Brexit Negotiations

[wiseowl]

7 hours ago, kowenicki said:

 

Hype.  The world will keep turning and we’ll be fine. 

 

Correct.

 

Much of it media created. It reminds me very much of the disater that awaited us via the "millennium bug" - planes might fall out of the sky, traffic lights would fail, the whole financial system would come crashing to its knees. Millions upon millions was spent on "preparation" and "experts" filled the tv screens.

 

What happened? ... Absolutely nothing and life carried on as normal.

 

There wasn't a lot wrong with the UK before we went into Europe - and there won't be a lot wrong when we leave it. 

 

You`ve also got a bunch of left wing cretins that will do anything to get into power via the back door. Seriously....... Jeremy Corbyn! Think very carefully what you wish for - the man hates everything "we" stand for.

 

As for suspending Parliament - fantastic news - biggest bunch of self-important half wits I`ve ever seen. I listen to the likes of Diane Abbott and positively cringe. That comment cuts across politicians of all parties by the way. 

 

Never thought I`d say it but we need a completely new system - the quality of our politicians has been "dumbed down" beyond all comprehension (same at local political level). We're run by f...ing idiots and something different is needed.

 

Lets' see what comes out of the wash.

[maddog]

I’d really like all of this shit to fuck off into the Brexit thread. 

[whittles left foot]

1 hour ago, wiseowl said:

There wasn't a lot wrong with the UK before we went into Europe - and there won't be a lot wrong when we leave it. 

And here is a post from one of the team from the picture posted by LaticsPete the other day .

 

2 hours ago, wiseowl said:

Millions upon millions was spent on "preparation" and "experts" filled the tv screens.

 

What happened? ... Absolutely nothing and life carried on as normal.

Perhaps that's why nothing happened?

 

2 hours ago, wiseowl said:

As for suspending Parliament

It isn't suspended-it is prorogued. Not the same thing if you only took the time to check.

 

2 hours ago, wiseowl said:

You`ve also got a bunch of left wing cretins that will do anything to get into power via the back door.

As opposed to a Prime Minister installed by less than 1% of the population. A man who 3 weeks before the referendum was in favour of continued membership of the single market.

 

2 hours ago, wiseowl said:

Correct.

So wise-just like Kow. Your way is the only way-and you are always right when soooo many think you may be wrong. 

[kowenicki]

9 minutes ago, whittles left foot said:

 

 

So wise-just like Kow. Your way is the only way-and you are always right when soooo many think you may be wrong. 

 

Like you then?  

[yarddog73]

Please stop.

[L1onheartNew]

So from this, Brexit is all down to Bury?

[wiseowl]

14 hours ago, whittles left foot said:

It isn't suspended-it is prorogued. Not the same thing if you only took the time to check.

 

To prorogue is to suspend Parliament without dissolving it - if you only took the time to check 

[whittles left foot]

57 minutes ago, wiseowl said:

To prorogue is to suspend Parliament without dissolving it - if you only took the time to check 

Apologies.

[wiseowl]

On 9/1/2019 at 1:31 PM, whittles left foot said:

Apologies.

An honourable gentleman - accepted and no hard feelings.

[beag_teeets]

On 8/31/2019 at 7:48 PM, wiseowl said:

Correct.

 

Much of it media created. It reminds me very much of the disater that awaited us via the "millennium bug" - planes might fall out of the sky, traffic lights would fail, the whole financial system would come crashing to its knees. Millions upon millions was spent on "preparation" and "experts" filled the tv screens.

 

What happened? ... Absolutely nothing and life carried on as normal.

 

There wasn't a lot wrong with the UK before we went into Europe - and there won't be a lot wrong when we leave it. 

 

You`ve also got a bunch of left wing cretins that will do anything to get into power via the back door. Seriously....... Jeremy Corbyn! Think very carefully what you wish for - the man hates everything "we" stand for.

 

As for suspending Parliament - fantastic news - biggest bunch of self-important half wits I`ve ever seen. I listen to the likes of Diane Abbott and positively cringe. That comment cuts across politicians of all parties by the way. 

 

Never thought I`d say it but we need a completely new system - the quality of our politicians has been "dumbed down" beyond all comprehension (same at local political level). We're run by f...ing idiots and something different is needed.

 

Lets' see what comes out of the wash.

