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Brexit Discussion Thread VI

johnnyskeleton

Hi folks, as Theresa May has won the vote of no confidence and we are heading into Brexit day early next year, I thought for the new thread people might give their summary of their views on Brexit to date before we get into the more day to day discussions.

So what do you think about what has happened so far? Who has come off well, who has come off badly?

Where do you think Brexit is going? What is going to be the likely impact on Ireland, Northern Ireland, the rest of the U.K. and the E.U. respectively?

Both this thread and the Mark V thread will remain open simultaneously for the next day or so and Mark V will be closed as it gets closer to the server busting 10,000 mark. Hopefully we can set down a solid foundation now for a top quality thread to come!

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Anthracite

Silent Running wrote: »

In fact, I believe Brexit is necessary to put this type of little Englander to bed once and for all. Then a more mature UK can emerge and take it's place in the world again.... if the UK doesn't survive, then England can emerge on it's own.

The weird thing is that this Little Englander went to IT Tallaght and never once mentioned being from the UK until after a years long break from posting.

Bit cynical

sKeith wrote: »

Why is the backstop being made such a big deal over?

Uk stated it does not want a border thru ireland.
Ireland stated it does not want a border thru ireland.
I'm sure N.I. said it doesn't want a border thru Ireland.

Conservatives are temporarily alligned with DUP and i believe its DUPs redline.

If parliment pass Mays deal, and new goverment is formed without DUP, wont the backstop not be a problem then.
Only the DUP seem to not want N.I. to have special status.

Rest of UK leaves, NI gets special status and london moves to NI and make profits that it can share with the other members of UK.

I have only heard of backstop as the reason WA is bad, for possibly locking them in unsolvable position, but it is solveable without the DUP in goverment which is only temporarily or did I miss other reason on why its bad?

I think it is the non-voluntary nature of the arrangement that is the problem. Other arrangements that a state might enter into only exist while both sides want them to continue. One side can unilaterally end the agreement (sometimes having to fulfill conditions) but the other side can't prevent the arrangement coming to an end.

The EU itself is such an arrangement. Continued membership of the EU is voluntary.

The backstop, once agreed to, however, is no longer voluntary since the UK can't get out of it unilaterally. Even if the UK walk away from the rest of the withdrawal agreement, the agreement concerning the backstop remains.

If it passes in the UK Parliament, it will be a fantastic stroke for Ireland since it will have effectively changed the status of NI.

LeinsterDub

sKeith wrote: »

Why is the backstop being made such a big deal over?

Because the British government are quite frankly liers and even if you dispute that fact they have flipped flopped constantly. Their word is worthless

Anthracite

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Because the British government are quite frankly liers and even if you dispute that fact brexit has flipped flopped constantly. Their word is worthless

This is what they are arguing:

1. There is no need for a backstop because it is possible to quickly and easily create the technology to ensure that no border is needed in Ireland.

2. They cannot possibly be tied by the backstop until the technology for no visible border is in place because this is a massive and onerous technological challenge which may take decades to resolve.

Bit cynical

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Because the British government are quite frankly liers and even if you dispute that fact brexit has flipped flopped constantly. Their word is worthless

I'm afraid this is a bit simplistic. Theresa May (representing the government) has agreed to the backstop. It is the Parliament that is having trouble with it.

Anthracite

Bit cynical wrote: »

I'm afraid this is a bit simplistic. Theresa May (representing the government) has agreed to the backstop. It is the Parliament that is having trouble with it.

Yes, I should clarify my post too: it is the Brexit Ultras who are arguing the two mutually exclusive positions that I mention above.

LeinsterDub

Bit cynical wrote: »

I'm afraid this is a bit simplistic. Theresa May (representing the government) has agreed to the backstop. It is the Parliament that is having trouble with it.

Technically correct but I was more referring to future governments based on the evidence of past governments dealings with Ireland

Peregrinus

Bit cynical wrote: »

I think it is the non-voluntary nature of the arrangement that is the problem. Other arrangements that a state might enter into only exist while both sides want them to continue. One side can unilaterally end the agreement (sometimes having to fulfill conditions) but the other side can't prevent the arrangement coming to an end.

