Westministenders: No Australia Don't Have A Deal

[RedToothBrush]

Since Friday, far from letting things calm down, Johnson has doubled down stating that if we can't have a Canada Deal (which the EU says wouldn't be equal because we are much closer than Canada geographically) we will go for an Australia Deal.

This is the latest rehash of a managed no deal package up as something else which the EU have already repeatedly said no to.

So we are on track for no deal.

At the same time Johnson has got very excited about American food and how its great. Almost as if he wants no deal wit the EU to force a shitty bad deal with the us through.

Johnson and his chronies have also been trying to undermine journalistic transparency by blocking access to the lobby to some media outlets in a move that makes us look like a tinpot dictatorship. Fortunately there was a mass walk out of journalists but it remains to be seen how long that can be maintained.

Far from being a clean slate to move forward from its already proving that nothing has changed and old divisions are as deep as ever, if not worse...

Lisa Nandy is not favoured by Momentum. My CLP voted for her and for Angela Rayner as deputy. I keep changing my mind between Nandy and Starmer.

So f*🤯king annoying reading reports of Johnson announcing his plans for HS2, buses and bikes and seeing Corbyn,still in situ, slagging him off, people being "let down by successive Tory governments".

What about people being let down by successive shit opposition to hold the government to account? Vaguely challenge the open electoral goal that this government provides?

Why is he still there? An interim leader would be thousands of times better!

What about people being let down by successive shit opposition to hold the government to account?

Is there a school of thought that if the opposition were not shit, they wouldn't be the opposition, but government ?

(ducks ...)

Project Fear becomes reality
Not many job loses, but already an attrition in options for Brits
n26.com/en-gb

The Atlantic Charter would seem on the face of it to be a repudiation of empire, but Churchill didn't think so. His position was very Rhodesian in that he did not believe that black and brown people would ever be able to govern themselves.

The empire was certainly very handy postwar. Labour's welfae state was paid for partly by american loans and partly by the Sterling Area scam, whereby all empire goods could only be sold to the mother country for pounds, when they were then sold on to world markets for dollars. The resulting recession, combined with the effects of the racist points system of the McCarran Act in the USA, is what led so many young men from the Carribbean to return to the UK so recently after serving there.

The Atlantic Charter would seem on the face of it to be a repudiation of empire, but Churchill didn't think so. His position was very Rhodesian in that he did not believe that black and brown people would ever be able to govern themselves.

So he thought Roosevelt was bluffing ?

If Boris has drunk deep from the well of Churchill it would explain a few things then ...

Well exactly DGR! It's as if Corbyn hasn't just had his chance 8 and a bit weeks ago!

www.civilserviceworld.com/articles/news/post-brexit-border-checks-inevitable-warns-gove-hmrc-extends-deadline-customs-support
"support"
will not magic up land to park vehicles while checks are taking place .....

He may have thought that FDR would not be around forever, and so it proved. He was opposed to the prewar plans for Indian self-government drawn up by an obscure committee including one CR Attlee that led to the Government of India Act of 1935.

Quite what Churchill thought he was going to do with India postwar is not clear. The whole thing was a confidence trick imposed by an Indian Army, Police, Judiciary and Civil Service overseen by a Viceroy and a few hundred Colonial Office types. Rather like the "Devils In Skirts," it was all a bluff. (Carry On Up The Kybher is the best historical account of the Raj yet made.)

Notice the narrative has shifted so that it's business that needs to do the work. You can bet your life the government is going to be as hands off about all of this as it can, whilst still claiming to have hands.

A lot of "yous" in that article ... "you will need to ..." "you will have to ..." "you will find ..."

What Jason118 was referring to ?

www.gov.uk/government/news/government-confirms-plans-to-introduce-import-controls

Government confirms plans to introduce import controls

Today, the government has confirmed plans to introduce import controls on EU goods at the border after the transition period ends on 31 December 2020.

Today, the government has confirmed plans to introduce import controls on EU goods at the border after the transition period ends on 31 December 2020.

We are leaving the EU’s customs union and single market, taking back control of our borders, and beginning to strike trade deals around the world.

In a speech today by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster at a Border Delivery Group stakeholder event, he confirmed all UK exports and imports will be treated equally.