 

In August 1998 I started work on the Royal Mail Y2K programme for the South East area, from north of London to Dover and about the same distance width wise, part of these 'preparations' as you put it. Memory is a bit hazy but over 8000+ desktop devices were replaced by the team that I led, some were replacing standard x86 desktops others replaced green-screen terminals that only accessed the mainframe which stored it's date in the DDMMYY format (Might have been MMDDYY, it was a US system?) and thus potentially affected by the millennium bug. This was a small part of the overall programme to mitigate the potential risks caused by the 2 digit year storage issue, another piece of work was replacing the affected systems themselves but fortunately I wasn't on that, had enough issues at desktop level whilst not causing one impact on delivery. The work was mostly finished around June 1999, certain devices and systems had to be left untouched as either the cost to upgrade/replace was higher than the Royal Mail risk profile at the time and the work they did could be replicated by human effort.

 

The impact of Y2K on Royal Mail was low, largely due to the work that occurred to prepare and mitigate the known effects and most of the unknown unknowns had extensive contingencies prepared. Mirror this across other organisations and the result was that the effects of Y2K globally fell fair short of worst case scenarios, the planes falling from the sky were in these worst case scenarios which quite understandably were the scenarios that cut through in to the non-IT focussed general population's awareness. Stories in the media about business processes being lengthened, expensive mitigations being in place and less critical systems undergoing extensive testing and actions being taken based on the results would generally be in the later pages in the papers as they were less sexy and headline grabbing.

 

But, feel free to write off these 'preparations' and use as evidence of the potential absence of impacts of a no-deal brexit, or even a brexit with a deal not having serious consequences. We're upto about £8bn worth of brexit preparations currently, this is just the figure that govt has spent, I've not got a figure of what industry has spent, maybe as much again? But, we've still got about 2 months to pull off no deal preparations and mitigate multiple risks in each and every economic sector. We'll be fine.

 

There wasn't a lot wrong with the UK before we went into Europe - and there won't be a lot wrong when we leave it.

 

Which criteria are you using to define that 'there wasn't a lot wrong with the UK' before we went into Europe? We first applied to join in 1961, just 16 years after the end of WW2, we'd been unable to afford the empire or suppress the independence movements in former colonies, we were practically bankrupt. We had significant bomb damage across the nation and were still trying to rebuild. I'm not sure that the economic, cultural and social aspects of pre-EU Britain are something to be held up as an example of something with not much wrong with.

 

I'd also like to know what you're basing your assertion that 'there won't be a lot wrong when we leave it' on? No other nation has left an economic, social, political or trading block before so there is no precedent to call upon. The safety net of solely trading on WTO rules is as was mentioned in last night's debate is something that only North Korea, Algeria and Serbia currently do, are these the nations that we are holding up as beacons for a bright new future as we seek to emulate their trading status? Apologies, if there are actually more nations trading on this basis but I'd be surprised if they are nations that we feel are either our equals or higher status nations. I'd like to know how many of the current top percentile of nations solely trade on WTO terms? If the WTO terms are so good, why do nations engage in comprehensive trade deals, surely WTO is fine? I'd also like to know, how the terms and conditions of WTO trade are arranged? Do members of the WTO have elected representation in the machinery of the WTO? How are the WTO courts populated? These are the courts that have jurisdiction over international trade on WTO terms, what say does Britain have in shaping the decisions of these courts? And finally, when will the current impasse at the heart of the WTO be over? What do you think the outcome of Trump blocking appointments to the Appellate body and his and Bolton's threats to leave the WTO will have on Britain 'not having much wrong with it' post Brexit?

 

Any answers attempting to mention GATT24 will be immediately rejected as they have already been proven false.

 

I agree with you that the current British Political system is no longer fit for purpose, one benefit to the whole Brexit bollox has been been to show up how badly served we are by our institutions at all levels. FPTP has resulted in the dominance of the party system requiring near absolute discipline which in turn has led to robotic politicians, I'm not going to say 'career politicians', would anyone complain about 'career surgeons' or 'career pilots'? I'd rather have representation by people how actually want to do it and have an understanding of how politics and associated institutions actually work, in what other walk of life would we be happy with plucky have a go civilians trying their arm? Go to a restaurant and let a bloke off the street have a crack at cooking 30+ covers without knowing which ingredients they have or how to cook any recipes? It's just another vacuous soundbite.

 

Again for the cheap seats. Didn't vote leave, didn't vote remain, spoilt my paper by drawing my own box, wrote "Fucked either way" and put my X next to that. I've got a History and Politics degree and A Levels, been following current affairs and politics for about 35 years and I couldn't tell you whether we would be better off in or out. I don't even know how you begin to define the criteria that could be used to even begin to answer the questions that relate to our membership of the EU. One thing I'm fairly certain of is that in 2016, less than 10 years after a global economic contraction and 6 years of ideological austerity the pre-conditions for making a great success of leaving did not exist. The choice to leave might be the right one but the timing sure as hell would've been an unnecessary risk to take. 

