UKC

...A small price to pay for the privilege of having a blue passport.

That's what HMRC think the government's 'favoured' option will cost businesses, year in, year out. 

Can't we just wrap up this joke, it was fun while it lasted, and get back to reality and common sense?

Yes.

No options. Just leave.

Yes but who’s going to pay for it? Will you chip in for my share?

You really haven't thought that through, have you?

That seems a lot of money given how much total trade with the EU amounts to.

How much does it amount to?

About 240 billion.

As somebody who manufactures in the uk and exports 90% I despair of the level of stupid and ignorant comments that come from Brexit supporters. TBH I just throw my hand in the air and say you know f**k all about the subject, so give it a rest. 

240 billion what?  Bananas?

No that sounds about right. It's due the the drop in economic growth we are experiencing. That's far more significant than the cost of contributing to the EU. In fact I think that's probably tax revenue and total loss would thus be about £50 billion per year. But hey, we get our country back.

If you have a spreadsheet on your pc you can do the sums yourself, they're very straightforward. Email me if you want copy of the one did.

Well that was informative. Thanks for pointing out the bits of my statement that were ignorant and stupid, you did do that didn't you?

How much will it cost then ?

Yes, bananas.

HMRC says it's £20 billion a year just in admin costs.

None of them have. 

No. 

Don't go bringing facts into this

Ah, profuse apologies. I foolishly brought rational thought and consideration of the evidence into a Brexit debate. Silly me.

You're on dangerous ground if you are suggesting that the votes of 'the less well educated/informed' shouldn't count as much as, say, your own vote.

How are you proposing to organize this?

I dunno. Any ideas? The ancient Greeks recognised that true democracy was impossible unless citizens were well informed. Incidentally, it wasn’t me saying that Brexit voters were not well educated/informed but the Daily Telegraph. 

I am content that everybody has an equally weighted vote, should they choose to exercise it.

You raised the subject here; I was assuming you were making some point.

Scrap Brexit and channel all the money saved into education and solving the social problems that led to the protest vote in the referendum.

Only the obvious point that my life/standard of living is going to be fxcked up by knobheads who know nowt. Did I really say that? Profuse apologies again.

The true knobhead is one who cannot accept a democratic vote....

Do you dispute that? If so on what grounds?

jk

...or recognise that democracy is a process not an event.

jk

A winning vote by a margin that the Brexiteers said they wouldn't accept if it went against them.

 

Read this Jim... https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/28/world/europe/uk-austerity-poverty.html

Dambisa Moyo - a respected economist - has just written a book on just that - Edge of Chaos.  Proposing voters be split into 3 tiers depending on their level of education.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dambisa_Moyo

Surely level of education is a problematic measure because it doesn't take into account societal inequalities that feed into creating those different levels - edited to add that I'd be interested to know more, as I imagine this must have been taken into account. 

If that's what I think it is, it's bollocks.
They are plenty of people who have degrees coming out of their ears and haven't got a clue.
And there are plenty of people with next to no qualifications who are very well informed.

No. There are plenty of non-financial reasons for saying it's a disastrous idea. Discussed at length elsewhere so I won't try and recap.

I would consider that if anyone knew what they were voting for and what the Brexit deal actually is. See the Irish 8th Amendment referendum for how to present referendum alternatives properly.

I haven't actually read it yet. 

It has had quite a 'measured' critical response, although her underlying premise - voters don't understand enough about long term economics and geopolitics to be able make a meaningful vote seems to be well received, whilst her solution is not so well thought out.

She is also the author of Dead Aid - proposing that developed countries shouldn't give aid to developing countries as it is counter intuitively unhelpful - which was similarly controversial but actually broadly well received.

I like the Australian system where everyone is required to vote.  We get too many distorted outcomes because the less well educated and most disadvantaged too often don't vote and as such all sorts of laws will be inevitably be distorted slightly against them ... and slightly towards well educated voters (retired middle class brits have done remarkably well on average in a country that is really struggling). Why do so many people forget that intelligence and educational attainment are not the same thing. Oh and stuff philosophers who want to pigeon hole people or do imposible things like band intelligence.

Spot on.

I think there's merit in that.

But a huge part of the problem has to be the media. The Brexit campaign was founded basically on a tissue of lies - from straight bananas to £350 million a week for the NHS. Not only did the media accept these uncritically, they amplified the claims endlessly while burying or denigrating any opposing arguments. It really wasn't a level playing field, and people really weren't given the opportunity to make an informed choice.

The remain campaign, trying to convince people that things like employment and environment legislation only exist because of the eu, when several countries had it long before the eu and in a more stringent format(still do).

There were lies and dodgy campaigning on both sides. 

'The remain campaign, trying to convince people that things like employment and environment legislation only exist because of the eu, '

A single example of a remainer arguing that point would be great - just one will do. 

I think we need some better independant public funded fact checking and adjudication  of all sides and with an improved investigative arm for modern forms of communication. The Brexit campaign was worse that the Remain campaign in the media but the biggest abuses were probably the Remain fake news on Facebook that arose from Cambridge Analytica work and the influence of the Russians. Democracy cannot exist fairly under such dirty tricks. Sadly although we know it happened we have no clear idea of the extent of it or its influence.

It was in the press, the union leaders were pushing the employment stuff while Labour fence sat. The green party and various ngos mentioned the environmental risks. 

(having only read a revie3w of the book) in fairness to Dambisa Moyo the voting proposal is only one of ten proposals which also cover campaign finance and other reforms. One of her other ideas is to require people to take a civics test before voting. 

That said, giving people "supervotes" because they have advanced degrees strikes me as a monstruous idea. First, as Moyo herself identifies, the problem with the poor and uneducated isn;t that they vote "badly" its that they vote in far fewer numbers than rich middle class people. Giving rich middle class people extra votes seems to compound the problem. Second, in a democracy voting achieves two things - it makes decisions and generates legitimacy. Giving people extra votes may (or may not) improve the quality of decision making; it will certainly reduce the legitimacy of the process. Third, I don't know of any evidence to suggest that "bad" voter decisions are any more the result of poor, uneducated people voting stupidly than it is of rich, well-educated people voting stupidly.  Have political decisions got noticably worse since the franchise was extended beyond property-holders? Hard to say but my guess is probably not. 

I think we get hung up too much on elections as the only vehicle for participation in government. I am increasingly pursuaded that we should be looking to add to elections with other ways of involving the people in decision-making. The problem with elections - and even more so with referendums - is you're asked to make a one-off decision about a complex topic which you then forget about for four years. 

The referendum campaign was miserable - on both sides - and I have no desire to rerun it here.

But for the 'remain' side, since you're asking: Osborne's threat of an immediate 'emergency budget' was a patent bogeyman; Alan Johnson's claim that ‘Two thirds of British jobs in manufacturing are dependent on demand from Europe’ was simply and completely wrong (see e.g. https://fullfact.org/europe/manufacturing-jobs-and-eu/); etc.

The referendum was almost perfectly designed to generate lies. The truth was hard and time-consuming to fathom - if it even existed. There was little to no downside from lying as you'd only be found out after your side had "won". And the upside to lying was enormous. 

I don’t know if that’s the true administration cost or not. I was using HMRC figures.

I was replying to a person who seemed to think that the £20 billion was the total cost.

"you have'nt thought that through"

None of them "think" that's the problem.

This is worth watching:

https://www.lbc.co.uk/radio/special-shows/ring-rees-mogg/van-driver-who-wen...

The issue with RM and his ilk is that they understand how money moves round. On physical goods they have absolutely no idea.No real world experience.

they need a good kick up the back side.

I quite liked Paul Sinha’s suggestion, although I suspect he wasn’t being entirely serious. “Everyone should be able to vote in a General Election and everyone should be about to vote in X Factor, nobody should be able to vote in both”.

Update, having listened to a lecture by Dambisa. The idea she is proposing is slightly different to the above. She suggests - more for single-issue referendums than presidential or party elections - to give extra weighting to people with relevant domain expertise. So a referendum on the NHS would give extra weight to the votes of doctors; one on education would give extra weight to the votes of teachers. This is a much less monstruous idea, which is apparently being considered by Switzerland (which has a lot of referendums) and Canada. I still see big problems in the implementation (can you imagine the arguments over whose votes should be weighted in the Brexit referendum? Or Scottish independence referendum? Or Irish abortion referendum...).

Interesting recent analysis by A. C. Grayling in Democracy and it’s Crises. Bang up to date including sections on Trump and Brexit!

That does sound like a more palatable idea, though on that basis we should be more confident about our politicians voting on political matters as 'subject experts'...

Can you imagine what it would be like after a century of only those deemed superior being allowed a vote or therefore carrying more weight.. It could be like the UK in the 1800s or the hunger games. The highly educated rich elite are unlikely to vote for any policy that would see their wealth, status or power eroded. 

^^^ my almost exact thoughts.
I, maybe deludedly, believe that we live in an equalitarian society, but 'selective' voting reeks of 'We're all equal, but some are more equal than others.' (To misquote)  Has she been reading Animal Farm recently?

Maybe our educated superiors should present an intelligible case for us thickies to persuade us to vote for their causes?  Severely lacking in a certain recent referendum!

