Brexit consequences

[Spinflight]

Can't find the old one, despite a search. Hence a year on...

I started it to compare the doom and gloom predictions from people who should know better, especially the treasury, to actual observable facts.

Thus far the treasury predicted our borrowing costs would soar by over 130 points. In fact they're down about 100.

No trade deals possible before (I forget the date they said, was far in the future though) compared to actual negotiations beginning with the USA later this month with the president firmly behind them. Canada, New Zealand, Australia, India, South Korea and several others I've forgotten have shown a great desire for a deal quickly.

Ftse 100 and 250 are well up, just shy of 7500.

Best of all from a macro economic perspective is inflation touching 3%. When you are £1800 billion in debt rating that away with inflation is far preferable to actually paying it off.

Growth has dropped a bit, though nowhere near the instant recession that was predicted. Bit early to say though this is likely due to the referendum.

External investment is actually nicely up, with several major companies announcing various large commitments.

Things could be rosier, though it would be a struggle to describe them generally as bad, quite contrary to 'informed' opinions. Even the oecd recently ate their pre referendum words.

we are CURRENTLY 100% compliant in every way

Yes, and the moment we leave, we could change all that (in fact various Brexiteers have already championed the lowering of standards), so the EU will want to protect their markets from inferior produce, therefore we cannot expect them just to say "carry on trading as before". Anyone who thinks otherwise is, frankly, stupid.

Now as I see Brussels as nasty, vindictive, federalists

Yes, because you seem to be blind to the fact that they have to represent 450 million people in negotiating with a party that has decided to leave their group. It is not their problem that we have virtually no trumps in our negotiating hand, and absolutely no ability to conduct any useful negotiation.

the EU – who on one hand says we are leaving, so no ties, and then says the European Court of Justice should rule over their citizens working here in perpetuity – when does that [guarantee of human rights] exist for EU citizens working in America, or elsewhere in the world
The joys of written constitutions, right?

You do realise that 'Brussels bureaucrats' are the civil servants of the EU just as UK bureaucrats are civil servants? If you feel that those civil servants are not responsive to your needs or UK needs in general, you have always had recourse to your elected MEP, who could look into things. They work for you.

Another reason the trade agreement (if any) will take years is that the UK is about to embark on wholesale opening of its markets to American agribusiness - Monsanto patented GM seeds and pesticides and herbicides, food processing according to US regs, imports of foods produced under US regs (chlorinated chicken, for example, and cheaper wine imports from the New World growers), antibiotic use in livestock and fowl, and much more. The upshot of this will be suspicion that low reg American agricultural products, and contaminated products, will be sneaked into Europe via the UK. There is also suspicion that cheaply produced and shoddy manufactured goods and clothing would flood the European markets via the UK once trade agreements are signed with low reg countries (see for instance problems with certain types of imported steel). Then there is the morass of patents, patent law, and intellectual property.
Why should the EU forget about the interests of its members and facilitate the UK and its future trading partners?

It's a pity you feel so strongly that the UK should be able to have it every way it wants. That is a profoundly unreasonable and irrational way of looking at things.

Mathsanxiety

”You do realise that 'Brussels bureaucrats' are the civil servants of the EU just as UK bureaucrats are civil servants? If you feel that those civil servants are not responsive to your needs or UK needs in general, you have always had recourse to your elected MEP, who could look into things. They work for you.”

Apparently in the 2000s, the costly expansion of UK government quangos we didn’t appear to need before 1997 was working ‘for me’, as were the small army of new NHS managers hired at a greater rate than doctors and nurses.

Layers of bureaucracy are a costly impediment to both good governance and the best possible end result, especially when there are -28- 27 other governments and their civil servants in the mix, ensuring that what comes out at the end is consensual ‘gloop’.

As to the laughable locally elected MEP who could “look into things”, you might as well said they’d get one of those ‘round-to-its’, as the UK is already the MOST voted down member in the European Council, so my local MEPs voice in ‘that place’ will be as influential in European affairs, as a duck fart in windy weather.

Finally as every senior Brussels ‘face’ is a pro European Superstate federalist, I promise you that these people do not represent me, I suspect neither do their aims represent the vast majority of people in the UK, Europe – and many of the current member states governments.

P.S. As to GM seeds etc ‘project fear’ along the lines of TTIP and every other end of our world fears before details are known.