This will mean traders in the EU and GB will have to submit customs declarations and be liable to goods’ checks. He also confirmed that the policy easements put in place for

a potential no deal exit will not be reintroduced as businesses have time to prepare.

There are a number of reasons for implementing import controls:

to keep our borders safe and secure so we know who’s coming in and how often, what they are bringing in, and why
to ensure we treat all partners equally as we begin to negotiate our own trading arrangements with countries around the world
to collect the right customs, VAT and excise duties
the EU has said it will enforce checks on our goods entering the Eurozone. We will likewise enforce our own rules for goods entering the UK

Business can prepare for border controls by making sure they have an Economic Operator Registration and Identification (EORI) number, and also looking into how they want

to make declarations such as using a customs agent. We will ensure facilitations currently available to rest of the world traders will also be open to those trading between GB and EU.

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Michael Gove said:

The UK will be outside the single market and outside the customs union, so we will have to be ready for the customs procedures and regulatory checks that will inevitably follow.

As a result of that we will be in a stronger position, not just to make sure that our economy succeeds outside the European Union but that we are in a position to take advantage of new trading relationships with the rest of the world.

This morning HMRC extended the deadline for businesses to apply for customs support funding to 31 January 2021. To date, applications have been made for around £18.5 million out of a possible £26 million – meaning there is at least £7.5 million left to claim from HMRC.

This is aimed at GB/EU traders. This approach does not apply to the flow of trade between Northern Ireland and Ireland, or between Northern Ireland and GB.

"the government has confirmed plans to introduce import controls on EU goods"

Well the alternative was no import controls on any all countries with whom we don't have a trade deal after transition - currently most of the world

Someone may have noticed this would have meant that many countries would have no incentive for a UK trade deal, as they'd already have the best possible situation:
i.e. the UK letting their goods in without controls while the other countries (have to) impose the same controls on the UK as on any other 3rd country

if it doesn't apply to to NI to Ireland, or between NI and GB, then doesn't logic dictate that GB to Ireland via NI (i.e to the the EU), will also not require any controls?

The subtlety is that England/Scotland/Wales to Eire via NI is subject to controls - but in order to identify that traffic you need to check everything - Gove's statement is worded to obscure that specific point. (controls in the reverse direction are also implied by his speech - ie everything routing from NI to England etc will need to be examined to confirm that it did not originate in Eire)

I wonder how many edge firms outside the UK will simply stop selling to us ?

Many years ago, before we joined the EEC, DF had an offer from a chap he worked with to pop to Italy every few weeks and finalise deals to import (in a series of transit vans) car spares that the manufacturers couldn't be bothered to export themselves. (Amusingly my Godfather did the reverse with Mini spares ). If my DF hadn't had such a bug up his backside about "working for himself", he might well have taken it.

Good interview with the rep from the vets governing body on R4 this morning - who knew that importing a ham and cheese sandwich required separate certifications for the ham, the cheese and the butter that all had to be overseen by vets

She had no idea how many more vets would be required to cover imports now (as previously they had been led to believe that they only needed to cover exports) as this was now a whole new scenario, the government hadn’t actually said which ports would have suitable facilities for SPS checks in place and no idea where new vets could be sourced at such short notice, given the current vet shortages.

Question for the regulars.

I've noticed that some people's names don't come up when you type @.

Is there a way that I can make myself not @-able? That fucking a$$hole astroturfer keeps @-ing me. I've already turned off my notifications.

Gove made that speech in Holyhead - a port which sold off its clearance land to a Supermarket some years ago.

The traffic jam getting out is bad enough without all the lorries stopping for an extra 20 minutes to have their paperwork checkd

There is a good thread on twitter today about the likely impact of a customs border - even setting aside regulatory convergence/divergence issues. Apparently at the Swiss border about 20% of trucks show up with incorrect paperwork, requiring additional information from the company or the customs agent. And if it's 7pm and they are closed ... the lorry can't move until the following morning.

