'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
Friends with benefits? Are they gonna shaft England or is England shafting them?
As I understand it both Europe and UK are feminine.
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
And if the restaurant serves horseburgers and understrength wine and has rats in the kitchen and Typhoid Mary doing the flipping, they'll take their business elsewhere, so no need to regulate any of that stuff either.
Pro_Rata and DJL point below to something that it's so easy to forget. This isn't about who will make the best Prime Minister. It's not about will be best to lead this country out of the mire. This isn't about who can be most trusted. Nor even about who can most effectively draw a line under this Caligula-era.
It's about:
1. Who Cons MPs prefer to shortlist and THEN
2. Who the Membership most like
Whilst I'm prepared to accept that the former are a bit more in touch with ordinary voters and I have very little faith that the latter are.
This makes betting very difficult. It's not like most other markets. We're betting on a niche point of view which is not necessarily in sync with the rest of the nation.
The thought of a few thousand HYUFDs choosing a next PM is a very scary thought. 😳
I think you have to be alive so Franco is out of the question.
The article makes one offhand reference to Brexit.
The comments are wall to wall Brexit
Good. We live in the context of Brexit, but we make no progress if we just reheat the same arguments about Brexit itself over and over again. If that means we have to ignore the elephant in the room a little in order to get things done, a price worth paying.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
And if the restaurant serves horseburgers and understrength wine and has rats in the kitchen and Typhoid Mary doing the flipping, they'll take their business elsewhere, so no need to regulate any of that stuff either.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
States have controlled the use of weights and measures for millennia, because it's a necessary condition for building trust in a market.
That's why there has to be a legal standard, but people are free to use conversions to other measures too.
That's a different matter, to prevent fraud. You don't want to have people buying a litre of fuel but only getting 950ml with the company fraudulently pocketing the difference.
I don't see what the harm is in having a legal standard for imperial, alongside a legal standard for metric, and allowing companies to choose to use whichever standard they prefer. Instead of companies having to display that a quarter pounder is so many grams, the legal standard is that it is instead.
If the conversion between metric and imperial were set standards then any weights and measures would still be standardised whichever route companies or consumers chose to use.
On a personal level I far, far prefer metric and would choose to use that 99.99% of the time. But I see absolutely no harm if others choose to use something different and see no advantage in requiring eg pints or quarter pounders etc being compelled to have a metric conversion alongside, if the conversion is standardised anyway.
That's quite a technocratic argument. The key issue is trust.
Allowing businesses to pick and choose which measurement system they want to use would erode trust. I don't see it as a particular burden to require businesses to use a single set of measurements, while allowing them to use additional ones if they wish.
Why on earth would it erode trust to let people choose for themselves?
It's the businesses that would choose and the consumers whose trust would be eroded.
No it wouldn't. Consumers choose which businesses they frequent, if the consumers aren't happy that burgers aren't listed in how many grams are in a quarter pounder, of how many grams are in an 8oz steak then they can take their business elsewhere.
Businesses do what they do to serve their customers, they don't have customers as a captive audience.
And if the restaurant serves horseburgers and understrength wine and has rats in the kitchen and Typhoid Mary doing the flipping, they'll take their business elsewhere, so no need to regulate any of that stuff either.
Again there's a difference between fraud, health and safety, and choice.
So long as a quarter pounder burger has a quarter pound of beef in it, then there's no fraud and who is harmed by it being sold by the quarter pound?
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
I've never seen a restaurant menu that specifies how many grams are in a quarter pounder or 8oz/12oz/etc steaks. Nor have I seen one that specifies the volume of soup.
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
I've never seen a restaurant menu that specifies how many grams are in a quarter pounder or 8oz/12oz/etc steaks. Nor have I seen one that specifies the volume of soup.
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
I have.
So its OK for a restaurant in your eyes to sell quarter pounder burgers, without specifying the metric equivalent, but it is not OK for a butcher to do so?
So long as the quarter pound is not fraudulent, even if its an alternative standard that is specified elsewhere to be converted to metric (as all imperial, even US, technically is nowadays as far as I'm aware) then what is the harm in consumers and businesses choosing that as the standards they'd prefer?
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
Some places sell ale by the yard! I've seen the glasses!
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
But for his embarrassing period stepping back for a potential leadership bid so abortive it scarcely existed, I see Brady has been Chair of the 1922 Committee since 2010, longer than an other person.
I know it is meant to be an important role, but I wonder how fulfilling it is outside of those periods when a challenge might occur, which is the only aspect of the role the media and public would be interested in.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
Some places sell ale by the yard! I've seen the glasses!
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
You'd need a handle. A tankard, rather than a glass.
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
Some places sell ale by the yard! I've seen the glasses!
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
I've drunk from litre glasses in Europe. You need a strong wrist of if a wimp two hands when full.
But for his embarrassing period stepping back for a potential leadership bid so abortive it scarcely existed, I see Brady has been Chair of the 1922 Committee since 2010, longer than an other person.
I know it is meant to be an important role, but I wonder how fulfilling it is outside of those periods when a challenge might occur, which is the only aspect of the role the media and public would be interested in.
I imagine very.
The media may only be interested at those times, but liaising between the backbenches and the government is probably a very interesting role to have, where there is always something happening even if the media doesn't report it. A bit like Chair of a Select Committee.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
I've never seen a restaurant menu that specifies how many grams are in a quarter pounder or 8oz/12oz/etc steaks. Nor have I seen one that specifies the volume of soup.
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
I have.
So its OK for a restaurant in your eyes to sell quarter pounder burgers, without specifying the metric equivalent, but it is not OK for a butcher to do so?
So long as the quarter pound is not fraudulent, even if its an alternative standard that is specified elsewhere to be converted to metric (as all imperial, even US, technically is nowadays as far as I'm aware) then what is the harm in consumers and businesses choosing that as the standards they'd prefer?
The point is that restaurants do not sell food by weight. They may use weights in the descriptions of a couple of specific food items where that is customary, but the only quantity of food they are selling you is a "serving" which they determine.
So they aren't relevant to a discussion of weights and measures.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
I would extend it further. Apart from giving change to beggars, I haven't used physical cash in months. Why not let retailers sell goods in any currency that they choose? Euros, bitcoins, US Dollars, Malawian Kwatcha etc? When it is all electronic, why does it matter? Let the customer choose.
