Westminstenders: It's oh so quiet...

[RedToothBrush]

It's oh so quiet // It's oh so still // You're all alone // And so peaceful until

You ring the news // Bim bam // You shout and you yell // Hi ho ho // You broke the spell // Gee, this is swell you almost have a fit // Brexit is fab and I got hit // There's no mistake get on with it

'Til it's over and then // It's nice and quiet //
Shh shh // But soon again // Shh shh // Uh oh let's start a big riot

You blow a fuse // Zing boom // The devil cuts loose // Zing boom // What's the use
Wow bam // Of leaving the EU

It's gone quiet.

May was supposed to go on a tour of the EU to get concessions. She hasn't.

Instead we are currently stuck in an internal never ending debate about Alternative Arrangements (which is being abbreved too A. A. by less convinced souls) and how Germany got all the money from Marshall Aid (it didn't) and how navy ships can suddenly sprout front opening hulls to become roll on roll off ferries to emulate the spirit of Dunkirk. One of our greatest ever military defeats, which merely had good PR.

The idea that there is going to be any shift in position between now and 14th Feb seems unlikely. It suits the EU and it suits the ERG to be blunt about it. It does not suit the UK national interest though.

Instead our livihoods and futures are slowly drip, drip, dripping away. Invisible to those loved up on the idea of Leaving. But like a newly wed, how long does that feeling last? 42% of British marriages end in divorce after all. When do people fall out of love with Brexit?

The revelation of the need for the WAIB is scary too. The WAIB is the Withdrawal Agreement Implementation Bill. You can read more about it here:
threadreaderapp.com/thread/1091734003265224708.html
Well I say you can read about it, but from the thread you can see that the WAIB hasn't been published yet. And for us to Brexit without a legal and constitutional nightmare parliament needs to pass both the WA And the WAIB. And if you thought it was difficult to get the WA through just wait until you clap eyes on the WAIB details.

With this in mind there are noises from the ERG about an A50 extension. Y'know the one we can't have unless the EU think it's it their interests too.

mlexmarketinsight.com/insights-center/editors-picks/brexit/europe/the-uk-rips-out-its-eu-law-drip,-only-to-hook-up-to-another
More on the WAIB.

Of course there is a more sinister explanation: May does indeed intend to no deal and or use civil contingency law to pass the WAIB in whatever form she sees fit without parliamentary scrutiny.

Tick, tick, tick.

A friend told me today not to worry about brexit as "we survived before and we'll survive again". I didn't say much. My history lessons were rather grimmer in reminding me, that the ones who didn't survive don't get to be so optimistic.

Incidentally, not sure if it's BBC trolling, but just a heads up there was a programme on R4 I caught a bit of when my Bluetooth connection dropped (fucking shitty, fucking cunting bastard car ...) about JIT and Japanese and US manufacturing advances and (just as I got to where I was going) the British disdain for said ...

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0002bnb

Tom Holland and Iszi Lawrence follow history’s story-laden lines and linkages. This week - supply lines, from Hannibal to Japanese innovation.

Thanks to RTB for creating these threads and to all the well informed posters, they are so helpful!

My dear (immigrant) friend who voted Leave and was quite vocal about it on FB at the time confided in me yesterday she thinks she might have been mistaken.

Do we really need TM's permission to arrange a people's vote? Couldn't we just, you know, arrange it among ourselves?

The Facebook memes leavers are sharing with me now have very few shares. Russian micro targetting? Lots of mini propaganda posts?

I’ve met a few people now who said they didn’t feel informed enough to vote.

The Facebook memes leavers are sharing with me now have very few shares. Russian micro targetting? Lots of mini propaganda posts?

The higher the level you want to feed the beast at, the more it costs you:

Fake Twitter likes - probably $100 for 100,000.

Keyword targeted replies (simple randomised template that appears to be a reply but in reality is simply a way of posting a slogan) maybe $100 gets you 1,000

all points in between up to:
The Gold Standard - a properly written post with reason, grammar and spelling ... $10-20 a pop ? Obviously a more precious resource which is why there are so few of them, and they are used for maximum effect.

