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Brexit matters

matacaster

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The USSR had illegal detention almost to the end of its history, such as Andrei Sakharov. The EU never has. Comparing the two is absolutely ridiculous.

As to democratic accountability, you appear to favour it as long as it leads the UK back to a (possibly imagined) pre-1960s society, so I assume anyone who's in favour of multiculturalism wouldn't get a vote.
EU trade restrictions on third party countries who are ethnically non-European would suggest an element of the EU trying to keep out Indian, Pakistani, West Indian and South African goods. This is hardly like your multicultural ideal is it?
 
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najaB

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There is an opportunity for an entrepreneurial newcomer a la tesla to create a new start electric manufacturer.
There is. But they, one would expect, would be more likely to set up shop in a home market of some 400 million people than a home market of 65 million.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

EU trade restrictions on third party countries who are ethnically non-European would suggest an element of the EU trying to keep out Indian, Pakistani, West Indian and South African goods.
Sorry to spoil your rant with facts, but up until 2009 the EU gave preferential access to goods from African, Caribbean and Pacific states until they were forced to stop by a US-lead complaint to the WTO.
 

matacaster

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I'll keep saying it; the EU is the biggest protection racket in the world. The individual countries are not but Brussels is. The Kray twins must have written their handbook. "come into our club and pay for our protection"
Agreed!

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Thats what happens when you get the order in three months earlier and said order includes paying to set up UK factories.

There are plenty of other factories around the world where Astrazenica are producing it for whoever has paid to produce it.

The UK factories went through similar production issues that the EU based factories are going through. But three months ago because the order was let three months earlier.

We just waited patiently though instead of smearing Aztrazenica, publishing the confidential contract online and sending the police to raid their premises. All the more appalling given that there is no profit for Astrazenica in these contracts (and no fixed delivery date just best reasonable efforts)

The EU are demanding that vaccines for supply to the UK and ordered three months before the EU ordered a single vaccine off Astrazenica are diverted to the EU and accusing the UK and Astrazenica of blocking them by not doing so. It is disgusting, outrageous, incompetent, bullying behaviour.

The EU have revealed far, far, more about themselves than they intended to this week.
Presumably astra zeneca had to guess if and when the EU would actually licence their vaccine to start making deliveries?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

Oh, come on. Have you seen who is in power at the moment? Does Britannia Unchained ring any bells?
As a small employer, I value flexibility from my staff and I try to reward them accordingly. It is NOT in the interests of small employers to screw their workers. Rigid EU or union rules can stifle company growth and ultimately harm that company's staff.

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At least , there are proportions.

In the FPTP , much less thank half of the people voted tories, but they got 80! seats majority.

Democracy my a...
The boundary commission recommendations are that Labour should lose seats this has yet to take place, so the boundaries are currently rigged in labour's favour.
 
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Journeyman

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As a small employer, I value flexibility from my staff and I try to reward them accordingly. It is NOT in the interests of small employers to screw their workers. Rigid EU or union rules can stifle company growth and ultimately harm that company's staff.
If you're not willing to sign up to the current minimum standards for staff protection, I'm not convinced you deserve to be employing people.
 

RT4038

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If you're not willing to sign up to the current minimum standards for staff protection, I'm not convinced you deserve to be employing people.
Sounds like an ideological viewpoint rather than anything based on practical application. There should be minimum standards, but whether the current ones are fit for purpose (in any direction) is a subjective opinion. No problem with review.
 

Journeyman

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Sounds like an ideological viewpoint rather than anything based on practical application. There should be minimum standards, but whether the current ones are fit for purpose (in any direction) is a subjective opinion. No problem with review.
We've had enough of our rights stolen by Brexiteers already, thanks.
 

najaB

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There should be minimum standards, but whether the current ones are fit for purpose (in any direction) is a subjective opinion. No problem with review.
I agree that there's nothing wrong with the principle of review, but the current government's actions do not give one any reason to believe that any resulting changes would favour the employee.
 