Even by the standards of the MOD this seems to be egregiously bad.
A review of the Ajax project by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) concluded a "litany of failures" had led to the years-long delays.
So far no operational vehicles have been delivered, despite the 12-year-old project already costing over £3bn.
The new reconnaissance vehicle was supposed to enter service in 2017...
Since the contract was signed in 2014, the project has delivered 26 reconnaissance vehicles out of a promised 589 vehicles - which can only be used for training...
However, the army has said it is "cautiously optimistic" that Ajax can enter service by 2030.
Even after all the delays it is only 'cautiously optimistic' they will enter service by 2030, and we all know that means it definitely won't.
How do contractors get away with this shit? There's no way that's just incompetence. You expect goverment to be in bed with defence contractors, but to allow this kind of thing must mean outright corruption, surely? Given the problems are never fixed and always reoccur.
Everybody involved gets some of the blame for this, there's plenty to go round.
It should, of course, be cancelled but the army will fight for it harder than they ever did in Basra or Helman because they quite correctly assume they won't get the money to buy anything else if they bin this off.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
I've never seen a restaurant menu that specifies how many grams are in a quarter pounder or 8oz/12oz/etc steaks. Nor have I seen one that specifies the volume of soup.
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
I have.
So its OK for a restaurant in your eyes to sell quarter pounder burgers, without specifying the metric equivalent, but it is not OK for a butcher to do so?
So long as the quarter pound is not fraudulent, even if its an alternative standard that is specified elsewhere to be converted to metric (as all imperial, even US, technically is nowadays as far as I'm aware) then what is the harm in consumers and businesses choosing that as the standards they'd prefer?
The point is that restaurants do not sell food by weight. They may use weights in the descriptions of a couple of specific food items where that is customary, but the only quantity of food they are selling you is a "serving" which they determine.
So they aren't relevant to a discussion of weights and measures.
Indeed. And contrary to the practice in some countries where fish and certain cuts of meat are sold by weight in restaurants.
'The Tory peer and Asda boss Lord Rose said returning to imperial weights and measures was “complete and utter nonsense” and would “add cost” for businesses.
He told Times Radio: “I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life. I mean, we have got serious problems in the world and we’re now saying ‘let’s go backwards’.
“Does anybody in this country below the age of about 40 know how many ounces there are in a pound?”
BEIS insisted the move would not inflict further costs on businesses as there was no intention to require them to make a change.'
But the Graun journalist notes something I hadn't quite realised - this proposal is completely futile anyway even on the Tories' (admittedly implicit) premisses about nasty EU banning Imperial stuff:
'it is still legal to price goods in pounds and ounces if displayed alongside prices in grams and kilograms.'
Yes. The whole argument is about whether someone can price and sell goods using Imperial measures alone, or if they have to give the metric values too. I welcome use of both systems.
Most consumers are too young to be imperial savvy. So it would take an absolute tool to *only* price in imperial. And before anyone says "what about pubs" take a look at their price list - 568ml is also displayed.
So this is a confected argument for seniles and idiots to propose something that no business will do.
I don't think I've ever seen 568ml displayed on a price list. The grams for a quarter-pounder burger is normally displayed, but not normally ml's for pints, I always thought that was an exemption to requiring metric alongside.
Quite frankly I don't see what's wrong with letting businesses decide. If they want to sell by metric, let them do so. If they want to sell by imperial, let them do so. If they want to do both, let them do so. Why should anyone else care, let the consumers and businesses choose.
If a company wishes to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying that a quarter pounder is 113.4g then I don't see what the issue is to be frank. Let people choose.
It is a lot easier for people to choose when there are standard rules of measures in place than it is left up to each business to make up their own.
If you go to a bar the bar can sell "Singles" or "Doubles" of spirits and those aren't standardised, depending upon the bar the law allows them to be either 25ml or 35ml which will be listed somewhere, typically on a wall, in their weights and measures disclaimer.
So long as its disclaimed whether you're talking either of 2 measurements, what's the issue? If people want to buy and sell in metric, they can, if they want to buy and sell in imperial, what's the harm in that? So long as the conversion is standardised, then its much ado about nothing, just trust people to decide what's best for them.
Because you want standardisation *across the market* not *across the UK market.* I bet you some other member of the 27 had pre existing weights and measures which weren't decimal and weren't lb and oz either, the whole thing fragments and gets bonkers. This is an irrational hill to die on.
I'm not sure what's that got to do with what I said, but either way I don't want to die on this hill, I really couldn't care less. Its other people who seem extremely bothered by the concept.
Whether you want to buy or sell in metric or imperial, I couldn't care, let people choose. So long as businesses aren't committing fraud in doing so, then let people choose whichever they prefer. If a business wants for some reason to sell quarter pounder burgers without specifying how many grams are in the burger, then so long as the measurement is correct - why should anyone care about that?
Standardised product information aids price discovery and reduces costs to consumers. Marginally, but it does. Why take it away and add yet more costs, even if they are tiny.
Because consumers and businesses ought to be able to choose.
If consumers choose to purchase quarter pounders, then a metric conversion on that shouldn't be required, they've made their choice.
I prefer metric, but if people are choosing metric because they prefer metric, then great. It shouldn't strip away other people's choices either, I'm pro-choice.
I also support choice and diversity in units of measurement - but that can still happen at the same time as having a legal minimum to use metric so that there is a standard for comparison.
I don't see any harm in dropping that legal minimum.
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
I've never seen a restaurant menu that specifies how many grams are in a quarter pounder or 8oz/12oz/etc steaks. Nor have I seen one that specifies the volume of soup.
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
I have.
So its OK for a restaurant in your eyes to sell quarter pounder burgers, without specifying the metric equivalent, but it is not OK for a butcher to do so?
So long as the quarter pound is not fraudulent, even if its an alternative standard that is specified elsewhere to be converted to metric (as all imperial, even US, technically is nowadays as far as I'm aware) then what is the harm in consumers and businesses choosing that as the standards they'd prefer?
The point is that restaurants do not sell food by weight. They may use weights in the descriptions of a couple of specific food items where that is customary, but the only quantity of food they are selling you is a "serving" which they determine.