I think the most rabid Brexiteers are probably more afraid of the deployment of the CCA than anyone here. If Twitter and Facebook are shut down, they'd lose their support base at a stroke. And given the pisspoor turnouts for Leave rallies so far, it's unlikely they'll go old school like Remainers anyway.

@BigChocFrenzy, well, I have just had an interesting email. I went through the application process yesterday to open an N26 bank account, and have just had the following response:

"Thank you for your interest in opening an account with N26. We’re sorry to inform you that it appears we will not be able to open an account for you.

As a bank, we have to follow strict legal requirements for every account we open. Unfortunately, occasionally this means we are not able to open accounts due to these restrictions. Due to legal constraints, we are not able to give you any more information at this time."

It's the last sentence that is interesting... why would they not be able to tell me? I've never been rejected for anything like this before, and have a good credit history.

Also means I'm back to square one unfortunately!

It's the last sentence that is interesting... why would they not be able to tell me?

Well obviously we can't know, but I had a similar ages ago with my bank issuing a new debit card. To this day they won't tell me why they did it. So many a case for Hanlons razor - it is a bank after all.

They're not proposing to stop doing the checks they already do. They're just streamlining the new things they'd have to do.

They're not proposing to stop doing the checks they already do. They're just streamlining the new things they'd have to do.

So do the new plans for nodding stuff through give:

1. More border control.
2. Less border control.
3. The same border control. ?

They're not proposing to stop doing the checks they already do. They're just streamlining the new things they'd have to do.

You may be swimming against a tide of hysteria here. One of the dangers of training people to ignore experts.

Part of me kind of agrees with Nissan man, although not to the extent that I would ever have voted to leave.

So do the new plans for nodding stuff through give:
1. More border control.
2. Less border control.
3. The same border control. ?

We don't know yet. It doesn't appear to be less though.

Reading between the lines it appears that importers will have to make a (simplified) customs declaration before the goods arrive and presumably the haulier will have to make a safety & security declaration before they embark. If that's the case then there's more border control, compared with the current situation.

If that's the case then there's more border control, compared with the current situation.

Remind me again, why we're leaving ?

Things are just going round and round with no progress at all. Wtf is going on with the backstop? What part of no does TM not understand?

We can't just let goods through from Europe. Not without letting in goods from throughout the world without tariffs. Cos WTO.

So yeah, HMRC can say this, but its not consistent with WTO rules and other WTO members can object.

But WTO rules are awesome.

Well the 6 o'clock news has offered no insight apart from Brussels have said they want TM to be more realistic and it's still a no.

Faisal Islam @faisalislam
PM: I’m not proposing a deal that doesn’t contain the backstop, I’m proposing changes

Philip Webster @Pwebstertimes
A backstop - not THE backstop. @faisalislam explains what May was telling NI she was after #BrexitShambles

Peter Foster @pmdfoster
I can scarcely believe this - we are not into a 'the backstop' v 'a backstop' semantics debate.

Downing St once again dancing on the head of a pin.

So let's be clear...1

In her speech, May recommits to a) December Joint Report and NO infrastructure and related checks b) no customs border in Irish Sea /2

That effectively rules out technology to create a border, even if May doesn't rule out some applications of technology to help with de-dramatising downstream consequences of Brexit. But the ERG/Shanker Singham ideas of tech (and drones) to fix border dies. /3

I've spent day talking to NI businessmen. So. Imagine. We've diverged and done trade deals with US, NZ, AUS etc... and have different tariffs, different standards (hormone-treated beef) leading to meat at different prices in UK. /3

Declan Billington who sits on NI's Agrifood Strategy Board estimates that a truck load of cheap beef, taken to a smuggers barn on the border, repackaged as EU-compliant beef is instantly worth €50,000 more. So massive incentive to smuggle./4

We know this because cigs (one in four cigs in IE is estimated to be bootlegged) and petrol/diesel smuggling costs some €300m in lost revenues. Add food, agri and industrial products to that in a diverged economy and you'll have a smugglers boomtime. /5

