piglinbland

I really don't care if he accepts his award or not . That said, his gesture is anything but pathetic and weak- "I am British, I was born here and my children were born here. There is no argument to be had about my patriotism. But the empire is something that oppressed black people." Sounds reasonable to me.

The sign of a good, battling league 1 side is when the opposition message boards slate you as being :censored:. How many times have we heard - "...you didn't play like a team in a relegation dogfight. Anyway, good luck for the rest of the season and hope you stay up." ? Hopefully, from now on we'll hear - "..How the :censored: Oldham are in the top six is beyond me..."

It's a complicated thing but I think the crux of the matter is that we should be happy to live in a society where we CAN refuse an honour. A bit like performance art, Tracy Emin, Wendy O. Williams and assorted people taking a dump on the floor. Not necessarily my cup of tea (sic) but happy that it exists.

Remember Gayle well because I lived behind Ewood Park when he played for 'Bastard' Rovers. A bloody good player for them too. I admire people who turn down their honours - although I do intend to accept my OBE (when it comes).

Is it similar to the Lambeth Walk?

Strictly speaking, it is. But interpretation is all. For example, is the "exporter" the buyer, the seller or the shipper?

Maybe you haven't followed this thread from the start? Because I put it all in there on several occasions - low-volume international trade from E.O.R.I. to the Rotterdam effect. The bottom line is that (from my own observations and at risk of repeating myself) goods are purchased and shipped for, ideally, maximum return and minimum fuss. The recipe for doing so relies on flexible interpretation of the rules and establishing good (and longstanding, if possible) business relationships with all concerned, particularly customs offices and shipping brokers, who, over time, will come to understand your requirements. Any product (within legal reason) can transit between the EU and Britain freely and without control, provided provenance can be supplied, obviously, in the form of receipts. Furthermore, goods can be (and frequently are) imported to Britain from outside the EU and then moved on to mainland of Europe, thus waiving EU import duties that should normally be applied - because Britain decides not to impose them. Britain can also export via all EU points of departure to the rest of the world and not pay a penny in tax and duty to the EU. Add to this that some UK businesses export successfully from the UK to the rest of the world without even being aware of some of the prerequisite formalities such is the level of rule bending! Since custom and excise regulations are the only EU directives that are not individually tailor- made for each and every member state, yet are so open to 'interpretation', I have always found it hard to believe the 'standardisation' argument. Or, in other words, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

You're wrong, my opinions stem from my own experience of spending more half my 50 plus years working in conjunction with Europe - the last 10 spent organising the export of goods from the UK to the EU (and often from there on towards Asia, Australia and America). Doubtless, my beliefs seem to you to be (using that outdated and obsolete term) 'left wing', but they are in fact based on pragmatism and the simple precepts of communication and collaboration - prerequisite to international trade, be that negotiating prices with dealers or meeting with customs officials at London, Bremerhaven or Le Havre. And, of the multitude of officials and entreprenneurs I meet on a daily basis, I can assure you that the prevailing opinion is that Brexit is the biggest balls-up since Suez. Now, since this debate has been on a purely rhetorical level for some while now, I'll state again that reality will likely play out somewhere in between the utopian dreams of the Brexiters and the armageddon portrayed by the remainers, (myself included, as I believe in the importance of worst-case scenario). We now need to realise that the 'purest' form of Brexit is impossible to achieve (ie. total control of frontiers AND single market) and that the likely compromise will be seen as a betrayal (although heralded as a triumph). Add to that my own experience - that Britain already freely interprets EU duty directives - particularly where China is involved - benefits from the free market AND transits from the UK to the rest of the world free of charge via the EU, and it's difficult to see how we could improve on that.