21C101

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"If the EU had sat around a table a week ago to formulate a plan to totally and permanently undermine it’s reputation and credibility, it could hardly have devised a more comprehensive plan to do so than the course of action it chose to actually undertake.

To in the first instance totally fail in its plan to procure life saving vaccines for the people of Europe was bad enough, but to react by persecuting innocent companies with police raids and slanderous accusations undermined the EUs claim to a rules based order. To then repudiate the Northern Ireland Protocol only 4 weeks after the ink was dry, and in so doing to drive a coach and horses through the peace process as a result, simply displayed a total disregard for international laws and norms.

But it gets worse, because the motivation for repudiating the GFA was specifically, deliberately and solely to prevent the people of Northern Ireland receiving the life saving medicines they had legitimately acquired and paid for from a US company. So the EU simultaneously broke two international treaties in order to facilitate the breaking of the Geneva Convention which forbids even combatants in war from blocking medical supplies to civilian populations.

Quite a feat in the space of 5 days."

Telegraph commenter.
 

edwin_m

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"If the EU had sat around a table a week ago to formulate a plan to totally and permanently undermine it’s reputation and credibility, it could hardly have devised a more comprehensive plan to do so than the course of action it chose to actually undertake.

To in the first instance totally fail in its plan to procure life saving vaccines for the people of Europe was bad enough, but to react by persecuting innocent companies with police raids and slanderous accusations undermined the EUs claim to a rules based order. To then repudiate the Northern Ireland Protocol only 4 weeks after the ink was dry, and in so doing to drive a coach and horses through the peace process as a result, simply displayed a total disregard for international laws and norms.

But it gets worse, because the motivation for repudiating the GFA was specifically, deliberately and solely to prevent the people of Northern Ireland receiving the life saving medicines they had legitimately acquired and paid for from a US company. So the EU simultaneously broke two international treaties in order to facilitate the breaking of the Geneva Convention which forbids even combatants in war from blocking medical supplies to civilian populations.

Quite a feat in the space of 5 days."

Telegraph commenter.
Nice unbiased source then...

The EU has blundered on this occasion and arguably broken the agreement (invoking a power that was permitted but not under the circumstances it was expected to be used). The Johnson government has blundered in nearly every decision is made during the pandemic, and threatened to break the same agreement. So if the EU deserves criticism the Westminster government deserves more. If they hadn't been for the delayed lockdowns and ineffective tracing we wouldn't have been in a state where we needed to vaccinate in panic mode.

The motivation was not to deny NI the vaccine - NI was and still is supplied from the UK's quota. The reason was to prevent vaccines that the EU believed were promised to them going to the UK instead. NI was not being singled out.
 

Dave1987

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@21C101 quoting a comment from a paper as anti EU as the Telegraph isn't really likely to help your cause in convincing remainers to admit Brexit was the right choice. I am well aware that for people like yourself reading comment after comment from columnist after columnist with the same anti EU dogma as yourself probably makes you feel all warm and cosy inside but its highly unlikely to convince others of your argument. I would still like to know where my vote on joining the CPTPP is as it will be sacrificing sovereignty which is precisely the reason we supposedly left the EU. Surely the Govt should be putting such a decision to the electorate as we will have rules to follow by which we had no hand in making.

@matacaster I presume you have seen that they have axed the review, so they clearly knew the reforms they wanted to implement would be deeply unpopular.
 

REVUpminster

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The vaccine roll out is the perfect example of how the EU works for France and Germany only. Germany is making millions from the Pfizer vaccine and France wanting a piece of the action wanted the French vaccine made by Sanofi to be the second major jab for Europe. The Sanofi jab vaccine failed so are switching production at the French factories to Pfizer. The only other country that is happy is Russia as they sell their vaccine to Hungary.