The EU itself is such an arrangement. Continued membership of the EU is voluntary.

The backstop, once agreed to, however, is no longer voluntary since the UK can't get out of it unilaterally. Even if the UK walk away from the rest of the withdrawal agreement, the agreement concerning the backstop remains.

If it passes in the UK Parliament, it will be a fantastic stroke for Ireland since it will have effectively changed the status of NI.

I don't think this is what the word "voluntary" means, bit cynical. If you enter into a binding agreement, you are bound by it. This doesn't make it "involuntary", asssuming you entered into it voluntarily in the first place, and voluntarily agreed to the terms on which it could be terminated.

There is nothing at all unusual about sovereign states voluntarily entering into binding commitments.

Gerry T

Just something I am curious about. Lets say UK does a hard brexit and says it's not putting up a border at NI, are they in breach of WTO rules/Most Favoured Nation etc..
Initially I though they were, but if they place NI business in the position of applying tariffs would this satisfy WTO, in that all countries exporting to the UK would be charged the same tariffs, NI wouldn't be getting a zero rate.
Any goods just shipped into NI and no tariff applied would be deemed as smuggled goods.

I see this as putting an additional burden on NI business importing from ROI, but is this in breach of WTO. Is this a barrier to ROI exporting to NI and could that be in breach of WTO.

Does anyone know if the UK would have to put up a border post a hard brexit and the UK implementing the process of NI business applying the tariffs.

MrMusician18

prawnsambo wrote: »

You are mostly right. The problem for the UK is that without a permanent solution to the border, the backstop will remain indefinitely as the default position.

But as long as it stands, it makes it more difficult for the rest of the UK to leave the CU or else face greater and greater divergence between NI and the UK. They are all choices for the UK. They haven't proven very good at making difficult choices.

The backstop, rather ironically would also make a United Ireland less likely. Not only would Ireland be required to support NI financially, without the alignments forced by the backstop - the all UK customs union arrangement would also expire, damaging Irish business.

Peregrinus

Gerry T wrote: »

Just something I am curious about. Lets say UK does a hard brexit and says it's not putting up a border at NI, are they in breach of WTO rules/Most Favoured Nation etc..
Initially I though they were, but if they place NI business in the position of applying tariffs would this satisfy WTO, in that all countries exporting to the UK would be charged the same tariffs, NI wouldn't be getting a zero rate.
Any goods just shipped into NI and no tariff applied would be deemed as smuggled goods.

I don't see this flying with the WTO, to be honest. Passing a law that people must pay tariffs on goods imported over the NI/RoI border NI but not putting in place the usual steps for actually collecting the tariffs would be a fairly clear evasion of WTO rules, which are based on what states actually do, rather than on what they say they do. "Deeming" goods imported across the Irish border to be smuggled goods if the importers do not seek out the customs authorities and pay the tariffs is a meaningless exercise if there are no mechanisms or controls by which those smuggled goods can be identified or detected.

The WTO position will be that if, in practice, people can import goods free of tariffs from the EU via the Irish border, then MFN rules require the same option to be extended to the rest of the world.

Gerry T wrote: »

Does anyone know if the UK would have to put up a border post a hard brexit and the UK implementing the process of NI business applying the tariffs.

The WTO doesn't explicitly require border controls. What it does require is effective arrangements to enforce and collect tariffs in a way that satisfies WTO obligations; border controls are the usual way of doing this - indeed, the almust universal way of doing this. If the UK can devise other mechanisms which are effective to collect tariffs on imported goods then they don't need border controls. (But, note: not only will they not need border controls at the Irish border; they won't need them anywhere, including at ports and airports in Great Britain.) There's a nod in this direction in the Joint Report where the UK says that it intends to develope technological solutions which will make border controls uneccessary.

But the key is that these other arrangements must actually work; they must be effective. Declaring this and deeming that is meaningless unless the tariffs are actually, systematically collected. If the arrangements introduced don't work, then the UK will be in breach of its WTO obligations.

Gerry T

Thanks Peregrinus, makes sense. And thinking about it, if the UK felt leaving business to collect tariffs was satisfactory then why would they suggest a technology solution. I suppose it can be extrapolated from the technology offering that the UK itself doesn't see a business only collection method as being satisfactory.

Bit cynical

Peregrinus wrote: »

I don't think this is what the word "voluntary" means, bit cynical. If you enter into a binding agreement, you are bound by it. This doesn't make it "involuntary", asssuming you entered into it voluntarily in the first place, and voluntarily agreed to the terms on which it could be terminated.

There is nothing at all unusual about sovereign states voluntarily entering into binding commitments.

Nevertheless this is where I think the problem lies with the UK Parliament.

I think you yourself made a post a while back about the nature of the backstop and how you thought the UK did not fully realise the full implications of what they had signed up for. I can't remember the exact wording.

Peregrinus

Bit cynical wrote: »

Nevertheless this is where I think the problem lies with the UK Parliament.

I think you yourself made a post a while back about the nature of the backstop and how you thought the UK did not fully realise the full implications of what they had signed up for. I can't remember the exact wording.

The issue (for some) with the backstop is that it can't be terminated unilaterally, only by agreement. But this shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone; it wouldn't be a credible backstop if it could be terminated unilaterally.

As far as I'm concerned focussing on the inability of the UK to terminate it unilaterally is a just beat-up. It obscures - and I think is intended to obscure - the fact that the backstop can be terminated, and the Joint Report and the Withdrawal Agreement set out termination mechanisms, and - crucially - that it is very much in the interests of both parties that it should be terminated and replaced. Given all that, the fact that it can't be unilaterally terminated is (a) as already pointed out, very much to be expected, and (b) entirely unworrying. It doesn't take too much thinking to work out that the Brexiter nonsense that the EU secretly intends to continue the backstop for ever is, well, nonsense.

jochenstacker

downcow wrote: »

Absolutely agree. Just let’s all stay in reality and accept it was pretty close everywhere incl the strongest remain areas and the strongest leave areas. My point is just that it was so close that it is irrelevant starting to break it down. The fact is the majority of uk voters voted to leave. And surprise surprise there were slight variations across the country

Well then the vote to leave is also irrelevant by your logic which seems turn 180 degrees between posts.

Enzokk

PeadarCo wrote: »

To be fair it would have. If you had a leader who ensured the UK had an agreed upon position on Brexit before triggering article 50 it would have made negotiations far easier. With about 3 months to go before Brexit there is still no agreed position on Brexit. The UK has a fairly bespoke deal that is arguably far better than what would have been expected this time last year. However it pleases no one because it's a compromise deal.

A good leader would have dealt with the hard choices Brexit entailed first and which many hard Brexiters still ignore. The red lines May set out shot the UK in the foot and raised expectations when the opposite was required. However there is a serious question on whether any Pm would have lasted long enough to negotiate a deal if they had done this.

But what deal would have a parliamentary majority along the lines of the current HoC numbers? There aren't enough moderate Tory voters to get a soft deal through, there aren't enough hardliners in either party to get a hard deal or even no deal through.

There is no way that Jeremy Corbyn and Labour will or should allow whoever is in charge to get a deal through that they could use in the next election as proof of their competence. This is more a result of FPTP than the stance of Labour so it should not be surprising. Even if the Conservatives in power came up with the unicorns deal it would be incumbent of the opposition to oppose it in a two party system.

So even if a Trump went in and pulled out of the negotiations as he said he would have done after a year, all that would have happened in that case is that the EU would have started no-deal preparations earlier and it would have become a self fulfilling prophecy.

