FTSE rising whilst prospect of FTA seems to be fading

NottinghamKnight

BananaRepublic said:

NottinghamKnight said:

Mickey666 said:

NottinghamKnight said:

Mickey666 said:

NottinghamKnight said:

Mickey666 said:

MK62 said:

Mickey666 said:

Thrugelmir said:

csgohan4 said:

Thrugelmir said:

csgohan4 said:

LHW99 said:

UK surely makes more exports to the EU than the rest of the world?

Not according to gov.uk

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-exports-to-non-eu-countries-continue-to-outstrip-eu

Surprising given the vast area covered by The EU, however making deals with individual countries, rather than en bloc like the EU, will be very time consuming/expensive and will unlikely have favourable terms compared to the EU as they know they have the UK over a barrel. 

Only 11% of UK trade is with countries with which there's an existing EU trade agreement. The creation of the RCEP has created a headache for the EU. Now the bigggest trade area in the world. 

 While the brexiteers are sniggering in their rich holiday houses abroad, not caring how brexit affects the average Joe. 

You are carrrying one big chip on your shoulder. Time to move on. Remainers living abroad are the ones who object. As it is they they now need to meet conditions of residency. The tales of woe show how much self interest determines peoples views. Much in the same way Covid has. Time to kick American Exceptionalism a byproduct of their form of capitalism into touch. 

If anything, I'd say the Brexit referendum was a masterclass in proving why asking the uninformed masses to make important decisions is the worst example of democracy in action.  It's all madness.

You do realise that it's the same "uninformed masses" who elect our MPs and governments don't you?........should they not be allowed to do that either?

Of course they should, that's the whole point of a parliamentary democracy.  We vote for a representative to make decisions on our behalf, on the basis that those representatives will be better informed than us by virtue of their 24/7/365 time spent on the job plus their daily access to expert advisers, parliamentary debates, select committees, the civil service etc.

We certainly don't or at least that is not what occurs. The majority of the people vote for a party, not an individual with a very few exceptions; indeed those votes are based on a feeling that the broad policies of that party are best for an individual and/ or the country, how many people read any of a party's manifesto. MPs are now supposed to be representative rather than any sort of cream of the population, and unfortunately will follow the party line as they are whipped into voting on the vast majority of issues. when MPs decide to make decisions against their party, and potentially against the majority of their constituents then things get very problematic. 

You're probably right that the majority of people vote for a party and probably don't even know the name of their MP (more uninformed-ness and why there are things such as 'safe seats'), but I didn't mention MPs, only 'representatives'. 

A political party can be our 'representative' and the principle of parliamentary democracy remains - the 'uninformed masses' defer all decision-making to parliament, with the party affiliation of their local MP being a fairly broad-brush expression of their own personal political leanings.

It seems to be a fairly good system, or the least bad on depending on your point of view.  But referendums break the system because they bypass the parliamentary process that generally does a good job of weeding out detrimental decisions, through its process of debate, expert advice, reviews and time for reflection.

In the case of the Brexit referendum, with all its complexity and uncertainty that even the professional politicians and expert consultants couldn't predict or agree about, perhaps a better approach would have been a second referendum when the detailed implications were much better known?

Thus, the first referendum could have been the simplistic in/out question, followed by the inevitable (and important) debate and negotiation of the exit deal, followed by a second referendum asking the same basic in/out question but this time in the fuller knowledge of what the detailed implications would be.

What we have actually done is ask the simplistic in/out question with little real knowledge of the eventual implications but when those implications are better known (ie 'the deal') we have deferred back to parliament to decide, rather than allow the people to decide.

Seems rather inconsistent really.

Maybe, democracy can be taken too far after all, would be much quicker to get the educated and wealthy to determine these matters. people like Boris, Rees-Mogg  etc

Did you forget the smiley?
I think we'd all agreed we've rightly moved on from the days where only landowners were allowed a vote  - and that didn't include women of course.
As for the like of Boris, Rees-Mogg etc, don't forget they are only in parliament because their constituents voted for them, so that's democracy in action isn't it?  After all, it would be an unrepresentative parliament that DIDN'T include representation of such people.

Maybe but the ultimate outcome is pretty similar and the electorate had a clear choice between in and out (as for the SNP in Scotland) between Boris and Corbyn and chose the former. Most people are voting for the least worse option let's not forget.

Boris is not unlike Thatcher, as both benefitted from unelectable opponants and huge luck. The Falklands War covered over the disastrous economic mess, and the Brexit success (in the eyes of many) and the vaccine purchases may well excuse the screw up dealing with covid. Slow to respond at the start. Care homes decimated. A ‘world beating’ track and trace system. 

