You're bemoaning Boris Johnson for being tactful? Interesting ...Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
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You're bemoaning Boris Johnson for being tactful? Interesting ...Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
Tactful = literally letting Russia get away with murder? What happened to your sovereignty obsession?
I don't think Russia should get away with murder and if there is evidence that a death four years ago was murder we should sanction Russia. That would be for the PM to lead on. Considering BJ was getting criticised for his lack of tact in the past when he was appointed, the critique in that article is bemusing.
Should? The reality is you let it go. Which is very different to what happened in the earlier case.
What the hell does tact have to do with not seeking to punish a country that kills people on your territory?
The death was in 2012 and the government's decision was made in 2013, though there is campaigning about it now that does not mean the government's changed policy due to Brexit :rolleyes:
The Chinese nuclear plant though...
Oh, all trade with the UK makes for 4% of the GDP of the EU. So in the unlikely case that all disappears, I think we will still be able to cope. The UK on the other hand depends for 12% of its GDP on trade with the 27.
You may find it hard to believe, but we really really really need you less than you need us. And you'll know that in the negotiations by the simple fact that you, as a non-member, can no longer leverage us into giving you a special treatment.
Hinckley Point C is something that is well over a decade in the making with billions spent on it already. Had Brexit been voted down there is zero down that Cameron and Osborne would have approved HPC, so it was only getting reviewed as we had a new PM. Realistically it was too far down the road to cancel and aside from the strike price (which market developments in recent years means it looks too expensive) the underpinning need for more nuclear is still there.
We didn't get very special treatment as members anyway, so better to be looking after our own interests than having people who don't have them at heart fully responsible for them.
Nice rationalization of the fact that you're building a nuclear power plant because the Chinese won't let you get away with not building it.
As for 'not getting a special treatment': the slew of opt-ins and opt-outs you got are a vivid reminder of how appeasing the eurosceptics never works.
We are going ahead with a plant we committed to years ago. To pull out now would lead to a court case that could see us owing EDF billions.
The slew of opt outs is because you guys were never happy and always wanted More Europe again and again rather than getting the status quo to work. We never got an opt out of the status quo ante. So it's all your responsibility not ours.
That is why you now have an unwieldy, unhappy behemoth. Maybe if you'd listened to our sage advice you wouldn't have such a faulty structure.
A nuclear plant you didn't want any longer and rightly so is being built because the Chinese forced you to. You can talk till hell freezes over but that is the reality
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: