EU referendum/Brexit discussion - Part 2

[CWARD]

4 minutes ago, Ryeman said:

Apparently Russian defence aircraft penetrated Swedish airspace recently and subsequently they seem to be seeking greater protection under the NATO umbrella by way of full membership.

http://www.business-standard.com/article/news-ians/sweden-to-send-war-pamphlet-to-4-8-mn-households-118052200439_1.html

 

Relevance to the EU and Brexit?

[Ryeman]

1 minute ago, CWARD said:

 

Relevance to the EU and Brexit?

Well, at a time when Europe needs to understand the threat Russia poses, I would have thought watering down one’s alliances was a bit counterintuitive.

Putin has no clear exit strategy come the next election and he knows time will run out for him and his corrupt cronies.

[CWARD]

Didn’t know we were exiting NATO as one of the few members that still contributes 2% gdp. Also a member of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, which no other EU state is. Their isn’t even an EU intelligence agency due to the massively varied standards, leaks and distrust.  The sharing of intelligence is mutually beneficial, most of it is done by bilateral agreements and nothing to do with the EU or it’s agencies. 

[Ryeman]

24 minutes ago, CWARD said:

Didn’t know we were exiting NATO as one of the few members that still contributes 2% gdp. Also a member of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance, which no other EU state is. Their isn’t even an EU intelligence agency due to the massively varied standards, leaks and distrust.  The sharing of intelligence is mutually beneficial, most of it is done by bilateral agreements and nothing to do with the EU or it’s agencies. 

It’s a process that has a beginning......

[CWARD]

I thought you may have given a worthy response, better luck next time. 

Luckily the intelligence agencies of the world over know the importance of sharing with like minded states. 

If the EU were in charge of intelligence they would be sat in their own bubble reacting, after much debate, to events rather than stopping them.  The individual states and their intelligence agencies know better about cooperation. 

[Ryeman]

When you’ve undermined the intelligence and will of the general public the official agencies are undermined.

Trump is currently undermining his.

Exposing your humint in a desperate attempt to defend your indefensible behaviour is one method.

Putin sees the re-establishment of the USSR as a strategy.

Clinton understood it and now it’s popular to believe she was worthy of being locked up.......really?.

[CWARD]

16 minutes ago, Ryeman said:

When you’ve undermined the intelligence and will of the general public the official agencies are undermined.

Trump is currently undermining his.

Exposing your humint in a desperate attempt to defend your indefensible behaviour is one method.

Putin sees the re-establishment of the USSR as a strategy.

Clinton understood it and now it’s popular to believe she was worthy of being locked up.......really?.

 

Are you in the wrong thread? None of what you’ve written is applicable to your initial post or this thread on the EU Referendum and now Brexit. 

If you mentioned French Foreign intelligence sinking the Rainbow Warrior or Mossad assassinations post Munich Olympic Games it may have had more relevance. Trumps undermining his FBI has none. 

 

Edited 22 May, 2018 by CWARD

[Ryeman]

1 minute ago, CWARD said:

 

Are you in the wrong thread? None of what you’ve written is applicable to your initial post or this thread on the EU Referendum and now Brexit. 

If you mentioned French Foreign intelligence sinking the Rainbow Warrior or Mossad assassinations post Munich Olympic Games it may have had more relevance. Trumps undermining his FBI has none. 

 

Well as I said before you need to have an idea of what the consequences of wanting to be truly British might end up being a less desirable one.

Was it to save money?.

Keep ‘foreigners’ out?.

Trade selectively?.

What is the vision and when will you know you’ve achieved it.......the 51.8% that is?.

[Ootohere]

The UK is 4 Nations with Nuclear missiles.   Just waiting for The Donald to start talking about the UK's deal / PCP.

No doubt he has been hatching some cunning stunt for an increase in the Monthly Payments.

Time actually that the UK was talking about the USA paying to have the UK help defend the Country of the Free.

