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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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[Deleted User]

Headshot wrote: »

I heard a German economist on tv recently said that Germany's reliant on UK is only 1% GDP for Germany so it's not really a big deal for them and they'll get that 1% back else where

Germany 2017 total exports $1,450B
to UK $95B
so 6.5% of total exports are to UK
2017 GDP was $3677B so dependence there would be ~2.5% rather than 1%?

UK exported only $45B to Germany, but they were still their biggest market after US ($59B)

Berserker

Fr Tod Umptious wrote: »

Why is Tommy Gorman allowed to editoralise so much on RTE News when he is reporting.

I personally don't agree with the DUP position but I also dont like tje way Gorman likes to stick the boot in when just reporting.

I've always found him to be far too SF leaning in his reporting on other issues related to NI also.

Can't conduct a proper interview like pretty much every RTE presenter. Pat Kenny was the only decent interviewer they had for years. Dobbo interviewed Boris at that conference last week and it was more of the same. Never let the man answer a question.

Tell me how wrote: »

Boris Johnson, JRM and the DUP have already said that they will be voting in support of her tomorrow.

Corbyn's position will be more at risk than May's this time tomorrow evening.

Given the circus that is the Conservative party at the moment, his inability to capitalise speaks volume about his calibre. I think he'll go before she does. If he loses this vote, he's in big trouble.

Itssoeasy

MrMusician18 wrote: »

While I happen to agree with Tommy, it's not a national broadcasters place to be so partisan.

Set out the facts and let us decide.

I agree it shouldn't be but honestly I think at this stage things need to be said, because the Republic of Ireland need to call it like it is. The DUP in the north have this fetish about the precious Union when we know the rest of Britian would love to get rid of it. They say they don't won't/wont be a hard border but the DUP don't care about the south and they'd probably love to have a hard border back. I realise that sounds stupid but well it's the DUP so logical thinking isn't their strong point.

Hermy

Irishmale0399 wrote: »

...Hard as it may be to have a border with the north...put a EU police force on it and see how things go. If it doesnt go well...offer the people of NI a chance to go independent...

Enforce the border with a foreign police force and when it all kicks off resolve matters by inviting them to leave the UK?

How can that end other than badly?

prawnsambo

Deleted User wrote: »

Germany 2017 total exports $1,450B
to UK $95B
so 6.5% of total exports are to UK
2017 GDP was $3677B so dependence there would be ~2.5% rather than 1%?

UK exported only $45B to Germany, but they were still their biggest market after US ($59B)

Yes, but that's not GDP.

Itssoeasy

tuxy wrote: »

Far from it. Motion of no confidence in the government will fail and her party has no one to replace her.

Will it fail ? The DUP said they'd vote with the government but is a certainty that all the tories will do so ? The majority isn't that big.

devnull

JRM has had his say.

Believes that as people voted for A50 which said the UK would leave in two years and the withdrawal act that gave the date as the end of March therefore unless they have very short memories or didn't read what they were voting for.

Therefore they did vote for whether a deal was made or not to leave on that date, therefore they are voting for No Deal now if a deal cannot be made so it is incorrect to suggest there is not a mandate for No Deal.

Seems to be suggesting that if this does not happen it is legally questionable and could be considered tyranny and they are going to use whatever power they have to force no deal and will not permit any extension.

No surprises that he's looking after his own interests as usual.

[Deleted User]

robinph wrote: »

The whole idea that because Germany sell more to than it buys from the UK means that they are going to cave in on a deal is daft.

Tesco sell me more stuff than they buy from me, that doesn't mean that I'm in a particularly great negotiation position with them though.

Tesco doesn't care about your purchase, because they're insignificant in terms of their overall financial performance.

[Deleted User]

Watching Alastair Campbell on a panel with Farage on BBC 2 at 7pm and his expression was a deadly serious 'I can't believe these snakeoil salesmen have hoodwinked the entire nation'.

This coup is all consistently quite incredible. But the Farage/Johnson et al types are smart enough not to take positions of power when they know it will be a disaster. Untarnished by any allegation of 'treachery' they are sitting there waiting to pounce when Brexit fails. Then, they'll declare that a "proper" Brexit would have been a success. Pulling on the heartstrings of their bizarre 'poor England' victimhood, they'll always stand up and provide a foreign scapegoat to the marginalised who have suffered from... native British rightwing Tory economic policies. Whatever happens, Brexit is a win-win situation for them. And a nation of people humiliated by the Brexit decision are now, with much greater knowledge of the deceit behind the 2016 'Leave' campaign's claims, proceeding to cut off that nose to spite their face. An intelligent, rational people would pause and say 'In light of this new information, let's re-evaluate things'. Not in Britain in 2019 - with a far better knowledge than in 2016 of how deep the ravine is, they rush towards it blindfolded and even more haphazardly, pumping themselves up with centuries of "indomitable British spirit" ahistorical navel-gazing drivel.

