EU Referendum: The result and aftermath...

[Esker-pades]

Well yes, paying £4.3 billion is usually cheaper than paying £39 billion. But would you care to tell us what this hypothetical '£39bn for nothing' deal has to do with this debate?

The £39bn comes from the "divorce settlement" which has already been negotiated by the UK and the EU. It isn't for nothing, it's to keep committments that we already made when we signed up to various agreements. IE: our obligations.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

The £39bn comes from the "divorce settlement" which has already been negotiated by the UK and the EU. It isn't for nothing, it's to keep committments that we already made when we signed up to various agreements. IE: our obligations.

And strictly speaking it's not even £39bn. It's a sum that's been estimated to be somewhere between £35bn and £39bn. Not surprisingly, certain Brexiteer politicians, with their usual disregard for accuracy, quickly started quoting the upper limit figure as if it's the actual set-in-stone figure.

I would imagine that if the worst happens and we leave without a deal, we'll still pay some, possibly all, of that £35-£39bn because it is in respect of previously agreed commitments, and if we don't pay, we'll be (correctly) seen internationally to be a country that reneges on our financial obligations, with the obvious implications for our credit rating etc.

 

[furnessvale]

Have you a source for your claim?

May I suggest you Google "Rotterdam Effect" and read up on this phenomenon, which is nothing to do with Irish transit traffic, or indeed Brexit except that it gives remainers false evidence that we are more reliant on EU trade than we actually are.

 

[birchesgreen]

I did, apparently our trade with the EU might be 42% not 44% then

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36229579

The claim: EU countries buy 44% of everything we sell abroad.

Reality Check verdict: The 44% figure is probably a bit of an overstatement, but not by more than about two percentage points.

 

[HH]

Errr, I don't think that's obvious at all.

It was a joke.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

It was a joke.

Ah.

 

[furnessvale]

I did, apparently our trade with the EU might be 42% not 44% then

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36229579

Well selected. Other reviewers give varying figures. Even so, that covers Rotterdam, which gives its name to the effect but it is by no means the only port involved in this trade.

Antwerp is named, but even Algeciras in Spain is now involved in transshipment of non EU traffic to/from the UK. No one tries to quantify this traffic because it doesn't suit the establishment narrative.

 

[birchesgreen]

Yes I selected a vaguely trustworthy source not a think tank whom I don't know who funds them. There were some others with different figures but all agree that trade with the EU is huge, whether it is 40 or 50% is a matter of what you count but even the low end is still not one you can dismiss.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Well selected. Other reviewers give varying figures. Even so, that covers Rotterdam, which gives its name to the effect but it is by no means the only port involved in this trade.

Antwerp is named, but even Algeciras in Spain is now involved in transshipment of non EU traffic to/from the UK. No one tries to quantify this traffic because it doesn't suit the establishment narrative.

Oh for goodness sake, do you really need to bring these silly conspiracy theories into everything? In the first place, the reason why this phonemenon has been given the name, The Rotterdam effect (or sometimes, the Rotterdam-Antwerp effect), is because those are far the most important, largest, ports that may effect those statistics, and it's generally believed that any contribution from other ports is going to be a lot smaller than any impact from the Dutch ports, and so isn't likely to have a significant impact on the statistics. In the second place, there have been attempts to estimate non-EU traffic routed via the EU. For example, the Office for National Statistics has looked at it , as has HMRC. From some checking around, although there are some slightly different estimates, noone seriously thinks that it brings our EU trade down below about 40%, which is pretty close to the figure trash80 cited. As for why there are no exact figures: You can't just wave a magic wand and get perfect statistics on everything... collecting decent data about something does usually take time and money, and until the arguments about Brexit came up, there was probably not much reason for the Government to spend the money collecting statistics about the ultimate destination of goods shipped to Europe. To get those statistics you'd have to start quizzing importers and exporters about what they are doing with their goods, which is potentially a lot more work than simply counting how much goes across the Channel, so it's probably not too surprising that really accurate statistics for that don't exist

It may surprise you to learn that the entire UK Government is actually not a big conspiracy whose sole purpose is to hide any statistics that don't conform to furnessvale's viewpoint. They do have other things to do, like running the country.

 

[furnessvale]

Oh for goodness sake, do you really need to bring these silly conspiracy theories into everything?

It may surprise you to learn that the entire UK Government is actually not a big conspiracy whose sole purpose is to hide any statistics that don't conform to furnessvale's viewpoint. They do have other things to do, like running the country.

Given that immediately before the referendum, the entire government machine was put at the disposal of the remain campaign, whilst being simultaneously denied to the leave campaign, you will not be surprised that I am taking no lectures on conspiracy theories from remainers.

 

[birchesgreen]

Why is that a conspiracy? Government policy was to remain in the EU. Why should they help out the other side?

 

[furnessvale]

Why is that a conspiracy? Government policy was to remain in the EU. Why should they help out the other side?

I'm pleased at that reply. Given that government policy is now to leave the EU I trust you will have no objection to the full resources of the government machine, including a £9m leaflet, being use by the leave side should remoaners ever get "The Peoples Vote".

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Given that immediately before the referendum, the entire government machine was put at the disposal of the remain campaign, whilst being simultaneously denied to the leave campaign

That is so wildly exaggerated as to amount to a falsehood, and you do yourself no favours in this debate by the way you repeatedly make up things that are not true, and then keep imagining that things are a conspiracy against your point of view.