A nicely presented critique from mikeroyboy - Although I think that 53 pages on and 6 weeks after the referendum our views are as diametrically opposed - and entrenched - as they can be. It's a bit much asking me to find a solution to the EU crisis although I have already on occasion suggested a plan - namely that Britain should have used her 2017 presidency to seriously and robustly strengthen her position in the EU. The cripplingly long and expensive Brexit process (if it ever goes ahead) will lead Britain to a place far behind where she would have been, free of charge, had she remained in the EU. I also believe that a majority of politicians from all sides of the political divide would privately agree with this. On Europe - It's revealing that, as the scale of the Brexit deception became clear, the argument that Europe was sequestering 'our' money and power changed to an argument that Europe is crumbling and on the point of collapse. Nobody, however, has wished to answer my questions - If Brexit does indeed precipitate the beginning of the end for Europe, how can this possibly be something we can rejoice over? How do you envisage the future of Europe without the EU? (if this is even possible). On Britain - I made a comment about Hinckley point the other day. It's indicative of our gullibility as a people in the face of giant media conglomerates that we have such a developed sense of patriotism (stimulated and nurtured all along the way, of course) when, ironically, we are about the least socially cohesive nation in Europe. If the French and the Chinese provide the technology and funding to build a nuclear power station which in turn powers our ever-increasing appetite to subscribe to and spend money with multinationals that operate out of tax havens and pay little or no tax in Britain, how the hell can we even consider ourselves to be inside the car, let alone back in the driving seat? No wonder Murdoch wants to operate outside of the EU - what with it's wretched notions of transparency, equality and social justice.

"Hi friend, Sincerely appreciate for your purchased 100 x uranium rods from our store, dear friend, i just checked the record, find that we do shipped your parcel out after you paid, Can you help us to go to your post office to check your parcel ? really need your kind understand and enough patience,will be sincerely appreciated. Dear friend, do not worried much, as a good seller, we always responsible for every customer. We promise, any problem will be solved out by our good communication , yes ？ Best regards of you and your families,"

Anyway, now we're back in the driving seat it's good to see 'mother'Theresa scuppering Hinckley point and the French/Chinese connection. Presumably we'll be now using British technology and British investment?

mikejh45 - apologies for my late reply! I have in fact acknowledged the poor economic state of the EU and it's individual member states on more than one occasion. I have never, to my knowledge stated that "because the EU and the IMF (in particular Lagarde) says "Brexit is wrong", we should take notice". I'm a certainly not a champion of this particular politician and my view of the EU is at best ambivalent. I occasionally post apposite articles of a theme that I generally agree with, nothing more. I don't proclaim to be an expert on economics and can offer no solution to the EU woes. However, I am and will remain vocally opposed to Brexit for the following reasons - 1/ The colossal financial cost of leaving the EU and setting up independent trade deals - within an uncertain timescale. A huge risk to take for at best, limited returns. A shaky global economy, changing climate and massive over-population are causing geo-political shifts that require cohesion to counter. Whatever one thinks of the EU, even in weakened form, it has the potential -vastness, richness and diversity to enable an effective pooling of resources. 2/ Britain. I believe we have a governing elite which is hell-bent on looking after it's own interests. This is true the world over but our own serves up a particularly nasty dish of lies and propaganda, through an establishment backed media. I have no doubt that once out of the EU we would see increasingly abusive employment laws, human rights abuse and a further widening of the rich - poor divide. This constant self-interest has been a crucial factor in our decline as an industrial power. 3/ The unquantifiable but nonetheless real intellectual decline that will follow in the wake of Brexit.

So here is the full report by the IEO - http://www.ieo-imf.org/ieo/files/completedevaluations/EAC__REPORT%20v5.PDF I fail to see how this damning indictment of the International Monetary Fund is relevant to Brexit and it's consequences, including the current impasse - which is what this discussion is about. Unless, of course, it's because Christine Lagarde is French. I think there is a 'them and us' mentality creeping into the debate now. What is important to remember is that Britain's future economy and world standing are at stake - I've made plain my view that Brexit is dangerously flawed, hugely risky and almost certainly not in the average Britons self-interest. If the EU were to collapse, Britain would almost certainly be drawn into it's vortex - certainly not the brave new world promised by the Leavers. For this reason alone and for everyone's self-interest we will have to cooperate with the EU and vice-versa. It's worth saying too, that the hyperbole surrounding the consequences for the UK of Brexit is indeed over-egged - but so too for the supposed toppling of the EU.

Only 3 years? It's generally accepted that fully extracting ourselves from the EU will take about 8 years.

Nonsense. "You are still peddling the same crap you put forward for a couple of months before the referendum" - Thanks for backhandedly crediting my consistency. If you look through my 'crap' you'll see that I forewarned about the legal and administrative difficulties of leaving, of EU intransigence and of this governments lack of foresight. Now that Napoleon and Squealer's utopian vision of 'being in the driving seat' has disappeared in a puff of smoke, we're going to topple Europe instead. Amazing!