Despite the European Medicines Agency approving the Astra Zenica vaccine France and Germany seeks to undermine it. How do europhiles feel about their parents and grandparents receiving it. Only France and Germany can be allowed to make money out of the vaccines. It's why they don't want to buy the Astra vaccine at cost even if Brussel does.
 

py_megapixel

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The vaccine roll out is the perfect example of how the EU works for France and Germany only. Germany is making millions from the Pfizer vaccine and France wanting a piece of the action wanted the French vaccine made by Sanofi to be the second major jab for Europe. The Sanofi jab vaccine failed so are switching production at the French factories to Pfizer. The only other country that is happy is Russia as they sell their vaccine to Hungary.
I'm struggling to understand what your complaint is here.
Would you prefer it if the factories in France were producing no vaccine at all?

I don't disagree that the EU has made an utter farce of its vaccination programme, but this particular complaint seems like not a problem to me.


How do europhiles feel about their parents and grandparents receiving it.
I am assuming that you would label me as a "europhile" because I generally support membership of the EU, and various elderly relatives of mine have been offered the vaccine, so luckily I can provide a direct answer to this question.

I am pleased that they will be receiving the vaccine. I am unsure what relevance this has to the matter at hand, though.

Despite the European Medicines Agency approving the Astra Zenica vaccine France and Germany seeks to undermine it.
Only France and Germany can be allowed to make money out of the vaccines. It's why they don't want to buy the Astra vaccine at cost even if Brussel does.
If that were true, which I don't believe it is, the EU programme would be a good thing, because it stops France and Germany controlling what vaccinations

There was a large controversy about the fact that Astra-Zeneca would be unable to supply the EU's order on time. I don't find it likely that this would have happened had there not been an order to Astra-Zeneca in the first place.
 

najaB

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Germany is making millions from the Pfizer vaccine...
In evaluating logic, if one of the premises of false you can stop going any further, as the whole argument evaluates to false. I pretty much stopped reading here.

Pfizer is an American company.
 

Dave1987

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So after all the condemnation of the EU for threatening to enact the nuclear option on the border in Ireland, good old BoJo is threatening to do exactly the same and enact article 16 to undermine the Brexit deal. Wow we are less than two months into our post-Brexit trading relationship and relations are already pretty bad with our closest trading partners. Trade with the EU is set to be extremely difficult for the foreseeable future it seems.
 

REVUpminster

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So after all the condemnation of the EU for threatening to enact the nuclear option on the border in Ireland, good old BoJo is threatening to do exactly the same and enact article 16 to undermine the Brexit deal. Wow we are less than two months into our post-Brexit trading relationship and relations are already pretty bad with our closest trading partners. Trade with the EU is set to be extremely difficult for the foreseeable future it seems.
They must be seen to punish the UK for having the temerity to leave even if it affects their own members; just as the pre christmas blockade on lorries did.
 

Journeyman

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They must be seen to punish the UK for having the temerity to leave even if it affects their own members; just as the pre christmas blockade on lorries did.
All they're doing is enforcing the same rules that they do on anyone else. We punished ourselves by leaving.
 

REVUpminster

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All they're doing is enforcing the same rules that they do on anyone else. We punished ourselves by leaving.
Exactly! We are outside the "protection" of the EU and have found how they treat other countries. We had to pay for our "protection" as you do in any racket.
 

WelshBluebird

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Exactly! We are outside the "protection" of the EU and have found how they treat other countries. We had to pay for our "protection" as you do in any racket.
Or more accurately, once again, once you leave a club you no longer enjoy the benefits that club offers. It isn't that complicated and certainly isn't a "racket".
 

yorksrob

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With regard to the NI protocol, can they not just do all the checks on the boat ?
 

Dave1987

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They must be seen to punish the UK for having the temerity to leave even if it affects their own members; just as the pre christmas blockade on lorries did.
I think you will find we decided to leave the club so we lose the privileges of being inside the club. Even the fabled CPTPP that we are desperate to join has protections built-in for the founding member states. So for all your protestations about the EU being a "protectionist racket", every trade bloc has protections built in for various states' industries.
 

py_megapixel

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I think you will find we decided to leave the club so we lose the privileges of being inside the club. Even the fabled CPTPP that we are desperate to join has protections built-in for the founding member states. So for all your protestations about the EU being a "protectionist racket", every trade bloc has protections built in for various states' industries.
I have to agree with you there.