So in my eyes it is not the leader that is the problem for the UK and what it can get from Brexit, it is that Brexit itself is impossible on the promises that continue to be made to this day.

downcow wrote: »

https://www.irelandbeforeyoudie.com/five-ways-brexit-could-devastate-the-south-of-ireland/

I know others have already pointed out that this is not proof of your assertion that Ireland will be worse off than the UK, but your link is handy in that it shows why we are so pissed off with Brexit. You cannot expect a country to happily accept the kind of damage that could happen without commenting on it. This is not to say we have a right to interfere in the decision, at the same time the history of Ireland the the UK is so intertwined that there really should have been consultation with Ireland on what Brexit could really mean before the referendum.

Peregrinus

downcow wrote: »

If you believe the economists (which I don’t) the roi is destined to even more financial difficulties than the UK after 29 March

I'm not aware of any economists whose models suggest this.

What the models do suggest, however, is that Ireland is more or less as exposedt to Brexit as the UK itself is, so Ireland will be potentially as badly affected by Brexit as the UK itself will be. We will have advantages that the UK doesn't have - viz, the support of the EU in making the necessary adjustments - so our recovery should be quicker, but in the short term it will be painful. And, the harder the Brexit, the more painful it will be.

As you can imagine, this doesn't leave us well-disposed towards Brexiters, and particularly to those Brexiters who have targetted a hard Brexit. It's one thing for their idiocy and imcompetence to bugger up their own country; quite another for it to bugger up ours.

downcow wrote: »

In fact if you want to follow many on here who feel it is simply about economics then roi should leave ASAP if UK goes

This doesn't follow at all as even a few moments thought would show. (But it is typical of Brexiters not to give their own ideas even a few moments' thought.) The fact that Brexit will be bad for Ireland does not mean that Irexit would not be even worse. And, in truth, it would be much worse. The adverse economic impact of Brexit is largely attributable to the impact it will have on our trade with the UK. But we do three-and-a-half times as much trade with the rest of the EU as we do with the UK; the adverse impact of Irexit on our trade would be much, much greater.

murphaph

Yeah the whole Irexit as a solution to Brexit is akin to cutting your arm off to stop the pain if a paper cut.

First Up

Peregrinus wrote:

This doesn't follow at all as even a few moments thought would show. (But it is typical of Brexiters not to give their own ideas even a few moments' thought.) The fact that Brexit will be bad for Ireland does not mean that Irexit would not be even worse. And, in truth, it would be much worse. The adverse economic impact of Brexit is largely attributable to the impact it will have on our trade with the UK. But we do three-and-a-half times as much trade with the rest of the EU as we do with the UK; the adverse impact of Irexit on our trade would be much, much greater.

The idea that we should chain ourselves to a country that takes 10% of our exports while discarding one of our main attractions for FDI is beyond nonsense.

Brexit will be disruptive for some parts of our society and economy but our options are far greater inside the EU than without.

First Up

murphaph wrote:

Yeah the whole Irexit as a solution to Brexit is akin to cutting your arm off to stop the pain if a paper cut.

Brexiteers will point out that it saves you the bother of cutting your fingernails.

[Deleted User]

First Up wrote: »

Brexiteers will point out that it saves you the bother of cutting your fingernails.

No one can tell me which finger to wear my ring on, or which wrist I should put my watch on, if I don't have an arm.

prawnsambo

Gerry T wrote: »

Thanks Peregrinus, makes sense. And thinking about it, if the UK felt leaving business to collect tariffs was satisfactory then why would they suggest a technology solution. I suppose it can be extrapolated from the technology offering that the UK itself doesn't see a business only collection method as being satisfactory.

If there was such a technology available, you'd think the Swiss, Norwegians, Turks and just about every other country with a trade relationship and a shared border with the EU would have been using it by now.

The reality is that there is no technology that can look inside vehicles and identify, ennumerate and value any goods therein.

downcow

Bit cynical wrote: »

I think it is the non-voluntary nature of the arrangement that is the problem. Other arrangements that a state might enter into only exist while both sides want them to continue. One side can unilaterally end the agreement (sometimes having to fulfill conditions) but the other side can't prevent the arrangement coming to an end.

The EU itself is such an arrangement. Continued membership of the EU is voluntary.