Edited 22 May, 2018 by Offski

[CWARD]

Please do tell me what Brexit has to do with NATO and Norway as your doing a poor job of it so far?

 

FYI. I believe in EU single market but not in a federal Europe , which is were it is heading. 

[Ootohere]

The Donald is doing very very good at driving up Oil Prices.

Great idea from him to have the US's rich overseas customers buying more 'Defence Equipment' from his buddies as they are bringing in more readies.

 

'What is the worst that can happen?'

[Ryeman]

1 minute ago, CWARD said:

Please do tell me what Brexit has to do with NATO and Norway as your doing a poor job of it so far?

 

FYI. I believe in EU single market but not in a federal Europe , which is were it is heading. 

Excuse me for simply expanding on the subject to include all aspects of what seems to me to be a dubious desire for a return to the past.

Brexit is ultimately an undermining of trust within the alliance.  Actions are what really matter, talk is cheap.

[CWARD]

I’ve never voted to go back to the past and only Corbynites seem to want any since such notion. 

 

Next month it will be 13 years since Tony Blair addressed the European Parliament.  Much of what warned against has come true. He was jeered by many after his speech, whilst others labelled him as anti-Europe.

Only after Brexit has the EU started to make noises about reforms with more democracy in the form of voting for a European President (to replace the various other EU presidents) to mimic the USA but only from candidates the EU puts forward.  This was from Junker himself who then promotes his own aide, Martin Selmayr, into the top position of the EU civil service. Hardly promotes the trust you speak of. 

 

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-eu-commission-selmayr/eu-lawmakers-roast-juncker-over-stitch-up-promotion-of-aide-idUKKCN1GO2K1

 

 

Edited 22 May, 2018 by CWARD

[lol-lol]

Anyways, back to BREXIT..

 

(Did we vote for this?  Is it a bi-product that many anticipated ?)   

Nice picture of the Canadian (wish I got my citizenship when I was living over there but at least I have Ireland as an alternate passport)

How much further worse off will the "average" UK citizen be when BREXIT actually happens?  I reckon more like £3k.  Worth a sweepstake ?

 

========================================================================================================================

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-22/brexit-has-left-households-900-pounds-worse-off-carney-says

 

Economics    Brexit Has Left Households 900 Pounds Worse Off, Carney Says

By   Jill Ward   May 22, 2018, 11:26 AM GMT+1 Updated on May 22, 2018, 12:58 PM GMT+1

• Accelerating inflation, weak investment hit U.K. incomes
• Weak productivity, stagnant wage growth are also factors

Mark Carney

 Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg

British households are about 900 pounds ($1,212) worse off than they would have been without Brexit, Bank of England Governor Mark Carney said.

 

Speaking to lawmakers on the Treasury Committee Tuesday, Carney said that compared to the bank’s forecasts made in May 2016 -- which were based on the U.K. voting to stay in the European Union -- economic output is more than 1 percent below where officials had expected. That “was predicated on a relatively weak European and global economy,” Carney said, an assumption that has also not panned out in recent years.

 

Taking the better-than-expected world growth since then, the economy is up to 2 percent worse off than officials could have expected, the governor said. That’s a 900-pound difference when translated into household incomes, “which is a lot of money.

 

“There are Brexit effects that come through,” he said, citing inflation driven by the pound’s decline after the referendum vote alongside sluggish wages. The U.K.’s poor productivity performance is also a factor, he said, as well as weak investment spending.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond hit back when challenged about the comments in Parliament, saying it is too early to make an assessment.

“On the question of future trajectory of household incomes, that will depend in part on the quality of the deal that we negotiate as we exit the European Union and we are focused on getting the very best deal for British jobs, for British prosperity for British businesses,” he said.

Edited 22 May, 2018 by lol-lol

[S00perb]

 

[domhnall]

22 hours ago, S00perb said:

 

 

it's a fair question he asks - Farage and all the others were peddling the Norway line, almost the next day that all stopped and they revealed their current madness

 

[@Lee]

 

 

[@Lee]

I haven't asked this in a while but as I've yet to receive an answer;
How will Brexit benefit Britain? 