What do you think about that figure? You seemed to be suspicious of it early in the tread suggesting it seemed high, not a fraction of the true cost as you now seem to accept.

That's 3 to 4x what we need to be spending to keep the NHS afloat and it's one cost of many resulting from the brexit that was supposed to be funding or NHS! Are you seriously still supporting this or are you starting to have doubts brexit may not be what you thought you were getting, that it might be far more painful than you'd accepted and deliver less that you'd hoped? It's going to ruin a lot of good businesses and people's lives and for what?

jk

Says you living in Europe's high-tax high-welfare exemplar where people do just that.

jk

Whereas being in the EU has brought Italy and Greece to their knees.

There have been plenty of articulate arguments made for and against modified versions of democracy including weighted voting. This thickie found and followed them well enough, I'm quite sure you could to if you spent more time reading and less time demanding spoon-feeding.

jk

Have you read it and, if so, would you care to summarize the arguments and conclusions?

Don't you have a BBC interview to attend or LBC radio phone in to host, Jacob?

Italy, the EU's 4rd biggest economy? Italy has some curious laws that have transferred the severe pain of bank failure onto individuals who invested through their savings rather than the taxpayer or institutional investors as happened elsewhere. I can see why that has caused a lot of pain and resentment but that's Italian law not EU and it's in response to the same pressures we've all experienced since 2008.

Being in the EU didn't bring Greece to it's knees, it never got up off them after war, dictatorship and corruption ground it down.

jk

Good answer. But it's not all roses in the EU.

Yes I’ve read it but can’t be arsed giving you a summary. Posted a longish review on Amazon - check it out, under Pete Trewin. Working from my iPad in the wilds of Wales so can’t provide links etc. Gesundheit.

To imply there is only one person that would advocate leaving without a deal does not make sense. Since when the majority voted Leave, there were no deals or options, They were voting to completely leave the EU.

Why they were voting was not clear. But they certainly knew what they were voting for and what that entailed.. Leave or Remain.

Fair enough.

There is a welter of such analyses appearing just now. One problem with the ones I have noted so far is that they seem merely a reaction to very recent events, such as the election of Trump. A longer view - back to the excesses which began to occur in the 80s - might be more instructive.

I find it difficult to take Grayling seriously on account of his 'New College of the Humanities.' The privatization and commodification of education; the privatization of *everything*; the big winners and big losers which all of those processes have created: perhaps we ought to examine those historical trends a bit more carefully if we seek to understand what's going wrong now.

I actually think that almost exactly the opposite should happen. There is a schism in British politics between the university-educated and the non-university educated. 90% of MPs has a university degree whereas just under 30% of the population has a degree (excluding under-16 year olds). That means, to a large extent, MPs are not representative of the electorate. Should they present an intelligible case for the thickies to vote for their causes? Or should we find new ways to include the "thickies" in poloitical decision making so that they are not supporting or rejecting someone else's idea, but that the policy proposal itself is developed jointly by the educated and the thickies? 

In Ireland, when they wanted to review a series of changes to the constitution, they commissioned an independent research organisation to create a sample of 66 members of the public who were representative of the population in terms of age, sex, place of birth and socio-economic status but otherwise chosen at random. They were joined by a group of 33 politicians. Together, the group met every weekend for a year and heard the input of both experts and members of the public. After a year of deliberation they put forward a series of policy proposals which were then voted on in parliament and eventually put to a referendum (I think the recent vote on abortion was one of the results of the exercise).  This strikes me as a much better, and more legitimate, way to gather the input of the people in the governing process. 

Some (or even most) leave voters might reasonably have assumed that there would be a deal by the time it came to leave.

One of the overarching problems is that we now how they voted, but not what they expected the outcomes to be. For instance, did you expect us to leave euratom?

Well said.

I'm sick to f***ing death by now of the attitude that we have to "respect" the vote and therefore leave (usually proposed by those pushing a specific and self-interested version of Brexit). We collectively did not know what we were voting for.

There are new warnings every bloody day from industry leaders about the consequences and job losses and loss of British competitiveness if we go through with even the least damaging form of Brexit.

It's bad enough that the voices of leaders of large corporations are ignored, because they're too "establishment". It's when SME owners point out that their companies and livelihoods face ruination, and the response is always "the people voted for this, and if you can't change your entire operation to avoid destruction, then f*** you and yours".

It's utterly disgusting how this sort of attitude has become regarded as honest, praiseworthy and decent, encouraged by people like Jacob Rees-Mogg and Isabel Oakeshott and various other less than savoury characters.

Unfortunately, it's a democratic right to be stupid, and I would resist any attempt to weight votes put to the electorate. However, it's also a democratic right to disagree with that stupidity, point it out and attempt to limit or even reverse it, and anyone pretending otherwise is seeking to subvert democracy.

*Deep breath*

Sorry, the utter madness of Brexit means I need to regularly rant or I'll go insane.

Who said it was. I'm just so sick of trite arguments like 'yeah but Greece and Italy!' being trotted out as if they're obviously compelling reasons for us to leave or evidence of the EU's evil. They're just not.

How do you feel about £20Bn/year in additional costs falling on British business as a result of the best case (best and already rejected!) brexit? That's £350M/week right there. Problem is it's not going to the NHS is it, it's being wasted in the very bureaucracy brexit was supposed to rid us of.

jk

Grayling takes the longer view! Going back to Plato/Aristotle. Like I said, interesting book, even if you disagree with his conclusions. Can’t think why you wouldn’t take him seriously in world in which Mogg/Gove/Boris and the rest of the traitorous crew are.

As I said: his 'New College of the Humanities.' One thing which I don't think will help our current ills is to set up more islands of private education accessible only to those with big money.

What they were voting for was on the ballot slip. What that entails is still far from clear.

What we do know is in the best case it's going to make us poorer, less secure and it's very likely to cost a lot of jobs, probably the sort of jobs your region depends on damaging the ecosystem you work within. We also know there are some severe and quite unexpected knock on impacts in the form of Euratom, Galileo, EMA etc that will cost us dearly, possibly in national security and actual lives shortened needlessly. Further we know what we won't be getting: any of what we were sold by Farage, Gove and their ilk. Indeed we'll be losing not gaining 'sovereignty' (your thing IIRC) or accepting economic ruin, straight choice. Ultimately business controls our government more directly than the electorate so we won't be accepting ruin, we'll be taking rules and paying fees for brexit in name only. That this ignominy and harm is self inflicted is tragic and pathetic in equal measure.

You've been mugged.

jk

I find this a very strange stance to take.

I'll qualify it by saying that I don't feel I was remotely qualified to make a decision on such a complex range of issues, and was incensed during the referendum that the responsibility of this decision had been passed to an electorate that was then treated with utter contempt by both sides.

But I recognised that a vote to leave would mean political and economic uncertainty and chaos. So I voted to remain.

Leave voters objectively could not have known what they were voting for, because it wasn't remotely defined. The choice between a hard or soft Brexit, which we are now disingenuously told is no choice at all because only one is actually a Brexit (not true), was completely ambiguous.

None of which to say that there aren't good reasons to be Eurosceptic, or that you might have concluded that any form of Brexit was preferable to remaining, or that you were happy to take the risk. They may have known what they were voting against, but what they voted for was a great big mystery box.

The other problem with the "I knew what I was voting for" is that you're basically saying that you understood completely the implications of Brexit, the balance of power, the difficulties of negotiating etc. etc. In other words, you knowingly voted for us to be in this situation right now, and knowingly voted for whatever final outcome, regardless of how shafted we get. And if you lose your job as a result, you knowingly voted for that too. You've thrown away any right to complain because you knew full well what you were voting for and you voted for it anyway.

It's completely understandable that people get defensive, but unfortunately it's completely irrational and self-defeating.

An attitude that I would respect more is "I thought I understood what I was voting for, but I was misled".

The only way I can see selective vote eligibility or vote weighting being workable is in electing members of a second chamber, which itself does not have legislating capability. Introducing such a thing for electing primary decision-makers would cause far more problems than it solved.

That is only your opinion and irrelevant. I think you will find almost none of this will happen.

None of that, that which includes both options: closely aligned or far removed, poor but 'free' and of course several things that have already happened. Get real FFS.

jk

It was precisely defined.

Leave or Remain.

How do you feel about the SM/CU?

Nice try at a wind-up. A bit easy to see through though, as nobody could be that thick.

Yet contrary to your ridiculous assertion our own government still have no idea what leave actually entails. How you knew when you voted for it what we don't know now two years on escapes me.

jk

I do think you are over-simplifying. The question was "Should the UK remain a member of the EU or leave the EU?"

Based on that you could vote to Leave the EU but wish to stay in the EEA or the Customs Union or remain subject to the ECJ. 

You are clutching at straws. Leaving the EU meant leaving EEA and customs union as a default.

It meant nothing of the sort though those were and are options, options with really big costs.

jk

Maybe that's what you think, but its strange how often Brexit advocates spoke of success outside the EU in terms of single market members Norway and Switzerland, rather than countries totally outside the single market; say Serbia and Albania

How so? Norway is a member of the EEA but not the EU. Turkey participates in the Customs Union but is not an EU member. They may be unpalatable options but they are still options and simply voting to leave the EU doesn't necessarily mean leaving those other institutions. 

It meant no such thing. Brexit, as defined by the question on the ballot paper, to leave the EU, encompasses a wide range of options for our future relationship with Europe, none of which was ruled out or selected, either explicitly or implicitly, during the referendum campaign.

?? Explain?

Everyone is allowed a vote, taxation hammers the high earner more than the low earners, the same with multiple property owners etc.. how does anything here compare to the notion that only the highly educated deserve a vote in the uk? 

Italy's pain started the day it joined the euro. It's accounting had what you might call a flexible approach.

Joining the euro didn't help.

This just isn't true. Tax evasion has been a problem in Italy long before the euro. in 2000, the year after the introduction of the euro, GDP grew by 3.7%. Unemployment dropped steadily from nearly 12% in 1999 to 6% in 2008.  

Of course, there are big problems in the Italian economy, but to tie them all to the Euro is incorrect. 

Of course. But they stretched things to meet the euro criteria. Brussels was happy with this. There currency was then effectively devalued the day they joined the euro. 

I thought the figure of £20 billion was high as it's something like 8% of our total trade with the EU.

I knew it was only part of the possible cost of leaving it was another poster who thought it was the total cost.

While the HMRC person quoted these figures they have been disputed by others with various figures for the admin cost being quoted dependent on the final customs deal being reached.

As some of the admin costs being mentioned are much lower than the £20 billion it would seem sensible to pursue such schemes and not use the most expensive one.

It should be noted that the EU would be subjected to similar costs and it is these avoiding these costs that might be the deciding factor in any customs deal.

There's always been a danger that the costs of Brexit would be high and the returns low but that's what can happen when the politicians are (supposedly) in charge.

My point is that clearly plenty of the comfortable and educated in Sweden vote for a safe, supportive tax funded system they may or may not be nett beneficiaries of, it's not just the poor and uneducated who elect your government.

jk

So you sort of believe it and think it's a big number maybe not really because it's all just opinions and there is someone willing to contradict HMRC? What if HMRC are right and we spend what we were promised we'd get back for the NHS, our gross (and apparently unjustifiably big!) contribution to the EU's budget escaping from the EU while remaining bound to it in many ways we no longer have control over for practical reasons. What if it's 2x or 5x or 10x that all told? Surely the point of leaving the EU is to achieve something, 'brexit means brexit' is bullshit, brexit does something. What does it do? And what are you willing to pay for that, what we pay today perhaps or more, what if it really is 10x what it costs to remain?

Short of remaining in the customs union (suits me if we must leave the EU) there will be big costs for business and taxpayer alike in the EU and the UK. Do you think we should stay in the Customs Union?

You are in charge, you as a well informed leave voter are in a tiny minority who have this country by the balls! You, not May, Johnson Gove or Rees-Mogg.... they're terrified of you, they're doing this for you, not for the group who will ever understand they're baying for their own ruin, not for the mob who realised that from the outset but the few who've heard both sides of the argument and have seen illusion collide with reality and realise the costs may totally outweigh what they stand to gain, that the well intentioned decision they made on available information will not pan out. You.

jk

Actually benefits are pretty harsh in sweden. Unemployment insurance is just that, an insurance scheme that stops paying out most of its money after 9mths unemployment etc.. so you can't really compare like for like.

Also because everyone votes you can't really know what Sweden's ultra rich are voting for. 

Why focus just on unemployment benefits, what do they do with the rest of your tax? Presumably they spend it on things that benefit the population as a whole, that even out the risks and opportunities people face and gain by quirk of who they are. Are you seriously arguing Sweden is a high tax low spending state?

We can guess but I don't much care either way, they are few. The many in the comfortable middle classes who must also support policies that cost them for uncertain returns are more interesting.

jk

What I can't grasp is how you correlate a Scandinavian high tax, equal rights culture with the idea that a UK voting system should only allow those most educated to vote? 

There is a plus side..  Corbyn won't ever see a ballot box.  

I don't. I don't think on balance that weighted/qualified voting, certainly not voting for an administration rather than an idea is a good idea. It is however an interesting idea in response to a real problem, one that deserves discussion and which may lead to further interesting and perhaps more palatable ideas as to how our democracy could be seriously improved. I don't think it's a good idea because our democracy does not exist simply to make good decisions. It would however be good if it could make the best decisions possible within the limitations imposed by its other important roles.

My point re. Sweden is that plenty of comfortable and well off people clearly are willing to vote for high taxes and high welfare for all, contrary to your assertion that such ideas are the preserve of the poor and would vanish if their voice was further muted.

jk

No where did I say that? You have an ability to read things that aren't written. I'd say sweden is low on benefits, but spends high on public services... health, education etc.. where the emphsis is on taking personal responsibility.. if you work then you have a right to a place at nursery for your kids and it is very heavily subsidised(max cost of about £200/month). If you don't work you can still have a few hours, but you still pay and you can't pick your time slot. 

Sweden spends quite a lot on infrastructure, transport, the environment, community projects, sport facilities and funding for clubs that have kids training etc.. 

There is more effort put in preventing someone becoming a feckless long term unemployed person in the first place, than bankrolling them when they get there.

But what would happen if only the rich voted for several generations? That's my point, society would change. 

It probably would, societies have changed before in response to such pressures in both directions, only so far though of course before the oppressed rise up to force change or fill a void.

As I said, a democracy doesn't exist simply to make good decisions and if people are to have unequal say in it (as they do currently in ours) then it should be for very good reason and managed very carefully indeed (which it isn't currently). Personally I think the risks of such a well intentioned policy outweigh the benefits.

jk

Good public services are the benefits of living in a decent functioning state.

Benefits of living in a decent functioning state.

Ah the feckless poor, the root of all our problems. Apparently.

jk

Misses the point. There will still be additional costs for my business trading outside the umbrella of the EU with countries that currently have FTA with the EU.You are too focused on just trade with the EU.

You also need to look at areas which are subject to EUR1 such as quite a few of the North African countries where there are recipricol rights. So if I sell to Tunisia whats the costs of doing it direct or going through say a German parent company of a Tunisian company.

It can get  (even within WTO rules ) incredibly complicated about how much processing is done on goods in each respective country.

So the HMRC's figure was a round number trying to pull together all these costings.

To the credit of the EU over the years they have chipped away at making it simple and low cost for both large and SME's.

And if you think that going to WTO rules is easy and low cost, just have a look at the tariffs for dry and wet horseradish to see how complicated even that is.WTO is just a bartering system.

I am not involved in a jit supply chain..thank goodness... nightmare for cars and aerospace.The ball park figure I see is that 30% of uk manufacturing is linked to jit supply chains. This includes your small specialised spring makers in Birmingham through to JLR. This is why these negotiations are struggling. Never mind the electorate, UK government knows it has to manage those industries or they will shut down ( slowly over a few years and not straight away) as they are removed from the European supply chain network. Alternative markets-- South America-- you have to be kidding- either no money or high tariffs. China- not easy. Africa- mostly a difficult market. North America---fine . Russia-?India- high tariffs.

Complicated - not arf.

Wrong. It's blindingly simple. Just cancel the whole damn mess.

I don't know how different the Swedish system is, but I think summo makes a valid point.

Why is the high tax economy apparently more widely accepted in Sweden than it is in the UK?

Is it because there is far more correlation between contributions and benefits? In general, UK benefits have become much less contribution based in the last 30 years, and they are less contribution based (pensions, unemployment benefit etc) than many of the other western European nations. If your state pension is heavily linked to your income and tax payments, is it easier to keep the wealthy on side?

Is it because Swedish government and public life is far more open? Is Sweden more classless? Is it because Swedish media is significantly different?

And you throw in the 'feckless poor' line, but surely Britain does have a problem with large numbers of people not engaging properly with education, training and employment? You can blame who you like; the people, their parents, the schools or the government; but I would say that this is a problem that we need to try to solve.  

Would it be the end of the world if we remained in the EU?

Of course not, after all we've survived over 40 years of membership. Some would even say some of us have prospered from EU membership.

But the referendum result was to leave.

So, can we really be said to have left the EU if we remain in the customs union and the single market?

From an economic and administration sense it would be a good idea to remain but then there's the free movement and ECJ which leavers won't accept.

In order to convince some of us leavers that we need to change our mind, otherwise you'll never win a second referendum, there'll have to be a real change in our relationship with the EU and that, going by past and present negotiations, isn't likely to happen.

And so we are stuck where we are.

Who knows where we'll end up?

In some sort of Norway type fudge which satisfies nobody?

Leaving on WTO rules which isn't the best outcome?

Or remaining in the EU as we are now? Is this even possible?

How do we remain totally in the EU but try to address the issues that apparently concerned the leavers so much that they abandoned all common sense and logic and voted to leave?

I suppose you've already seen this

youtube.com/watch?v=0xGt3QmRSZY&

But they need paying for. A point that the UK fails to address.

Yes. Society should try and prevent folk reaching that level. Better education, better healthcare (mental as much as physical). But these need funding through taxation.

What makes any high taxation society function is complex. Sweden has the lowest tax of the three (Denmark and norway). But yes, you do feel and see where it goes, although that doesn't mean some services are not stretched. 

I hadn’t seen it actually.

Thanks for that.

Just goes to show that you cannot trust a word that a politician says.

Quite simply: yes. It'd be utterly pointless but it's the least harmful version of pointless if it's pointless action we want.

Won't accept at what price, everyone has a price? Would *you* vote to ratify our decision to leave if the next red bus read "Leaving the EU costs us £350M a week. Sorry, the NHS is going to have to make do"? What if we get this really wrong and it's bad, say £3.5Bn/week?

You're honestly telling me you'd cut your nose off to spite your face, if when the time comes to vote for 'the deal' you'll do so regardless of how terrible it is so long as the alternative is the status quo in which you and your country has thrived? I don't believe it, you didn't vote out to make things worse, you thought you were making things better, you'll likely soon be faced with a similar choice but different information, I doubt your motives will have changed.

Not really, we're going through a process, one that if it's not aborted will play out for a decade or so taking us into a new world where new processes will be possible, we're not stuck, decisions can be made, revised or un-made.

Probably and that'll likely be put back to the public, probably minus the backing of the libertarian brexiteers so who knows which way the wind will blow, my bet would be a narrow remain vote but I wouldn't bet the house on it.

Well that's one way of describing it.

Almost certainly.

By discussing them honestly and openly to find real solutions to the real and pressing problems, most of which are rooted in austerity and the march of technology, not EU membership.

jk

We are being mugged; by Michel Barnier

"but then there's the free movement and ECJ which leavers won't accept"

That sounds like a sense of entitlement on the part of those Leavers to have everything exactly as they want over and above just voting "Leave" in a non binding referendum.

How, specifically?

jk

While 'we' didn't vote to make ourselves poorer it is an acceptable consequence, you and me have debated this particular topic before.

Remaining in the EU might prevent the disaster that you are predicting but it might precipitate a whole new set of problems.

What would be ideal is a debate with the EU that recognises the importance of trade between us and the need for compromise.

But as is often stated by remainers 'Why should the EU compromise its position?' 

Which is fine but makes negotiations far harder than they need to be and perhaps impossible to achieve.

How much poorer is acceptable to you? How many less secure than you tipped off the bottom of society and through our threadbare safety net is an acceptable price to pay, how many jobs lost, how many businesses ruined? Two years in this still never ever gets answered. I'm afraid I'm going to keep asking because at some point very soon we as a society need to face facts and answer these questions honestly and clearly then we need to be able to live with our choice.

Would prevent all of the negative outcomes associated with leaving. We'll still have severe repercussions of our actions to deal with for years to come either way, plenty of harm has already been done.

We had debate and compromise, I think you mean further indulgence of our exceptionalism.

The EU and Britain weren't distinct, we've shaped albeit imperfectly it to our advantage for decades. Now we can't. There is no reason for the EU to compromise, they have our balls in a vise and we're turning the screw.

Something will be achieved but it'll not be better than before, if it's not terribly destabilising and painful for both parties Barnier and Davis's teams will have done well. If you believed we held all the cards and it'd all be easy I'm sorry, you were warned, I'd be quite cross about those warnings being poo pooed.

jk

Never thought it would be easy. Dealing with the EU never is.

That was obvious after Cameron failed to secure any meaningful deal pre referendum.

This pessimism was reinforced the moment that the UK negotiating team caved in to the EU's initial demands and timescale.

How to put a price on how much Brexit is worth?

Remember the early 1980's when the UK was in the depths of a real recession? Not your present day 'worst recession since the 1930's' but real Boys from the Blackstuff recession.

Whole industries shut down, whole streets where nobody had a job, communities wracked by heroin abuse and its associated crime, etc, etc.

Yet out of all this came the 1990's and a new hope with a booming economy, returning employment, standard of living rises, etc.

Was the cost of the 1980's worth it for the good times that followed?

(One caveat being of course that some communities never recovered from the 1980's recession and may have helped give rise to Brexit).

The EU is us, and other countries too. It's not 'them'.

He didn't really want a deal, as he was quite happy with the status quo of being able to reap the benefits of EU membership while still allowing others and the press to scapegoat the EU for any and all ills, notably many that had nothing to do with the EU. Remember, he/us was already an influential part of the EU and so, understandably, was pretty content with the way we'd helped shape it to mutual benefit.

The negotiating team had no other option, since the idea that 'the EU needs the UK more than the UK needs the EU' was always nothing more than populist rhetoric.

Well it seems that many may have been swayed by the lure of £350m per week, so now that it's turning out that the figure may be much higher and in the other direction I suspect quite a few people might be reconsidering their stance.

I seem to recall that this economic recovery took place while the UK was a member of the EU and benefitting hugely from the international trade conditions this facilitated.

Not sure what your point is here. The cost of the 80s was largely austerity-driven, much like our current decade. The good times that followed came about when austerity politics started to be replaced with more socially responsible policies, while still benefiting from EU membership advantages.

Those communities, sadly, are often those that voted Brexit. Somehow they have been deluded into thinking that the unfair distribution of opportunities within the UK has been due to EU decisions, when the reality is very much that it has been UK politics that has been the cause of most community marginalisation away from London & SE.

I know, poor deluded bastards.
Pity they all can't be hard rock climbers, living in the South of France and get paid for going on trips to Venezuela with Steve Backshall.

It's a shit life.

Curious post. Not sure of your point, but curious anyway.

I hear your positive thoughts on membership of the EU and don't disagree with some of them yet myself, along with 17 million others, voted to leave.

That's 17 million people who were apparently conned into voting a certain way.

My point about the 1980's was that for those who lived through them they were some terrible, terrible times as you know.

Many of those affected didn't see the need for such wholescale reform of the UK industrial landscape.

Yet out of this misery, a self inflicted misery which the UK government didn't have to implement, came a new industrial, social and political landscape.

I was asking JK if this was a price worth paying as he had asked what price was worth paying for Brexit.

Your implication, knowingly or otherwise, is that paying a price today will gain economic benefit tomorrow. That may have appeared to be the case after the dreadful 80s (but in any case happened within the framework of EU cooperation) but there's no indication of similar happening this time, at least according to the government's own advisors along with pretty much every 'expert' on the planet. Choose to believe in unicorns if you wish - and maybe your wishes will magically come true.

You were doing quite well in the 'getting me to think about the consequences of Brexit and maybe changing my mind' debate till you felt the need to resort to insult my intelligence.

Every time someone resorts to such tactics it just reinforces my desire to leave.

A childish attitude I admit but then what else would you expect from someone who believes in unicorns?

Are you saying that you consider my pointing out that your view is contrary to that of pretty much every known authority, insulting your intelligence?

So how else would you have me describe an apparent determination to believe in an outcome that no reputable authority considers to have any likelihood at all of occurring?

Unfortunately I think it's the default local for the frustrated hardcore Remainer.
They are so blinded by their arrogant, intellectual superiority that they can't accept the fact that they couldn't construct a simple case (Which is blindingly obvious to them) for their point of view to show the error of your typical dumb arse leaver.

I saw that result coming weeks before June the 16th.

My divergence from the mainstream thinking on the consequences of Brexit is just my opinion and you are quite right to point out how I could be wrong however, you insulted my intelligence by suggesting that the existence of unicorns might be linked to magic when everybody knows that they're real.

Have a 'like' for that

Thank you

… and again; no...

You see this is the basic fallacy of the 'respect the vote' boot boys. Did people vote to 'completely leave' as that is really a meaningless statement.

Did individual voters consider the single market, customs union, ECJ, Euratom, Air traffic regulations, financial services passporting, existence of trade deals and the difficulty of negotiation new ones, and would the new ones be better or worse than the deals we benefit from already, did they think about how EU legislation would be repatriated especially environmental and employment law, did they think about farmers doing without the CAP payments and how we would replace them.

The list goes on and on.

Remember that we ARE leaving right now and look how complex and f*cked up our negotiations are.

I work in the aerospace industry, I will probably be OK for the next few years. But when my son, who will be looking for a career in about 15 years, asks me if he can have a job like mine (he shows some aptitude for engineering) I have to say, with great sadness, that he will probably have to leave these benighted and broken shores to have the opportunities I had.

Yes. Sadly many of them voted for something the choice they made cannot deliver.

There's not much of a causal link between the cruelty of Thatcher's industrial 'policy' and later economic success, they're separate strands that have remained separate, that which was ruined and remains ruined, that which was nurtured and has boomed and bust and boomed and bust, never in the boom years trickling much wealth down to repair the ruins of the industrial communities Thatcher destroyed.

I replied, or at least I typed a reply.

No, I don't think the pain inflicted on the industrial communities in the 80s was worthwhile, not least because it was largely unnecessary. The bank-deregulation fuelled boom of the 80's and the easing of austerity through the 90's was essentially unrelated to Thatcher's decision to destroy traditional industry with no plan to replace it, a decision that still has negative repercussions nearly 40 years on for those communities affected. It's an interesting choice to compare the harm brexit is likely to do to the harm Thatcher did in the working class towns of Britain. Unnecessarily destructive and it ultimately achieved nothing worthwhile that couldn't have been achieved relatively painlessly over time in cooperation with those communities. Good analogy.

As ever you haven't quantified how much poorer you're willing for Britain or yourself to be to achieve brexit and whatever it is you think brexit does (it's almost all about damage limitation these days from those actually implementing it). Would you consider a decade of joblessness and pain like the 80's an acceptable price for (others of course) to pay? What if it's all for nothing, if that pain just rolls on into a second decade or we go back on bended knee to the EU, ruined, small?

Brexit isn't going bad because of politicians failing to implement it well, it's because there isn't a course of action for them to pursue that leads to success whether they do so well or not. It's going bad because people like you who are engaged, who can see it is not working out as you expected aren't stepping up and speaking out so the politicians press on in more fear of your wrath that the harm they're doing.

jk

Then he'd be right to insult your intelligence because that's just f****g stupid and cruel. I don't think you're either.

jk

All the industries you talk of were dying long before Thatcher, they were being out priced from many places globally... still are. Ship building was dying from the 60s because they could be build much much cheaper elsewhere and everyone was in denial in the 70s, as yard after yard closed. Same for the uks low quality car production in 70s..  over priced steel.. high extraction cost coal, with a steady flow of pit closure from the early 60s. Of course it's easy to blame one person, but these industries were dead already, partially through too much union influence, but chiefly overseas competition.

It is only a new approach like that of Nissan which was able to make a profit from manufacturing. 

It's not that a strong case for remaining couldn't be made, it was but it's un-glamorous, it's compromised, it's real. It's that the message was very hard to convey to people through communication channels with agendas of their own and in the face of a counter campaign which liberally dismissed facts as lies, denounced experts as wrong or corrupted and offered a plethora of contradictory futures to people with a wide range of contradictory hopes and grievances. But you know that, it's just convenient to pretend there's no case for remaining because you still hope you'll be getting the version of brexit you were sold, not the stinking turd it's shaping up into.

jk

I'm well aware of that though the roots of those failures extend back into the first great war at least, far beyond the 60's. Thatcher's cruel failure was to destroy the remains of those industries with no plan or intent to replace them.

Yes. That doesn't excuse the callousness of what Thatcher did.

We've still not really embraced the ethos of the great manufacturing nations that emerged from the ruins of war, we've changed how we exploit our workforce for sure but we've failed to learn from the successes and failures of those countries that were forced to rebuild ground up, we've just flip-flopped who holds the brake on productivity rather than releasing it.

jk

Thatcher did not destroy them, they'd already destroyed themselves by refusing to reform over the previous 20 years. The people I know who left mining and finished  up in places like Nissan were a bit shocked at first at just how different work place practices could be. 

You are suffering an obsession if you think the UK cannot be successful independently and has to join up with just 27 countries such as Luxembourg, Malta, Cyprus, Latvia, Greece and Estonia, out of nearly 200 countries including India, Brazil, China, Australia, South Korea, USA, Japan, and Canada. We are not in trouble. We have the 5th largest economy in the world.

We are also in Europe, at the moment. 

The size of the economy isn't relevant.  India is 6th.  I hope you aren't aiming for the UK to be like India.  Something like GDP per capita is the relevant number, and on that we don't do very well and it will get worse with Brexit.

Perhaos note that all of those countries are part of large trade blocs.

We are in trouble, growth is sluggish compared with other developed nations, productivity is flatlining, inward investment is declining. And I would say that worst of all, our delusional sense of self-importance is viewed by the rest of the world as a joke.

We did have until the pound crashed after the referendum.

W

Or have enormous reserves of natural resources or recent dividends from huge investments in technology and education.

What do you mean by the term "independent"? It's thrown in casually, but really requires some definition in this context.

Ah yes. Luxembourg comes top in that. Because it's a tax haven. Hardly a power house of productivity.

Do you think the UK should become one too? Otherwise your point is irrelevant.

FTFY

Its the second most productive country in the world

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)_per_hour_worke...

It seems incredible to me that so many people are bleeting "we're doomed". But then dislike the statement that we are the 5th largest economy. They don't want to hear it. They want to be failing.

Apart from the imagined, general, we'll all be worse off.  How will leaving the EU specifically change your life ?

As a manufacturer and exporter to the EU.  I expect my costs will go up slightly. They will have to be passed on to EU customers. 

But is it earning or exploitation ?

I'm not one of them who's clicked dislike but I suspect some are disliking the stupidity inherent in claiming we're the 5th largest economy as any kind of proof that we should be leaving the very environment in which we have attained that position.

Can we rebuild our world after brexit? Sure, in time of course we can but it is going to hurt before it gets better and it's not going to be a short sharp scratch. Can we rebuild it so we're out-competing our European peers in 10, 20 or 30 years time on the things that actually matter to ordinary working Brits? Seems unlikely really given the head start we'll be conceding as they compete for the same prizes.

What do you think that'll do for your competitiveness? I imagine you don't care, you do something niche, so what do you think it'll do for everyone else's competitiveness, what do you think your community will be like 10 years from now if its economy fails to grow or even contracts, if the supply chains break down or the big multinationals that support them relocate back into the single market?

What of any value to you do you get in exchange for this risk, for the costs associated with leaving, for the harm already done?

jk

How is it stupid to reply to Pasbury "these benighted and broken shores"  by pointing out we are listed as 5th largest economy in the world ?

That we will need to "rebuild our world" is crazy.

Apart from the imagined, general, we'll all be worse off.  How will leaving the EU specifically change your life ?

Where we are now doesn't matter, Brexit will affect the future not the past. I don't want our economy or social fabric to be harmed at all, that is the exact reason why I think leaving the EU is such a disaster for MY country. Why the hell should I want it to fail - such a stupid rebuttal though one constantly rehashed by the hard of thinking.

Well the general (pretty highly likely) we'll all be worse off is quite a compelling argument against don't you think? Otherwise my employer, with manufacturing sites across Europe, is already asking the UK sites to justify their existence. The lack of clarity about the customs union especially makes it very hard to commit to investment in the UK operations. If our borders become expensive to traverse then, in the longer term, the company would be stupid to expand UK operations. This is what is happening across all sectors in the real world - wake up.

Who might look elsewhere for their goods. Best of luck with that.

Because it's irrelevant to what matters.   It says nothing about our standard of living.  As above, India is of comparable size but is a very poor as a country with a low standard of living. That is why it is stupid

I am already worse off, it's not imaginary.

- I will no longer have the right work in the EU

- I will no longer be protected by the EU diplomacy.

- The likes of Russia will use divide and rule between the EU and UK more easily

- I will find it harder to recruit from the EU (this has already happened)

- The rise of nationalism and the right will be easier within the EU without the UK's presence (probably already occurring)

- I will less and less be viewed as coming from a stable, sane, measured, reliable country

etc

So you don't expect much specific change. But lots of people (they voted remain) have told you the country will be much worse off and you believe them. But I am stupid to the n'th degree just because I hold a different opinion ?

Every credible forecast says we'll all be worse off. Nobody has yet elucidated a real, tangible benefit of Brexit for the general populace.

Quite since firstly it doesn't address the point that our big economy is not perceived to work for many of us. It's also stupid to not acknowledge we grew to that position from ruin within the very bloc we're leaving, especially so when this fact is used as an argument for Britain being big enough to stand alone in a world increasingly pulling together not apart.

Not really. We're breaking or putting up significant barriers between us and our by-far biggest and physically closest trading partners, we need to rebuild equivalent or better links (our world from a trade perspective) elsewhere if this is not to be a nett negative. It's hard to see that happening without significant opposition as the compromises inherent become apparent and it's hard to see we'll be getting better deals than the huge bloc we're leaving that has a big head start negotiating those very same deals, from strength.

It reduces my opportunities to live and work elsewhere, even more so for someone with less education. By depressing the value of my pay and savings it increases my costs reducing my ability to buy and do the things I enjoy. It depresses economic growth reducing my career and earning opportunities and reducing revenue for the treasury thereby pushing up taxes or degrading the public services, some of which I use, some of which are the safety net beneath a decent society. It decreases my security by degrading connections with European law enforcement and security agencies and infrastructure. It leaves shortages in the skills and labour market that drive up costs, drive away business and cause delays. It damages the intellectual industries key to our future, (our pensions) by driving away foreign researchers and grant money. Our linked focus on reducing immigrant numbers degrades our ability to cultivate international ties by attracting and retaining talented entrepreneurial students with ties to other countries. It likely adds layers of extra bureaucracy to my work reducing competitiveness, increasing costs and frankly just pissing me off through the whole stupidity of the endeavour and two years of listening to f*****g stupid arguments for leaving built on dishonesty, delusion and prejudice.

Now please, you tell me what of value I get from leaving?

jk

Which of your list is the most important to you and how much would you pay each year to keep it ?

Good god the density of wrongness in your short post is enough to create an intellectual black hole!

You think we'll be better off?

There are all important to me in different ways, it's not  a case of picking. I (we) have the opportunity to keep them all and get benefit financially by remaining in the EU.  There is no cost.

We were 4th largest economy in the World in 1960.

