Should we stop bullying the United Kingdom?

Aegir wrote: »

I’m not sure what your point is?

Are Irish tax payers paying off UK debts, as Fuaranch claims?

He is doing what the Brexiteers are doing, blaming Johnny Foreigner for something that is the fault of no one but the Irish government. It’s irrelvant what the UK’s debt or bank bailout is, that is just a look over there statement.

No. Irish tax payers are not on the hook for UK commercial bank bailouts. The UK took care of its own disastrous mess with a programme that paralleled what happened here and in the US. We are, however, guaranteeing and managing out a load of loans that were run up by Irish regulated banks in the UK and around the world. Anglo, for example, had huge property loans all over the place.

We are also on the hook for international loans that we took out, largely to deal with current expenditure during the 2008 crisis where our economy was turned upside down for several years. Massive borrowing had to happen to keep the country stable and functioning during that period and we have actually managed to refinance it and reduce the debt level quite a lot over the last few years.

I would, however, be very cautious of using Irish debt to GDP ratios as our GDP (in common with a lot of small, wealthy countries that attract FDI) is subject to huge variations due to things like movement of intellectual property and transfer pricing and so on.

My point is that the Irish situation was not unique and the UK tends to forget that for all the tabloid ranting about the Eurozone crisis and the Irish banking crisis, they had an absolutely parallel and equally huge banking and financial disaster in 2008 in the UK.

I find the Irish are great at wallowing in "only in Ireland" misery and the UK is the opposite. They can't remember any negative history. The Empire's remembered through rose tinted glasses and is imaged to have been some kind of club based on garden parties and hugs, The 1970s IMF bailout is erased from memory, the 1980s recessions and riots are largely erased from Tory memory at least, Northern Ireland happened somewhere far, far away in a foreign land that they've had no influence over at any stage, the 2008 crisis only impacted the Euro and they'd no banking issues at all.. the list is endless.

There's nothing wrong with self critique and there's nothing necessarily wrong with thinking positively either. However, I find both Ireland and England are off the deep-end and in opposite directions on those issues. One has an inability to forget anything and the other can't remember anything.

steddyeddy wrote: »

I think it's indicative of the intelligence of leave voters that they voted to leave the EU because they didn't like Pakistani immigrants.

Let's call them what they are, Pakistani........



Expats. After all, sauce for the goose.

Remember last year Michael O Leary warned that come Sept. 2018 there would be no Summer 2019 flight planned of Britain didn't secure flying rights.

Can't find anything stating this issues has been resolved. Will flights to and from the UK to Europe be cancelled next year?

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

The term expat isn’t the same as immigrant for a reason, it’s not permanent. Immigration is generally considered permanent.

The definition states permanently or temporarily.

There's plenty of Eastern European and Chinese "immigrants" who went home after the crash and I never would have thought the large UK expat community would have any intention of leaving the sun and sand to return to the UK.

Ya the BBC did a report and found it's just semantics http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170119-who-should-be-called-an-expat

Franz Von Peppercorn wrote: »

The US call temporary working visas (ie the H1B) a non immigrant visa.

The ex pats to Arab countries (for instance) are not immigrants - none willl have permanent residency rights or the right to citizenship (nor would any child born there).

It's semantics. The word might mean something for you, but the dictionary definition means it can go both ways.


An immigrant is simply someone who moves to another country and takes up permant residence. It's not specific to any particular reason.


BTW, the H1B is a bad example as it is a very specific visa. The generic US non immigrant Visa is quote "required by anyone seeking temporary admission to the United States who is not eligible to travel visa free under the Visa Waiver Program (ESTA) or is traveling to the U.S. for a wide variety of reasons, including tourism, business, medical treatment, study, research and certain types of temporary work"

badtoro wrote: »

Let's call them what they are, Pakistani........



Expats. After all, sauce for the goose.

Its the vast numbers of Eastern Europeans clogging up the NHS.

My aunt is waiting 4 weeks for a doctor appointment in Scotland. My cousin cant find a school for his kid as they are full.

Its immigration from the EU /SNP policy or both.

People voted for Britex because they got sick of seeing free loaders from Poland getting preferential treatment when they give nothing back.

Its immigration from the EU not Pakistan that is the issue.

prinzeugen wrote: »

Its the vast numbers of Eastern Europeans clogging up the NHS.

My aunt is waiting 4 weeks for a doctor appointment in Scotland. My cousin cant find a school for his kid as they are full.

Its immigration from the EU /SNP policy or both.

People voted for Britex because they got sick of seeing free loaders from Poland getting preferential treatment when they give nothing back.

Its immigration from the EU not Pakistan that is the issue.

Free loaders from Poland? Are there loads of polish people that have moved to Scotland to sit around doing nothing on the meagre unemployment payments there? Have you any stats to back that up? Sounds like perpetuating xenophobic rubbish to me