So they aren't relevant to a discussion of weights and measures.
Restaurants can and do list food by weight and to do so but to then use a different weight would be fraudulent.
IANAL but I think if a restaurant were to sell a quarter pounder burger but only were to standardise that they only put 75g of beef in it, then that would be deemed deceptive and illegal, and they wouldn't/shouldn't get away with saying "ah but its just a serving name".
If a butcher wants to sell quarter pounder burgers, or 8oz steaks, without listing the metric alternative then what is the harm in that?
If people know that when they order a quarter pound of anything they're actually getting a quarter pound then that would improve trust not undermine it, even if its an alternative measurement to what we'd typically prefer.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Because resolving those issues isn't within the gift of the UK government. It requires the EU to do us a favour, which isn't going to happen. What it means is that in the long term the UK becomes even more detached from the EU as trade with the rest of the world liberalises at a faster rate than it will with the EU.
The only way forwards is to work within the bounds of the TCA and cast our export and import net significantly more widely than we have done for the last 30 years.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
Some places sell ale by the yard! I've seen the glasses!
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
I've drunk from litre glasses in Europe. You need a strong wrist of if a wimp two hands when full.
The state my hands are in nowadays, I need two hands for a wineglass! Like carpal tunnel syndrome, only worse!
On the topic of trust, it would surely aid trust to have imperial standardised not harm it.
If I go to a restaurant and order an 8oz steak then I want to know that steak is 8oz (within margin of error) and not a steak they're simply calling 8oz but is actually six ounces.
Even after years of metrification there is still plenty of things that people choose to buy in imperial. We shouldn't try to override their choice, but we should be sure that the standards are there that it is what people say it is.
The snooty attitude of "people under 40 don't understand imperial" is a bit backwards anyway, you don't need to for some things. I don't understand imperial one bit, I couldn't care less about it, but I know what an 8oz steak is. I don't know off the top of my head what the unit smaller than an ounce is, if there is one, or how to convert it but I don't need to either. I know what a pint is, I couldn't tell you how many pints there are in a gallon, but I don't need to know that either.
There are two pints in a quart and four quarts in a gallon. So there are eight pints in a gallon.
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
Some places sell ale by the yard! I've seen the glasses!
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
I've drunk from litre glasses in Europe. You need a strong wrist of if a wimp two hands when full.
And I have drunk in imperial pints in Stockholm, and from a Facebook conversation I picked up, it seems a bar I visited in Fuengirola last year has imperial half pints as its smaller measure (the larger is 400ml)
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Because that opinion is extremely inefficiently spread by constituency in voting terms, and the other side feel more strongly and emotionally about it than we do.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
You know full well the reasons though. You don't like them, but we've been over them to death and they're not new to you.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Not only red wall, but many of us want a friendly relationship with the EU but the idea of rejoining is unacceptable unless specifically stated in a manifesto
It seems some want honesty and integrity but not always
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
It is absolutely the answer. The people decided it wasn't working and voted against it. You can agree or disagree with the decision, yet it is the reality.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Not sure, but my working theory is that it's the difference between number of people and amount of noise.
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
You know full well the reasons though. You don't like them, but we've been over them to death and they're not new to you.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
You know full well the reasons though. You don't like them, but we've been over them to death and they're not new to you.
Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.
Oh, pardon me for existing!!!
There's no harm in you existing, just recognise that other people have opinions different to your own.
We had a vote, people chose to leave, that is the reason we left. That right there is 17.4 million different reasons why it wasn't working for us.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
We could perhaps have a Ministry of Silly Walks next. JRM has the physique and mannerisms for that one already.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
We could perhaps have a Ministry of Silly Walks next. JRM has the physique and mannerisms for that one already.
- He'd be superb in the role. Would love to see it.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Remainers: we don't like this one little bit Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS Remainers: ... Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Because the tories are desperate to fight the next election on a platform of Brexit betrayal. Why give the demented confabulators who led us into this mess what they want? Rejoiners are playing the long game.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Not sure, but my working theory is that it's the difference between number of people and amount of noise.
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
Good points. A difficulty is this. Those who want change from where we are can be described as Remainers, but this would be wrong.
In the Referendum Brexit faced the problem that there was only one, unified version of Remain (status quo) but many differing visions of Brexit. The campaign coalesced around a populist one of course because it needed the votes. Remain had no popular or populist cause to espouse, especially once the EU had said no to real change or derogations.
The problem is now reversed. There are a multiplicity of alternative possibilities, but only one status quo, that being Boris's Brexit.
SKS and LDs job is to unify the support for change just as the populist campaign unified the diverse Brexit vote.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
I do get slightly irritated when the BBC refers to earthquake victims (for example) buried under "tonnes of rubble". A minor skirmish in their undeclared culture war, perhaps, but when the history of the licence fee and its demise comes to be written it will be there as a footnote.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Genuine question. I have never heard the weight of new babies proudly given in any form other than pounds and ounces, and I hear of plenty. Cumbria, where I live is of course well behind general trends. Is it just here or is elsewhere the same?
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Remainers: we don't like this one little bit Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS Remainers: ... Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
I don't know anyone who has anything to do with international trade, or with reasonably high education, who doesn't think Leaving was a mistake, and doesn't want to rejoin.
"Joe Biden set to send refugees to Spain as migrant crisis worsens Washington and Madrid close to securing a deal to relocate immigrants currently on the US-Mexico border"
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
It is a clear minority, but not hardly anyone, about a third of thirtysomethings do for example. It is hardly anyone over 50.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
I do get slightly irritated when the BBC refers to earthquake victims (for example) buried under "tonnes of rubble". A minor skirmish in their undeclared culture war, perhaps, but when the history of the licence fee and its demise comes to be written it will be there as a footnote.
My eldest son attended ground zero in Christchurch (NZ) and witnessed the appalling tragedy
He has had delayed severe PTSD and anxiety culminating in 3 years of serious issues and is only just beginning to show signs of improvement
Broadcasters need to have more respect in their reporting
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
How do contractors get away with this shit? There's no way that's just incompetence. You expect goverment to be in bed with defence contractors, but to allow this kind of thing must mean outright corruption, surely? Given the problems are never fixed and always reoccur.
