That may be so, but he should be being quizzed as to what he would do as much as any leaver, more so in fact as it will be he who negotiates
(Snip)
Sorry, but that's rubbish on several levels. Cameron's position is that we should be in; what happens after will depend on, amongst other things, the strength of any leave vote. But he will have little idea of what the public precisely want as leave are purposefully being unclear.
And all because leave are trying to include anti-immigration people along with the EEA'ers in a desperate fight for votes.
If leave are so incompetent as not to come up with firm proposals to the public, why should Cameron when he's on the other side of the debate. It's one colossal failure of responsibility by leave.
Leave is The Big Lie. it's disgraceful politics, and I can imagine the screeching from them if (say) the EU tried similar tactics.
You keep saying this, but I completely disagree.
If Farage or Boris, or any other LEAVE campaigner for that matter, said "This is what we will do if we vote LEAVE", what weight would that carry? How can any such promise be made without opposition saying "What authority do you have to make good on this?" to which the answer is "none". They might as well promise the moon on a stick or free gold bullion, it doesn't matter, because they cant deliver either
On the other hand, Cameron is the only one who has the authority to make any decision post Brexit, yet he hasn't outlined any plan and no one seems to ask him. Being PM he should be making it clear what he will do, and how big the margin is (realistically if it is LEAVE it wont be that big) doesn't matter a jot
But you say the first is bad, but the second good. Very strange
I keep on saying it because I am right.
Your argument fits into what SeanF says above: you want Cameron to do your job for you. Pure laziness.
The leave groups coming up with a solid position would carry a heck of a lot of weight: it wouldn't bind whoever has to do the renegotiation, but it would be hard for them to deviate from it. After all the people's choice would have been clear.
Actually David Cameron's wants and whims are irrelevant in the face of a "leave" vote - it'll be Gove, or God forbid Boris that decides the future in that scenario !!
I rather think our EU friends might have a bit of a say in the matter as well.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically or economically, TBH.
Maybe this is something that the Leave campaigners should be clearer about: these things might happen, but they might not, it depends.
Reading Leave literature it is hard to conclude other than voters are being promised an end to mass migration from EU member states and ongoing free access to the single market. As you say, that is not something that can be promised.
You say all this if it didnt equally apply to Remain.
Please tell is what developments will happen in the EU over the next 5-10 years, we want to know what we are signing up for. Will there be a common border force, common judiciary, common police force, EU army. What powers will the Eurozone demand as it federalises, what powers and costs will be taken on to solve the financial problems in the southern countries. They voters should know what they are voting for, because whatever it is, it isn't the status quo.
Paying £350m seems cheaper than losing 25000 direct and indirect jobs.
Go on then. Will you be paying cash or cheque? I didn't know you had £350m spare, but if you do, I'm sure the Indian board of Tata will appreciate it...
...oh, you wanted somebody else to pay the money. Ah. Awkward pause...
OK, less glibly for the moment. If government uses tax money to subsidise uneconomic industries, then it is taking money from economic industries to do so, so it makes the economy worse off. There is also an opportunity cost: money spent on uneconomic industries is money not spent elsewhere. There is also the problems inherent in focussing resources on producing goods that people don't want to buy in enough numbers to make it profitable to make them: you end up with stockpiles, shoddy goods, or worse
We tried this in the post-war period for about thirty years, and we ended up with industries that spent a lot of money making stuff that we didn't want to buy because we could buy them cheaper and better from abroad.
The 25,000 people you refer to will eventually find other jobs. Given their ages and skillsets they will not necessarily be good jobs and the transition process will be painful (to say the least!) but mostly they will. If you genuinely want to help (and I assume you do: I'm not being sarky here) then offer things like tax rebates, special development areas, redundancy payments, genuine sympathy, and let them work their own way out. The people are not stupid and - given enough help[1] - they'll find solutions eventually.
[1] That bit's important
The government currently takes taxes from struggling business like steel to subsidise profiable businesses like Starbucks and Google. They do it through paying benefits to their workers. That doesn't appear to disturb you too much.
Nor does the fact that our steel industry would be more competitive if it wasn't tied to ridiculous EU directives.
Is it EU directives or our government's implementation of those directives that's the problem? The Germans seem to get along just fine under the same rules.