If you were in a tennis club, and then you decided to cancel your membership, then I don't think it would be fair to still expect free access to play on the courts.

Of course, you would probably expect a smoother experience leaving than we had, but I don't thing the blame for be fairly laid entirely at either Britain's door or the EUs.
 

21C101

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I have to agree with you there.

If you were in a tennis club, and then you decided to cancel your membership, then I don't think it would be fair to still expect free access to play on the courts.

Of course, you would probably expect a smoother experience leaving than we had, but I don't thing the blame for be fairly laid entirely at either Britain's door or the EUs.
Indeed, but you wouldn't expect the tennis club you were previously a member of to make you wait for two hours to go in when you subsequently visit as a guest, and refuse you entry at all if you made a spelling mistake on their 40 page guest registration form; while laughing at you and sayiing "thats your fault for leaving" while they did the formalities as slowly and pedantically, while other Tennis clubs sort it out guest registration in 5 minutes cheerfully and politely.

You also wouldn't expect them to phone up the sports shop in the town where the tennis club was and threaten to boycott them if they continued to sell you tennis balls either, and do it without consulting the other members including the person who lives next door to you and shares a fence with you; then tell the local police that the shop has been making illicit sales to you and get them to raid the shop.

A tennis club that treated members who left and cesased paying subscriptions like that would reasonably be described as running a protection racket.
 
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py_megapixel

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Indeed but you wouldn't expect the tennis club you were previously a member of to make you wait for two hours to go in when you visit as a guest, and refuse you entry at all if you made a spelling mistke on the guest registration form,while laughing at you and sayiing "thats your fault for leaving" while they did the formalities, while other clubs sort it out in 5 minutes cheefully and politely.

You also wouldn't expect them to phone up the sports shop in the town where the tennis club was and threaten to boycott them if they continued to sell you tennis balls either, and do it without consulting the other members including the person who lives next door to you and shares a fence with you.
Indeed not. The EU are not blameless here. But neither are the Brexiteers in the UK...

To continue the analogy, the club also probably wouldn't expect you to spend several months spouting lies about them to your family and friends to persuade others of your position, and say "if you agree with me leaving the tennis club I'll put the membership fees towards building our own court for us all to use" when in reality the savings from cancelling the membership are nowhere near the cost of a tennis court in any sensible timeframe.

I am not suggesting that the pettiness of the EU, particularly in regard to vaccines, is excused by Britain's behaviour towards them - but I am saying that it is ridiculous to lay the blame entirely at the EU's door.
 

nlogax

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Indeed but you wouldn't expect the tennis club you were previously a member of to make you wait for two hours to go in when you visit as a guest, and refuse you entry at all if you made a spelling mistke on the guest registration form,while laughing at you and sayiing "thats your fault for leaving" while they did the formalities, while other clubs sort it out in 5 minutes cheefully and politely.

What is this crass and perverse view of the world you seem to have where you believe everyone's 'laughing' at the UK because it decided to leave the EU of its own accord?

This is a particularly unpleasant situation. It's of our own making and we shouldn't be surprised that stuff is going wrong. Sure, the EU haven't exactly played a blinder here but no-one wanted this sort of thing to happen and no-one finds it funny - with the exception of a few arch Brexiteers whom I've long suspected just want to watch the world burn.
 

class ep-09

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They must be seen to punish the UK for having the temerity to leave even if it affects their own members; just as the pre christmas blockade on lorries did.


You are joking, right?

Checks and barriers are due for UK and EU not being this same custom area.

That is one of the WTO rules , beloved by brexiters.

By brexiters logic (lol) , we should be very happy with the checks and bariets as that was WTO who imposed these rules.