The example is crazy, but the underlying issue is not I think corruption but optimism bias. Companies bid for contracts on the basis that everything will go perfectly, and anyone who builds in margins of error gets triaged out before the final selection. The purchasers know it'll probably overrun, though they will hope not by more than a year or two.
Most organisations have the same internal problem. Nobody gets promoted for saying they'll do something in 18 months when it *might* get done in 12. Management assumes if you say 18 that it'll take 24.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Not sure, but my working theory is that it's the difference between number of people and amount of noise.
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
Good points. A difficulty is this. Those who want change from where we are can be described as Remainers, but this would be wrong.
In the Referendum Brexit faced the problem that there was only one, unified version of Remain (status quo) but many differing visions of Brexit. The campaign coalesced around a populist one of course because it needed the votes. Remain had no popular or populist cause to espouse, especially once the EU had said no to real change or derogations.
The problem is now reversed. There are a multiplicity of alternative possibilities, but only one status quo, that being Boris's Brexit.
SKS and LDs job is to unify the support for change just as the populist campaign unified the diverse Brexit vote.
That's true, but the necessary condition for all of that is sufficient agreement that Things Aren't Going Well, and I don't think we're there. Not yet, anyway. And, as we see here, campaigning to get that viewpoint accepted creates as many problems as it solves; "They'll come to steal.your precious Brexit" and all that. So the sentiment has to come from the bottom up. Which- gradually- it is. After all, if something is a mistake, and there are ways of reversing that mistake, only a crazy person wouldn't at least investigate the options.
Oh, I’m drinking ice cold Saperavi wine and eating Tbilisi’s third best Khinkali with daubs of Ajeri along with a bowl of Loba bean soup while sitting on my sunny wooden terrace at 28 Alexandra Dumas street in Tbilisi Old Town and staring beyond Sofia cathedral where Melchizedek I is buried even as the granny downstairs sings an Abkhazian nursery rhyme to the household baby
If this gets any more Georgian I will start worshipping ram’s horns as I retreat to my bandit’s lair in the fierce mountains of Svaneti
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
I simply have not heard the lib dems state their intention is to rejoin
Labour will have to have a credible position for the next GE
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Genuine question. I have never heard the weight of new babies proudly given in any form other than pounds and ounces, and I hear of plenty. Cumbria, where I live is of course well behind general trends. Is it just here or is elsewhere the same?
Just be grateful the locals have got round to using Anglish with a dash of Danish. You could be listening to some mum proudly saying that her child weighs pedwar lb kɨnthaβ̃ oz.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
It is a clear minority, but not hardly anyone, about a third of thirtysomethings do for example. It is hardly anyone over 50.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Agree. The tricky questions are: What about EEA/EFTA and under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Remainers: we don't like this one little bit Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS Remainers: ... Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
I don't know anyone who has anything to do with international trade, or with reasonably high education, who doesn't think Leaving was a mistake, and doesn't want to rejoin.
You don’t get out much if you don’t meet well-educated Leavers
On the other hand, you express an underlying truth which I have now been noting for a while. There is a lot of Rejoin sentiment out there, especially on the Left (where it is intense), as soon as Labour reach power (they will try and hide all this until then) it will burst into the open like a nest of spiderlings hatching out. Starmer, if he is PM, will come under immediate, severe pressure to move swiftly closer to the EU
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
You know full well the reasons though. You don't like them, but we've been over them to death and they're not new to you.
Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.
Oh, pardon me for existing!!!
There's no harm in you existing, just recognise that other people have opinions different to your own.
We had a vote, people chose to leave, that is the reason we left. That right there is 17.4 million different reasons why it wasn't working for us.
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Not sure, but my working theory is that it's the difference between number of people and amount of noise.
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
Good points. A difficulty is this. Those who want change from where we are can be described as Remainers, but this would be wrong.
In the Referendum Brexit faced the problem that there was only one, unified version of Remain (status quo) but many differing visions of Brexit. The campaign coalesced around a populist one of course because it needed the votes. Remain had no popular or populist cause to espouse, especially once the EU had said no to real change or derogations.
The problem is now reversed. There are a multiplicity of alternative possibilities, but only one status quo, that being Boris's Brexit.
SKS and LDs job is to unify the support for change just as the populist campaign unified the diverse Brexit vote.
That's true, but the necessary condition for all of that is sufficient agreement that Things Aren't Going Well, and I don't think we're there. Not yet, anyway. And, as we see here, campaigning to get that viewpoint accepted creates as many problems as it solves; "They'll come to steal.your precious Brexit" and all that. So the sentiment has to come from the bottom up. Which- gradually- it is. After all, if something is a mistake, and there are ways of reversing that mistake, only a crazy person wouldn't at least investigate the options.
One thing I wonder in the Brexit polling is the question of which is the horse and which is the cart?
Is it that Tory polling is dropping because the Tory policies are unpopular (Brexit being their signature dish) or is it that support for Brexit is dropping because it is associated with the crap Tories?
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Agree. The tricky questions are: What about EEA/EFTA and under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
Labour will not be supporting FOM under any Starmer manifesto so I am told.
Morning all. I think this one is pretty easy. The ideal is obviously to have standard units of measurement that everyone - young and old, right left or centrist, British or burdened by being foreign - understands and uses. That's the point of a measurement system. Clarity and consistency across people and places. So this should be the direction of travel. Going in the opposite direction, whilst not the most terrible thing in the world, is a bit silly. Which is on brand for this government. Everything they do that isn't terrible is a bit silly.
Hardly anyone in the UK uses metric measurements to describe their height.
Interestingly it’s used a lot more for weight
I confess I do the American thing and weigh myself in pounds alone.
Stones seem utterly pointless, I can weigh in pounds and just use that as a decimal number as if it were metric. Plus its easier to target losing a pound than a kilogram so its more satisfying.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Agree. The tricky questions are: What about EEA/EFTA and under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
Your last sentence is spot on, and the EU have a lot of responsibility over their inflexibility which led to Brexit
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
And for now, he's right to do so. Noise and toxicity beat raw numbers.
I stick by my calendar proposed on Brexit Day;
The 2024 rewrite of the TCA (which has to happen) will actually promote trade and co-operation at the expense of the UK giving up some of the more hypothetical freedoms.
