I don't know what point you're trying to make. If that's true, that would have happened with or without Brexit.
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I don't know what point you're trying to make. If that's true, that would have happened with or without Brexit.
The point I am making is hardly a new one; the whole idea of the UK being a sovereign nation making its own choices freely is a joke. As is the idea that the UK is an equal party to the EU.Quote:
Originally Posted by Steely Glint
Your compatriot doesn't stop blabbering about the UK being sovereign and an equal partner.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-37396805
Remember how everyone mocks the EU's ability to get anything done? Kind of ironic that Rand expects it to come together to reach an agreement with the UK. It's looking increasingly likely that there will be no agreement. :noob:
Actually, both members and EU institutions are pretty much of the same mind about this; no special deals, no cherry picking. Very often the actual words used for what the UK can expect from the EU side are identical coming from Brussels and other capitals. The Visegrad is merely a reminder that these countries have even less on an incentive to allow the UK access to the entire internal markets on the basis of some bespoke deal that allows them to curtail free movement of labour.Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
To be honest, it wouldn't even surprise me if the end result is that the UK doesn't get more control over its borders but less.
My point is that different countries want different things from the agreement, and there's no way in hell Britain can agree to even most of those things without paying a huge domestic political cost.
That's true too of course; reason why I said that what May thinks the future relationship with the EU should be is less relevant to the outcome than what J. Muscat (PM of Malta) thinks about the same subject.Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
If that happens it will be a real shame but we can live with that. However it's interesting that while the most fervent Europhiles are suggesting that the requirement will be continued free movement, that the threat to veto merely reflects an opening position demand that all citizens living in the UK at the time of the vote get their rights maintained. Quite frankly there is no doubt that will happen anyway, everyone from all sides of the debate in the UK has said that should happen and the only condition that has been suggested is that the agreement rightly must be reciprocal and any Brits living overseas in the EU get their rights maintained too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
Unless someone wants to have a one-way agreement which would be beyond moronic, there is no way the UK won't agree to what the Visegrad group are demanding.
If he was demanding that continued unlimited and unrestricted free movement is the precondition of any future deal then that would be a much bigger roadblock.
Yes but the future relationship of the UK with the 91% of the globe that isn't in your union will now be in our hands to negotiate rather than held over a barrel of whatever Muscat thinks. That is progress.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hazir
You somehow kind of missed the bind Switzerland currently is in. Oh well, keep on the horse blinders and only see what you want to see.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
Well Switzerland is showing what taking back control means; if things really spin out of control they ask to be allowed to ask the EU for consent. And they have binding referenda.Quote:
Originally Posted by Khendraja'aro
Yes I have. The Swiss have the best of all world's and a GDP per capita more than double ours. If we could be more like the Swiss I'd be quite content.Quote:
Originally Posted by Khendraja'aro
Plus they have like the world's best chocolate. Some bind.
Funny that you would call what amounts to membership without voting rights and some other limitations thrown in for good measure, the best of both worlds.
Also it is a well known fact that Belgian chocolate is better.
Membership without having to implement the vast bulk of rules and an ability to fudge about for years is pretty good yes. Which is why the Swiss are increasingly happy with what they've arranged and in no hurry whatsoever to switch their positive arrangements for the arrangements of the ever more unhappy members of the club.
Belgian chocolate isn't bad but it's no Toblerone.
I seriously from which universe you get your information.
Great chocolate isn't bad but it's no mediocre chocolate.
Are you pulling a CGT ?Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
I'm saying that Belgian chocolate is great and that Toblerone is mediocre.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hazir
I figured that out. I couldn't figure out why you said it.
At least we now know where Rand gets his news from: https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/779059904036438017
Yeah, so many jobs in the EU depend on exports to the UK that we must give them a good deal. These people still don't understand how these things work. Even if their numbers would be true, which they probably aren't. Or at least not in any meaningful way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
And it's always a one-way dependence, one that Britain wins from. :bored:
I've never read that rag.Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
Yet you totally agree with it, so that's interesting.
Even a broken clock ...
...is right more frequently than the Express?Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
It may be true for a broken clock, but FM Johnson gets it wrong so often that even ministers have started making jokes about his imbecile statements about Brexit.
https://www.ft.com/content/3b1a3c3e-...0-8ec15fb462f4
Not convinced that the Brexit leaders are any smarter than the average Daily Express reader.
Seems like the big US banks Theresa May tried to placate have now told her that they are even willing to pre-emptively move business out of London if she can't give clarity over the outcome of the Brexit talks. That puts her a bit in a bind of course, because unless she's going to give in and do a Norway, she's not in control over that outcome.
Project Reality goes on .