Or perhaps we should leave WTO too, as
we had not vote for its rules ?
 

nanstallon

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The relations between EU and UK are getting dangerously acrimonious because of a combination of factors -
1. Britain chose to leave the EU. It is only natural for the EU to feel upset. Nobody likes being dumped.
2. Britain wanted to keep the benefits of EU membership, without the cost and responsibilities. It is understandable that the EU wouldn't accept this cherrypicking.
3. Britain failed to realise that the UK and RoI must be either both in, or both out of, the EU. Otherwise, there has to be a customs border.
4. This customs border can either be at Newry and all along the NI/RoI border - clearly contrary to the Good Friday Agreement - or in the Irish Sea - which understandably upsets the good folk of NI who don't all want to be treated as different from the rest of the UK. So, unless the British want to go back to the days of the Troubles, or alternatively eventually lose NI to a reunified Ireland, the only way they can have Brexit is to persuade Dublin that the RoI should also leave the EU. Not much chance of that! In all reality, Brexit just isn't practicable. Cameron is not a stupid man; he surely realised that before calling that referendum?
5. Having insisted on completing Brexit, despite many opportunities to think again in the light of facts becoming increasingly obvious, the British are so so surprised to find that they can't trade as freely as before. But it can't possibly be their fault!
6. The EU handled Covid vaccination poorly, and are way behind Britain on getting people immunised. Britain got that more or less right. The EU doesn't like to admit that, and accuses Britain of hogging the available vaccine. Very foolishly, the EU threatens to interrupt trade between NI and RoI because it thinks Britain will use this loophole to hog more vaccine. But understandably, when Britain has in the past threatened to breach its treaty obligations.

So, lets be grown up about this. Covid is everybody's problem and UK and EU should try to be better neighbours. Better still, Britain should swallow its foolish pride and admit that Brexit doesn't work, can we come back?
 

Dave1987

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You are joking, right?

Checks and barriers are due for UK and EU not being this same custom area.

That is one of the WTO rules , beloved by brexiters.

By brexiters logic (lol) , we should be very happy with the checks and bariets as that was WTO who imposed these rules.


Or perhaps we should leave WTO too, as
we had not vote for its rules ?
What an absolutely fabulous post! BoJo was proclaiming that WTO rules were fine for us to revert to yet they would have required even more checks than now! WTO rules are specifically designed to encourage countries to agree trade agreements. The EU is a trading bloc that has removed all borders and checks from those who are part of the bloc so goods and services are traded freely without borders. Even the CPTPP has rules to follow and does not remove all checks or tariffs.
 

Senex

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The relations between EU and UK are getting dangerously acrimonious because of a combination of factors -
1. Britain chose to leave the EU. It is only natural for the EU to feel upset. Nobody likes being dumped.
2. Britain wanted to keep the benefits of EU membership, without the cost and responsibilities. It is understandable that the EU wouldn't accept this cherrypicking.
3. Britain failed to realise that the UK and RoI must be either both in, or both out of, the EU. Otherwise, there has to be a customs border.
4. This customs border can either be at Newry and all along the NI/RoI border - clearly contrary to the Good Friday Agreement - or in the Irish Sea - which understandably upsets the good folk of NI who don't all want to be treated as different from the rest of the UK. So, unless the British want to go back to the days of the Troubles, or alternatively eventually lose NI to a reunified Ireland, the only way they can have Brexit is to persuade Dublin that the RoI should also leave the EU. Not much chance of that! In all reality, Brexit just isn't practicable. Cameron is not a stupid man; he surely realised that before calling that referendum?
5. Having insisted on completing Brexit, despite many opportunities to think again in the light of facts becoming increasingly obvious, the British are so so surprised to find that they can't trade as freely as before. But it can't possibly be their fault!
6. The EU handled Covid vaccination poorly, and are way behind Britain on getting people immunised. Britain got that more or less right. The EU doesn't like to admit that, and accuses Britain of hogging the available vaccine. Very foolishly, the EU threatens to interrupt trade between NI and RoI because it thinks Britain will use this loophole to hog more vaccine. But understandably, when Britain has in the past threatened to breach its treaty obligations.