2029 will be EEA in all but name.
2040ish will be the UK choosing to be in the room when decisions are taken.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Agree. The tricky questions are: What about EEA/EFTA and under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
Interestingly for such a negotiation over exceptions for SM, the EU seems to have handed us a card.
Hungary have been exempt from Russia oil import ban iirc. They can now potentially make use of a cheaper source of oil than rest of EU.
Sounds like the SM is not as unshakable as we have been told.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
That's what I'm arguing for: bilateral, and maybe multilateral, treaties in security and trade in certain defined areas between sovereign states that don't want to be part of the EU - fine - and even some other cooperation agreements with the EU itself too.
I'm not arguing for going back into the EU's orbit, and would be very wise to anything that smelt like that.
An institutional architecture implies some kind of associate membership of the EU, which is 5 steps too close to them and puts us within their orbit. It suggests a one size fits all relationship with the EU for European countries that aren't in it but that one size fits all relationship didn't work for us in the past.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us. Did it cock up the trade in NI? Did it restrict our company trading in the EU with red tape etc? Did it restrict our travel to the EU? Did it restrict us from working in Europe? Did it reduce our pool of labour needlessly?
Because the people voted against it.
That is not the answer to the question asked. You may as well have said because I like eggs for breakfast.
You know full well the reasons though. You don't like them, but we've been over them to death and they're not new to you.
Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.
Oh, pardon me for existing!!!
There's no harm in you existing, just recognise that other people have opinions different to your own.
We had a vote, people chose to leave, that is the reason we left. That right there is 17.4 million different reasons why it wasn't working for us.
That's the pot calling the kettle blackarse......
No it isn't, I've never expected others to agree with me, nor questioned why they don't.
My opinions are my opinions and I may be forthright in expressing them, but I neither expect nor demand that you agree with them.
I don't agree with voting Labour, but I don't pretend not to understand why people do. I don't like religion, but I don't pretend not to understand why theists exist. I can disagree with someone without pretending they have no reason to believe as they do and ask rhetorical questions like "I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us".
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
I simply have not heard the lib dems state their intention is to rejoin
Labour will have to have a credible position for the next GE
Yes, you say this every few months despite me posting a link to the official LD policy in response. Here it is again:
"In a passionately argued debate last September, conference resolved that the party should support a longer-term objective of UK membership of the the EU, but we rejected a proposal for an immediate campaign to reverse Brexit, which, it was argued, was more likely to alienate voters sick of the recent history of Brexit-inspired division and bitterness. Conference also called for the closest possible alignment between the UK and the EU on trade, security, environmental, social, judicial, educational and scientific issues."
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Remainers: we don't like this one little bit Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS Remainers: ... Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
I don't know anyone who has anything to do with international trade, or with reasonably high education, who doesn't think Leaving was a mistake, and doesn't want to rejoin.
You don’t get out much if you don’t meet well-educated Leavers
On the other hand, you express an underlying truth which I have now been noting for a while. There is a lot of Rejoin sentiment out there, especially on the Left (where it is intense), as soon as Labour reach power (they will try and hide all this until then) it will burst into the open like a nest of spiderlings hatching out. Starmer, if he is PM, will come under immediate, severe pressure to move swiftly closer to the EU
Una popcornio momenta
Sadly, Leon, I can barely get out at all these days. I should have said anyone outside one or two people on boards such as this, to be more accurate.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Agree. The tricky questions are: What about EEA/EFTA and under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
Your last sentence is spot on, and the EU have a lot of responsibility over their inflexibility which led to Brexit
You mean the incompetence of the governments you supported which did nothing about the key driver of FOM - entitlement to jobs and benefits simply by residence, without further qualification. Absolutely classic example of a Brexiter blaming the EU for his own government's incompetence.
Oh, I’m drinking ice cold Saperavi wine and eating Tbilisi’s third best Khinkali with daubs of Ajeri along with a bowl of Loba bean soup while sitting on my sunny wooden terrace at 28 Alexandra Dumas street in Tbilisi Old Town and staring beyond Sofia cathedral where Melchizedek I is buried even as the granny downstairs sings an Abkhazian nursery rhyme to the household baby
If this gets any more Georgian I will start worshipping ram’s horns as I retreat to my bandit’s lair in the fierce mountains of Svaneti
Spending the week with Georgian bandits might make a flint knapper's article?
… Ukraine, the pandemic, and related matters are all contributing factors. But Brexit runs through almost all these developments like a stick of rock. Brexit has reduced the ability of airline companies to recruit baggage handlers and airport staff. Brexit paperwork continually slows down traffic at Dover and other ports.
Brexit has increased export costs for small businesses and larger companies. The prospect of further Brexit tariffs is one reason why Jaguar Land Rover is talking about shifting battery production to Slovakia. The UK government’s sabre-rattling about the Northern Ireland Protocol has increased pressure on the pound by deterring investors.
… there are certain aspects of our national experience that are entirely related to Brexit, and yet no one wants to mention them.
… Brexit is unsayable to the Johnson cabal and the Tory Party. Real world problems cannot be spoken about by a Vote Leave government that is more concerned with its own salvation than the real world, and a party hollowed out by a rightwing takeover that has transformed support for Brexit into the lodestone of what it means to be a Tory or even a loyal citizen.
… Brexit problems have become the invisible terrors of which Tories dare not speak… The 2016 referendum was won because Leave campaigners pretended there would be no negative consequences for leaving the European Union. Any seeds of doubt would have threatened the vote, and to some extent their ongoing silence is a continuation of that.
To acknowledge post-Brexit problems now would risk exposing the dishonesty and delusion at the heart of the Brexit project in the first place. It might lead the public to ask unwelcome questions about why these problems are taking place when Brexiteers denied that they would ever happen, and what Brexiters did to prepare for them or plan for them, and what they propose to do now.
…Terrified of falling into the Red Wall Brexit trap, the Labour Party has been almost as silent as the government, focussing on ‘making Brexit work’, without saying how, and referring to - wait for it -’post-Brexit opportunities’ while studiously ignoring post-Brexit negativities.