And a few short years later we were essentially bust going repeatedly cap in hand to the IMF crushed by debt as our remaining grip on empire was lost our currency failed and our unreformed industries died of sclerosis and loss of their captive markets.

jk

I'd speculate that without membership of the EU we'd have dropped more than one place.

And anyway in Nov 2017 we dropped to 6th place.

I would argue exactly the opposite as somebody involved in manufacturing. What UK has become is a manufacturer of high value niche products.We have ditched the commodity products. Thank goodness , because you get nowhere competing like days of old

I make far more money, pay my employees (fewer of them- down by 75%) far more, export far more, have higherturn over , pay more taxes etc etc than we did when we competed on price etc from that era.

UK manufacturing has reshaped itself and moved on.

Thatcher is irrelevant to what happened, UK manufacturing shook itself out of it's stupor.

And all within the EU trading block

I am not making arguments for leaving. Only giving my opinion that all your predicted doom will not happen.

We are not setting up trade barriers. We are stepping outside the trade barriers set up by the EU.

A member of my immediate family faces the very real prospect of redundancy due to brexshit. Are you happy now?

Let's look at slightly more general problem. Do you know where the yeast comes from that is used to bake your bread? Lots of it comes through Felixstowe, in tankers. It's been a perfectly workable system since the creation of the single market and now you want to stop that. Cream yeast has a life span and can't be kept indefinitely. So as of March 29th next year, assuming talks progress at their current rate, tanker delivieries will dry up and bakeries will start to run out of yeast, a week later supermarkets will start to run out of bread.

So for a potential lack of bread, and familial redundancy, what do I personally gain?

The opposite of what Neil? I don't disagree with you, our manufacturing/engineering future clearly lies in high value, high intellectual input niches rather than mass-employment assembly or extraction, I'm just wondering what it is I've written you disagree with.

Not in those communities left high and dry without any help or connections in the decades after their employment was shut down. Yes of course that heavy and extractive industry was on the way out for a variety of reasons, some our fault, the issue is with how that change was (not) managed in the late 70s and early 80s. Britain's modern industry is not an evolution of the old, it's a whole separate stream and in many case in new areas well away from those damaged by the past decline.

jk

I have just chopped my leg off so I can save money on shoes.

And with all due respect, you haven't remotely substantiated that opinion. Given that your opinion flies in the face of expert consensus, you'll understand why your opinion on this matter isn't being held in particularly high regard.

I'm sure a workaround will be found for the yeast, unfortunately your bread will cost more.

Oh and your wages won't have gone up.

Not answering that question then ?  I didn't think you would.

Like you haven't answered anyone who's asked what we get of value in exchange for the harm already done and forecast.

jk

This is precisely why I do not accept the vote.  The benefits of the people of Europe cooperating better than they have for the past 2000 years goes beyond ££. 

Really?  Supermarket bread is rubbish anyway.  I prefer small bakeries' bread but it's too expensive.
That'll spurn me on to grow a yeast culture and bake my own.

Cheers Brexit!

How will leaving the EU stop yeast passing through Felixstowe and why do you think I want to stop that ? Why do you think I will be happy if your family member is made redundant ? The sky is not going to fall.

That's the sort of shite that Michael Gove would come up with.

There's a big difference.

I have not made any claims about the advantages of leaving. So why ask me to provide some ?

But MG has given a list of things that he would lose. I suspect none of them really matter to him, apart from making his point. So it is reasonable to ask him how much he would be prepared to pay to keep one of them, don't you think ?

Of UKC's brexit cheerleaders you puzzle me the most because for brexit to deliver what I presume you want you need both the remainers and those implementing brexit to fail and succeed in such a perfect way that we're free of the EU's influence but also that of the libertarians and nationalists driving our negotiations. I have no idea how you square that given the probability of it happening is essentially nil and the costs will be highest for those least able to absorb them.

jk

They all matter to me, a lot.  I'd, be prepared to pay a lot to keep them.  In fact I probably will pay a lot to keep them because we all need most them really and we will have no choice but to pay for what we once got freely.

I agree with you on that.

Do you really not see how that statement comes across?

You're avoid having to defend yourself by saying nothing at all. You're the one here that's proposing a change, but you have no interest in explaining why that change is a positive thing.

Meanwhile, others have pointed out, in general and specific terms, many likely negatives resulting from that change, including some that are already becoming manifest. Do you wonder why their patience with you and people who share your view is growing thin?

He answered your question by pointing out that there are no costs associated with keeping those things, so the question is entirely irrelevant.

Because pretty much every post you make shows you are completely indifferent to any cost or loss associated with leaving the EU.

I don't believe you.

Because I don't believe you're voting for pain for pain's sake, you must believe we get something of value for the risk we're taking. What? Doesn't strike me as a question that should be hard to answer or one deserving of evasion.

Really? They matter to me. If you genuinely don't think those things matter you're a far stranger man than you seem. The additional cost is nil, we're paying a small price (~£4 per person per week gross) we're quite happy with for those benefits.

What do you believe brexit actually does for me?

jk

What don't you believe?

Leaving the EU without a deal for trade will result in customs delays. That's partly what the single market was designed to remove. Our supply chains over the last 20 years have grown absolutely dependent on there not being any such barriers, you leavers are trying to put them back.

I'd just remind you that upthread you said you knew exactly what you voted for: to leave the EU entirely - well my examples of familial redundancy and the shortage of yeast will be direct consequences of your choices and your campaigning. Have you got any positive outcomes of brexshit that you could share with me?

No jk, could you ask what it does for him as well?

F*** me sideways. Do you deny climate change and believe in a flat Earth too?

Interesting piece in the Daily Mail a few days ago on supply chains from the boss of Unipart - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5775771/Were-road-Car-mageddon-hard...

Even the DM starting to publicise possible problems!

(Edit - as Trevers points out below, from the date it looks like this is a Mail on Sunday piece - they supported Remain.)

It's a good job that Trump hasn't just introduced 25% tarifs on steel (plus other things). Oh hold on.

Obviously we will be exempted the new tarif as long as we bend over backwards and allow Trump to screw us over whichever way works for him and our PMs husband's hedge fund.

(Edit: in reply to David of course)

Just a heads up that the article was published Sunday, so presumably it's a piece for the Mail on Sunday? The MoS was pro-remain at the referendum.

Firstly I don't think your fears for the future will come to pass. You don't agree with me on that. So you are not going to accept any predictions I make for any advantages.

Televisions, computers, mobile phones and cars mostly come from outside the EU. They should become cheaper.

You can't name an advantage to brexshit, because there isn't one.

Well if you provided reason and evidence to substantiate your opinions, rather than blind faith which is all you've offered, then we could have a reasoned and respectful discussion.

Based on what? What have you seen or understood that leads you to confidently stand diametrically opposed to so many professional economists and investors?

Great, I eat loads of those.

I'd be fascinated to see your evidence for the UK's car stock being predominantly non-EU built, even excluding UK built vehicles it seems quite unlikely.

jk

David, my company imports and distributives something that TNT calls a dangerous good. We buy it from Germany in bulk ie by the pallet. So can you assure me that this process will not become more expensive in terms of actual cost and my time (or my staff's time).

Reading your posts I think you either know jackshit or are ignoring what you know. The latter is my guess.

Since EU phone tariffs appear to zero, I wonder why he thinks they will be cheaper too

http://madb.europa.eu/madb/euTariffs.htm?productCode=851712&country=JP

It's just bullshit.

I don't believe you.

Thanks - yes, overnight, so in the Sunday print ed.. No sign of Dacre recanting yet then...

You don't seem to have a history of "reasoned and respectful discussion".  It is not wrong to give an opinion without supplying evidence.  I disagree with the predictions of impending disaster. These predictions are based entirely on the unsubstantiated opinions of others.

I checked because I doubt you'll bother to. UK top 5 uk sellers (RHD variants):

Ford Fiesta, 19k/year: Germany and Spain

VW Golf, 14k/year: Belgium and Germany

Quashquai, 12k/year: UK (supply chain and exports dependant on CU and SM)

Vauxhal Corsa, 11k/year: Spain

Ford Focus, 9k/year: Germany and Spain

I could keep going down the list but it seems barely worth the effort.

jk

Yes, you are right, I was posting too quickly. I should not have added cars to the list of items that mostly come from outside the EU. Sorry. Although quite a lot do.

It isn't wrong to give an opinion without supplying evidence but unless you can include some solid argument with that opinion there's no reason at all for anyone to take any notice of it.

Fine, but if you're attempting to debate a complex subject, don't expect other people to value your contributions when all you offer is belief. And when the prevailing consensus opinion is that the national course being driven by those who share your viewpoint will be entirely to the detriment of those you're debating with, don't expect them to show you much patience or indeed politeness.

I'm sure it will get more expensive in cost and time, unless you source it from outside the EU. Why do you think I should assure you otherwise ?  I supply products for the transport of dangerous goods in Germany. My price increases will be passed on to you. 

So slow down and stop making stuff up off the cuff, you might actually find someone takes you seriously. Of the top 10 best sellers in the UK ~6% are non EU built so far as I can tell (Kia Sportage, built in Korea who we're leaving our FTA with when we leave the EU).

jk

Yes I made a mistake in typing. It's the only one I've made. I said I'm sorry. Are you so desperate to score points ?