 

Now we've spent three and a half years watching most of the half assed facts from both leave and remain crashing against reality, as a nation we are in an even worse state than we were in 2016, on to our 3rd PM, Corbyn has lost about 5 national elections, 3rd or 4th Lib Dem leader, Brexit Party PLC and the Tories throwing actual conservatives out of their party, Soames has voted against the tories 3 times in about 40 years! That's less than most of their current cabinet have done in the last 6 months! And we are still no nearer to a positive outcome that is even close to some of the benefits we were promised by the leave side with many of those benefits have been proven to be categorically false! And yet there are still enthusiastic cheer leaders for this course of action.

 

We've had three years to be sold the benefits of leaving, or remaining, neither side has been able to articulate any fact based positive version of a sustainable future for this nation, politics has been reduced to tribal vitriol devoid of content. But, we've had enough of experts and their facts. I guess it now comes down to whether you think that Jacob Rees-Mogg reclining over three government front bench seats or 21 dyed in the wool tory MPs voting against their party, aware of the consequences is a better motif for your position on brexit.

 

tl;dr ; Bunch of shite

[nzlatic]

45 minutes ago, beag_teeets said:

 

Bunch of shite

I won't quote it all because it was so lengthy, but fantastic post 

 

What a lot of the things you were quoting were based on, can probably be neatly summed up as "meaningless slogans".  And what we saw last night was people who have been spouting these meaningless slogans and all the other bluff and bluster that comes with it, finally being put in a position where they have to offer some answers.  And, ultimately, they have nothing.  The Tory rebels were asking for clarification on what negotiations were happening or anything that may suggest the government are at least trying to avoid a no deal brexit so as to avoid voting with the opposition. But got nothing.

 

I do find it almost comical that the likes of Rees-Mogg and the ERG voted against May's deal, whereas if they voted for it (I think the numbers are right) then we would now be out of the EU.  But they didn't vote for it because it wasn't the type of Brexit they wanted.  It's staggeringly arrogant for them to then assume that the type of Brexit they want is also wanted by each and every one of the 17.4 million people who voted to leave in the referendum. 

 

As much as I would rather we remained, Brexit might have been achieved with sensible and pragmatic politics. But instead we got red lines, ludicrous posturing, lack of preparation and blaming the EU, remoaners, Gary Lineker at every turn for it not being the utopia they promised.

 

I read something today that sums it up quite well... "What was promised is undeliverable and what is deliverable is undesirable".

 

 

[leeslover]

1 hour ago, beag_teeets said:

 

No other nation has left an economic, social, political or trading block before so there is no precedent to call upon. 

Point of order Speaker. Off the top of my head:

 

Eastern European countries leaving COMINTERN and Warsaw Pact

 

Everyone except Russia leaving the Soviet Union.

 

Slovakia and Czech Republic separating

 

Yugoslavia going 6 ways

 

Norway and Sweden dissolving Union

 

UK leaving Commonwealth free trade arrangement

 

Irish Republic leaving UK

 

Every country gaining independence from the British, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Belgian, Dutch and Italian Empires 

 

Singapore leaving Malaysia 

 

Greenland leaving the EU

 

Egypt and Syria dissolving Ba'athist Arab Republic.

 

And I haven't even started on the Holy Roman Empire. Many went well, despite having more to leave and in more challenging circumstances (the Prime Minister of Singapore was a Remainer and actually cried at the result, but accepted it and cracked on...)

 

 

[beag_teeets]

Great list of comparable situations! The close integration of the EU member states is exactly the same of colonised nations and the collapse of the USSR!

[leeslover]

14 minutes ago, beag_teeets said:

Great list of comparable situations! The close integration of the EU member states is exactly the same of colonised nations and the collapse of the USSR!

If what you meant was, "nobody has ever left the EU," then you should have said so and I'd have been left with Greenland (and Iceland was far enough in to use Article 50 to halt accession talks).

 

But if you meant that and ignored those two you'd have been saying, "it's crazy for anyone to ever leave the EU because nobody has done that before," which is rather more cult-like than I think your position is.

 

Either way, I know what I'm hoping for in the final round of Pointless 

[beag_teeets]

To some extent I guess I do mean "No comparable country with a similar population has left the shared institutions, customs union and with a level of integration in such areas as security, intelligence, foreign policy and the fucking rest of it that we get with the EU" before, which I agree weakens my point. Your examples whilst somewhat relevant do not mirror a 21st century linked economy, JIT supply chains..etc.. whilst having a land boarder that will no longer have regulatory compliance that has a bit of a history of near civil war. History is a guide but doesn't present a roadmap.

