Brexit-lite here we come

[Bearbehind]

Theresa May has today said the UK wants to maintain the closest possible economic ties with the EU and to guarantee the rights of EU citizens living in the EU.

Are any Leave voters actually happy with that?

I'd say smallfox was referring to lindy not you corcory

Still looking forward to your explanation on how any new trade agreements will counter the devalued pound, the cost of Brexit and the cost of keeping the economy going in the meantime though.

"Its another "I think" or an "I believe" statement by a leaver.
Sigh, so easy to dismiss"

As also are all statements about the nature of the future of the EU. It's crystal ball stuff, whichever side you are trying to predict.

So you can either sigh about the inherent inability to see the future. Or you can shape it. And that's Brexit.

The future of the EU is much easier to see.

We would have been exempt from ever closer union.

We would have had a break on benefits paid to immigrants.

We would have continued to have free access to the single market benefiting business and our economy.

Turkey would not have joined within the next 10 years.

We would be exempt from paying the EU for Eurozone bailouts

There are a load more but you don't actually want to hear them.

Tell me now what certainties you have with Brexit, or are you going to offer more platitiudes about "shaping the future" cause sure as shit those that are shaping the future for us right now aren't you.

I don't agree with any of that.

Having heard it all before, at the time of the EEC referendum, where concerns about a trading bloc becoming political union were dismissed as ridiculous scaremongering.

So staying with the EEC (now EU) has a proven track record of change.

Brexit does not. It is in itself the change - and has happened.

• we are out of closer union
• we can decide what benefits to pay to whom
• we can settle out own trade deals and are out of TTIP
• Turkey isn't relevant
• we have nothing to do with euro or bailouts

What a load of bullshit Small you believe your own crap so absolutely there is really no point discussing anything with you

Um what is bullcrap? The agreements Cameron got, enforceable under international law?

Please tell me why its bullshit, and not your faith in the future fuckwittery?

Also:

"we are out of closer union"

We were anyway, enforceable under international law.

• we can decide what benefits to pay to whom

That was agreed too.

• we can settle out own trade deals and are out of TTIP

We may be out of TTIP, but we seem to be using CETA (which is the same) as a model, our deals are more likely to be like the TTIP deals we didn't want to sign than the one the EU would have passed (Psst, we could have vetoed it anyway, no matter)

• Turkey isn't relevant

Has to meet 30 odd conditions of which it has met 1 since it started negotiating in the 1980s. Irrelevant.

• we have nothing to do with euro or bailouts

We were anyway. Although we may still have to contribute as part of the IMF.

See, your arguments don't stand scrutiny at all .

"We are out of TTIP" ?

This would be the TTIP that the UK Conservative Government had already stated it would be happy to sign, without safeguards for out public services, but that France and Germany (amongst others) were stalling on signing, due to their concerns.....

That TTIP?

Or the one that David Davis , Liam Fox and Boris Johnson are big fans of?

Those who are going to be negotiating our trade deals?

That one?

If you believed the red herring about TTIP you really aren't good enough for this argument,

At the moment we are in a state of limbo. Brexit hasn't yet happened - no one really seems to know what deal we do actually want.

We can't settle any trade deals with anyone until we sort out the position with the EU.

Turkey has been trying and failing to get into the EEC/EU for at least 35 years, so it's relevance hasn't changed, apart from some (not all) in the Leave camp trying to scaremonger.

We didn't have anything to do with the Euro and there were no plans for us to join.

Many people know what we want but we cannot yet start negotiating and showing your full hand in public is not a great negotiating strategy.
Lets wait and see what we get and argue about the proposals when they are actually on the table.
The EU has many discussion projects on the table, including greater VAT harmonization, further limiting individual fiscal policy.

"Many people know what we want"

Didn't your mother tell you I want never gets? We can want all we like, but it depends who holds the stronger hand, outside of the EU we hold a far weaker one that they do, so brexiteers are unlikely to get what they want.

Many people know what we want but we cannot yet start negotiating and showing your full hand in public is not a great negotiating strategy

There have been some laughable comments on this thread but that one takes the biscuit.

Are you seriously saying that the reason Leavers won't say what they want to happen is so the country doesn't play its hand too soon?

Has there been a secret leave convention are you all agreed this? Maybe that's what the Facebook group is?

That will make me chuckle all day.

Many people know what we want

This is priceless. Many people know what they personally want, but they are mutually contradictory.

So, do we go for Hard Brexit? Invoke Article 50 early next year and then spend 2 years trying to negotiate a clean exit? Followed by opening up WTO negotiations, with up to 160 nations in the WTO? Trade deals can take 10 years, but six seems quite a reasonable time, so at least 8 years of uncertainty seem very likely.

Or take the Daniel Hannon line - and go for an EEA type option which gives us access to the single market, doesn't control immigration, and has us paying in something like 85% of our contributions with no say in the laws being made? This is so similar to what we have now that it would be a complete waste of time.