[Bignij]

34 minutes ago, Lee01 said:

I haven't asked this in a while but as I've yet to receive an answer;
How will Brexit benefit Britain? 

It won’t. And it’s certainly not doing your blood pressure any good either.

[Ryeman]

So who does own EasyJet -

http://m.atwonline.com/aeropolitics/easyjet-confirmed-uk-airline-despite-eu-ownership?NL=ATW-04&sfvc4enews=42&cl=article_4&utm_rid=CPEN1000000426856&utm_campaign=14991&utm_medium=email&elq2=898c2efcb33c44c7ab16a2613e05e44a

 

Really?.

[lol-lol]

11 hours ago, Lee01 said:

I haven't asked this in a while but as I've yet to receive an answer;   How will Brexit benefit Britain? 

 

If one differentiates between

1. Government,
2. Standard citizen/worker/shopper
3.  Person who works in a company who exports mainly outside the EU
4. Person who works in customs procedures 

The affects are different.

1. Government failed to balance the books in 8 years so an extra £10-20 billion a year in imports revenue.  This week's ONS figgures showing UK borrowed over £40B extra, UK debt now nearly £1,800 B.
2. Will be paying more for European goods Autos, food etc ie the £10-20 billion mentioned per year above made of customs procedures costs, duties and VAT.  Weaker pound affect as we have seen.
3. Weaker pound can boost their trade.  Good for that exporting company, might be good for the exporting company workers if the benefit is shared
4. Customs procedures implementation and operation looks like it will create over 10,000 new jobs and  of revenue about 3 billion for those companies.     

[domhnall]

11 hours ago, Ryeman said:

So who does own EasyJet -

http://m.atwonline.com/aeropolitics/easyjet-confirmed-uk-airline-despite-eu-ownership?NL=ATW-04&sfvc4enews=42&cl=article_4&utm_rid=CPEN1000000426856&utm_campaign=14991&utm_medium=email&elq2=898c2efcb33c44c7ab16a2613e05e44a

 

Really?.

 

every EasyJet flight I have been on recently has been operated either by the Austrian subsidiary or Easyjet Gmbh (the German one), haven't been on a British EasyJet in over 6 months (and I am on two of their flights each week)

 

 

[domhnall]

17 hours ago, Lee01 said:

I haven't asked this in a while but as I've yet to receive an answer;
How will Brexit benefit Britain? 

 

it might finally get shot of Scotland.....

 

this from the Herald this week

 

EVERYONE is either talking independence this week, or trying not to talk about it.

On Friday, Nicola Sturgeon will finally deliver the SNP’s long-awaited Growth Commission blueprint for independence 2.0. The Scottish Tory leader, Ruth Davidson, tried to upstage it in a speech at the liberal Tory think tank, Onward, in which she supported the Union, but conceded that the highly-centralised London-centric version, is no longer “fit for purpose”. This is not an issue that will go away, as the former Labour Chancellor, Alistair Darling hopes. There will be another referendum in his lifetime, and here’s why.

Scotland cannot be content as a declining region of the over-centralised BrexitBritain that Remainer Ruth Davidson described, inadvertently echoing much of the SNP’s case. The UK Tory attempt to revisit the British Empire in “Global Britain” is not a project that will involve Scotland, emotionally, morally or economically, as the original empire arguably did. This is not a partnership of equals, even in theory.

 

Nor is it the caring-sharing UK that Gordon Brown promised would be the reward for a No vote in 2014 – a new, federal Union committed to social welfare. It will be a centralised, deregulated, free-market Britain, which will seek to overcome the economic self-harm of Brexit by trying to undercut our European neighbours through social cost-cutting, tariff wars and currency manipulation. Britain is raising the drawbridge against the very immigrants who help keep the economy buoyant and society diverse.

