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Thread: EU Referendum - Who's made their mind up

  1. #276
    In The North Stand With All The Old Folk SS's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    I'd like to have some of what you are having.

    Pound is down and has only stabilized because all the clowns responsible for this have run off and a person who is sane and understands how the economy works has been put in charge. It turns out that none of the leaders on the leave side were actually competent enough to get voted in so despite the "it must be a leaver in charge" they've all realised they'd quite like it if they can blame a remainer when the talks go terribly rather than taking the blame themselves.

    Having "initial trade talks" is a million miles away from doing a deal. Just because someone says they are interested it all gets a bit more complicated when you actually try and do that in practice hence why they take about 10 years to negotiate. Also I'd imagine all of those countries that have previously shown an interest in doing a deal with the UK have also shown interested in doing a deal with the EU - a market that (even excluding the EU) is approximately 8x larger than the UK.

    Maybe you'd like to tell the 6 people at my organisation who have been made redundant in the last week because of a collapse in deals and investments that "things are moving along better than expected". Or the people who have savings trapped in property funds that they can't get access to. Or the people whose holidays have become 10-15% more expensive overnight.

    And this has barely even started yet - most companies will have hedging arrangements in place or will wait it out for the next 6 months. If the pound stays where it is or gets worse then those costs ultimately have to be passed on to customers. I'm sure everyone will be delighted when wages are frozen and their shopping bills rise 10%.

    You may also care to know that as a non-eurozone member we wouldn't have to contribute to cover the cost of the failure of the Italian banks if that were to ever happen so I'm not sure what the argument is here? Why does Italy becoming like Greece (which it won't by the way for a number of reasons I won't bother going into here) mean we should leave the EU?

    To summarize your rationale for "the best thing we ever did" appears to be that armageddon hasn't happened in the 3 weeks since we voted to leave.
    Much of this is speculative nonsense where every conceivable problem is attempted to be pinned on leaving the EU. Basically, scaremongering - exactly what convinced the majority in this country to vote leave in the first place. This is the problem with remain voters, they simply can't get their head around how sick of it all many are.

    As for deals, investments, savings, property funds and holidays - well, I'm sure the vast majority of the country's hearts are bleeding indeed. Cloud cuckoo land springs to mind.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    I'd like to have some of what you are having.

    Pound is down and has only stabilized because all the clowns responsible for this have run off and a person who is sane and understands how the economy works has been put in charge. It turns out that none of the leaders on the leave side were actually competent enough to get voted in so despite the "it must be a leaver in charge" they've all realised they'd quite like it if they can blame a remainer when the talks go terribly rather than taking the blame themselves.

    Having "initial trade talks" is a million miles away from doing a deal. Just because someone says they are interested it all gets a bit more complicated when you actually try and do that in practice hence why they take about 10 years to negotiate. Also I'd imagine all of those countries that have previously shown an interest in doing a deal with the UK have also shown interested in doing a deal with the EU - a market that (even excluding the EU) is approximately 8x larger than the UK.

    Maybe you'd like to tell the 6 people at my organisation who have been made redundant in the last week because of a collapse in deals and investments that "things are moving along better than expected". Or the people who have savings trapped in property funds that they can't get access to. Or the people whose holidays have become 10-15% more expensive overnight.

    And this has barely even started yet - most companies will have hedging arrangements in place or will wait it out for the next 6 months. If the pound stays where it is or gets worse then those costs ultimately have to be passed on to customers. I'm sure everyone will be delighted when wages are frozen and their shopping bills rise 10%.

    You may also care to know that as a non-eurozone member we wouldn't have to contribute to cover the cost of the failure of the Italian banks if that were to ever happen so I'm not sure what the argument is here? Why does Italy becoming like Greece (which it won't by the way for a number of reasons I won't bother going into here) mean we should leave the EU?

    To summarize your rationale for "the best thing we ever did" appears to be that armageddon hasn't happened in the 3 weeks since we voted to leave.
    Get the man a sandwich board with the words "the end is nigh"

    Don't bleet about property funds for gods sake, they're like shares their price goes up and down and it's a risk to invest in them.

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    Quote Originally Posted by SS View Post
    Much of this is speculative nonsense where every conceivable problem is attempted to be pinned on leaving the EU. Basically, scaremongering - exactly what convinced the majority in this country to vote leave in the first place. This is the problem with remain voters, they simply can't get their head around how sick of it all many are.

    As for deals, investments, savings, property funds and holidays - well, I'm sure the vast majority of the country's hearts are bleeding indeed. Cloud cuckoo land springs to mind.
    Yep pretty sure the pound dropped 15% on the day result was announced because of some unrelated event. And the likely recession that is coming will be because ordinary people are just being too negative about things couldn't possibly be to do with the fact that business investment has dried up due to the risk we cut ourselves off from a market where 50% of our exports go or that overseas investors don't fancy investing in UK businesses that can't sell into the EU without tariffs.

    The reality is that the leave voters are blaming all of their current problems on the EU because the UK politicians (and Daily Mail/Express) have found it convenient to blame all the issues in this country on the EU rather than admitting its a result of their own policy making. After the EU exit is complete and things are still crap or likely even worse I'm sure they will find someone new to blame, probably those pesky scientists for the global warming hoax or the US government for faking the moon landing.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    Yep pretty sure the pound dropped 15% on the day result was announced because of some unrelated event. And the likely recession that is coming will be because ordinary people are just being too negative about things couldn't possibly be to do with the fact that business investment has dried up due to the risk we cut ourselves off from a market where 50% of our exports go or that overseas investors don't fancy investing in UK businesses that can't sell into the EU without tariffs.

    The reality is that the leave voters are blaming all of their current problems on the EU because the UK politicians (and Daily Mail/Express) have found it convenient to blame all the issues in this country on the EU rather than admitting its a result of their own policy making. After the EU exit is complete and things are still crap or likely even worse I'm sure they will find someone new to blame, probably those pesky scientists for the global warming hoax or the US government for faking the moon landing.
    The moon landings definitely fake. I know that for a fact because someone told me.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    Having "initial trade talks" is a million miles away from doing a deal. Just because someone says they are interested it all gets a bit more complicated when you actually try and do that in practice hence why they take about 10 years to negotiate. Also I'd imagine all of those countries that have previously shown an interest in doing a deal with the UK have also shown interested in doing a deal with the EU - a market that (even excluding the EU) is approximately 8x larger than the UK.
    You really should do a bit of research before typing your wild doom-mongering

    The only reason EU trade deals take so long is because of the beurocratic c**p they have to go through with 28 individual members all having to reach agreement over every single detail.
    Individual countries can negotiate their deals far quicker. Switzerland started their free trade talks with China in 2010 and reach the agreement in 2013, with the deal coming into effect the following July 2014

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    Quote Originally Posted by Saint Toppy View Post
    You really should do a bit of research before typing your wild doom-mongering

    The only reason EU trade deals take so long is because of the beurocratic c**p they have to go through with 28 individual members all having to reach agreement over every single detail.
    Individual countries can negotiate their deals far quicker. Switzerland started their free trade talks with China in 2010 and reach the agreement in 2013, with the deal coming into effect the following July 2014
    Great example and I'm quite familiar with that deal.

    The Switzerland-China trade deal was indeed completed in 4 years as you state which is less than is typical. What is particularly interesting about that deal is Switzerland was required to immediately remove all tariffs on imports from China, whereas China was permitted periods of 5, 10, 12 and 15 years to slowly remove tariffs on imports from Switzerland depending on the particular type of good that was being imported. The deal may have been signed quickly but the immediate benefits are massively in favor of the Chinese.

    This perfectly illustrates why negotiating free trade deals as a group of 500million people rather than 60million allows you to negotiate better deals. It may well take longer but you have a lot more power to actually negotiate your position. China was basically able to say to Switzerland if you don't like that fine see you later, whereas Switzerland was desperate to get access to China's much larger market. Also worth pointing out that this deal does not include either financial services or car manufacturing which are two of the UK's largest export areas.

    Unfortunately we are now in exactly this position with the EU, I'm sure they'd like to retain access to the UK with no trade barriers but they'll survive if we don't reach agreement. On the other hand 50% of UK exports go to the EU so we are in a lot more trouble if we walk away without tariff free access.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    Great example and I'm quite familiar with that deal.

    The Switzerland-China trade deal was indeed completed in 4 years as you state which is less than is typical. What is particularly interesting about that deal is Switzerland was required to immediately remove all tariffs on imports from China, whereas China was permitted periods of 5, 10, 12 and 15 years to slowly remove tariffs on imports from Switzerland depending on the particular type of good that was being imported. The deal may have been signed quickly but the immediate benefits are massively in favor of the Chinese.

    This perfectly illustrates why negotiating free trade deals as a group of 500million people rather than 60million allows you to negotiate better deals. It may well take longer but you have a lot more power to actually negotiate your position. China was basically able to say to Switzerland if you don't like that fine see you later, whereas Switzerland was desperate to get access to China's much larger market. Also worth pointing out that this deal does not include either financial services or car manufacturing which are two of the UK's largest export areas.

    Unfortunately we are now in exactly this position with the EU, I'm sure they'd like to retain access to the UK with no trade barriers but they'll survive if we don't reach agreement. On the other hand 50% of UK exports go to the EU so we are in a lot more trouble if we walk away without tariff free access.
    The last time our exports to the EU was 50% was in 2008. It peaked at 54% in 2006 and has been dropping steadily ever since to approx 44% now.
    Our reliance on the EU for exports lessens every year as our global exports grow. This will only increase further once we gat trade deals around the world.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Saint Toppy View Post
    The last time our exports to the EU was 50% was in 2008. It peaked at 54% in 2006 and has been dropping steadily ever since to approx 44% now.
    Our reliance on the EU for exports lessens every year as our global exports grow. This will only increase further once we gat trade deals around the world.
    Whether its 44% or 50% it is a huge share of our current exports. This may well decline moderately over time - but putting at risk a significant part of that 44% immediately whereas it will take much longer to negotiate enough trade to replace it (which even then will almost certainly be on worse terms) does not seem to me to be a sensible approach. Also worth pointing out that we would have to renegotiate all of the 50+ trade deals the EU currently has with other countries which again would likely be on worse terms then we currently get as part of the EU and is clearly going to take a very long time to do.

    Regarding your original list of "interested countries" the EU already has a trade agreement with South Korea and an agreement with Singapore has been reached but is yet to be signed. China/India are notoriously protectionist which is why it makes sense to negotiate as a large block as otherwise you end up with a crap deal like Switzerland.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Scouse Don View Post
    I voted to remain but my shares are up considerably.Don't know whether to laugh or cry.
    Only because there are lots on international companies in the FTSE who are benefitting from the weak pound. Don't worry, if the pound goes as low as predicted you will be giving your gains back over the shop counter.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    Whether its 44% or 50% it is a huge share of our current exports. This may well decline moderately over time - but putting at risk a significant part of that 44% immediately whereas it will take much longer to negotiate enough trade to replace it (which even then will almost certainly be on worse terms) does not seem to me to be a sensible approach. Also worth pointing out that we would have to renegotiate all of the 50+ trade deals the EU currently has with other countries which again would likely be on worse terms then we currently get as part of the EU and is clearly going to take a very long time to do.

    Regarding your original list of "interested countries" the EU already has a trade agreement with South Korea and an agreement with Singapore has been reached but is yet to be signed. China/India are notoriously protectionist which is why it makes sense to negotiate as a large block as otherwise you end up with a crap deal like Switzerland.
    You keep banging on about worse deals, worse terms etc with absolutely no evidence to support that assertion.
    Even though May has pretty much ruled out a Norway style deal, you do realise that financially we would be better off by over £2Bn a year even if we got exactly the same terms (which we wouldn't do anyway as we wouldn't sign up to the scheme which they actually pay to be in).
    So do you have any actual evidence of all these worse terms we'll allegedly get?

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    You mean aside from the deal that Switzerland did with China that I just pointed out?

    It would seem to me that its up to the people who voted leave and the politicians who support this to explain why we are going to get a better deal with the EU when the vast majority of meaningful politicians in the EU say otherwise? And please don't say to me "Germany sells us cars so they want a deal" because the operation of the EU means every single other country has to agree to the deal, we can't just get Germany to agree we have to get France and Italy on board - both of whom are in no mood to do a deal right now, Paris would actually quite like our Financial Services businesses.

    Outside the EU I accept that we could do deals faster but I fail to understand how negotiating as a group of 60m people versus 500m people would allow a better deal to be negotiated? I can't produce evidence of a country that's negotiated a deal within the EU and the left and negotiated another one because no one has ever done this before but I'd think the size of the market you are negotiating access to is a pretty important factor in your ability to stand firm in negotiations.

    So the Norway deal would save us 2 billion (about 1/9 of the amount on the side of the bus but lets ignore that for now). And you say "we wouldn't do this" but why would the EU offer us something better that gives the same market access because then Norway gets to turn around and say hey this isn't fair I want that deal. But ok lets go with this for now. The total UK government spending in 2015 was £748billion, so £2billion equates to 0.26% of the UK government's annual spend. For reference also, the UK Government spent £150billion on public pensions in 2015.

    In exchange for that we get control over fisheries, agriculture and the ability to make trade deals with other countries the EU doesn't have trade deals with. However, we then have no representation on any of the EU bodies and no say in making any of the rules, the vast majority would have to be implemented in the UK anyway to allow access to the EEA (approximately 75% in the case of Norway). We have to accept free movement of people as we do now. Goods exported to EU countries are also subject to additional origin checks to ensure compliance which adds further to costs. Side note - this is a great example of what "taking back control" actually means in practice.

    Despite all of that, that is currently the best available option to us and if we have to leave the EU, I could accept that deal. But I fail to see how giving up all of that for the sake of 0.26% of the UK Government's annual spend and to "take back control" of some pretty minor areas is a good deal.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post

    So the Norway deal would save us 2 billion (about 1/9 of the amount on the side of the bus but lets ignore that for now). And you say "we wouldn't do this" but why would the EU offer us something better that gives the same market access because then Norway gets to turn around and say hey this isn't fair I want that deal. But ok lets go with this for now. The total UK government spending in 2015 was £748billion, so £2billion equates to 0.26% of the UK government's annual spend. For reference also, the UK Government spent £150billion on public pensions in 2015.
    Because Norway signed up to almost every single option which they didn't have to. They actually pay a supplement every year to be part of the Schengen agreement, something we never would sign up to.

    The majority of their payments (including for full free market access) are based on a percentage of their overall GDP. Britain's GDP is approx. 5 times that of Norway. Norway contributes approx. 1Bn Euro's a year into the EU so even on exactly the same terms our maximum contribution would be 5Bn Euro's which is considerably less than our current contributions.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The_Nator View Post
    In exchange for that we get control over fisheries, agriculture and the ability to make trade deals with other countries the EU doesn't have trade deals with. However, we then have no representation on any of the EU bodies and no say in making any of the rules, the vast majority would have to be implemented in the UK anyway to allow access to the EEA (approximately 75% in the case of Norway). We have to accept free movement of people as we do now. Goods exported to EU countries are also subject to additional origin checks to ensure compliance which adds further to costs. Side note - this is a great example of what "taking back control" actually means in practice.
    .
    Taking back control means we don't have a raft of EU directives imposed on us every year. Over the course of the last EU parliament hundreds of directives were voted on in the EU where the UK voted against them but were out-voted and had them imposed anyway.
    One of the latest directives voted on last year was regards to ports & shipping. The majority of UK ports are privately owned where as a large number of ports across the EU are state owned (or at least part state owned). This new directive effectively forces our privately owned ports to reveal their entire pricing structure and detail all the individual charges they make. It also allows the EU to impose a common pricing structure across the EU. Either way our ports lose all of their competitive advantage and there's not a damn thing we can do about whilst still in the EU.
    In the past they've tried something similar with airports but never quite got the majority they needed but it wont stop them trying again. Heathrow & Frankfurt pretty much dominate Europe in terms of being international hubs so if the EU ever did gain control they could wipe out our advantages there as well which would see business moved to other countries across the EU.

    Your assertion that the 'vast majority' of EU rules would be imposed on us anyway is completely unfounded.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Saint Toppy View Post

    Your assertion that the 'vast majority' of EU rules would be imposed on us anyway is completely unfounded.
    It was founded, and an example of Norway provided.

    The simple fact is that to trade with a particular country / region you need to comply with their rules anyway. The EU provided a way of harmonising those rules such that everyone would be compliant, thus trade is easier as everything is standardised. The problem is that simple minded people who want to moan about something, like to complain about such rules despite those rules 1) never really affecting them and 2) having a benefit that they didn't understand.

    Unfortunately, not recognising or understanding a benefit, does not mean that the benefit is non-existent.

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    Quote Originally Posted by johnnyl View Post
    It was founded, and an example of Norway provided.

    The simple fact is that to trade with a particular country / region you need to comply with their rules anyway. The EU provided a way of harmonising those rules such that everyone would be compliant, thus trade is easier as everything is standardised. The problem is that simple minded people who want to moan about something, like to complain about such rules despite those rules 1) never really affecting them and 2) having a benefit that they didn't understand.

    Unfortunately, not recognising or understanding a benefit, does not mean that the benefit is non-existent.
    What a desperate , lame response

    1 - as pointed out even under the full Norway T&C's (which we wouldn't sign up to anyway) we would be financially better off
    2 - Norway has signed up to pretty much everything that the EU has to offer, something that the UK has already said we wouldn't do

    We already trade globally with the majority of our exports going outside the EU so complying with those other countries rules isn't an issue. If we export goods to the USA those goods have to meet US standards, so if we trade goods with the EU once were outside then those goods will have to meet EU standards. So whats different than what we have now ?

    Harmonising rules doesn't always make them better, in fact if anything they end up with something that's half baked in an attempt to try and satisfy everyone. The EU is a mess, always has been and always will be. Leadership by committee has not and never will work and neither does a "1 size fits all" model. The more you try to force integration the more problems you create, particularly with the extreems of inequality that exists across the EU.
    The weaker states will never be brought up to the same level as the likes of Germany and the UK meaning either the strong have to be brought down to create equality or there will always be a huge gulf between them socially and economically. Adding more weak countries to the bloc will just exacerbate the problem further.

    A united Europe was a nice idea borne out of a desire to end armed conflict in Europe, but that need has long since gone and the federalists are just clinging to an out-dated ideology, blindly pushing ahead to the hallowed ground of a united Europe that nobody outside Brussels even wants.

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    Quote Originally Posted by fishy3005 View Post
    Lets all just calm down and play Pokemon go
    We can't. UK voted out of playing pokemon because the people in deprived areas couldn't enjoy it too.

    Shame. Good game.

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    Well there's a surprise, another one of the so called 'experts' that told us Brexit would ruin the country is completely wrong !
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ny-France.html

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    The Daily Mail? Wow, that's the place to go for the truth. One the the publications that told the mugs to vote Leave along with the Sun. Just like the 92 GE with 'It's the Sun Wot Won It'

    Good to see that people are still buying the lies over 20 years later. The Mail, Express and Sun just tell you what they want in order to keep the Establishment in power

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    Quote Originally Posted by retro74 View Post
    The Daily Mail? Wow, that's the place to go for the truth. One the the publications that told the mugs to vote Leave along with the Sun. Just like the 92 GE with 'It's the Sun Wot Won It'

    Good to see that people are still buying the lies over 20 years later. The Mail, Express and Sun just tell you what they want in order to keep the Establishment in power
    The Mail might be a right wing rag but it still doesn't change the fact that the IMF stated quite clearly before the referendum that if we voted to leave the EU then we would almost immediately enter a recession.
    Now a month after the vote they're saying well actually we were completely wrong (again) and the UK economy is going to continue to grow, and grow faster than the rest of the EU

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    Quote Originally Posted by Saint Toppy View Post
    Well there's a surprise, another one of the so called 'experts' that told us Brexit would ruin the country is completely wrong !
    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ny-France.html
    Sure about that?

    First meaningful data on actual post-referendum economic performance suggests otherwise

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-36864273

    This is an actual well-respected survey of individual businesses and their order books/business activity so not the IMF or other forecasts that have been debunked as scaremongering by the Brexiteers.

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