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
The will be like Remain then, they might aspire that we might carry on as before, but on the other hand we might have to become part of a common EU Border Force policing our borders, or a common EU Army fighting in conflicts that the British People or even government might not approve of, we could end up being part of a common EU Judicial system that ends centuries of trial by jury and where police from other EU states can make arrests on our streets. We may have all sorts of damage inflicted on the City of London by new financial regulations adopted under QMV. But then again its possible that some or none of this might happen. And so on.
The premise behind that is that Cameron is lying. That may well be. But if you do believe that, you must surely accept that the Leave side is lying too.
Alooha in Urdu means potatoes. So effectively Ted Cruz said
'Potatoes are great'
In the midst of a ponderous and chilling tale about terrorism and political correctness, Senator Ted Cruz dropped a delightful mispronunciation of the Takbīr—the multivalent Arabic phrase, “Allāhu Akbar,” usually translated as “God is great.” Cruz went with something like...Alooha akbar? Aloha akbar?
Anyway, keep practicing! Arabic is a difficult language to learn.
That may be so, but he should be being quizzed as to what he would do as much as any leaver, more so in fact as it will be he who negotiates
(Snip)
Sorry, but that's rubbish on several levels. Cameron's position is that we should be in; what happens after will depend on, amongst other things, the strength of any leave vote. But he will have little idea of what the public precisely want as leave are purposefully being unclear.
And all because leave are trying to include anti-immigration people along with the EEA'ers in a desperate fight for votes.
If leave are so incompetent as not to come up with firm proposals to the public, why should Cameron when he's on the other side of the debate. It's one colossal failure of responsibility by leave.
Leave is The Big Lie. it's disgraceful politics, and I can imagine the screeching from them if (say) the EU tried similar tactics.
You keep saying this, but I completely disagree.
If Farage or Boris, or any other LEAVE campaigner for that matter, said "This is what we will do if we vote LEAVE", what weight would that carry? How can any such promise be made without opposition saying "What authority do you have to make good on this?" to which the answer is "none". They might as well promise the moon on a stick or free gold bullion, it doesn't matter, because they cant deliver either
On the other hand, Cameron is the only one who has the authority to make any decision post Brexit, yet he hasn't outlined any plan and no one seems to ask him. Being PM he should be making it clear what he will do, and how big the margin is (realistically if it is LEAVE it wont be that big) doesn't matter a jot
But you say the first is bad, but the second good. Very strange
I keep on saying it because I am right.
Your argument fits into what SeanF says above: you want Cameron to do your job for you. Pure laziness.
The leave groups coming up with a solid position would carry a heck of a lot of weight: it wouldn't bind whoever has to do the renegotiation, but it would be hard for them to deviate from it. After all the people's choice would have been clear.
But we all know why leave don't want that ...
I don't know what your last line means.. been out of the game of smart arse arguments for a month or so....
But all I say is that its down to the elected PM to decide what we do in either scenario; it just seems obvious. What anyone else promises is immaterial.. Cameron could decide to pass a law that everything stays exactly as it was if he wanted
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically or economically, TBH.
Alooha in Urdu means potatoes. So effectively Ted Cruz said
'Potatoes are great'
In the midst of a ponderous and chilling tale about terrorism and political correctness, Senator Ted Cruz dropped a delightful mispronunciation of the Takbīr—the multivalent Arabic phrase, “Allāhu Akbar,” usually translated as “God is great.” Cruz went with something like...Alooha akbar? Aloha akbar?
Anyway, keep practicing! Arabic is a difficult language to learn.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I shall continue to give my opinion, as usual, thank you. On this particular point my opinion is very much in the mainstream. If it pains you to read it, then I suggest you skip my posts, and also avoid reading the views of the IMF, CBI, G20 finance ministers, major investment banks, Bank of England, and academic economists.
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
The will be like Remain then, they might aspire that we might carry on as before, but on the other hand we might have to become part of a common EU Border Force policing our borders, or a common EU Army fighting in conflicts that the British People or even government might not approve of, we could end up being part of a common EU Judicial system that ends centuries of trial by jury and where police from other EU states can make arrests on our streets. We may have all sorts of damage inflicted on the City of London by new financial regulations adopted under QMV. But then again its possible that some or none of this might happen. And so on.
The premise behind that is that Cameron is lying. That may well be. But if you do believe that, you must surely accept that the Leave side is lying too.