For me, the best explanation for the whole Brexit vote was given by Juncker when the result came in back in 2016:

'If, over 40 years, you are explaining to your general public that European Union is stupid, that there is nothing worth, that you have to leave, that the European Union membership is not bringing any advantages to your populations, you can’t be surprised that the day you ask people: ‘Do you want to stay or do you want to leave?’ that a too high number of British – in the case we are discussing – are expressing the view that it is better to leave.

“On Europe there are so many lies, so many half-truths which are circulated around, that one cannot be surprised.' (Source)

That society is now going to reap what its rightwing, and it alone, has sowed for many decades.

[Deleted User]

prawnsambo wrote: »

Yes, but that's not GDP.

GDP is in there too - admittedly added as a ninja edit 2 mins after original post.

EdgeCase

Deleted User wrote: »

Germany 2017 total exports $1,450B
to UK $95B
so 6.5% of total exports are to UK
2017 GDP was $3677B so dependence there would be ~2.5% rather than 1%?

UK exported only $45B to Germany, but they were still their biggest market after US ($59B)

The goods export figures are largely not that relevant to the UK - Well I mean they're relevant, but they seem much smaller than the overall economy. It's the inability to sell services into the EU which would be an absolute killer for them.

The services aspect of any non-deal scenario are the elephant in the room that the UK media is conveniently ignoring.

briany

Deleted User wrote: »

Watching Alastair Campbell on a panel with Farage on BBC 2 at 7pm and his expression was a deadly serious 'I can't believe these snakeoil salesmen have hoodwinked the entire nation'.

That's been Campbell's attitude towards Farage & co. since at least 2016.

Brexiteers loathe Alistair Campbell anyway, so he's not a representative to win many over to his side. They see Campbell as wholly representative of the political establishment, and someone who speaks for the 'elites', much as Trump voters see Hilary Clinton, I suppose.

lawred2

When's the next round of royal family elections scheduled for?

Kinda hard to have any sort of debate with this level of ignorance about the EU really..

https://twitter.com/damocrat/status/1084937896921047042?s=19

Nice rebuttal

https://twitter.com/KitCatK/status/1084960176820666369?s=19

EdgeCase

I'm very worried with with how Sterling's trading this evening after that vote. It's gone up in value against the Euro and Dollar and the problem with that is that the traders are jumping a couple of steps ahead of themselves.

Their assumption is that the vote having failed is going to trigger either a second referendum or a general election and that the UK now won't leave the EU or at least there'll be a very soft Brexit.

However, because Sterling's trading well, the Brexiteers are now going to take that as an endorsement of a hard Brexit i.e. "Evil EU Empire defeated - Sterling SOARS" type headlines.

That's just going to reinforce them and also the markets have clearly not priced and continue not to price a hard crash out scenario into anything which could result in an unbelievably bad crash in a few weeks time if the worst case scenario does happen. The traders are being incredibly optimistic.

There's a London and to a degree Tory / old Etonian bias in the London financial media and that has a huge impact on market perceptions of what's going on.

10000maniacs

Eric Cartman wrote: »

Basically , the DUP will vote against any backstop at all, I suspect many tories against this deal were in the same category, anything that looks like capitulation to the EU via northern Ireland will be shot down by the same group again and again.

Yet only 24 ministers voted to kill the backstop in the previous vote. Obviously 10 of those were the DUP.

Headshot

Deleted User wrote: »

Germany 2017 total exports $1,450B
to UK $95B
so 6.5% of total exports are to UK
2017 GDP was $3677B so dependence there would be ~2.5% rather than 1%?

UK exported only $45B to Germany, but they were still their biggest market after US ($59B)

Sorry I was thinking of German cars it's 1% GDP exporting cars to the Uk

The German car industry won't be really affected and they have a lot of say in Germany

WomanSkirtFan8

Holy moly!

432 to 202

Thats one hell of a wallop.

Difficult to see where it goes from here now. :eek:

Donald Trump

EdgeCase wrote: »

I'm very worried with with how Sterling's trading this evening after that vote. It's gone up in value against the Euro and Dollar and the problem with that is that the traders are jumping a couple of steps ahead of themselves.

Their assumption is that the vote having failed is going to trigger either a second referendum or a general election and that the UK now won't leave the EU or at least there'll be a very soft Brexit.