 

I know we won't agree and I know you hold your view quite strongly, I'm still not sure what route will be best to take, I would like to have the certainty of those who have such convictions.  

[leeslover]

24 minutes ago, beag_teeets said:

To some extent I guess I do mean "No comparable country with a similar population has left the shared institutions, customs union and with a level of integration in such areas as security, intelligence, foreign policy and the fucking rest of it that we get with the EU" before, which I agree weakens my point. Your examples whilst somewhat relevant do not mirror a 21st century linked economy, JIT supply chains..etc.. whilst having a land boarder that will no longer have regulatory compliance that has a bit of a history of near civil war. History is a guide but doesn't present a roadmap.

 

I know we won't agree and I know you hold your view quite strongly, I'm still not sure what route will be best to take, I would like to have the certainty of those who have such convictions.  

I would certainly have left without the famous trophy if that was the question! Although in a twist I think you exaggerate the level of integration in many areas (at present).

 

I don't know how this will pan out - if we aren't allowed to leave (I'd roughly define as out of SM, CU and ECJ) then my life will go on. Mostly I'll be disappointed that we remain tied to a failing trade and regulatory model that sees all of it's members become poorer vs every other region in the world. I'll also worry about seeing Catalonia revisited in 20 years with police shipped in from outside to crack the skulls of grannies who won't behave. That's my project fear I guess, I accept we all have our own.

[leeslover]

Maybe when David Davis said pressure for a solution would come from the EU27 and it wouldn't be sorted until the midnight hour he actually wasn't being a complete fuckwit?

[nzlatic]

Had the realisation this morning that by either luck or design, Cummings and the Leave movement have played an absolute blinder.  I was watching Nicky Morgan and her horror show on GMB this morning and realised that no matter how many of these car crashes the tories seem to have, they are untouchable in the both party and leadership polls.  Then it dawned on me... it doesn't matter how many deceitful things they do (misleading twitter account, doctored videos etc), stuff that would normally derail any standard general election campaign, people will still vote for them this time round.  Because it's a single issue election, all that other stuff is being ignored.

 

We're effectively in the middle of a 2nd referendum here.  A lack of tory policy, campaigning solely on a vacuous Brexit slogan and mainly going after Labour on Brexit rather than spending - it's all designed for one thing... winning this "2nd referendum".  And it will work, we're heading for a tory majoriy.  The Leave vote is unified by 2 things, firstly the tory/brexit party alliance and secondly because the brexit that's being voted on is still unspecified.  

 

In any actual 2nd referendum the Leave vote would be split because there would probably be a specific brexit on the table, and there isn't a nationwide majority for any specific brexit.  The Remain vote would be unified.

 

In reality, it's the Remain vote that is being split in this election and there is no sign of any substantial Remain alliance.  It seems people are willing to accept another 5 years of tory rule, just to keep their Brexit.  A Brexit that no one is even pretending has any benefits any more.  How depressing.

[Ryan]

On 11/25/2019 at 10:02 AM, nzlatic said:

Had the realisation this morning that by either luck or design, Cummings and the Leave movement have played an absolute blinder.  I was watching Nicky Morgan and her horror show on GMB this morning and realised that no matter how many of these car crashes the tories seem to have, they are untouchable in the both party and leadership polls.  Then it dawned on me... it doesn't matter how many deceitful things they do (misleading twitter account, doctored videos etc), stuff that would normally derail any standard general election campaign, people will still vote for them this time round.  Because it's a single issue election, all that other stuff is being ignored.

 

We're effectively in the middle of a 2nd referendum here.  A lack of tory policy, campaigning solely on a vacuous Brexit slogan and mainly going after Labour on Brexit rather than spending - it's all designed for one thing... winning this "2nd referendum".  And it will work, we're heading for a tory majoriy.  The Leave vote is unified by 2 things, firstly the tory/brexit party alliance and secondly because the brexit that's being voted on is still unspecified.  

 

In any actual 2nd referendum the Leave vote would be split because there would probably be a specific brexit on the table, and there isn't a nationwide majority for any specific brexit.  The Remain vote would be unified.

 

In reality, it's the Remain vote that is being split in this election and there is no sign of any substantial Remain alliance.  It seems people are willing to accept another 5 years of tory rule, just to keep their Brexit.  A Brexit that no one is even pretending has any benefits any more.  How depressing.

Very recent polls showing 5 point swing from Lib to Labour, we’re on...