UK self sufficiency in food has been falling every year for decades, and now we produce 65% of our food; so in a brave new (Brexit) world the UK can look at what is best for us, in farm subsidies, what we grow, and how we grow it, WITHOUT the 27 state protectionism and thoughts of chairman Brussels – and while none of the Europhiles could even think of it, trading with the world on OUR standards, could make food cheaper than it is now.

“Michael Gove signals change of thinking on UK environment”

Until Brexit negotiations are finalised, everything else on foodstuffs are just pro EU scare stories. IMNSHO

CardinalSin

Still ‘scurrying’ around with your fake accusations and attempts to disparage other posters input with:

”Oh dear, Thea doesn't like people pointing out the flaws in her "arguments" when they're comprehensible at least so she decided to just throw rude accusations around. The typical MO of the bad loser...”

Lets recap about the recent flaws in arguments, that were not mine;

On totally incompetent Private Finance Initiative borrowing by the last government, the argument AGAINST was (and excuse me, I go into a fit of the giggles every time I read it);

”PFI is the natural outcome of the philosophical stance that 'There is no such thing as society'. The reasoning behind PFI was that simply writing a cheque for hospital building and expansion and improvement of equipment and technology was not politically feasible,"

On the Eurozone’s employment, unemployment and Temp Contract shame affecting their young workers, ridiculously compared to our Zero Hours, the apologist left it at ‘it was hard to explain’.

On the £350 mil NHS money mentioned on the side of a bus, apparently intelligent people on here thought that MP Boris of a few months, and MEP Farage with one Westminster MP, could write the future UK budgets of an arch-remainer Osborne, representing a Remain government position, and warning the UK finances would collapse the day after a Leave vote.

On the prospect of a far left government in the UK, apparently because he now scrubs up well with a suit, white shirt, tie, and like a militant trade unionist he will sit ‘around a table’, UK businesses, especially the city, will have nothing to fear from saint Corbyn.

Yeah, I’m really having my bottom handed to me on a platter.

Oh, you really (sorry really) are!

You have lost every single one of those arguments, mainly by dint of claiming that what was said was the opposite of what was actually said. I dare say you will have some success with those who were stupid enough to vote Brexit in the first places, but everyone else can easily see what was actually written.

I hope your 50 cents are adding up to a nice pension...

And finally, even the Tories admit we will not have the same access to the single market after Brexit...

You have lost every single one of those arguments

This is largely irrelevant though. I don't think winning arguments is the aim. The point is the sound and the fury; what (if anything) it signifies is secondary. It's a very effective way of shutting down debate.

I agree. Unfortunately, the case for Brexit has always been more noise than substance.

Why are UK MEPs so spectacularly useless that they get voted down all the time? Ireland seems to be able to do diplomacy pretty well and to make her voice heard, ditto many other states. What accounts for the failure of UK MEPs, do you think?

I am interested to know what the EU may have done that has personally adversely affected you to the point of typing in caps and underlining so much to give the impression of constantly spitting nails. Are you seriously trying to imply that EU policies are the cause of the decline in UK food production? Ever heard of the Common Agricultural Policy? You seem to be aware of its role since you mention post-Brexit subsidies (but I will take a guess that you have no idea where the money for subsidies will come from). Are you aware that lack of foreign farm workers this year has meant that crops have rotted in the fields? They have been put off coming to do seasonal work by reports of post-referendum xenophobia in Britain. Are you at all aware of how American meats, eggs and cheese, along with the grasping claws of Monsanto will impact UK agriculture when a free trade agreement is signed with the US?

Also interested to learn how you think government and public services might operate without bureaucracy.

It's actually a myth that UK MEPs have been unsuccessful. They really have one of the best records of getting what they want, and the few times they voted against anything, and therefore "lost", they normally actually wanted the vote to go through, but voted against it as a sop the the likes of the Daily Heil and the xenophobic factions of the UK and the Tory party.

”PFI is the natural outcome of the philosophical stance that 'There is no such thing as society'. The reasoning behind PFI was that simply writing a cheque for hospital building and expansion and improvement of equipment and technology was not politically feasible,"

That was not the argument against PFI, Thea. You really don't read too well.

It was a description of the political context in which PFI was first dreamed up (by the government of John Major, incidentally).
So powerful was the Thatcherite mantra that public services were a blight on humanity and those using them the scum of the earth that no increase in taxation or contributions could be debated.