So, lets be grown up about this. Covid is everybody's problem and UK and EU should try to be better neighbours. Better still, Britain should swallow its foolish pride and admit that Brexit doesn't work, can we come back?
No. 4 should have been blindingly obvious to everyone right from the start — if you're moving out of the customs zone, there's got to be a border somewhere. (School history and what a Zollverein is all about, anyone?) And yet it all seems to have eluded the Brexiteer brigade. Or, as classic English Tories, are they all just so ignorant of and uninterested in Irish affairs that they never gave it a thought (or indeed did think, but believed the Irish would just dutifully follow GB out of the EU)?
No. 5 is just a good bit of British exceptionalism, isn't it? — nothing's ever our fault!
 

madjack

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The relations between EU and UK are getting dangerously acrimonious because of a combination of factors -
1. Britain chose to leave the EU. It is only natural for the EU to feel upset. Nobody likes being dumped.
2. Britain wanted to keep the benefits of EU membership, without the cost and responsibilities. It is understandable that the EU wouldn't accept this cherrypicking.
3. Britain failed to realise that the UK and RoI must be either both in, or both out of, the EU. Otherwise, there has to be a customs border.
4. This customs border can either be at Newry and all along the NI/RoI border - clearly contrary to the Good Friday Agreement - or in the Irish Sea - which understandably upsets the good folk of NI who don't all want to be treated as different from the rest of the UK. So, unless the British want to go back to the days of the Troubles, or alternatively eventually lose NI to a reunified Ireland, the only way they can have Brexit is to persuade Dublin that the RoI should also leave the EU. Not much chance of that! In all reality, Brexit just isn't practicable. Cameron is not a stupid man; he surely realised that before calling that referendum?
5. Having insisted on completing Brexit, despite many opportunities to think again in the light of facts becoming increasingly obvious, the British are so so surprised to find that they can't trade as freely as before. But it can't possibly be their fault!
6. The EU handled Covid vaccination poorly, and are way behind Britain on getting people immunised. Britain got that more or less right. The EU doesn't like to admit that, and accuses Britain of hogging the available vaccine. Very foolishly, the EU threatens to interrupt trade between NI and RoI because it thinks Britain will use this loophole to hog more vaccine. But understandably, when Britain has in the past threatened to breach its treaty obligations.

So, lets be grown up about this. Covid is everybody's problem and UK and EU should try to be better neighbours. Better still, Britain should swallow its foolish pride and admit that Brexit doesn't work, can we come back?
Great post. Plus:

7. The EU's leaders have to demonstrate that life outside is more difficult than inside. Le Pen was on 48% last week against Macron.
8. I am no Brexiteer but I believe that EU leaders and accepted wisdom (groupthink, even) have bought into the narrative that the UK has become something of a failed state, that they hold all the cards, and that (see 7) life is always going to be demonstrably inferior outside. This is mostly true - at the moment - but when something happens that challenges this, they have cognitive challenges in dealing with it.
9. Brexit can only logically be a success (politically, economically) if it is measured against the EU's failure - so the UK inevitably will have to proceed in a way that undermines the EU, whether this is a stated objective or not (again not my vote...)

re number 4, remember that the Irish voted against the Treaty of Nice, first time round. This is not a specific prediction that Ireland will vote out - although if I was Irish I'd be worried about the lack of democracy in the Article 16 episode - but the point is that a lot can change over 20 years...
 

najaB

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Indeed, but you wouldn't expect the tennis club you were previously a member of to make you wait for two hours to go in when you subsequently visit as a guest, and refuse you entry at all if you made a spelling mistake on their 40 page guest registration form; while laughing at you and sayiing "thats your fault for leaving" while they did the formalities as slowly and pedantically, while other Tennis clubs sort it out guest registration in 5 minutes cheerfully and politely.
They're applying the same rules that they apply to other non-members. The fact that we're terrible at filling in the forms due to not having to do so for nearly fifty years is our problem, not theirs.
 

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