I wonder if we will lose NI and Scotland? The siren charms of the EU handing out big bags of sweeties may be too much to resist. I bet they don’t want Wales ... 🙂

Yes, everything looks better in hindsight, look at the decades of screw ups that Churchill produced, he appeared far less competent than Boris through much of his career (and Boris is trying to model his career on his slightly posher predecessor).
A united Ireland would be far easier for everyone (apart from Unionists of course) and could lead to a grown up relationship between Ireland and the UK; a century from independence, and not long after Canada, Australia, New Zealand etc and there is still all the rubbish around common travel area, right to work, bailouts etc. 
EU definitely wouldn't want NI, Scotland would be problematic like a Baltic state and the Spanish would have issues around Catalunya, most of Europe is more regional than national let's be honest.
Strangely Wales would follow the Celtic tiger model better than Ireland, couple of houss drive from London rather than a flight, would work well with suitable tax rates.

MaxiRobriguez

The deal we've got is a reasonable one. Harder than many remainers/lefties would have liked but tariff-free trade and a level playing field which limits what the Tories can do in terms of divergence from working rights and environmental standards, should placate some of their worst fears. The concessions won on state aid should benefit any future socialist government too and the ability to strike our own trade deals in the future will be of benefit. 

There are pro's and con's to Brexit but what we have is nowhere near as bad as it could have been, and absolutely nowhere near as bad as a no deal. I am a Labour voter but I respect that Boris' brinksmanship has won us more concessions than we would have won otherwise.

My biggest concern is not with Brexit. It is with a parliament voted in for five years solely to deliver Brexit which as of tomorrow is done but we will have three and a half more years left before the next election. The current government has no mandate to do anything else than what it already has, and the inevitable tax increases/spending reductions to pay off coronavirus debts should not be taken solely by an ideological government who have shown over the past year they're quite happy to stick their noses in the trough. 

The_Green_Hornet

MaxiRobriguez said:

The deal we've got is a reasonable one. Harder than many remainers/lefties would have liked but tariff-free trade and a level playing field which limits what the Tories can do in terms of divergence from working rights and environmental standards, should placate some of their worst fears. The concessions won on state aid should benefit any future socialist government too and the ability to strike our own trade deals in the future will be of benefit. 

There are pro's and con's to Brexit but what we have is nowhere near as bad as it could have been, and absolutely nowhere near as bad as a no deal. I am a Labour voter but I respect that Boris' brinksmanship has won us more concessions than we would have won otherwise.

My biggest concern is not with Brexit. It is with a parliament voted in for five years solely to deliver Brexit which as of tomorrow is done but we will have three and a half more years left before the next election. The current government has no mandate to do anything else than what it already has, and the inevitable tax increases/spending reductions to pay off coronavirus debts should not be taken solely by an ideological government who have shown over the past year they're quite happy to stick their noses in the trough. 

Plenty of other stuff in the Conservative's 2019 election manifesto for people to get upset about.

https://assets-global.website-files.com/5da42e2cae7ebd3f8bde353c/5dda924905da587992a064ba_Conservative%202019%20Manifesto.pdf

MaxiRobriguez

The_Green_Hornet said:

MaxiRobriguez said:

The deal we've got is a reasonable one. Harder than many remainers/lefties would have liked but tariff-free trade and a level playing field which limits what the Tories can do in terms of divergence from working rights and environmental standards, should placate some of their worst fears. The concessions won on state aid should benefit any future socialist government too and the ability to strike our own trade deals in the future will be of benefit. 

There are pro's and con's to Brexit but what we have is nowhere near as bad as it could have been, and absolutely nowhere near as bad as a no deal. I am a Labour voter but I respect that Boris' brinksmanship has won us more concessions than we would have won otherwise.

My biggest concern is not with Brexit. It is with a parliament voted in for five years solely to deliver Brexit which as of tomorrow is done but we will have three and a half more years left before the next election. The current government has no mandate to do anything else than what it already has, and the inevitable tax increases/spending reductions to pay off coronavirus debts should not be taken solely by an ideological government who have shown over the past year they're quite happy to stick their noses in the trough. 

Plenty of other stuff in the Conservative's 2019 election manifesto for people to get upset about.

https://assets-global.website-files.com/5da42e2cae7ebd3f8bde353c/5dda924905da587992a064ba_Conservative%202019%20Manifesto.pdf

Let's face it though they didn't win an 80 seat majority based on what was in their manifesto. They won it on a three word slogan of Get Brexit Done (which was masterful, by the way) and a opposition leader who was hated.

BananaRepublic

MaxiRobriguez said:

 Let's face it though they didn't win an 80 seat majority based on what was in their manifesto. They won it on a three word slogan of Get Brexit Done (which was masterful, by the way) and a opposition leader who was hated.