You are the poster who compared zero hours contracts to EU* temp hours situations (they vary, and this has been pointed out many times). Why do you keep on telling everyone else on this thread that they have posted what is in fact your own posts? Do you have as much trouble reading your own posts as everyone else has?
If the links I provided were too hard for you to understand I am willing to go through them and explain what they mean. 'It was hard to explain' is a reflection of your own comprehension problems.
"There are none so blind as those who will not see", as the saying goes.

*(or 'Eurozone' as you insist on calling it)

Your comment on the £350 million is laughable. Of course huge numbers of idiots who voted Leave believed every single word of that slogan on the bus. It is a very well documented fact. The stubborn refusal of Theresa May's government to countenance the EU Brexit bill of £60bn is in part due to the infamous promise on the bus. There is consternation among Leavers that paying the Brexit bill should be even considered in light of that slogan.

UK business has far more to fear from Brexit than from any Labour government. The City especially. A disorderly Brexit and a hard Brexit are the City's worst nightmares, because passporting will be kaput. The refusal to pay what is owed as part of the separation of the UK from the EU is one element that increases the likelihood of disorderly and hard Brexit scenarios. Same goes for refusal to countenance FOM and the ECHR and ECJ by the UK after Brexit, and failure to make substantial progress on the subject of Northern Ireland and its border with Ireland.
www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/aug/04/end-brexit-squabbles-focus-transitional-deal-iod-urges-ministers
Problems, problems.
All self-inflicted.

FOM and ECJ/ECHR intransigence arises from the necessity of keeping the foaming-at-the-mouth Leavers in the Tory party from biting off Theresa May's ankles.

Oh and going back to your previous comment on consensual agreements - why do you think these are 'gloop'?
What would you prefer as a decision making process?
ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/17CCE/production/_89468479_northkoreaconvention.jpg
Something more along these lines ^^?

cdn.drawception.com/images/panels/2015/8-11/CSH8ybrFtz-4.png
There ya go.

CardinalSin

Re your ”Yes, because you seem to be blind to the fact that they have to represent 450 million people in negotiating with a party that has decided to leave their group. It is not their problem that we have virtually no trumps in our negotiating hand, and absolutely no ability to conduct any useful negotiation.”

So you call these our major ‘disadvantages’ in negotiations?

• The Eurozone with much higher unemployment EXPORTS far more stuff to us, than we do to them.

• The Eurozone relies on UK jobs growth to give THEIR youth jobs.

• The EU relies on the huge pool of finance in the City e.g. through U.S. Investment Banks with far larger pockets than European Investments banks (still needing ECB cash injections), that if EU Negotiators and Member States put too many bank reserves etc restrictions in place for doing banking IN Europe, it will REDUCE he available finance to the EU states – which is why I suspect the Deutsche Bank may have been told to do more home/EU lending (where they already have huge exposure), than investment banking lending elsewhere in the world.

• The EU losing their 2nd largest annual net contributor, is desperate for cash, especially as similar sized economies to us in France (looking for Euro 60 billion a year painful cuts to its still rising Budget Deficit) AND Italy (a general basket case, hardly grown since Euro launch), cannot currently pick up the UK’s financial slack.

So yes, EU Negotiators ARE representing 450 million people who mostly don’t know what a dire position this clearly EU political (not economic) ‘project’ is in – so please do not confuse an EU’s DESPERATE need to shaft us for its own survival, with Europhile dilutions of its inherent STRENGTH.

By sapping our future competitive edge, the EU believe it will give them more time (as they had to re-arrange deckchairs on the Titanic) to ‘change’ – and all those Westminster MPs falling for Barnier’s agenda and want to tie our governments hands in negotiations – are as commercially thick as the proverbial ‘two short planks’.

Apples and oranges, apples and oranges...

Here's a handy guide for you Thea...

CardinalSin

YOU stated that the 'UK has virtually no trumps in its negotiating hand', I list what we have, and you answer 'apples and oranges' and something cut and pasted.

Why not attempt to answer each of mt points, and then you can BEGIN not to making so many ill informed statements.

Mathsanxiety

While Remainers pretend that they were deceived pre Referendum by the Leavers NHS £350 mil illustration on where the UK’s saving of the £10-£13 bil NET we pay into the EU every year could be spent - as well as Farm Subsidies the Chancellor has already guaranteed – Leavers like Vince Cable to this day are STILL lying to the UK young of the benefits to them of being in the EU.