And to be clear here, it's ILLEGAL traffic that's the problem - they won't be looking to comply with the rules. Recall the 2008 Dioxin scandal where dodgy interests used bootleg oil to heat pig barns, soaking the meet in Dioxin levels 80-100 time EU limits. /6

That led to recalls in 23 countries and cost Irish pork industry a €100m according to Stephen Kelly at @ManufacturingNI And then guess what? The smuggling is still linked to paramilitary groups. /7

So you still need to police 300 miles of border with 200 crossing. No good having 'light touch' regulation, voluntary registration back from the border. That NOT THE PROBLEM. It's the crooks. So then maybe you use @ShankerASingham drones, right? /8

Genius idea that, since helicopter-like machines hovering over the badlands outside Crossmaglen, Derry or Newry surely aren't going to cause any flashbacks to The Troubles. Of course not. And if you identify a dodgy lorry, then what? Well, you got to send a man to intercept it/9

What kind of man? Does he have gun as well as a peaked cap? Does he need a woman in combat fatigues to protect him? How hard is it to see how quickly the downward spiral begins? /10

Because with that much money at stake, you are surely naive if you don't think that mafia gangs with para military roots don't start running the kind of intimidation and suppression operations that will also bring banks brutal memories? /11

Thickness confession.

A post on another thread made me realise that there are two things here:

1. The UK Border Force who will who check for illegal immigrants, check passports etc.

1. Customs and Excise dept. who will not now be checking goods coming and going from the ports for a year or so.

So smuggling of goods may increase but not smuggling of people necessarily. So in terms of 'control' I'd say it's the same control on 1 and less control on 2.

Great - vote leave, fund terrorist's
Just makes you feel all warm and fuzzy doesn't it.
What a complete clusterfuck

Peter Foster @pmdfoster
How long before things get nasty for anyone found co-operating with the authorities?

Remember the foul and savage practice of kneecapping? In those parts, strange to relate, they do.

All of which is to say... /12

The backstop needs to actually deliver on those December 2017 promises Mrs May re-iterated today, and it needs to deliver in the real world. I understand that NI biz leaders offered Mrs May that they would go and talk to Malthouse types - or have them to NI. /13

I hope they take up the offer, and I hope they listen. Because if you don't want the checks done between GB and NI, then its pretty much a customs union with sufficient regulatory alignment not to leave NI in special measures. Same as its always been. 14/ENDS

Lonely- why do we think there will be great boarder checks for people? That's a lot of extra staff .........have they been recruiting? Training?

I think point 12 of Peter Foster's thread is the big one:

People who co-operate with the government with 'alternative arrangements' would be natural targets for organised crime

Just thinking about movement of people - flying you have your passport checked, but eurotunnel - driving- the French pay far more attention to your passport - from memory the British side was more of an "honesty" system (we entered our details with the booking).

Which we made me think about the info sharing between countries when you travel - are there systems in place for that?

We can't just let goods through from Europe. Not without letting in goods from throughout the world without tariffs. Cos WTO.

Surely in a worst case scenario we'd just have to make exactly the same offer to everyone else, and offer the same conditions?

That could mean they'd have to be arriving on a Ro-Ro ferry at one of the designated ports and both the importer and the haulier would need EORI numbers and whoever's paying the bill needs to have a direct debit agreement in place with HMRC for paying duty and VAT.

And they could say that the new customs arrangements won't apply to goods transiting the EU on the way to the UK (if they're transiting under seal before clearing in the UK there's no need for the simplified procedure) so (as far as I can see) we'd still only be opening our borders to EU free-circulation goods - exactly the same as now.

Speculation of course but entirely feasible.

why do we think there will be greater boarder checks for people?

I don't think there will be greater checks?. I think same checks 'control' for people smugglers. Less control for goods. I think it was fishes who thought there'd be more?

For what it's worth I think definitely less control of money and less control of laws/ regulations. Hey ho!