Exactly. In four years time Boris may struggle to retain the Labour votes he captured, even if the economy does well. That said, the remainers who deserted the Tories may well return.

I wonder if Starmer will plan to renogotiate the deal to look more like EU membership. That assumes he can make decisions and he doesn't seem too gifted in that regard, even if he is not Corbyn which is a good thing.

Sailtheworld

MaxiRobriguez said:

The deal we've got is a reasonable one. Harder than many remainers/lefties would have liked but tariff-free trade and a level playing field which limits what the Tories can do in terms of divergence from working rights and environmental standards, should placate some of their worst fears. The concessions won on state aid should benefit any future socialist government too and the ability to strike our own trade deals in the future will be of benefit. 

There are some very obvious deficiencies. Imports from the EU will have a phase introduction of new documentation requirements. Exports to the EU won't - new documentation requirements will apply from tomorrow. If the UK hasn't managed to get even this tiniest of concession then I take claims that they conceded to anything with a pinch of salt.

I know people will say business has had four years or more to prepare but they really haven't. Government are well behind the curve. For example; there's a grace period for deliveries to NI. For animal products the form that's needed to accompany shipments didn't come out until last night, today DEFRA have emailed to tell everyone to ignore it because they've changed the form already and now they've just withdrawn the new form.

EDIT: Now on V5 of the form since V1 last night!

An interesting few weeks ahead!

moneyfoolish

BananaRepublic said:

That said, the remainers who deserted the Tories may well return.

This one certainly won't! At least, not as long as the current clown is Prime Minister.

Mickey666

Malthusian said:

Xbigman said:
David Cameron saw the alarming rise in UKIP support and made the offer of a referendum to slow it down. It worked wit
The idea of a second referendum to decide how we left the EU is one that I would have supported. But that was never on offer. Remainer MPs, in a majority in parliament, insisted that there be a remain option on the ballot. In short they wanted to rerun the 2016 referendum in the hopes of overturning it.
NOT holding that form of second referendum was a good call.

There was never any such thing as a "referendum on how we leave the EU".

UK: Ok, we had a second referendum and we've decided we'd like the Norway option.

EU: Non. You can have any option except Norway.

UK: But we decided as a nation that we want a Norway-style agreement.

EU: You appear to have forgotten that you have the right to unilaterally leave the EU, but you don't have the right to unilaterally decide what agreements we have in place afterwards, that's a bilateral decision. And we don't agree on the Norway option.

UK: But we had a referendum where we decided we'd leave the EU, and another referendum where we decided we'd do so on Norway-style terms. If we can't leave on Norway-style terms then we have to renege on one referendum or the other.

EU: That would appear to be a "vous" problem and not a "nous" problem.

UK: What's wrong with Norway terms anyway?

EU: We don't want you and your net-contributor status to leave, and rejecting the option your idiotic opinion poll chose causes you maximum inconvenience.

You're right, there was no referendum about HOW we leave the EU, but perhaps there should have been because without it everyone was basically voting in the dark (ie uninformed) about what the consequences would really be.
But your amusing little sketch completely misses that point.  It would be pointless to ask the voters what sort of deal they wanted because, as you rightly allude, it was never in the UK's power to dictate anything.
The point of a 2nd referendum would have been AFTER the exit deal had been negotiated, ie instead of letting parliament decide yesterday it could have been the people that would decide if the exit terms were acceptable to them.
Thus, referendum 1 - should UK leave the EU?  yes/no  and referendum2 - should the UK leave the EU on the terms now negotiated? yes/no.
I suppose there could have been 3 options - 1. stay, 2. leave with the deal, 3. leave with no deal (ie WTO terms etc).
Actually, option 1 was not a real option by now because the UK had no unilateral power to stay, it would have require the approval of the EU.
But there we are, all water under the bridge now,  but of course for the next few years, anything that goes wrong with the economy will be blamed on brexit and anything that goes well with the economy will be blamed on brexit - so hours of more pointless politicking to look forward to

Cus

I don't understand why so much time and effort was spent negotiating the fishing industry (0.1% of GDP, 24k jobs) rather than financial services industry (6.5% of GDP, 1.1mn jobs)
My fear is that it was because of a nationalistic sentiment.

eskbanker

Cus said:

I don't understand why so much time and effort was spent negotiating the fishing industry (0.1% of GDP, 24k jobs) rather than financial services industry (6.5% of GDP, 1.1mn jobs)
My fear is that it was because of a nationalistic sentiment.

Yes, it's populist politics rather than economics - fishermen have the popular perception of being the brave hardy souls out in all weathers, etc, while the financial services industry remains heavily tainted by scandals and the tabloid-led booing and hissing of bankers earning bonuses despite nearly bankrupting the country in 2008, blah, blah, blah....