Agreed, the extreme-right in Germany and France are absolutely toxic. But only in Britain are we casually and flippantly racist, anti-European, anti-diversity, anti-politically correct, anti-health and safety, anti-multicultural etc. etc. We seem to have embraced a peculiarly Anglo-Saxon culture whereby the cult of personality takes precedence over substance. When the 'Daily Mail' reviewed the 2003 British film of sylvia Plath's life 'Sylvia', with the following words - ' who wants to watch a film about a depressive poet who commits suicide', I knew I was living within a society on the cusp of decadence. How right I was. From my visits to France, Germany, Spain, Italy etc, amidst all the angst there is at least an understanding of the virtues of communitarianism - as there is in most of Central Europe (Russia excluded). In other words, in the interests of peace and stability, the referendum should never have happened. It did - and without the slightest shred of evidence that it was in our interests to do so, we voted out. Leaving the EU was the singularly most destructive and mind-bogglingly :censored:ed up thing we could ever, ever have done. But we did it. That Nigel Farage could just walk away from this, the toffee-nosed :censored:, beggars belief. Anyway, :censored: Europe, :censored: their Fords, :censored: their Hadron collider. :censored: Volvo, Saab, BMW, Mercedes, Fiat, MAN, Audi, Peugeot, Citroen, Renault, Lancia and Alfa-Romeo. :censored: Opel, Airbus, Allianz, Axa, Volkswagen, Total, Thompson, Veolia, Siemens etc, etc. Britain's small but very game firm (ie. Boris Johnson and 3 fitters from Aston Martin aided by a small but tidy mob from Thornton's chocolates ) will go toe to toe with you lot any day. But not straight away because Hayleys having her hair straightened on Thursday.

With due respect, notice that I'm quoting from a European newspaper, hence the speech marks (and the acknowledgement to 'Liberation'). So it is pointless to address these quotes as if they came from me. I was merely posting from a publication that is probably fairly obscure in the UK and therefore, I thought, interesting to our board members. My own view is, that while Brexit was a total sham bordering on the criminally insane, it's time to move on and leave Europe - as is the wish of the people.

I don't disagree with your points but to whose advantage would the fall of the EU be? Surely the more predatory, peripheral nations? How do you imagine the geo-political stability of Europe (and with regard to Britain) should the EU dissolve?

I doubt that the withdrawal of Britain will seriously undermine the EU. Sadly, however, we should expect a concerted terror campaign in France prior to the 2017 elections - aimed at splitting the population and precipitating the arrival of Marine Le Pen at the Elysée. If this happens, the days of the EU may well be numbered. This splitting of the union would be seen by the lunatic fundamentalists as an opening door to exploit their avowed aim of chaos and the destruction of all infidels - by the infiltration and picking off of countries one by one.

Maybe so, but I can't see how anyone could have imagined it would pan out any other way. Kind of underlines the hardships that lie ahead.

Michel Barnier has been named by Jean-Claude Juncker as the EU's Brexit negotiator (according to 'Liberation'). 'The Frenchman, ex- European commissioner for the interior market and financial services (2009 - 2014), bête-noir of the city of London and the English press, is hardly an Anglophile and barely speaks a word of English.' '...an appointment to counter May's 'trio de choc' - Johnson, Davis and Fox - this 64 year old Savoyard is very under-estimated in French politics due to his distaste for small talk and his limited sense of humour. A staunch and tenacious supporter of Europe, his unprecedented shake-up of the financial institutions during his role as regulator required multiple approval from the British government - and he likes to tell that of 42 texts proposed, only 2 were rejected by the British.' 'For Barnier, there is no question of selling out the interests of the E.U.to please a country which has shot itself in the foot. From what we can gather, he believes there will be two successive negotiations - the first, within two years, the rupture between London and the EU and only then, Britain's new stature... Because she was so ill-prepared for Brexit, her gracious majesty's government is totally ill-equipped for and without clear ideas as to the handling of this retreat - notably concerning her own legislation and her international commerce'.

I'll wait for the second tour of the French presidential elections on May 7th before judging that. As it stands, Brexit and Daech play into the hands of the extreme right. Tipping point?

Quite scary really. The geo-political landscape ten years from now could be unrecognisable.