No FT subscription, care to offer a summary?Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
The Bullingdon Buffoon that goes by the title of Secretary of state for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, made some silly remark that thinking movement is an intrinsic element of the single market was baloney. When confronted with this statement Schäuble and Macon first looked at eachother. Then Schäuble answered that he usually respects foreign ministers, but that if that wasn't sufficient answer, he could send the Buffoon a copy of the TEU and he'd even be willing to travel to London to explain it. Macon added to that, that a good paté actually needs all its ingredients.
Discuss; do you think Schäuble respects the Buffoon?
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articl...sh-on-eu-rulesQuote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
So because Schauble repeats some baloney that makes Johnson wrong?
Had Johnson been talking about membership of the Single Market then yes of course it would be indivisible, but Johnson wasn't talking about membership he was talking about access so it is complete baloney :rolleyes:. That's like saying that Muirfield golf club, which requires members to have a penis but allows golfers without a penis access to play as non-members ... insists on a penis for all golfers who want to play on the grounds because that is part of the membership requirements.
Unless access is restricted to members only then rules that apply to members only are not rules for access. Johnson is right and Schauble is wrong in trying and failing to merge the two. Just like if TTIP ever got agreed it wouldn't have included free movement between the EU and USA.
If the TTIP is anything like CETA it doesn't amount to complete access to the Single Market.
But they would have access with zero free movement rights. I would have been quite happy to have Single Market membership via the EEA but that doesn't look like what the government is going for and they're seeking Single Market "access" and that does not entail free movement. Schauble is talking out of his arsehole conflating membership rules and access.
TTIP is a comprehensive trade agreement. It does not create a single market.
You guys (bleary-eyed Brexiteers) seriously don't even have a comprehension of the most basic things you're talking about. You don't know what article 50 entails, you don't have a clue about the future relationship you can have with Europe, you don't understand the functioning of the WTO and worst of all, you think that there is a 'world outside' that is going to strike deals with you before you have dealt with the first three.
At this point I'm not sure you actually know what you're talking about.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
The EU's principle for giving access to the single market--and, indeed, even for making trade agreements--has been to condition degree of access on degree of compliance with the EU's principles and regulations. The TTIP makes many concessions, but they are conditional. The TTIP was at least at one point intended to guarantee the freedom of movement of corporations' managers and other employees. The UK does not have the negotiating clout of the US, and you currently enjoy even less goodwill. Any restrictions you place on the four freedoms will come with a commensurate restriction of your level of access to the single market in addition to delaying negotiations, to the point of completely sabotaging them.
If we leave the Single Market it won't be to create or join a Single Market. So why would a trade deal be to create one?Quote:
Originally Posted by Hazir
Johnson is suggesting we have free trade between the Single Market and the UK, from outside. He is not suggesting we be a member of the Single Market.
Not sure why you think that negates a single thing I wrote. Of course there will be negotiations and of course the opening positions of the two parties won't start the same.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aimless
Ultimately I hope and expect a reasonable compromise to be reached. The notion that compromise is forbidden by Lisbon is bullshit though. Whether there is a willingness to reach a compromise is entirely different.
WTF. You got every single thing about this arse-backwards wrong. You seem to think that "access" and "membership" are two different things.Quote:
Originally Posted by RandBlade
They. Are. Not.
You obviously completely and utterly ignore such countries as Norway and Switzerland.
In short, you currently want to have your cake and eat it, too. Geeze, man. Your brain is obviously completely shutdown.
And there will be NO compromise regarding free movement. Because a) Switzerland and Norway won't allow it, b) several member countries won't allow it (and they do have Veto rights) and c) you must be daft to think that one of the founding pillars of the EU is open to compromise.
Norway is a member of the Single Market, as such it is required to follow all rules of the Single Market including the four freedoms.
Switzerland is not a member of the Single Market, it has access to the single market based on all trade agreements it has signed with the EU (which includes free movement because they agreed to it).
There is no membership of the single market. Full stop. The EU has members as does EFTA. The EU members have full access to the single market. All others have limited access to the single market either on the basis of the agreement that established the EEA or in the case of Switzerland the so-called bilaterals. Once you are no longer a member of the EU you drop out of the entire structure.
Your ability to negotiate any deals will be severely limited by the fact that countries won't or cannot negotiate with you for as long as at least your WTO standing has been sorted out. Your WTO standing won't be sorted out until you have disentangled yourself from the EU and EEA.
When Obama said you were at the back of the queue he wasn't giving an opinion, he was laying out the legal situation that would be brought about by Brexit.
You bleary-eyed Brexiteers make auto-dafe look like a reasoned act.