Amazing, your price increases (caused by Brexit), will be passed to me, which will be passed to my customers (which might include you as a climber). F*cking brilliant, everyone pays more and guess who wins. As i said you either get it (so you are a tw*t) or you dont (so you are a moron).

Aren't you shooting yourself in the foot here?
I seem to remember bringing up the subject of car imports was ridiculed.
Now you're pointing out that there's a huge EU to UK import of cars, obviously an important consideration.  Are they (EU) really going to want to slap on huge trade tariffs?  Are they $%&£

Absolute balls

This is getting really unpleasant.. How is that an acceptable way to express yourself on UKC.

I don't know what you mean anyway ? Are you saying  I should not pass on costs, which you then say you would also pass on ?  Do you mistakenly think I have denied their would be any costs ?

Care to explain how you other items will become cheaper?

Not huge tariffs but probably some increase will arise. As with so many other topics - it'll all just get a bit more expensive, more inconvenient, more beaurocratic, more time-consuming.

Nobody is predicting the sky is going to fall. Just that things will get a bit shitter in many many ways. I, and many others, want to know what the great benefit is to counter all this?

I would love to hear a passionate, well researched plan for our future outside the EU. I have heard nothing whatsoever.

Probably not but then I'm not claiming they will either, simply picking David up on his bullshit. We may of course leave them with little option if Mogg and his libertarian mates have their way.

How do you think you and your fellow Britons benefit from brexit?

jk

The problem is that this isn't really about tariffs. Car manufacturing depends on just-in-time delivery so border checks, which slow things down, will have an economic impact.  To a certain extent this can be smoothed over with trusted trader schemes but only to a certain extent.

Yes. The EU is currently taking legal action against the UK because it claims we have imported large quantities of goods, mainly electronics from China, and failed to collect and send to Brussels the high EU tariffs. When we leave, either we keep that money, or we remove the duty and get cheaper products and importantly cheaper components for our own products.

Cars should also get cheaper because Toyota, Mazda, Honda, etc. should be cheaper and the others will have to compete.

Is this what you mean?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-43328398

In which case, allowing fraud to go unchecked doesn't sound like a route to cheaper goods to me.

"Car should get cheaper because cars should be cheaper".  Bonkers.

So we save by reneging on a relatively small one off debt then unilaterally scrapping tariffs on imports from China? What do you think the real consequences of us doing this would be?

Japan is in the final stages of completing a trade deal with the EU, one we'll be walking away from. We have nothing and we're starting afresh without the weight of half a billion consumers behind our negotiators! You're just not making any sense

jk

So what are you referring to ?  Why all this hatred because someone has a different opinion ?

Because your opinion is not based in reality, in ANY way

I don't hate you. I was referring to the claim you made that msot of the UK's cars are not EU made, you made this claim to support the idea that our leaving the EU will make life in Britain cheaper. It was bullshit. I'm sick to the back teeth of it.

What do you think you gain of value by leaving the EU that is worth the harm done and the harm forecast?

jk

It's not your opinions that are the problem but the repeatedly making up bullshit and presenting it as fact.

No you misunderstand. I was not talking about avoiding the disputed payment to the EU. It was not collected so does not in fact exist.  I was talking about duty collected after we left the EU.

We don't need a trade deal with Japan to remove our own tariffs on imports.

Toyota Avensis and Auris, Honda Civic, Jazz and CRV are all manufactured in the UK.

From your list only Mazda is 100% manufactured outside the UK / EU. 

How many times are you going to go back to my typing /composition error?  It was a mistake.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I don't think anyone hates you - what people hate is your willingness to repeat unsubstantiated crap about how there are going to be few problems.

You have plenty of direct evidence on this thread showing there will definitely be problems

Cars should get cheaper.

Yes, dear. 

There is a lot more evidence of hatred on this thread.

Repeating an opinion is not something to hate, or describe as unsubstantiated crap just because it is the opposite of yours.

Why?

If you could focus on the rebutting the "unsubstantiated" part, the "crap" part would disappear. 

The problem is you give opinions with no supporting evidence: this is something to hate

There are plenty of examples above of people saying they or their family/friends/acquaintances will probably lose their livelihood directly because of Brexit. How are you going to reassure them when all you give is unsupported bullshit?

(replying to an earlier post you made about people wailing "dooom!" because i didn't have time earlier): 

Whether we are doomed or not is not the pertinent question. And I agree with you that people on the remain side of the debate who say we are, don't really help move the debate forward. We will of course, continue to be at the upper end of wealth in global terms for a good time, regardless of what happens with Brexit. However, there does seem to be an assumption made by many - not all - leavers, and certainly the government, that we can leave the EU without losing many of the benefits of being part of the EU. The governments position that we should leave the EU, not be under the jurisdiction of the ECJ, and yet still have a say over how the EU draws up data protection rules is just one example.

The pertinent question is, given where we are, what is the best way forward? Here, we should be clear-eyed about the benefits and draw-backs of the different options we might push for. It is an illusion to think that we can be totally sovereign even outside of the EU. If you export to the EU, you will still need to abide by EU rules. Most British companies will still need to abide by the General Data Protection Regulation even if we do finally exit the Customs Union, single market and everything else. It will become the default data protection regulation.   

It is not that we will be unable to survive alone, it is that we will have less influence over rules which, in many cases, we will have to abide by anyway. Britain will have the notional sovereignty to set our own rules but practically speaking we will align closely to the EU. So the question should be asked, do we really gain that much from leaving the EEA, the Customs Union and all the rest of it? Or should we stay in, accepting that we will have to abide by many of the rules anyway so better to have at least some influence over what rules are set? 

What you are hearing is anger, genuine, substantiated anger. Sorry if you have attracted a bit of flak. To your credit you actually make more sense than our negotiators in Brussels do. Though I must admit I am damning you with faint praise.

OK, let's go with yeast for a while ...

If, post 2019, yeast becomes prohibitively expensive, and bread prices are going to sky rocket, I see an opportunity. Open a UK yeast manufacturing plant, employing, I don't know, 100 people and pay them over £10 an hour to open sacks of dry goods, emptying them into a processing vessel and pressing the green button on the control panel.

That's 100 people off benefits, paying taxes and spending in their local economies.  Plus an employer paying their taxes to the UK pot, and maybe becomes a millionaire because they've cornered the UK yeast market.

Also, you being a typical good green UKCer, you can see it reduces the carbon footprint, cuts out shit belching HGVs crossing half of Europe.

Forgot to say, maybe your loaf will cost an extra 10p, whoopydo,  you'll have forgotten about in a few weeks time.

What's not to like?

You hardcore Remainers are just so negative, pessimistic souls.

Or just make a decent loaf at home.

I do love the Brexiters who keep saying accept the vote as it all goes tits up.

It is a bit like voting to put to sea in a shit boat. There is this big debate as to whether it will make it across the channel or not. In the end half the people think it a bad idea while the other half think it might make it. The vote is swung by one snotty nosed kid who gets nudged into it by his dad so the boat sets off into the waves. At which point several people point out that the boat leaks and has gaping holes in it and that if we set off as it is then everyone will drown. To which the leavers reply "accept the vote!" even though less than half of them still think it a good idea.

It's like the whole countries going for a Darwin award

Your business case is a crock of shit. Grow up.

Classic Remain speak!

Go on then, you're the highly educated intelligent one, enlighten me, why is it a crock of shit?

And you wonder why you lost the vote!!!! Arrogant $%&£er!

"Your business case is a crock of shit. Grow up."

Yeah, really mature, you're like little babies who've had their favourite teddy taken off them.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&u...

Hello, anybody there?

It’s a great way of making really expensive, crap bread.

Or like you say it’ll cost 10p more, brilliant!

OK, you've convinced me!

While you're here, why has butter gone up nearly 33% or more and we haven't even left the EU yet?
10p I can handle.

Who'd have thought that yeast production and importation could be so interesting

http://ec.europa.eu/competition/mergers/cases/decisions/m5020_20080711_2021...

I recommend following David Heinig (@DavidHenigUK) on Twitter.

He's a renowned expert in international trade and a TTIP veteran.

He is usually an upbeat fella (you probably have to if you do his job) but this is what he tweeted after the Trump announcement of unilateral trade restriction on steel and aluminium :

"Dangerous times ahead for the world trading system. I am losing my usual optimism that a sensible solution will be found as there's no evidence the US administration see trade policy as anything other than zero-sum"

A blatant violation of WTO rules signalling the end of multilateral rules based trade, and a - tragic, IMO - return to bargaining, threat, and coercion.

Worst. Time. Ever. to Brexit.

The years to come won't be easy.

Butter price rises for several reasons, not particularly Brexit-based if I remember. Bad harvest and less animal food, China buying more butter, stuff like that. 

So you're advocating unilaterally removing tariffs? This is Prof' Minford's plan right, one too extreme for most brexiteers, the plan Minford himself said would wipe out British manufacturing as collateral damage? Don't you work in British manufacturing or is this just another expert opinion to be cherry picked and scoffed at hyper-selectively, he's only right about the good bits?