And how about the UK media? What about the state broadcaster? Can’t they ask the questions that politicians aren’t asking? They could, but with some exceptions, they prefer not to, and don’t draw the dots even when the outline of the picture is obvious.
… a complex and precarious democracy of 67 million people is being asked to shut its eyes to the act of gratuitous self-harm it has inflicted on itself, in order to protect a dishonest government and a clueless political class from ignominy… there are no sunlit uplands waiting for us, only an endless series of crises made so much worse by the problems that we refuse to speak about.
Assume that this is even half true - and much here is plausible, it leaves a mystery and opportunity.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
Not sure, but my working theory is that it's the difference between number of people and amount of noise.
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
Good points. A difficulty is this. Those who want change from where we are can be described as Remainers, but this would be wrong.
In the Referendum Brexit faced the problem that there was only one, unified version of Remain (status quo) but many differing visions of Brexit. The campaign coalesced around a populist one of course because it needed the votes. Remain had no popular or populist cause to espouse, especially once the EU had said no to real change or derogations.
The problem is now reversed. There are a multiplicity of alternative possibilities, but only one status quo, that being Boris's Brexit.
SKS and LDs job is to unify the support for change just as the populist campaign unified the diverse Brexit vote.
That's true, but the necessary condition for all of that is sufficient agreement that Things Aren't Going Well, and I don't think we're there. Not yet, anyway. And, as we see here, campaigning to get that viewpoint accepted creates as many problems as it solves; "They'll come to steal.your precious Brexit" and all that. So the sentiment has to come from the bottom up. Which- gradually- it is. After all, if something is a mistake, and there are ways of reversing that mistake, only a crazy person wouldn't at least investigate the options.
One thing I wonder in the Brexit polling is the question of which is the horse and which is the cart?
Is it that Tory polling is dropping because the Tory policies are unpopular (Brexit being their signature dish) or is it that support for Brexit is dropping because it is associated with the crap Tories?
There is also a subtle distinction, which is generally confused. Brexit is at least four linked questions:
Do you want to have left the EU
and
Do you support the current deal or prefer a different one (and if so what?)
and
Do you think the government/parliament is handling the issue as well as possible
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Remainers: we don't like this one little bit Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS Remainers: ... Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
I don't know anyone who has anything to do with international trade, or with reasonably high education, who doesn't think Leaving was a mistake, and doesn't want to rejoin.
You don’t get out much if you don’t meet well-educated Leavers
On the other hand, you express an underlying truth which I have now been noting for a while. There is a lot of Rejoin sentiment out there, especially on the Left (where it is intense), as soon as Labour reach power (they will try and hide all this until then) it will burst into the open like a nest of spiderlings hatching out. Starmer, if he is PM, will come under immediate, severe pressure to move swiftly closer to the EU
Una popcornio momenta
Sadly, Leon, I can barely get out at all these days. I should have said anyone outside one or two people on boards such as this, to be more accurate.
I’m sorry to hear that and I hope PB provides a modicum of entertainment to distract you
There's a suggestion going around that Ukrainian forces who were supposed to have withdrawn from Severodonetsk have instead trapped the Russians there. Would be a very interesting move and apparently there are the same network of underground tunnels as we saw in Mariupol.
“Brexit was a mistake which is causing harm but we shouldn’t do anything to reverse it” is a bizarre way of thinking. It’s like mishandling a knife and then resolving to let yourself bleed to death. https://twitter.com/seanjonesqc/status/1532630897173962752
Not really. Some divorces are mistakes and people find out the grass is not greener. For that group it would still be the exception rather than the rule to get back together with the ex.
Perhaps we should try and tempt the EU with friends with benefits instead of a second marriage or bitter enemies bitching about each other?
I think that, in time, the UK and the EU will adopt a closer and more cooperative relationship with each other but we'll never go back to full EU membership. You can't ever put the genie wholly back in the box.
We had decades of friction over our membership for very good reasons and I think both sides recognise it was the wrong model for both the EU and the UK.
Agree with that although would replace wrong with imperfect. The Ukraine war may actually open up possibilities for different levels of involvement with the EU and a strong UK government would be exploring what possibilities an outside EU satellite group could develop.
Of course, if you look at the original Vote Leave manifesto (and I'm not trying to trigger anyone here) but 'create a new European institutional architecture' was in there.
It's certainly what I voted for, and would consider supporting today too.
I think that's a bit naïve, CR. Anything that puts the UK back in the EU's orbit is, IMO, unacceptable. I have no issue with co-operation with the EU as long as it's a very tightly defined set of rules with the basis of co-operation set out in separate agreements or treaties rather than one overall and undefined relationship based on "trust" or relying on the other partner to act favourably. No more freebies, no more favours.
I agree with that post. I am a remainer, but we have left and so what you describe is the way forward. I wish both sides would get on with it. In my opinion there are hundreds of trivial to complex agreements that have to be made to make all our lives better. Red tape on trade, and a particular bug bear of mine, is red tape on temporary exports, and then we trivial things, but which have significant real effects on people, like the pet passport fiasco and the 90 day in 180 day travel issue.
Lets get on with it.
However what we do re NI I have no idea.
I think that broadly will be the Labour, and LD, approach to Brexit at the next election To "do away with unnessecary Brexit red tape", the former tacitly, and the latter expicitly to ultimate Rejoin.
Red Wall Tory MPs would be over the moon if Labour takes that approach.
Recent polling on Brexit as a mistake and the 58% voting Lab/LD/Green suggests other wise.
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Thinking it was a mistake but wanting to reverse it are two different questions
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
Oh, I think the LD policy is honestly stated. To have a closer relationship inclusing rejoining the SM with the long term aim of Rejoin once opinion has moved.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
Absolutely not. Labour has no intention of joining the EU short or long term under Starmer. The issue is toxic
Oh, I agree, but they do support much closer regulatory alignment, which means following EU rules and policy. It is the same direction but a slower track.
LBC's Matthew Thompson on Twitter: Well. What was previously a joyous atmosphere turns to a chorus of boos and whistles as Boris and Carrie Johnson walk up the steps into St Paul’s Cathedral.