Or, listen to the racists, and round up all the immigrants? No key Brexitter has said that, to my knowledge, but a significant number of people say they want that.

It would be laughable if it wasn't a serious issue.

You also forgot retaining access to the single market whilst opting out of free movement and controlling our borders, presumably by magically floating a few hundred miles further off the coast of France in order to opt out of the refugee crisis. Not going to happen, of course, but I'd venture to suggest still a pretty popular 'want' amongst the Leave camp.

15 hours after a statement that 'we know what we want', and yet no one of the Leave camp has articulated it. The problem is, you know what you don't want, which is not the same.

I think it's actually been put quite a few times:
A large proportion of Brexit voters want:

• to have control and some say in who actually enters our country (just like most of the rest of the world).
• to be in full control of our own laws (just like most of the rest of the world)
• to have a mutually beneficial trade arrangement with EU countries.

However when anyone says that you rather repeatedly come back with that it won't happen despite the fact that you have absolutely no way of knowing or prooving that. Its simply what you believe or think. However, if a Brexit voter says what they believe or think you pretty much call their views ridiculous ignoring the fact that you have no more proof in what will or won't happen than any of us.

If there is no trade deal or agreements do you think the EU will be happy to wave goodbye to the £7+ billion we currently pay in?

Well said Lindy.

Also there is no requirement to know exactly what we want post referendum. I voted to leave the EU that was the question I was asked, answered and expect acted on. I'm happy with any compromise that ends with the UK NOT being a full member of the EU. I'd also be pretty happy to see Nigel on the honours list he's been maligned abused and threatened as have his wife and children for saying what a large proportion of the country wanted.

- to have control and some say in who actually enters our country (just like most of the rest of the world)

If we want single market access we will have to accept some FOM at the very least. As long as there is crisis in the world we will always have refugees.

- to be in full control of our own laws (just like most of the rest of the world)

Impossible in a world of global trade deals. Other countries will have input into our legislation as part of those trade deals.

Impossible if we go onto an EEA style deal, we will be forced to implement EU laws we no longer have any input into.

- to have a mutually beneficial trade arrangement with EU countries

Which we already have as members of the EU.

I'm happy with any compromise that ends with the UK NOT being a full member of the EU.

Literally any compromise at all? So you'd be fine with both EEA membership involving freedom of movement, payment and observation of EU law without a say in it, and also with going it entirely alone? If that's what you think then fair enough, but I'd venture to suggest that you're unusual in being happy with such a wide range of options. Because Option A has a lot more in common with full EU membership than it does with Option B.

Also, if most of the rest of the world have full control over their own laws Lindy, actual full control, I'm sure I'm not the only one who'd like to hear the list of countries meeting that definition.

The real difficulty is that the Leave voters have contradictory demands. If you then add in the statement from TM that she is wants the agreement of all four UK countries, two of which want to Remain, then you can see that something somewhere will have to give.

Added to the 16 million plus who voted to Remain, yes posters on MN can say 'you are whinging, get over it' but can any politician really afford to effectively say "yah boo sucks" to them? Admittedly a Tory Government might just get away with this, because more Tories than other parties voted to Leave.

Peregrina, yes.

I still can't quite decide if TM is just caught in an unresolveable Brexit conundrum that is genuinely keeping her awake at night, or if she's loving it and has put the chief Brexiteers in the key posts and then issued them with irreconcilable demands deliberately; set them up to fail...

Some freedom of movement such as freedom of movement of labour would be much better than the current uncontrolled movement. Imigration is good and beneficial if done properly. If not done properly it is can have the opposite effect. This thread is about the EU not refugees. No where on this post has anyone even hinted at not helping refugees. The UK has a long history of helping those in need. Much longer than the existance of the EU.

I believe most countries have good control of their own law making. Much more than we currently have. It's not an unreasonable aim. I don't see the US being made to be told what to do very often.

A beneficial trade agreement would be possible whilst opting out of the other aspects of the EU. It was originally just for trade after all. I do not see major EU multi million € businesses letting it be any other way. The EU exports rather a lot to us and when it comes down to it, it is businesses and those that actually make the money that have the real power rather than the pen pushing politicians. Regardless of what those politicians might like to think.

The real difficulty is that the Leave voters have contradictory demands

Have you spoken to all 15 million leave voters?

We were asked one question - do you want to remain in the EU or do you want to leave?

The majority voted to leave.

We are leaving the EU.

#getoverit

Thankfully I am not the Prime Minister, but she doesn't have the lazy easy option of saying #getoverit She has to try to balance competing demands for what she sees as the good of the country. I hope that when she does get a deal she goes for a General Election so that she can truly say, if she wins, that she has a mandate. Then if the best deal that she manages is an EEA style agreement she will truly be able to say, that's what you voted for #getoverit.

Has anyone spoken to the 15 million leavers, which is actually 17 million, but there are enough pointer in the press to know that they fall into broad categories.