Is a No Deal exit really a possibility?

[StorminaBcup]

Is there really a risk of a No Deal for Britain leaving Europe or are they making it sound even more of an utter shambles (if that's possible), so that whatever deal we leave with won't be quite so bad in comparison?

There will be a deal I suspect. Both sides need one. It's just a lot of political posturing from both sides at the moment trying to usher the best deal.

Norway & Switzerland are both members of the EEA & EFTA.This means they are effectively members of the EU single market & customs union, and they have to abide by its rules, specifically the ‘four freedoms’.

Only EU members are members of the customs union, although the EU also has a separate customs arrangement with several potential accession countries (Andorra, Turkey, San Marino). Norway and Switzerland are not in the customs union, and there are customs checks at the border, although due to FTAs their goods have tariff-free access to the EU. The border checks are to avoid good of other (non-Norwegian) origin being imported tariff-free into the EU. We can’t have a similar arrangement due to the Irish border, in our case, we would need to be in both to prevent a hard border. The four freedoms refer to the single market, not the customs union.

This explains the differerence well: www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2016/10/07/the-difference-between-europes-customs-union-and-single-market

SoloD the UK was only second to the USA in term of value of German imported cars USA 27 B , UK 26.9 B would you be happy to lose that much business

Rosstac
I doubt that German car manufacturers are happy to lose any business but as they are on record as saying they would rather lose the busines than undermine the EU it's unclear what your point is.

Ross Why am I not allowed to mention the 3 month rule? Who are you to go around setting rules for this forum?

The comment was made that anybody can come here without a job and that's just not true. Just because the U.K. government does nothing about people coming over here for longer/indefinitely does not mean that the law isn't there. In Belgium you have to register at your local commune within 8 days of arriving in Belgium in order to be issued with an ID card and you can do nothing without your ID card. Why not petition the U.K. government to implement a similar scheme in order to 'control' the number of people?

Also interested to hear how leavers want EU migration to be cut but are welcoming of trade deals with all kinds of other countries (India, China, etc) which will have huge numbers of visas as part of the trade deal? Why are we more in favour of Indian and Chinese migrants than Spanish or Dutch? (Personally I don't care, I'm well aware that migrants are far more valuable to the country that any cost they incur).

I should clarify before Ross decides to pick me up on it that obviously you can visit Belgium for longer than 8 days (less than 3 months!) but you have to register if you intend to live, work, attend education establishments, claim benefits or buy health care.

Why am I not allowed to mention the 3 month rule?

Because it knocks their entire position into a cocked hat?

They really hate it when you talk about the three month rule.

Element No?? Don't tell me they're trying to limit debate and avoid answering questions now?!

It’s two years for a reason
Apparently when the current Eu as we know it began in the seventies two years was agreed purely because it’s not enough time
This was to stop a future ( at that time) leader getting stroppy and removing his/ her nation on a whim -

Our Foolish government ( who surely must know that). should have made and agreed plan way before signing the A50 thing

I’m so angry about all this. All of it was totally avoidable

I moved from the UK to another EU country and had to prove I had funds available to support myself. As I bought a property and had sufficient 'cash' it was relatively easy but just turning up without would be near impossible if you want a 'normal' lifestyle with a roof over your head and earning an income.
ID cards help reduce crime and proper registration of people would make it much easier for the authorities to 'remove' people that should not be in the country, or at least 'discuss their prospects'.
The 'rules' of the EU have been very carefully thought through and challenged by tough negotiators from 27/28 countries so those that are fully enforceable by the EU will have a very strong foundation.

The sensible thing (apart from Remaining) would have been a national dialogue about what Leave means, what different stakeholders in UK want, practical and realistic discussion about the border with Ireland to create some kind of consensus- even drag a few of us Remoaners kicking and screaming to the table. And then trigger A50.
Not the other way around.
BTW, still kicking and screaming.

What angers me the most is no-one seems to know what Brexit actually is and what they hope to achieve from it and yet they voted for it anyway.

Whoever you ask, all you get in reply is vague, meaningless soundbites about taking back control, protect the borders, making Britain great again etc.

I've come across only one person in real life and on MN who had a clear vision of what they wanted to Brexit to be. It was unrealistic, unobtainable vision but at least they'd thought about it before casting their vote. Everyone else just talks in soundbites I am fully convinced they understand the meaning of.

Is that why we're getting no deal? Is Theresa May sat in the meetings beating her chest while chanting, "Brexit means Brexit, take back control, sovereignty, make Britain great again, 350 million for the NHS!"

What is being gained is sovereignty We already are

to make the UK a self-governing democracy again We are a monarchy

to save us becoming a vassal state to a corrupt, anti-democratic European superstate run largely by and for the benefit of Germany

We already had a veto on just about everything hence not using the Euro. We could have vetoed free movement too.

Oh and that 'superstate' gave us human rights eg the right to life and forced most if not all of our anti discrimination legislation.

Well said sash. We had a super sweet deal with the EU, but some people could not stop moaning about wanting special treatment and how we were being constantly shafted by the Eurocrats. The whole thing has been a total, complete, and utter disgrace and I'm sure other EU nations are sick to the back teeth of us.

If no deal scenario gets put to parliament, and it is rejected (as it surely will be), then what?

I, at this stage, just want the Leavers to own this shitstorm.

I predicted, the day after that disastrous result, that everyone else would be to blame

I feel a little sorry for TM as Leavers are shrieking and tearing their hair out at how inept she and her fellow Brexit negotiators must be if they didn't just march up to Barnier and Junckers and announce the post Brexit Deal to them- like she holds any power at all.