Cameron isn't exactly lying, but he probably doesn't know the answer any more than you or I do, so he is taking the least plausible but most favourable to him of the future possibilities, that nothing will change. He would be more honest to say that he doesn't have the faintest idea what will happen in the next 5-10 years of the EU, but people don't look favourable on PMs that don't appear to be in command of the facts, even if not the country.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I take it that the only "plausible predictions" you refer to are the ones that you agree with :-)
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
The will be like Remain then, they might aspire that we might carry on as before, but on the other hand we might have to become part of a common EU Border Force policing our borders, or a common EU Army fighting in conflicts that the British People or even government might not approve of, we could end up being part of a common EU Judicial system that ends centuries of trial by jury and where police from other EU states can make arrests on our streets. We may have all sorts of damage inflicted on the City of London by new financial regulations adopted under QMV. But then again its possible that some or none of this might happen. And so on.
The premise behind that is that Cameron is lying. That may well be. But if you do believe that, you must surely accept that the Leave side is lying too.
Cameron isn't exactly lying, but he probably doesn't know the answer any more than you or I do, so he is taking the least plausible but most favourable to him of the future possibilities, that nothing will change. He would be more honest to say that he doesn't have the faintest idea what will happen in the next 5-10 years of the EU, but people don't look favourable on PMs that don't appear to be in command of the facts, even if not the country.
No, Cameron would say he has agreed a deal which would ensure that the UK is not forced to join a common border force, and EU Armey or single judicial system. You must believe that he is lying.
Paying £350m seems cheaper than losing 25000 direct and indirect jobs.
Go on then. Will you be paying cash or cheque? I didn't know you had £350m spare, but if you do, I'm sure the Indian board of Tata will appreciate it...
...oh, you wanted somebody else to pay the money. Ah. Awkward pause...
OK, less glibly for the moment. If government uses tax money to subsidise uneconomic industries, then it is taking money from economic industries to do so, so it makes the economy worse off. There is also an opportunity cost: money spent on uneconomic industries is money not spent elsewhere. There is also the problems inherent in focussing resources on producing goods that people don't want to buy in enough numbers to make it profitable to make them: you end up with stockpiles, shoddy goods, or worse
We tried this in the post-war period for about thirty years, and we ended up with industries that spent a lot of money making stuff that we didn't want to buy because we could buy them cheaper and better from abroad.
The 25,000 people you refer to will eventually find other jobs. Given their ages and skillsets they will not necessarily be good jobs and the transition process will be painful (to say the least!) but mostly they will. If you genuinely want to help (and I assume you do: I'm not being sarky here) then offer things like tax rebates, special development areas, redundancy payments, genuine sympathy, and let them work their own way out. The people are not stupid and - given enough help[1] - they'll find solutions eventually.
[1] That bit's important
So are you suggesting that the government stop taxing and borrowing to subsidise retailers of imported consumer tat, the foreign factories which make said imported consumer tat, foreign hoteliers, foreign wine and spirit producers etc etc etc ?
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically or economically, TBH.
No, it's going to be absolute carnage.
It will be absolute carnage if HMG have failed in their duty to plan for a Leave result.
At which point one would expect Cameron to call a General Election to elect a more competent government.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I shall continue to give my opinion, as usual, thank you. In this particular point my opinion is very much in the mainstream. If it pains you to read it, then I suggest you skip my posts, and also avoid reading the views of the IMF, CBI, G20 finance ministers, major investment banks, Bank of England, and academic economists.
Well they would say that wouldn't they. Even if you dont beleive that they have an interest in the UK staying in the EU, which many of them conspicuously do, and even if most of those hadn't said the same about joining the Euro and been wrong, they certainly have an interest in being pessimistic because if you turn out to be wrong no one cares, where is if you are optimistic and wrong, you tend to lose credibility.
Leaving that to one side, they mostly predict a downturn of 2-3% which is less bad than some years under Gordon Brown, but we managed to survive that and have an economy in the rude health it currently is. Your lack of faith in your country to do well out of short term adverse circumstances is disturbing. Or perhaps you are too advanced in years to care how well we might do in 5 years time
It will be absolute carnage if HMG have failed in their duty to plan for a Leave result.
What plan should they have made? EEA, for example? And what possible plan could they have, which doesn't depend on what our EU friends would accept, which can't be known until we get into negotiations?
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically or economically, TBH.
No, it's going to be absolute carnage.
It will be absolute carnage if HMG have failed in their duty to plan for a Leave result.
At which point one would expect the government to fall, and a General Election to be called.
At which point the government would win again.
Or, in the vanishingly unlikely event that the people voted for Jeremy Corbyn, we would be lumbered with a government that is possessed of all of this government's faults, while being possessed neither of its intellectual firepower* or its experience of governing.
