To wonder what Starmer was thinking with this one

You’ve never ran/been on a project that has people rotating. Old guy who has just mastered the processes off, new guy who doesn’t know the ropes on. Retrain them.
If every year all the teachers at your kids school were replaced, would that be acceptable? Every year you get a new GP? Every year you get all new colleagues?
It makes outsourcing much more palatable.

Today has really brought into stark reality how deeply stupid the general public, and many journalists, are. The majority on this thread just do not understand what this deal is and refuse to listen and learn. It’s stupidity and it is so depressing.

This has been the case since Brexit. People do not listen when factual information is presented to them. It's the equivalent of putting your fingers in your ears and singing "la la la I cant hear you. With misinformation spread so easily online they can read one false soundbite from Farage or the Daily Mail and then that is their opinion formed forever. I can only assume this phenomenon accounts for the popularity of Trump in the US too.

Right, so it’s no different. It’s just one person for three years (if they want) instead of changing them round.
They still need to meet all visa requirements. Nothing has changed.

we can offer you the same guys for 3 years at this rate, rather than rotating them every year.

so one person for 3 years rather than 3 people for a year each. I don’t see the issue? 🤷🏻‍♀️

I haven’t said anything about jags or land rovers. Not sure if that comment was also to me. I have no opinion or knowledge regarding car sales.

@CamillaMacauley ”i reckon Indian firms will just be using it to bring the odd Indian higher level manager over on a temporary basis. Specific people already working for the business who they need.”

You really don’t know what you are talking about.

The Indian outsourcing companies like Infosys, Tata, Cognizant plus Accenture, KPMG will bring in more Indian nationals and be able to sell them as consultants more cheaply to UK companies to man their IT projects.
They remain employees of the outsourcers (eg. Infosys). They work for UK companies as consultants (eg. BP/NHS/Asda).
They can now say to their clients, we can offer you the same guys for 3 years at this rate, rather than rotating them every year.

As for selling more Landrovers and Jaguars to India, JLR is owned by Tata, an Indian company.

It does make me chuckle that Farage is bleating on about cheating the British worker, when he himself admitted he shouldn't have set up an Isle of Man tax haven and uses Thorn in the Side Ltd to funnel earnings and only pay corporation tax, rather than income tax, which is of course significantly lower. He is such a raging hypocrite and yet because he is seen drinking a pint in a pub, he somehow appeals to a type of person who wants to believe that India is going to rip us off.

Today has really brought into stark reality how deeply stupid the general public, and many journalists, are. The majority on this thread just do not understand what this deal is and refuse to listen and learn. It’s stupidity and it is so depressing.

People like @HellsBalls and @sideeyes could actually learn something here, but instead of reading the replies being written to them, they’re ignoring it and blundering forward with “Indian workers taking British jobs for cheap.”

Just listen! Learn something. Be a smarter person.

Are you really equating non-com loopholes with a very standard trading agreement to avoid double social security payment?
As I said, the room wanted growth and FTAs outside the EU. Hooray! This provides both.

Why would they be cheap if they’re working over here? If an Indian firm brings a temporary Indian worker over here they’re going to have to pay them a uk wage so they can live here. Plus plane fares and resettlement costs and tax in India. So I’m struggling to see how that would be cheaper than a uk worker.

a uk firm won’t be allowed to employ an Indian national and not pay NI. That’s not how the trade deal works. 🤷🏻‍♀️

i reckon Indian firms will just be using it to bring the odd Indian higher level manager over on a temporary basis. Specific people already working for the business who they need.

I ask again how is it different from Sunaks Indian wife who iirc didn’t have to pay tax here as she said the uk wasn’t her permanent home or similar? That was way before Starmer so it appears there’s been some such arrangement for some time.

Weren't Labour massively against Indian nationals paying Indian tax rather than British tax prior to the election?

I understand the logic of it but Starmer really needs to read the room a hell of a lot better.

@Wibble128 the complete failure to read the room you say.
Didn’t the room want growth and FTAs outside the EU? This deal delivers both.

It’s not about ‘taking workers’. If a British company employs someone from India (and they meet visa requirements in terms of salary etc) they have to pay NI. This is purely for Indian workers working for Indian companies being sent to the U.K. site of the same business for a short period.

They pay an NHS surcharge

I don’t disagree that there needs to be more focus with comms.
In this case though, what can he do? Ministers have been out explaining it, but the tone of the interviews is very hostile and negative. Plus nobody is listening - they’ve looked at the incorrect (lying) headlines and drawn their conclusions. As did you in starting this thread. It’s not an excuse, it’s a reason.

We don’t take many IT workers from US and Canada. Too expensive. India is still cheap. They will get too expensive sooner or later maybe, however they next cheapest place is the Philippines and they don’t have as good an education system as the Indians.

Since when did we have to like politicians and PMs? I've been conscious of politics since Mrs T came to be PM in 1979 and I'm desperately trying to think of a PM I have ever liked. I was probably the least repelled by John Major and Gordon Brown, but mostly because they were fairly grey in temperament.

Someone explain how Starmer's comms are more awful than Clown BoJo or Lettuce Truss? I'm not even a Labour supporter but from a neutral view I'm struggling to see how anyone can accuse him of being more disastrous than those two.

So your issue is Starmer, not the FTA with India?

Whether you like or dislike him is irrelevant to ‘cut through’. When the Mail outright lies in its headline and the BBC et all spin it negatively even while it’s being explained to them, when all the media has definitely been given the info but still try to find fault, that’s not Labour’s fault.

Here you go. Plus upthread Daniel Hannan’s post about it can be found. Is he anti-Labour enough for you? Because he thinks it’s a great deal.

These deals take ages to put together.

The reform council elections and controversy resulting from that probably weren't even thought of when they were putting together this deal which probably took months of negotiation.

Then of course because it is so difficult and takes so long you can't change it.

And completion pops up at the very time Starmer doesn't want it to, as he probably wasn't even thinking about getting battered in a local council election by reform when the negotiations started.

Events dear boy events.

It's a 2-year extension of the reciprocal agreement that we already have with India to allow social security payments to be made in the country of origin for short term expat staff who are seconded to the UK for limited periods. It is very similar to the reciprocal arrangements that we have with many other countries. As such, it really isn't the big deal that you're trying to make it out to be.

Problem is that even ‘respectable’ news outlets aren’t reporting it fairly. This morning on the 11am LBC news bulletin the announcer said ‘Jonathan Reynolds is defending the trade agreement from critics who say…’. Not even a tiny mention of what the agreement involves just what the critics say which are obviously Farage et al.

Are US or Canadian workers in the UK 20% cheaper too?