It's true that the Government did decide that it supported Remain, and it spent about £9 million delivering a leaflet that explained its point of view to households in the UK. That is nothing like 'the entire Government machine'... compared to the size of the entire Government machine (budget: About £700 thousand million per year) it's negligibly small. But I'd accept it was Government support for Remain - just not on anything like the scale you're claiming. And it was of course all above board and open. Apart from that, the Government gave quite a lot of financial support equally to both the Remain and Leave campaigns (A £600K direct grant, a free mailout, free campaign broadcasts etc.) So it's not true to imply that Government support was denied to the Leave campaign. Beyond that, Government ministers were free to campaign on whichever side they wished to. Some campaigned for Remain, some campaigned for Leave.

Personally, as a Remain supporter, I have some doubts about the Government's decision to take an official line supporting remain, as I think it arguably would've been better for the Government to 'officially' be completely neutral and leave the campaigning to individuals and campaign groups. But at the same time, it wasn't an underhand thing, it was open, very limited in scope - essentially, to a leaflet delivery, and the stuff that the Government did to support Remain was kept in the public domain. Don't confuse publicly supporting one side with underhand behaviour. The two are completely different.

 

[birchesgreen]

I'm pleased at that reply. Given that government policy is now to leave the EU I trust you will have no objection to the full resources of the government machine, including a £9m leaflet, being use by the leave side should remoaners ever get "The Peoples Vote".

Well for a start anyone who uses terms "remoaners" i find suspect. There will not be a second referendum in any case.

 

[furnessvale]

That is so wildly exaggerated as to amount to a falsehood, and you do yourself no favours in this debate by the way you repeatedly make up things that are not true, and then keep imagining that things are a conspiracy against your point of view.

The entire government machine WAS put at the disposal of remain despite your protestations.

This is different from "the entire government machine WORKED for the remain campaign to the exclusion of their normal work" which is what I believe you THINK I said.

Most departments of government produced facts and figures useful to the remain campaign, using civil service time and money, but direct requests by leave for similar access were refused.

I would be pleased to know which statements I have made that are "made up", as opposed to me simply holding a different opinion from you.

 

[furnessvale]

Well for a start anyone who uses terms "remoaners" i find suspect. There will not be a second referendum in any case.

Oh dear! I am sure you have been called worse, Brexit supporters certainly have!

Pleased you think there will not be a second referendum, so the issue of who gets all the additional government support will not arise. Roll on 29th of March then!

 

[AM9]

Well for a start anyone who uses terms "remoaners" i find suspect. ...

I think the 'remoaner' made-up word thing is more puerile than just suspect. 'Brexit' is just as childish.

 

[birchesgreen]

Oh dear! I am sure you have been called worse, Brexit supporters certainly have!

Pleased you think there will not be a second referendum, so the issue of who gets all the additional government support will not arise. Roll on 29th of March then!

Oh yes i have been called much worse by some of your fellow Brexit fans, and threats of expulsion, even death. Bring on the civil war eh, you guys will regret it.

 

[furnessvale]

Oh yes i have been called much worse by some of your fellow Brexit fans, and threats of expulsion, even death. Bring on the civil war eh, you guys will regret it.

Please do not lump me with those people and I will not lump you with equally threatening elements from the remain side.

For your information, the word remoaner was carefully chosen in this context and it is a word I rarely use.

IMO a remainer is a person with a sincerely held view that the best option for the UK would have been to remain in the EU. A remoaner is a person who, having seen the result of a democratically held referendum, refuses to accept it and uses any means possible to overturn it, including the so called peoples vote.

If either of those caps fits, feel free to wear it.

 

[birchesgreen]

Well as you seem quite keen on conspiracy theories i thought you were, just not those conspiracy theories eh. We do seem to be well through the rabbit hole of nutdoom though what with the recent posts on the EU fourth reich or Roman Empire 2.0.

I'm not a remainer or a remoaner, i'm an EFTAer if such a term exists?

 

[furnessvale]

Well as you seem quite keen on conspiracy theories i thought you were, just not those conspiracy theories eh. We do seem to be well through the rabbit hole of nutdoom though what with the recent posts on the EU fourth reich or Roman Empire 2.0.

I'm not a remainer or a remoaner, i'm an EFTAer if such a term exists?

In which case, we are not a million miles apart!

 

[birchesgreen]

Maybe not bro, though its not because I am against the EU as an idea. Its just that I think if we (as in the UK) arn't going to take it seriously being in the EU then its best not to be in it.

I did vote remain though as I couldn't trust politicians to get anything right. Sadly been proven right. :P

 

[Groningen]

Personally i still do not why Theresa May postponed the vote about the treaty between UK and EU. Only to Tories to vote for the treaty. In my eyes nothing has changed and even some parts of Labour against it. Moving up the vote with 1 month is lost time. The vote seems to be January 14th;so only 2,5 months to the leaving date.

 

[nlogax]

ally i still do not why Theresa May postponed the vote about the treaty between UK and EU.

She's insistent on thinking the extra time will help secure a vote for her deal. Not that it's entirely obvious to anyone else that she'll get what she wants.

 

[Groningen]

Maybe Theresa May can just like Donald Trump block everything until she gets her way. But the UK is hopefully not the USA.

 

[birchesgreen]

She wants to delay it as long as she can so the only choice will be her deal or no deal, only the most hardcore headbangers would want for that.

 

[birchesgreen]

Well isn't that a surprise, Seabourne Freight has links to one of the largest Tory donors.

 

[nlogax]

Well isn't that a surprise, Seabourne Freight has links to one of the largest Tory donors.

Tempting as it might be to yell 'scandal', wealthy Tory donors have their fingers in a lot of investment pies and this possibly / probably wasn't a deliberate attempt to further fatten a Conservative wallet or two.

That being said, a bit of due diligence wouldn't have gone amiss. Something the entire Brexit process has lacked for its duration.

 

[HH]

There's smoke. There may also be fire.

 

[306024]

There's smoke. There may also be fire.

Perhaps the ‘M’ part of the RMT should put out a press release.