personally rather annoyed if the EU were to allow itself to ridden over like that. It's absolute nonsense.

The sheer arrogance is mind boggling. Who do they think they are?!

The many deluded Brexiteers still think that they have an Empire. Hence the arrogance of them. The cluelessness and the stupidity they performed and still perform in their Brexit negotiations contrasts that but also proves their delusions.

Thomas__.

Enzokk wrote: »

I didn't mean it in a positive way. What I meant was she was skilled at playing the politics game and has risen to the top. The history books will judge her in the future but right now she is arguably vying for the spot as the worst PM with David Cameron. That is not someone who is capable in a positive light, that is someone that plays the game to rise to the top but is found out when the pressure is on.

That's quite right and I take your point as I agree with you on what you said. Still politicians like her are all over the place these days and concluding from your post, they are the product of their parties and the system they keep therefore there are no visionaries and decent politicians to vote for cos such people don't make it to the top. Democracy and politics suffer from this because it leaves the voters less or no real alternatives to vote for and what presents itself as an alternative are people from the extreme edges of the political spectrum. The polarisation in politics that took hold in recent years and exacerbates on emotional topics that dominate the daily debates (such like Brexit, Immigration, radical Islamism and the terrorism that comes from it) makes it even harder for the moderate ones to not just get heard and listened to it even deprives them of votes necessary to overcome this current polarisation.

Politicians like May are no good to improve anything, they just make things worse. Weak opposition leaders like Corbyn contribute to that because they represent no real alternative to the others as well, they are just the smaller evil to choose from.

Thomas__.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

This should clear up any confusion about what Brexit was for and how future immigration policy will go.

The UK has a more "welcoming" attitude to immigrants than any country in the EU, Michael Gove has claimed.

And he hit back at claims the voters who backed Brexit in the 2016 EU referendum were motivated by what he called "darker feelings" about immigration and had led to an increase in racism.
...
"The British people have a robust and pragmatic and liberal approach. They want to welcome people here who want to work."

The current reality in the UK proves Mr Gove being either a liar or someone who's cut off from reality in his own country and from the doings of his government. Otherwise there would not be such an harassment towards EU nationals and the Windrush scandal had never happened.

Peregrinus

Michael Gove wrote:

"The British people have a robust and pragmatic and liberal approach. They want to welcome people here who want to work."

". . . which is why the EU's free movement of labour is wholly unnacceptable to us." :rolleyes:

ancapailldorcha

Thomas__. wrote: »

The current reality in the UK proves Mr Gove being either a liar or someone who's cut off from reality in his own country and from the doings of his government. Otherwise there would not be such an harassment towards EU nationals and the Windrush scandal had never happened.

I would argue that the UK is by and large a very welcoming country. Remeber that well below half of people vote for the Tories. The dysfunctional voting system is what keeps them in while punishing anyone with fresh ideas.

Gove is one of the less privileged of his party so hearing him come out with this sort of nonsense is bemusing to say the least. While the Lib Dems must share some of the responsibility for the 2014 Act, they wouldn't have introduced it were they in government alone. It was very much a sop to the Tory right and immigration skeptics in Tory heartlands along with a feeble, incompetent and petty attempt to push the "tens of thousands" dogma.

[Deleted User]

Thomas__. wrote: »

The many deluded Brexiteers still think that they have an Empire. Hence the arrogance of them. The cluelessness and the stupidity they performed and still perform in their Brexit negotiations contrasts that but also proves their delusions.

It will be quite amusing if Charles is not confirmed as head of the commonwealth after the Queen.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-43833029

Peregrinus

Topgear on Dave wrote: »

It will be quite amusing if Charles is not confirmed as head of the commonwealth after the Queen.