The traffic jam getting out is bad enough without all the lorries stopping for an extra 20 minutes to have their paperwork checkd

It's probably the first time Gove had ever been to that part of the country. If he lived there or visited often, he would see the A55 heaving with lorries going to and from the Irish boats.
Hmm, but I wonder how much will switch to large container vessels which bypass Great Britain altogether? Gove I am quite sure, knew what he was saying, but dressed it up carefully so that the plebs wouldn't realise.

I know that Rees-Mogg is of the opinion that we won't know the benefits for 50 years; I just wonder how long it will be before we realise we have well and truly damaged ourselves.

Mistigri change to a throwaway Gmail or Hotmail account for MN?

www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/feb/11/barnier-tells-uk-dont-kid-yourself-about-financial-services-deal

theguardian.com
Barnier tells UK: don't kid yourself about financial services deal
Lisa O'Carroll
4-5 minutes
Michel Barnier
Michel Barnier: ‘There will not be general open-ended ongoing equivalence in financial services, nor other management or financial agreements with the United Kingdom.’ Photograph: Michael Sohn/AP

Michel Barnier has warned Sajid Javid and Boris Johnson that “they should not kid themselves” that Brussels will give a special deal to the City of London after a photograph emerged of the UK’s opening negotiating position on the new post-Brexit arrangements.

A briefing paper, snapped by a long-lens camera as it was taken into Downing St on Monday, suggested the UK would seek in the coming negotiations a “permanent equivalence” regime for financial services that would last for “decades to come”.

Speaking in the European parliament in Strasbourg, the EU’s chief negotiator scotched the chancellor’s hopes for maintaining such stable access to the European market after the end of 2020, when the UK leaves the single market and customs union.

“I’d like to take this opportunity to make it clear to certain people in the United Kingdom authority that they should not kid themselves about this. There will not be general open-ended ongoing equivalence in financial services, nor other management or financial agreements with the United Kingdom,” Barnier said. “We will keep control of these tools, and we will retain the free-hand to take our own decisions.”

Negotiations on the future relationship between the UK and the EU are due to start in the first week of March.

At the end of the transition period, the British financial services sector will no longer have the right to operate in the EU as it does today.

The City will instead rely on Brussels judging that the UK’s regulations and supervisory systems are sufficiently robust – a so-called equivalence decision that can be overturned with as little as 30 days’ notice.

The document photographed outside Downing Street said that Javid would instead be seeking “comprehensive, permanent equivalence decisions”, according to a report in the Financial Times.

Such an equivalence deal could mean foreign companies such as investment firms and clearing houses can serve European customers largely from their home base and avoid having to set up a subsidiary in the EU.

Barnier told MEPs that Brussels would not even engage in talks on the topic let alone be open to granting such a deal.

He said: “We are not negotiating on these topics, rather we are checking that there is consistency and wherever possible granting equivalence on particular sectors of the financial industry.

“That’s what we did with Canada, that’s what we did with the United States. It works. So I don’t see why it shouldn’t work with the United Kingdom.”

While all the focus on Brexit talks has been on goods, the financial services chapter in any trade deal is critical for the UK. It employs more than 1 million people and contributes £127bn to the economy, according to Javid in an article in City AM on Tuesday.

“We hope to agree a chapter on financial services in the UK-EU free trade agreement that establishes a baseline for the trading relationship,” the chancellor said.

“If the EU, like us, wants a durable relationship, we should also include measures to directly address the long-term needs of industry for a reliable equivalence process.”

He said this offered “the best solution to the question of agreeing our relationship with the EU this year” and was “important not only in the short term, but to establish the norms and ways of working with the EU that will endure for the decades to come”.

The photograph of the briefing paper sets out two possible “landing zones” in talks with the EU.

One would involve “selective equivalence” and a side deal committing to a “joint declaration on cooperation” which would kick in if the deal the government hopes to conclude by the end of the year does not include financial services.

The second “landing zone” would be a “time-limited” agreement on financial services.

I turned off email notifications for @-ing.

Except DGR the no equivalence for financial services plays right into Johnson's 'the EU is bullying us' game.

I think we are at the stage now, where the situation is potentially so volatile that we just can't make realistic predictions. Will people turn on Johnson when things go tits up?

But perhaps Johnson and Co have now realised that they have got to do some work - we never did hold all the cards, as they are about to find out.