The backstop, once agreed to, however, is no longer voluntary since the UK can't get out of it unilaterally. Even if the UK walk away from the rest of the withdrawal agreement, the agreement concerning the backstop remains.

If it passes in the UK Parliament, it will be a fantastic stroke for Ireland since it will have effectively changed the status of NI.

Well put and very accurate. Now would any of you accept ireland entering such an agreement that it had no way out no matter what the outcome.

Leroy42

The UK are currently struggling to deal with a few hundred migrants coming across the channel. This is the country that is telling everyone that an open border is fine.

If, as the Brexiteers are telling everyone, the soon to be Brexited UK sees the massive increases that await them, whilst the terrible and doomed EU falls apart, clearly every EU citizen will simply fly to Ireland and cross into the UK through the North.

It is a complete non starter this fantasy about "we simply won't put up a border" that they are currently throwing about.

Peregrinus

downcow wrote: »

Well put and very accurate.

It's not accurate at all, for reasons already pointed out.

downcow wrote: »

Now would any of you accept ireland entering such an agreement that it had no way out no matter what the outcome.

We are very keen to enter into this precise arrangement, which the EU cannot end unilaterally any more than the UK can.

Seriously, the whose point about sovereignty is that it is the ability to enter into international commitments. And the whole point about commitments is that you are in fact committed to them; you can't walk away unilaterally.

Honestly, the more I hear, the more I realise that Brexit isn't, in the mind of Brexiters, about sovereignty at all. It's about a toddler's understanding of sovereignty.

prawnsambo

downcow wrote: »

Well put and very accurate. Now would any of you accept ireland entering such an agreement that it had no way out no matter what the outcome.

Well yes. The GFA is one such binding commitment that we have entered into. One in which we were also bound to change our constitution for. The UK can just as easily walk away from the backstop agreement btw. There's absolutely nothing stopping them from doing so. Except that their word would be seen as muck from that point onwards. As would ours if we reneged on the GFA and reinserted our territorial claim to the six counties in our constitution.

Leroy42

downcow wrote: »

Well put and very accurate. Now would any of you accept ireland entering such an agreement that it had no way out no matter what the outcome.

We would have to if it was the only way to square the circle that we had created.

Unfortunately for the UK (in relation to Brexit only) the UK do have a responsibility to both NI and the ROI. If the UK was simply GB, then none of this would be an issue and GB would probably have already left.

But the UK, as in the case of Gibraltar, want everyone else to continue on with the current agreements whilst they themselves ditch them.

And simply look back at the 2008 crash and bailout to see the fallacy of your argument. We found ourselves in a corner, with the only options being bad, terrible or worse. Now, one can argue about the policy we went with, but whatever your position it can safely be assumed that very few people wanted any of the options. We would have much preferred a get out of jail card. But we took, again it can be argued in another thread, the least worst option.

The UK find themselves in a similar place (although I would argue that this is far more their own making than Irelands in 2008) but 2 years later they still do not want to face the reality of the situation.

J Mysterio

murphaph wrote: »

Yeah the whole Irexit as a solution to Brexit is akin to cutting your arm off to stop the pain if a paper cut.

Or, your 'friend' is jumping off a cliff, shouldn't you jump too?

J Mysterio

Really, all this nonsense that has infected the thread the last couple of days points to a lack of any news to discuss in terms of the furthering of the negotiations.

It's seemingly just what May wants... Count the clock down, increase uncertainty and concern... Bounce Westminster into the deal to avoid chaos.

MrMusician18

J Mysterio wrote: »

Really, all this nonsense that has infected the thread the last couple of days points to a lack of any news to discuss in terms of the furthering of the negotiations.

It's seemingly just what May wants... Count the clock down, increase uncertainty and concern... Bounce Westminster into the deal to avoid chaos.

Well there have been no further negotiations. The negotiation effectively ended when the UK government agreed to endorse Mays agreement.

In fairness, there is never any real news over the Christmas break apart from natural disasters. I suspect the natural media blackout was used by her to increase her chance of success by whatever means possible. As the news cycle cranks back to life over the next few days, we might miss this break...