He will be. "Head of the Commonwealth" is a title with no powers or functions attached. The Commonwealth as an organisation can function perfectly well without a "Head". The only point of having a "Head" is to give the British monarch a role in the Commonwealth; the title was introduced when India became a republic, and for the first time the Commonwealth included a member which did not have the British monarch as head of state. Being "Head" of the Commonwealth gives the Queen a connection to each member state which doesn't depend on her being Queen of it.

If the British monarch isn't the Head of the Commonwealth, there is literally no point at all to having a Head. So the choice isn't so much "should it be the British monarch or someone else?" but "should the Commonwealth have a head or not?"

Thomas__.

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Thomas__. wrote: »

The current reality in the UK proves Mr Gove being either a liar or someone who's cut off from reality in his own country and from the doings of his government. Otherwise there would not be such an harassment towards EU nationals and the Windrush scandal had never happened.

I would argue that the UK is by and large a very welcoming country. Remeber that well below half of people vote for the Tories. The dysfunctional voting system is what keeps them in while punishing anyone with fresh ideas.

Gove is one of the less privileged of his party so hearing him come out with this sort of nonsense is bemusing to say the least. While the Lib Dems must share some of the responsibility for the 2014 Act, they wouldn't have introduced it were they in government alone. It was very much a sop to the Tory right and immigration skeptics in Tory heartlands along with a feeble, incompetent and petty attempt to push the "tens of thousands" dogma.

There is the official 'face' and there is the private one. It always depends on who one meets. There are plenty of stories to this. I even have one of my own from my late Grandmother who came to Northern England around the late 1940s and had to start form nothing there, learning the language and integrating into the English society. I remember her telling me that what she very often heard was 'bloody foreigners' and 'where are you from' (cos she always spoke English with an accent). As I said, this is a matter where individuality and individuals come in, what the government policy is makes the decisive reputation to the world. How the govt handles abuse towards foreign nationals by their 'natives' adds to it.

Recent examples are rather deterring foreign nationals (including EU nationals) to go to the UK for work and that applies for all sorts of employees with lesser and higher qualifications. Not less of those EU nationals already settled in the UK are seriously considering and also preparing to leave the UK because the uncertainty regarding their residence status continues and is not answered yet by the UK govt and it appears that the UK govt with this present PM has no much interest to take the uncertainty away from those people, rather playing with it and reckoning with them leaving the UK rather than remaining.

I am aware of the other roughly 50% of Britons who don't vote Tory and some days it is hard for me to bear that in mind when I see what this present UK govt is doing and ignoring.

There are some interesting new articles in the Guardian to that topic if you're interested in reading them.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/19/civil-servants-union-boss-dave-penman-hits-back-at-rudd-windrush-blame

https://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/2018/apr/19/ministers-home-office-officials-created-windrush-scandal

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/19/theresa-may-was-not-opposed-to-go-home-vans-official-accounts-suggest

I know about the comments from those Britons on the Guardian who are opposing all that and this govt, but they can do nothing but just write against this govt cos for the time being there is no snap GE in sight to vote the Tories out of power.

One has to look at both sides to get the bigger picture, but as hard as I try to keep the balance, my high regards for the UK are already Fading away with this Brexit madness and these hostilities non-Britons have to face in the past couple of years which has grown worse since BrexitRef. This UK which emerges since the BrexitRef is not the UK I once valued, certainly not and if it will lead to the break up of it, with Scotland going independent, frankly, I would just say good for the Scots to rid themselves of this nasty and hostile environment the Tories have created and are still persuing.

52% of the UK population has gone insane with their Brexit obsession and they might have to learn it the hard way how utterly wrong they are. I still pity the other 48% who are against Brexit and still stand for this world open and welcoming UK, but it appears that they are incapable to reverse the course the UK is on.

Thomas__.

Topgear on Dave wrote: »

Thomas__. wrote: »

The many deluded Brexiteers still think that they have an Empire. Hence the arrogance of them. The cluelessness and the stupidity they performed and still perform in their Brexit negotiations contrasts that but also proves their delusions.