 

I am not a member of the SNP, or a nationalist, but there is no doubt in my mind now that Scotland should be an independent country in Europe. Federalism might have been an enlightened alternative to independence, but I’ve been writing about it for more than 20 years and it is less likely now than ever. Labour picks it up every so often, and Richard Leonard claims to be an enthusiast, but there’s no demand for it south of the Border, and you can’t have federalism in one country. Moreover, Brexit Britain is about restoring the unitary British state, which is why the autonomy of the Scottish Parliament is being curbed.

Nations exist for a reason: they are geographical entities, with common culture and social norms, which have been shaped by history and economic circumstances. It is the natural condition of nations to govern themselves, and really we can’t expect others to govern for us. That just leads to the paternalism and dependency of the Barnett Formula. Scotland’s endemic slow growth cannot be addressed by remaining tied to London. Only when the key decisions are taken in Scotland will it be able to progress like other European small nations, and remain an open society.

 

This has nothing to do with “identity politics”, as the Tory Environment Secretary, Michael Gove, claimed at the Policy Exchange conference, suggesting that independence was all about tartan racism. This was richly ironic in the wake of Windrush, which revealed endemic racism at the heart of the supposedly “warm home” of the British state. Mr Gove was one of the leading figures in the Brexit campaign which was the epitome of a narrow nationalist project that sought to limit immigration and diversity. Scotland is an open, European nation and wishes to remain so; it is Mr Gove’s Brexit Britain that is obsessed with borders and cutting off from the rest of the world.

Membership of the European Union allows nations to be self-governing without borders, without protectionism, without punitive immigration controls and without nationalism. The selfish, militant and often racist nationalism of the 20th Century has largely been extinguished. It is Brexit that has revived it in the UK. Independence in Europe is the only option that makes sense for a small country like Scotland.

In recent years I’ve explored the diverse small countries of Europe, from Denmark on the North Sea to Slovenia on the Adriatic; from high-tax Norway to low-tax Slovakia. They’ve all been successful in their own ways because they make their own way. Being small works well in borderless Europe. Big is not better.

 

The EU (European Economic Area in the case of Norway) is a unique set of institutions that provides stable trading relations, and open markets while guaranteeing national security. Small countries don’t have to be concerned about the things that used to make them vulnerable: tariffs, currency wars, military alliances and imperialism. Instead they can get on with business. Yes, the big decisions tend to be made by the Brussels machine, and this can sometimes be hard for countries with acute difficulties like Greece. But no small country has ever sought to leave the EU.

Look at minuscule Slovenia, which was successively occupied last century by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Nazi Germany, Italy and the Communist Warsaw Pact. You can understand why they love the EU and the euro. They don’t need to worry any more about big neighbours with bad intentions. They can carry on with what small, homogeneous countries do rather well, which is innovate and experiment. Tiny Estonia hadn’t a bean when it was liberated from communism 25 years ago, so it turned itself into the leading digital nation on the planet, offering “e-residency” to anyone, anywhere. When land-locked Slovakia fell out of Czechoslovakia after the Velvet Divorce, it had little except mountains and trees. It has been one of the fastest growing countries in the EU ever since.

 

Scotland can’t look to London to solve its problems – it’s just not going to happen. Countries have to make their own decisions, make their own mistakes. An independence referendum may be off the agenda right now, but Unionists should not delude themselves that because Scottish voters are scunnered with referendums, that means they are content with the Union.

They are not, and as the reality of Brexit becomes clearer over the next couple of years, Scotland will have to look seriously at its options. The spirit of 2014 has not gone away. Voters are biding their time till they see what Brexit brings, but unless Britain finds a way back into Europe, Scotland will find a way out of the UK.

 

 

[@Lee]

Good luck to Scotland if it happens. Being half Scot I should be entitled to reside there.

[S00perb]

21 hours ago, Lee01 said:

I haven't asked this in a while but as I've yet to receive an answer;
How will Brexit benefit Britain? 

 

It won't and they just can't answer