No of course not but are you sure that's what your fellow travellers want, the flooding of the market with cheap goods and services which destroy their livelihoods?

jk

UKC has become a nasty place.

Remainers shout down, abuse, and hound any other voice out of the forum. You can clearly see likes and dislikes are completely tribal and just used for intimidation.
These are the people who consider they are the reasonable, inclusive ones.

I have stated that most people voted Leave expecting it meant completely leaving the EU.
I gave my opinion that the doom remainers were predicting was not likely to happen.

This is some of the more direct abuse aimed at me just on this one thread.

A lot of it claims I have said something incorrect. But does not say what.  It's just abuse.

You really haven't thought that through, have you?
my life/standard of living is going to be fxcked up by knobheads who know nowt
the 52 included the less well educated
None of them "think" that's the problem.
I'm sick to f***ing death by now of the attitude that we have to "respect" the vote
Get real FFS.
nobody could be that thick.
contrary to your ridiculous assertion
f*****g stupid arguments
Good god the density of wrongness in your short post is enough to create an intellectual black hole!
You can't name an advantage to brexshit, because there isn't one.
I have just chopped my leg off so I can save money on shoes.
Do you wonder why their patience with you and people who share your view is growing thin?
F*** me sideways. Do you deny climate change and believe in a flat Earth too?
It's just bullshit.
stop making stuff up off the cuff
you are a tw*t) or you dont (so you are a moron).
Absolute balls
picking David up on his bullshit
Bonkers.
It was bullshit. I'm sick to the back teeth of it.
repeatedly making up bullshit and presenting it as fact.
all you give is unsupported bullshit?
You're just not making any sense
Because your opinion is not based in reality, in ANY way
repeat unsubstantiated crap

UKC is still getting worse.  Is this really what we want ?

Instead of whining about people not liking you, why not try and substantiate the claims you make?

What claims ?

Sorry I'm late. Can you add "How the f*ck do you expect people to respect your opinion when you refuse to substantiate it?" to your list please?

...

You appear to be confusing abuse with a simple statement of fact.

How about your claim that cars will be cheaper, for starters.

What did you want me to substantiate ?

No. That is just abuse.

... which only goes to show deeper levels of delusion.

Add that to your list too.

This

"Whereas being in the EU has brought Italy and Greece to their knees."

And that this

"Why they were voting was not clear. But they certainly knew what they were voting for and what that entailed.. Leave or Remain."

for starters.

I thought cars should be cheaper because we will be outside the EU trade barrier which taxes cars entering the EU. The US representative was complaining about it on the news last night.

Sigh. My sentence wasn't complicated. Anyway:

Your opinion "that the doom remainers were predicting was not likely to happen".

I'd just like to stick up for David here. These Brexit debates do tend to descend pretty quickly into name calling and insult. Sometimes a good rant is fun to read and a well-crafted barb can also raise a smile. But too much of it just stifles discussion and I think we've got to that point on this thread. 

I don't see how there can be any dispute about that ? Both were acceptable to join the Euro. But are now in massive debt to the European bank.

The same applies. People voted for Leave the EU. That is completely unambiguous.

I can only substantiate my opinion by confirming that it is my opinion. What more can I do ?

The euro may well have made things worse but the problems in both economies existed either before the euro or independently from euro.  Greece has spent more than half the years since 1800 in default. And Italy suffered as much from Berlusconi as it did from the Euro. The effect of the euro was to artificially overvalue the currency, prevent them from devaluing, and perhaps most perniciously, give them access to cheap loans.

I'll let you google the difference between correlation and causation.

So what does leave entail? Our politicians don't know, i dont know, you clearly don't know. So your claim that everyone who voted leave knew what that entailed is moronic.

You can expect annoyance, rudeness, anger and frustration from those who are giving very real reasons they are concerned for the immediate and medium term future of this country, some whose families will be directly negatively affected by Brexit, who you dismiss with an opinion based clearly on absolutely f*ck-all.

I would suggest you re-read the whole thread very carefully, trying not to get upset at people's responses and try and take in what they are saying. Real and substantiated negatives versus positives not even able to be named, let alone substantiated, is what has characterised the entire Brexit debate, and if you can't understand people's anger about this then you must be totally lacking in empathy.

He was probably making a much more specific point. EU tariffs on cars imported from a third country outside the EU are 10% but US tariffs on cars imported from the EU are 2.5%. Trump has got it into his head that too many BMWs and Mercedes Benz's on the streets of New York is a bad thing (despite Mercedes building cars in Alabama) so is now kicking off about car tariffs. 

What it means for Brexit is that Britain could, potentially, cut import tariffs on foreign-made cars. But as has been pointed out above the majority of cars sold in Britain are assembled either in the EU or in the UK itself. 

David, I'm not trying to silence your voice because it's different, I want to hear and understand it but I also expect to challenge and meaningfully debate what I disagree with. We've 20 odd times asked you a simple question:

What do you think brexit does that is good and outweighs the harm it has done and is forecast to do?

If you don't think it does good or you think it does nothing as you seem to be hinting in your evasions, why did you vote for it and why in light of how it's going (let's be honest, not well) do you still support it?

That you refuse to respond to such a simple key question is infuriating from the perspective of a conversation but also because it's not just a conversation, the whole country is now dancing to your evidently damaging tune yet your thinking on why we should do so where it is exposed seems muddled, contradictory and wilfully blind to real problems. Your solution to being asked to discuss this further as we need to if we are as a society to work through brexit to an acceptable conclusion is not to listen but to double down on the bullshit. You won't feel it I know but I'm softening what I really think here by calling bullshit, I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt calling you neither fool nor liar because I can't understand what motivates your often nonsensical responses and your refusal to engage with rebuttals. It's like you think it's all just opinion as if this isn't really happening and as if every possible outcome is still equally probable. It's utterly disheartening and exasperating given the seriousness of the predicament we're in and it's lead to me being quite rude to you. Frankly I'm not inclined to apologise, I'm so heartily sick of it.

jk

You can nit pick about the degree to which the EU influenced the problems in Greece and Italy, you accept the euro may have made things worse. But it's unlikely Italy would now qualify to join the euro, and Greece certainly wouldn't. They have degraded to this point while in the EU and euro.

Pointing out that Greece has been in default for 100 of the past 200 years is hardly nit-picking. Greece didn't qualify when they joined. The rules were stretched to let them in. And Italy's problems are at least as much the result of Berlusconi than the euro. But I'm not arguing that the Euro is an unalloyed good. 

The EU commission have been clear that  Leave means we completely leave. However they are prepared to consider something like the Norway deal. But they have never said that they would enter into any sort of arrangement.

By presenting evidence, tested theories and reasoning to support that opinion.

I think faeries are real, what more can I do to convince you all they're real?

It's ridiculous isn't it, I'm making a claim that flies in the face of plenty that we know, I'm making it without any supporting evidence and I haven't explained how I arrived at this conclusion, I just demand you share my faith. Fine when it's faeries, less so when you're setting the foreign policy agenda.

jk

I don't get upset easily. Which is why I am still here. Those people are long gone. Thanks to this abuse.

I am entitled to my opinion. I think you will find it will be proved right.

Most of the things people are saying are plain abuse. I have tried to address all the points made to me.

Ok, putting your unsubstantiated claim about the eu causing all Greece and Italy's woes to one side. You claim people knew what leaving the eu entails. So does it entail leaving the CU and does it entail leaving the EEA? As we've seen above people were told we could have a Norway-style arrangement, they're in the EEA but not the CU. So what will our position be? You don't know and for you to claim tjat leave voters knew is just another silly unsubstantiated claim.

Yes, I know that she was. I was just confirming that the duty existed.

If import tariffs are cut, then it would be surprising if the cost of cars did not fall.

You haven't answered my question, you haven't even tried. What do yo think brexit does that makes it worth the harm and risk?

jk

We buy 90+% of our cars tariff free in a highly competitive market! This argument does not make sense, your refusal to recognise and engage further with that fact is annoying, it leads to people being rude.

jk

No you haven't. Answer jkarran's question.

Also, you don't know what "abuse" means. May I suggest a dictionary.

I have answered that. The EU commission have said that leaving the EU means leaving the CU and EEA.

You are being abusive. I am answering questions as fast as I can read them and post..

What he said ^

If this was some purely hypothetical debate, people would politely ignore you and move on. But this is real, and happening, and people on this thread are already experiencing the negative effects.

This thread represents a microcosm of the wider Brexit "debate", which features pro-EU politicians and journalists, along with industry leaders and analysts making reasoned and evidenced arguments and warnings. Meanwhile, pro-Brexit politicians and journalists are essentially going "blah blah blah, willofthepeoplewillofthepeoplewillofthepeople, show some faith in country and no, we don't want a second referendum, it wouldn't be the willofthepeople to gauge the will of the people".

No, your claim was  "they certainly knew what they were voting for and what that entailed.. Leave or Remain.". So now you're claiming that although leave voters were told we could be like Norway (in the eea) they actually knew that leaving the eu entailed leaving the EEA. I don't want to be rude, you being a bit delicate and all, but you do come out with some bollocks.