It will be quite amusing if Charles is not confirmed as head of the commonwealth after the Queen.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-43833029

That of course would make me chuckle.

Leroy42

Tony Connolly was on RTE 1 this morning and he basically rubbished the Telegraph story on the basis that no new proposal had been submitted and therefore there was nothing to forensically dismiss.

He stated that ideas had been put forward in the meetings, mainly in line with what had previously been proposed by the UK (and rejected) and he wondering why the Telegraph was running a story like this.

Peregrinus

Leroy42 wrote: »

Tony Connolly was on RTE 1 this morning and he basically rubbished the Telegraph story on the basis that no new proposal had been submitted and therefore there was nothing to forensically dismiss.

He stated that ideas had been put forward in the meetings, mainly in line with what had previously been proposed by the UK (and rejected) and he wondering why the Telegraph was running a story like this.

As I say above, I think they are trying to undermine May.

Peregrinus

Interesting story on Bloomberg this morning.

Essentially, the report says the UK has signalled that it is going to accept the EU take on "regulatory alignment" for NI, provided that this can be extended to the whole of the UK, to avoid an intra-UK regulatory border.

This would in some ways be a huge climbdown by the UK, effectively subjecting the whole of the UK to the EU regulatory regime for goods (as well, of course, as keeping the whole of the UK in the customs union - the Bloomberg article doesn't say so, but I think this is implicit in the UK's proposal).

However the report also says that the EU is going to reject this.

It doesn't say why, but presumably it's because the EU would see it as cherry-picking - in effect, the UK remains in the single market for goods, but not for services or labour. They are willing to allow a modest degree of cherry-picking to facilitate an open border in Ireland, provided this is confined to the border region (i.e. to NI), but they will not allow the whole of the UK to benefit from this cherry-picking.

Econ_

Peregrinus wrote: »

Interesting story on Bloomberg this morning.

Essentially, the report says the UK has signalled that it is going to accept the EU take on "regulatory alignment" for NI, provided that this can be extended to the whole of the UK, to avoid an intra-UK regulatory border.

This would in some ways be a huge climbdown by the UK, effectively subjecting the whole of the UK to the EU regulatory regime for goods (as well, of course, as keeping the whole of the UK in the customs union - the Bloomberg article doesn't say so, but I think this is implicit in the UK's proposal).

However the report also says that the EU is going to reject this.

It doesn't say why, but presumably it's because the EU would see it as cherry-picking - in effect, the UK remains in the single market for goods, but not for services or labour. They are willing to allow a modest degree of cherry-picking to facilitate an open border in Ireland, provided this is confined to the border region (i.e. to NI), but they will not allow the whole of the UK to benefit from this cherry-picking.

‘We accept NI will be legally tied to the CU but we want the rest of the UK not to be legally obliged to follow but we will voluntarily commit ourselves to aligning with NI’

I think that is the road they are trying to go down. It is no wonder the EU won’t accept this as it creates the potential for there to be a complete mess with the border if the UK backs out of their ‘voluntary commitment’ at any point in the future.

Professor Moriarty

Econ_ wrote: »

‘We accept NI will be legally tied to the CU but we want the rest of the UK not to be legally obliged to follow but we will voluntarily commit ourselves to aligning with NI’

I think that is the road they are trying to go down. It is no wonder the EU won’t accept this as it creates the potential for there to be a complete mess with the border if the UK backs out of their ‘voluntary commitment’ at any point in the future.

Exactly. More uninformed doublespeak by the Tories while they thrash around looking for a way out of the clusterfúck they created. A bespoke deal seems impossible. It's on a knife edge now. Either they capitulate or they crash out.

LeinsterDub

Econ_ wrote: »

‘

I think that is the road they are trying to go down. It is no wonder the EU won’t accept this as it creates the potential for there to be a complete mess with the border if the UK backs out of their ‘voluntary commitment’ at any point in the future.

And by if you mean when? Because in the last year we've see how much the UK's word is worth.