“Sir Vince Cable labels Brexit-backing pensioners 'self-declared martyrs' who have 'shafted the young”

In early 2004 the UK had 580,000 unemployed 16-24 year olds, which trended higher to 711,000 before the crash, and passing on to the Conservative coalition a still trending higher over 920,000, as the UK hired 2-3 million EU citizens, so where was the EU benefit to our young back then?

In the Eurozone REPEAT Eurozone I purposely use for reasons I’ve explained several times before, from the early 2000s to now, youth unemployment and ever declining Permanent jobs being substituted for over 50% of them now doing Temp work, is a EU social and economic disgrace.

How dare EU-at-any-cost- Remainers, STILL look to deceive our young with THEIR own inability to see the PROBLEMS within the EU that will not change, because its mainly those Eurozone citizens IN or close to Permanent employment, that want to keep it as it is – as those ever more jobless, often less educated are outvoted and flung on the EU permanent employment scrap heap, as our youth were in the 2000s.

Thea, I really CBA to pick apart all your spurious "points", because they are not actually points, but twisted attempts to equate things that are not equal (hence apples and oranges - think about it). And that's when they are actually related to the subject, which most of them aren't - they are carefully pared down "statistics", claiming that because our economy was better than some of the other EU economies, that we, through some mystical force, have bargaining power on what they allow us to do now that we have told them we don't want anything to do with them.

It's intellectual dishonesty in it's highest form.

But Remainers were not deceived by that lie on the bus, Thea.
It was Leavers who were deceived. The people who designed that bus slogan knew the Leavers would fall for it. They did their research.

The Chancellor cannot guarantee any money to anyone without having a guaranteed source for that money. When the economy tanks after Brexit, where is that money going to come from?

In early 2004 the UK had 580,000 unemployed 16-24 year olds, which trended higher to 711,000 before the crash, and passing on to the Conservative coalition a still trending higher over 920,000, as the UK hired 2-3 million EU citizens, so where was the EU benefit to our young back then?
What a pity the UK public by and large failed to understand that FOM works both ways.
It is a huge pity that successive UK governments have presided over grossly inequitable education systems that complacently watch as generation after generation a generous one third of school leavers are functionally illiterate even in English, and needless to say, they have no proficiency in modern foreign languages such as German.

Why were UK youth not equipped to travel for work in Germany, where business and industry can't fill apprenticeship places?

It is not the fault of the EU if UK youth are basically warehoused in schools and not taught useful skills, or if UK youth are unaware of opportunities the EU offers to people willing to travel for work.

Still confusing the Eurozone with the EU, I see.
No you have not explained why you constantly refer to that entity (which the UK is not leaving) in the context of a discussion on leaving the EU.

For Thea:

Leave voter says she voted in the referendum for more money for NHS

Straight from the horse's mouth there.
This video can be found on a number of news sites, but I chose the Express as the most ardently pro-Brexit and most likely to be believed by Tory Thea.

It's actually a myth that UK MEPs have been unsuccessful. They really have one of the best records of getting what they want, and the few times they voted against anything, and therefore "lost", they normally actually wanted the vote to go through, but voted against it as a sop the the likes of the Daily Heil and the xenophobic factions of the UK and the Tory party.

Fullfact article on this question: fullfact.org/europe/eu-facts-behind-claims-uk-influence/

Official EU voting records* show that the British government has voted ‘No’ to laws passed at EU level on 56 occasions, abstained 70 times, and voted ‘Yes’ 2,466 times since 1999, according to UK in a Changing Europe Fellows Sara Hagemann and Simon Hix.

In other words, UK ministers were on the “winning side” 95% of the time, abstained 3% of the time, and were on the losing side 2%.

UK influence would be greater if all our MEPs actually bothered to attend parliament and vote. UKIP MEPs have the worst record for turning up and voting of any party represented in the European parliament. If Britons want more influence and better representation in the EU, the obvious answer would be to (a) turn out and vote in elections (b) look up the voting record of their MEPs before doing so.

But you know Brexiteers don't like facts Misti - can you find it on fulllies.org ?

Or maybe alternativefacts.org...

Cardinal Engaging is waste of time, but posting factual stuff backed up with a source (a) doesnt take much time (b) stops the last post on every thread on the politics forum being from the same person and thereby helps prevent interesting threads being killed off and (c) gets up the noses of the altreich anti-facts brigade.

We're lulling them into a false sense of security!

Just gauging where we are...