I simply have not heard the lib dems state their intention is to rejoin
It's in their Europe policy paper on their website: "At our 2020 autumn conference, Liberal Democrat members agreed to call for: ‘The closest possible alignment between the UK and the EU towards customs union, single market and freedom of movement, including minimising tariff and non-tariff trade barriers, no lowering of environmental, food and animal welfare standards, and the maintenance of strong diplomatic, developmental, defence, security, judicial, educational and scientific cooperation.’ We resolved: ‘to support a longer-term objective of UK membership of the EU at an appropriate future date to be determined by political circumstances, subject to public assent, market and trade conditions and acceptable negotiated terms’."
The policy seems to be (1) initially, improve the currently adversarial UK-EU relationship; (2) work towards Single Market membership; (3) work on "maximising public support for eventual UK membership of the EU". So 'rejoin' isn't something that is an immediate aim but the party seems pretty clear that that's where they'd like to be in the long term if they can convince the general public that it's a good idea.
Good morning to everyone. Malcolm I see you're not very happy this morning!
Was sorry to read about Mr Jessops blue tits yesterday but, as he posted, that's what happens in nature!
Morning OKC, I am indeed happy but when I read the drivel that someone is salivating about some tosspot Tory and whether he has had some cowardly unprincipled wasters send him a letter about whether to chuck out an out and out crook then I get annoyed. Tories are an abomonation, unprincipled spineless lickspittles.
7/10 - a beginning of a return to form from @malcolmg here, with some range in the insults.
LBC's Matthew Thompson on Twitter: Well. What was previously a joyous atmosphere turns to a chorus of boos and whistles as Boris and Carrie Johnson walk up the steps into St Paul’s Cathedral.
"They want to touch him, they love Boris".
He's finished.
Actually Sky kept playing his reception and concluded he received applause and boos much in equal number
I simply have not heard the lib dems state their intention is to rejoin
It's in their Europe policy paper on their website: "At our 2020 autumn conference, Liberal Democrat members agreed to call for: ‘The closest possible alignment between the UK and the EU towards customs union, single market and freedom of movement, including minimising tariff and non-tariff trade barriers, no lowering of environmental, food and animal welfare standards, and the maintenance of strong diplomatic, developmental, defence, security, judicial, educational and scientific cooperation.’ We resolved: ‘to support a longer-term objective of UK membership of the EU at an appropriate future date to be determined by political circumstances, subject to public assent, market and trade conditions and acceptable negotiated terms’."
The policy seems to be (1) initially, improve the currently adversarial UK-EU relationship; (2) work towards Single Market membership; (3) work on "maximising public support for eventual UK membership of the EU". So 'rejoin' isn't something that is an immediate aim but the party seems pretty clear that that's where they'd like to be in the long term if they can convince the general public that it's a good idea.
Comments
If I go to McDonalds and look at their menu it doesn't say how many grams of beef are in a Big Mac, but it does for a Quarter Pounder. That's just petty.
If a restaurant lists on their menu they're selling 8 ounce steaks but don't list how many grams that is, do you think that should be against the law?
If any pub wanted to sell decent ale by the quart, I would be interested.
So long as a quarter pounder burger has a quarter pound of beef in it, then there's no fraud and who is harmed by it being sold by the quarter pound?
I don't think these are relevant examples for the discussion at hand.
So its OK for a restaurant in your eyes to sell quarter pounder burgers, without specifying the metric equivalent, but it is not OK for a butcher to do so?
So long as the quarter pound is not fraudulent, even if its an alternative standard that is specified elsewhere to be converted to metric (as all imperial, even US, technically is nowadays as far as I'm aware) then what is the harm in consumers and businesses choosing that as the standards they'd prefer?
Holding a quart glass could be tricky. Like some of the bigger Bavarian steins.
I know it is meant to be an important role, but I wonder how fulfilling it is outside of those periods when a challenge might occur, which is the only aspect of the role the media and public would be interested in.
One of the reasons that the EU is very cross with us is simply telling them no and them not getting what they wanted, it's acting like a spoilt brat that isn't used to not getting its own way all the time.
We need 10 more years of separation from the EU before we can even contemplate a multilateral treaty including the EU, it just comes with too many compromises and for little to no gain for the UK. Everyone who has said we need a closer relationship with the EU hasn't really outlined what the UK gains from it, the TCA doesn't include things like equivalence so it's never going to happen, it doesn't include customs arrangements so those aren't going to happen either. People who are suggesting a closer relationship are trying to reopen the door for membership by chipping away at Brexit, it's nothing more than that.
The media may only be interested at those times, but liaising between the backbenches and the government is probably a very interesting role to have, where there is always something happening even if the media doesn't report it. A bit like Chair of a Select Committee.
(Add to it the data on support for Brexit as it stands now - at record lows.)
Why is this not a series of open goals for Labour, the LDs and all others who either oppose Brexit in itself, or oppose the way it has so far been done. Why is majority opinion being so badly represented?
So they aren't relevant to a discussion of weights and measures.
It should, of course, be cancelled but the army will fight for it harder than they ever did in Basra or Helman because they quite correctly assume they won't get the money to buy anything else if they bin this off.
IANAL but I think if a restaurant were to sell a quarter pounder burger but only were to standardise that they only put 75g of beef in it, then that would be deemed deceptive and illegal, and they wouldn't/shouldn't get away with saying "ah but its just a serving name".
If a butcher wants to sell quarter pounder burgers, or 8oz steaks, without listing the metric alternative then what is the harm in that?
If people know that when they order a quarter pound of anything they're actually getting a quarter pound then that would improve trust not undermine it, even if its an alternative measurement to what we'd typically prefer.
The only way forwards is to work within the bounds of the TCA and cast our export and import net significantly more widely than we have done for the last 30 years.
Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.
It seems some want honesty and integrity but not always
Since 2019, all the noise has been from the out side; the remain/rejoin/ rapprochement side have, understandably and probably correctly gone into hibernation. Starmer's "get Brexit right" (or whatever it is) is sufficient to bring wrath on him.
A 50:40 opinion split that all this is a mistake is significant (and the underlying trend is increasingly to think that the UK is heading down the wrong path wrt Europe), but not yet enough for any mainstream politician to risk the flack.
But the trend is what it is- and bluntly, a chunk of it is demographic. Unless that trend changes (and why should it?), then democratic permission to try this ought to flip to a democratic demand to correct a mistake. Maybe around 60:30?
