REMOANERS, get over it and back BREXIT.

The_Last_Username

I find it bemusing how - given the number of very severe difficulties faced by the EU - so many seem to long to stay within the inefficient dinosaur that the EU has become.

From the belligerence & downright bullying from EU senior officials to gross inefficiency, poor finances and stagnant growth.
Think of Greek austerity; banking problems in Germany and Italy; migration; bureaucracy; increasing antipathy towards the EU itself in France, Holland and more; the high sovereign debt levels of Italy, Portugal, Ireland & Holland; .........................

Why would anyone want more of that?

HornetSaver

setmefree2 wrote: »

This sentence alone would make me vote Brexit if we have another vote.“There must be a threat, there must be a risk, there must be a price, otherwise we will be in negotiations that will not end well and, inevitably, will have economic and human consequences,” the French president said.

Whatever side of the EU debate you were on: if the result were the other way, and Brexiteers really had respected the result (hahahahahahahahahah), I suspect we would then have moved onto a consensus that what we really wanted from the EU is access to the Scandinavian, German and Benelux markets, the benefit of importing from the cheaper countries with minimum fuss, as-good-as-possible-under-the-circumstances diplomatic relations with Spain, and sufficient stability in Eastern Europe not to make Russian expansion a realistic possibility.

France were just part and parcel of the organisation that served no specific purpose to us. Isn't the situation at Calais a bunch of human consequences for both the migrants and those legitimately trying to travel, as a result of the French either claiming that France is not a safe country, else refusing to apply the law on asylum seekers?

Don't the French export more to us than the other way around? Specifically, don't they export to us product categories which we are perfectly capable of doing ourselves (food, drink, vehicles, electrical equipment and heavy machinery). Even if we wanted to import specific items in the last three categories, aren't they are available at better quality and price elsewhere within the EU, not to mention Japan, Korea, the US or China?

To be fair to Hollande I don't think it's idle talk, I think he really means what he says. What I don't understand is how his words get him anywhere (given that the EU rules which matter to the UK the most, indeed arguably tipped the scales in the referendum w.r.t. asylum seekers, are generally broken by France anyway, and it can therefore be assumed that any new deal will be honoured to the minimum possible extent by France). When other EU leaders such as Merkel and Renzi, and indeed non-EU leaders such as Obama, make similar comments I am concerned, because those comments are coming from people whose words could actually have real consequence.

The_Last_Username

HornetSaver wrote: »

To be fair to Hollande I don't think it's idle talk, I think he really means what he says. What I don't understand is how his words get him anywhere (given that the EU rules which matter to the UK the most, indeed arguably tipped the scales in the referendum w.r.t. asylum seekers, are generally broken by France anyway, and it can therefore be assumed that any new deal will be honoured to the minimum possible extent by France). When other EU leaders such as Merkel and Renzi, and indeed non-EU leaders such as Obama, make similar comments I am concerned, because those comments are coming from people whose words could actually have real consequence.

Hmmmm.
Apart from the "real consequence" bit I'm in broad agreement.

Francois Hollande; French elections April/May 2017. Chance of remaining? Slim to fair.

Angela Merkel; German elections no later than 22nd October 2017. Chance of remaining? Very slim to slim.

Barack Obama; USA elections November 2016. Chance of remaining? Nil.

Matteo Renzi, Italian election May 2018 (so still almost a year before Brexit, note). Chance of remaining? Slim - indeed he may not even remain in position after November's referendum this year.

So to say that these people's comments could have "real consequence" in regard to the UK's Brexit is at best disingenuous, since the chances of any remaining in position throughout Brexit "talks" are at best slim.
Which points towards their comments being irrelevant since they will have no real input on these discussions, and whatever input they DO have early-on could easily be changed by a successor.

HornetSaver

The_Last_Username wrote: »

Hmmmm.
Apart from the "real consequence" bit I'm in broad agreement.

Francois Hollande; French elections April/May 2017. Chance of remaining? Slim to fair.

Angela Merkel; German elections no later than 22nd October 2017. Chance of remaining? Very slim to slim.

Barack Obama; USA elections November 2016. Chance of remaining? Nil.

Matteo Renzi, Italian election May 2018 (so still almost a year before Brexit, note). Chance of remaining? Slim - indeed he may not even remain in position after November's referendum this year.

So to say that these people's comments could have "real consequence" in regard to the UK's Brexit is at best disingenuous, since the chances of any remaining in position throughout Brexit "talks" are at best slim.
Which points towards their comments being irrelevant since they will have no real input on these discussions, and whatever input they DO have early-on could easily be changed by a successor.

Merkel is desperate to be more moderate with the UK than she is being, but is under political pressure to haul us over the coals. Whether she is in place or not is therefore an irrelevance, as she's the better of our options.

Where Obama leads, Clinton will follow. We needed Trump's promise to put us at the front of the queue about as much as we need colon cancer.

Renzi I'll give you. Italian leaders tend to say what they mean and do it for the very short period they're actually in place before being ousted, so I generally give their comments weight and then take the new one's comments at face value.