However, because Sterling's trading well, the Brexiteers are now going to take that as an endorsement of a hard Brexit i.e. "Evil EU Empire defeated - Sterling SOARS" type headlines.

That's just going to reinforce them and also the markets have clearly not priced and continue not to price a hard crash out scenario into anything which could result in an unbelievably bad crash in a few weeks time if the worst case scenario does happen. The traders are being incredibly optimistic.

There's a London and to a degree Tory / old Etonian bias in the London financial media and that has a huge impact on market perceptions of what's going on.

No need to be dramatic.

It fell a bit during the day and regained (part of) it in the evening. Wasn't an unusual or outlier large movement by normal standards.

Bit cynical

Given today's events in the HoC, what, in the opinion of those here, should our Government say and do?

Godot.

Unreal amount of drama... the cloak & dagger stuff, the scheming, the bare faced lying. Such an interesting time to follow politics. Just need Sinn Fein with their 7 MPs to march into the Commons at the last minute tomorrow WWE style to bring down the government.

Headshot

The need to do a house of cards version of UK politics

ilovesmybrick

Headshot wrote:

The need to do a house of cards version of UK politics

They did, it was the original house of cards books and later series by Michael Dobbs! Brilliant if you've never seen it.

MarkHenderson

Bit cynical wrote: »

Given today's events in the HoC, what, in the opinion of those here, should our Government say and do?

There is nothing they can do. The EU as always will dictate to us from a height.

Itssoeasy

Bit cynical wrote: »

Given today's events in the HoC, what, in the opinion of those here, should our Government say and do?

Our government ? They should keep doing what they've done and keep the head down. It's an agreement between the UK and the EU not Ireland on its own. I honestly don't know where they(the UK) go from here. I mean yes the people voted to leave the EU but it's also clear the politicians tasked by the people of carrying out those wishes can't agree on how to do it.

briany

lawred2 wrote: »

They love their own Etonian elites though

That is the great irony of it. Mogg would be welcome down the local Whetherspoons any time, but he'd probably decline as it would probably mean breathing the same air as working class people for a prolonged period of time. And what ever would his nanny think?

prinzeugen

lawred2 wrote: »

When's the next round of royal family elections scheduled for?

Kinda hard to have any sort of debate with this level of ignorance about the EU really..

https://twitter.com/damocrat/status/1084937896921047042?s=19

Nice rebuttal

https://twitter.com/KitCatK/status/1084960176820666369?s=19

There is so much wrong with that comparison. The USA is more democratic than the EU.

The way they EU is run is more like the Soviet Union or China.

I think the only ones being delusional (seems to be the buzzword here) are those that think there will be a second referendum. Its going to be no deal.

A second referendum is political suicide for the majority of MPs. But I bet Sturgeon will be announcing another Scottish referendum in the next day or so.

Just in case there is another GE or she is forced to resign herself.

EdgeCase

Donald Trump wrote: »

No need to be dramatic.

It fell a bit during the day and regained (part of) it in the evening. Wasn't an unusual or outlier large movement by normal standards.

I'm not being dramatic. It's very odd that Sterling reacted to that vote by gaining against EUR and USD.

I guarantee you tomorrow the Express or similar will be using it as a justification for a hard line brexit.

kippy

Pa8301 wrote: »

I'd love to see a The Thick of It based around the current situation. Though I think the current omnishambles is more ridiculous than anything Armando Iannucci could come up with.

Was it that hard to predict?
Essentially you have a group of politicians who never wanted Brexit negotiating the exit. Their hearts cannot be in it.
I don't see that changing. The only possible outcome is a second referendum and a realisation that the last two years could have been spent far more productively.
I suppose it beats the crap outta populations at war.

Spanish Eyes

EdgeCase wrote: »

I'm not being dramatic. It's very odd that Sterling reacted to that vote by gaining against EUR and USD.

I guarantee you tomorrow the Express or similar will be using it as a justification for a hard line brexit.

I'm no trader or anything, but maybe the fact that the vote was lost means that staying in looks more likely. Or something!

almostover

prinzeugen wrote: »

There is so much wrong with that comparison. The USA is more democratic than the EU.

The way they EU is run is more like the Soviet Union or China.

I think the only ones being delusional (seems to be the buzzword here) are those that think there will be a second referendum. Its going to be no deal.

A second referendum is political suicide for the majority of MPs. But I bet Sturgeon will be announcing another Scottish referendum in the next day or so.

Just in case there is another GE or she is forced to resign herself.

Yes, the EU has been sending dissenters to the gulags for years and repressing free speech. Not to mention that the EU is a communist cesspit ruled by a powerful ruthless dictator! Seriously, do you actually believe that drivel that you've written?