Doubling down on Brexit culture wars is not the votewinner that you think.
Furthermore, why are those who want to rejoin not standing fair and square and honestly saying so
We had a vote, people chose to leave, that is the reason we left. That right there is 17.4 million different reasons why it wasn't working for us.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/cricket/58516470
Leavers: STOP SUBVERTING THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE TRAITOR. GET OUT OF THE WAY, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, AND LET US GET ON WITH THIS
Remainers: ...
Leavers: WHY AREN'T YOU ADMITTING YOU WANT TO REJOIN?
In the Referendum Brexit faced the problem that there was only one, unified version of Remain (status quo) but many differing visions of Brexit. The campaign coalesced around a populist one of course because it needed the votes. Remain had no popular or populist cause to espouse, especially once the EU had said no to real change or derogations.
The problem is now reversed. There are a multiplicity of alternative possibilities, but only one status quo, that being Boris's Brexit.
SKS and LDs job is to unify the support for change just as the populist campaign unified the diverse Brexit vote.
Round here we use Yan, Tean, Tether, Mether.
Labour has already hit the ceiling.
Washington and Madrid close to securing a deal to relocate immigrants currently on the US-Mexico border"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/06/02/joe-biden-set-send-migrants-spain-landmark-deal/
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2022/04/07/metric-or-imperial-what-measures-do-britons-use
England CXXV-VIII trail New Zealand's CXXXII all out by VII runs with II wickets remaining.
Labours is less transparent, but clearly a move to closer alignment, which in practice means following EU regulations .
He has had delayed severe PTSD and anxiety culminating in 3 years of serious issues and is only just beginning to show signs of improvement
Broadcasters need to have more respect in their reporting
Most organisations have the same internal problem. Nobody gets promoted for saying they'll do something in 18 months when it *might* get done in 12. Management assumes if you say 18 that it'll take 24.
Oh, I’m drinking ice cold Saperavi wine and eating Tbilisi’s third best Khinkali with daubs of Ajeri along with a bowl of Loba bean soup while sitting on my sunny wooden terrace at 28 Alexandra Dumas street in Tbilisi Old Town and staring beyond Sofia cathedral where Melchizedek I is buried even as the granny downstairs sings an Abkhazian nursery rhyme to the household baby
If this gets any more Georgian I will start worshipping ram’s horns as I retreat to my bandit’s lair in the fierce mountains of Svaneti
Labour will have to have a credible position for the next GE
I don't know anyone else who does it.
and
under a non Boris government would the EU be more open to flexible negotiation about SM and derogation from FOM.
Brexit would never have won if there had been a common sense derogation over FOM.
On the other hand, you express an underlying truth which I have now been noting for a while. There is a lot of Rejoin sentiment out there, especially on the Left (where it is intense), as soon as Labour reach power (they will try and hide all this until then) it will burst into the open like a nest of spiderlings hatching out. Starmer, if he is PM, will come under immediate, severe pressure to move swiftly closer to the EU
Una popcornio momenta
Is it that Tory polling is dropping because the Tory policies are unpopular (Brexit being their signature dish) or is it that support for Brexit is dropping because it is associated with the crap Tories?
Stones seem utterly pointless, I can weigh in pounds and just use that as a decimal number as if it were metric. Plus its easier to target losing a pound than a kilogram so its more satisfying.
I stick by my calendar proposed on Brexit Day;
The 2024 rewrite of the TCA (which has to happen) will actually promote trade and co-operation at the expense of the UK giving up some of the more hypothetical freedoms.
2029 will be EEA in all but name.
2040ish will be the UK choosing to be in the room when decisions are taken.
Hungary have been exempt from Russia oil import ban iirc. They can now potentially make use of a cheaper source of oil than rest of EU.
Sounds like the SM is not as unshakable as we have been told.
My opinions are my opinions and I may be forthright in expressing them, but I neither expect nor demand that you agree with them.
I don't agree with voting Labour, but I don't pretend not to understand why people do. I don't like religion, but I don't pretend not to understand why theists exist. I can disagree with someone without pretending they have no reason to believe as they do and ask rhetorical questions like "I'm not sure how the previous relationship didn't work for us".
https://www.libdems.org.uk/eu-relationship
"In a passionately argued debate last September, conference resolved that the party should support a longer-term objective of UK membership of the the EU, but we rejected a proposal for an immediate campaign to reverse Brexit, which, it was argued, was more likely to alienate voters sick of the recent history of Brexit-inspired division and bitterness. Conference also called for the closest possible alignment between the UK and the EU on trade, security, environmental, social, judicial, educational and scientific issues."
Do you want to have left the EU
and
Do you support the current deal or prefer a different one (and if so what?)
and
Do you think the government/parliament is handling the issue as well as possible
and
Do you want to rejoin.
(I am Yes, No (EFTA), No, No)
There's a suggestion going around that Ukrainian forces who were supposed to have withdrawn from Severodonetsk have instead trapped the Russians there. Would be a very interesting move and apparently there are the same network of underground tunnels as we saw in Mariupol.
LBC's Matthew Thompson on Twitter: Well. What was previously a joyous atmosphere turns to a chorus of boos and whistles as Boris and Carrie Johnson walk up the steps into St Paul’s Cathedral.
"They want to touch him, they love Boris".
He's finished.
"At our 2020 autumn conference, Liberal Democrat members agreed to call for: ‘The closest possible alignment between the UK and the EU towards customs union, single market and freedom of movement, including minimising tariff and non-tariff trade barriers, no lowering of environmental, food and animal welfare standards, and the maintenance of strong diplomatic, developmental, defence, security, judicial, educational and scientific cooperation.’ We resolved: ‘to support a longer-term objective of UK membership of the EU at an appropriate future date to be determined by political circumstances, subject to public assent, market and trade conditions and acceptable negotiated terms’."
The policy seems to be (1) initially, improve the currently adversarial UK-EU relationship; (2) work towards Single Market membership; (3) work on "maximising public support for eventual UK membership of the EU". So 'rejoin' isn't something that is an immediate aim but the party seems pretty clear that that's where they'd like to be in the long term if they can convince the general public that it's a good idea.