It's also why no one, even her closest, most rabid Brexiteers aren't challenging her leadership, let alone Labour- as they can clearly see what lies ahead and do not want their names besmirched by it in history's books.

But no, Leavers, You created this Mess. You own it. I wish each of you had an L tattooed on your foreheads (if there was room around the spider's web ).

Are leavers worried about their jobs? If I was a vocal Leaver I'd be worried I'd be first on the list when redundancies started.

I am sorry, but I am well and truly baffled as to why May was in such a hurry to invoke A50 with NO plan as to the consequences of this action. That was just daft.

Or did she have a gun to her head and wanted to prove she could out Brexit the mega Brexiteer cabal or what?

Shakes head in misery at all this unnecessary crap heading our way.

Just to put to bed the 'German Car Makers' myth.

David Davis, (before the referendum):
We are too valuable a market for Europe to shut off. Within minutes of a vote for Brexit the CEO’s of Mercedes, BMW, VW and Audi will be knocking down Chancellor Merkel’s door demanding that there be no barriers to German access to the British market. And this is not just German cars. The same will happen with Shell and Unilever in the Netherlands, EDF, EADS and the viticultural trade associations in France, Seat in Spain, and Fiat and the fashion designers in Italy
www.conservativehome.com/platform/2016/02/david-davis-britain-would-be-better-off-out-of-the-eu-and-heres-why.html

Unfortunately for Davis, he was as usual talking nonsense and none of his predictions came true. Unilever even moved their HQ from London to the Netherlands, taking their tax contributions with them.

VW sells 10 million cars a year worldwide. Of these, only 250,000 are sold in the UK, so less than 3%. For all German manufacturers the figure is less than 10% of sales, so although they don't want to lose the UK market, it is not as important to them as Brexiters claim.

But here's the ironic bit. Almost all cars currently sold in the UK are either imported from the EU or are assembled in the UK from components produced in the EU. Not just the obviously European brands (VW, Mercedes, BMW, Opel/Vauxhall, Skoda, Audi, Ford, Fiat, Seat, Dacia, Renault etc) but also the Japanese brands (Honda, Nissan, Toyota) are made in the EU, as are the less obvious brands such as KIA and Hyundai which are made in Poland and the Czech Rep for the UK and European market. After Brexit, the car manufacturers currently in the UK will be forced to relocate - e.g. Nissan is owned by Renault and will move to France or to Dacia in Romania, BMW already make Minis in Holland and have previously made them at Magna-Steyr in Austria, Jaguar/Land Rover have already built a £1billion plant in Slovakia (bigger than any plant that they have in the UK)

So post-Brexit, with no car factories left in the UK, almost all cars sold in the UK will continue to come from the EU, but actually in increased numbers to replace the lost UK production. Even the only American brand (apart from Ford Europe) selling in any quantity in the UK, Chrysler/Jeep, is owned by Fiat.

The EU companies will continue to sell cars in the UK - there are few alternative manufacturers, and people buying Mercedes, Porsche or BMW are not going to swap them for a Hindustan Ambassador. The downside for everyone, Brexiters and Remainers alike, is that we'll all be paying 20% more for the car (and the spares and servicing).

@Havana
All this verifiable information, you are spoiling my dream of unicorns!
I wonder if JLR had their fingers crossed behind their backs when they said the 'Electric RangeRover' will be built in Solihull (when the finish designing it)?
Too many in the UK think that the UK is big and important, they need to get out more.

There is one reason why I think there will be a deal.

Well 3 million, actually. There are 3 million EU citizens in the UK (along with the many British citizens who are also EU citizens). Are their governments really going to offer them up as collateral damage and eg allow them to miss out on essential medicines and food?

I do think it will go to the wire like it did with the Greek bail-out where Greece was going to crash out of the euro every 5 minutes. But I think by 11.59pm on 29th March 2019 a deal of some sort will be done.

Barnier says 80% of things are agreed. The main sticking point is the Irish border and that can be sorted if we stay in the customs union, something I am forever banging on about, but I'm right and a lot of Leave voters wouldn't mind that because it was the political union they objected to. If Ireland gets sorted (and customs union also sorts out the whole tariff thing) we are there and the other bits can be sorted out during the transition.

Lets hope I am right.

But I'm still not booking any holidays for 2019 although as I've said before, ds has GCSEs so can't book anything for Easter/May half term and will need to wait for exam and college induction dates anyway.

Maybe their governments will air lift them out, keenster? Emergency repatriation is a thing, after all.

We already had a veto on just about everything hence not using the Euro. We could have vetoed free movement too. Oh and that 'superstate' gave us human rights eg the right to life and forced most if not all of our anti discrimination legislation

To be fair, this isn't true. We could not veto free movement - that was part of what David Cameron tried to achieve when he was negotiating his grand new relationship with Europe.

And we already had some discrimination laws before the EU, although in some areas they were added to, quite substantially. For example, that's why there's no cap on compensation for dismissal for discrimination. But we introduced the Equal Pay Act ourselves.

The human rights stuff mainly comes from the ECHR, which is separate to the EU.

pineapple

Yes but for 3 million - plus all the Brits who have EU citizenship too?

I know we had the Berlin airlift but this would be on another level entirely!

We could not veto free movement
But we could have made it work MUCH better for the UK - the three month rule
but as the Home Office are incompetent
and the UK politicians do not care about the "regions"
instead we got Brexit