In either scenario, we still end up more royally screwed than one of Messalina's bodyguards.
*'Intellectual firepower' being a relative term in this case.
Your argument fits into what SeanF says above: you want Cameron to do your job for you. Pure laziness.
The leave groups coming up with a solid position would carry a heck of a lot of weight: it wouldn't bind whoever has to do the renegotiation, but it would be hard for them to deviate from it. After all the people's choice would have been clear.
But we all know why leave don't want that ...
I don't know what your last line means.. been out of the game of smart arse arguments for a month or so....
But all I say is that its down to the elected PM to decide what we do in either scenario; it just seems obvious. What anyone else promises is immaterial.. Cameron could decide to pass a law that everything stays exactly as it was if he wanted
It's quite obvious what it means. It is to leave's advantage to leave what the vote means unclear as it means leave supporters can make different and contradictory promises to the electorate.
In addition, it gives them more power after the vote as they can complain the people aren't getting what they voted for (despite not having made it clear what the people were voting for in the first place)
As for your last paragraph: he (or whoever is in charge of the negotiations) can be guided by what people chose. At the moment, that choice is as clear as mud.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I take it that the only "plausible predictions" you refer to are the ones that you agree with :-)
No, I think most of those are tosh as well, I think the people that predict it will make very little short term difference are most likely to be correct.
Paying £350m seems cheaper than losing 25000 direct and indirect jobs.
Go on then. Will you be paying cash or cheque? I didn't know you had £350m spare, but if you do, I'm sure the Indian board of Tata will appreciate it...
...oh, you wanted somebody else to pay the money. Ah. Awkward pause...
OK, less glibly for the moment. If government uses tax money to subsidise uneconomic industries, then it is taking money from economic industries to do so, so it makes the economy worse off. There is also an opportunity cost: money spent on uneconomic industries is money not spent elsewhere. There is also the problems inherent in focussing resources on producing goods that people don't want to buy in enough numbers to make it profitable to make them: you end up with stockpiles, shoddy goods, or worse
We tried this in the post-war period for about thirty years, and we ended up with industries that spent a lot of money making stuff that we didn't want to buy because we could buy them cheaper and better from abroad.
The 25,000 people you refer to will eventually find other jobs. Given their ages and skillsets they will not necessarily be good jobs and the transition process will be painful (to say the least!) but mostly they will. If you genuinely want to help (and I assume you do: I'm not being sarky here) then offer things like tax rebates, special development areas, redundancy payments, genuine sympathy, and let them work their own way out. The people are not stupid and - given enough help[1] - they'll find solutions eventually.
[1] That bit's important
The government currently takes taxes from struggling business like steel to subsidise profiable businesses like Starbucks and Google. They do it through paying benefits to their workers. That doesn't appear to disturb you too much.
Indeed. My lefty pals can't understand how I am therefore anti tax credit but pro proper disabled payments. I can't understand how they are so stupid as to not get the difference.
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
The will be like Remain then, they might aspire that we might carry on as before, but on the other hand we might have to become part of a common EU Border Force policing our borders, or a common EU Army fighting in conflicts that the British People or even government might not approve of, we could end up being part of a common EU Judicial system that ends centuries of trial by jury and where police from other EU states can make arrests on our streets. We may have all sorts of damage inflicted on the City of London by new financial regulations adopted under QMV. But then again its possible that some or none of this might happen. And so on.
The premise behind that is that Cameron is lying. That may well be. But if you do believe that, you must surely accept that the Leave side is lying too.
Cameron isn't exactly lying, but he probably doesn't know the answer any more than you or I do, so he is taking the least plausible but most favourable to him of the future possibilities, that nothing will change. He would be more honest to say that he doesn't have the faintest idea what will happen in the next 5-10 years of the EU, but people don't look favourable on PMs that don't appear to be in command of the facts, even if not the country.
No, Cameron would say he has agreed a deal which would ensure that the UK is not forced to join a common border force, and EU Armey or single judicial system. You must believe that he is lying.
Judging by Osborne's big fat porkie pie over the EU rebate, this government is prepared to say absolutely anything whilst keeping a straight face.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I shall continue to give my opinion, as usual, thank you. On this particular point my opinion is very much in the mainstream. If it pains you to read it, then I suggest you skip my posts, and also avoid reading the views of the IMF, CBI, G20 finance ministers, major investment banks, Bank of England, and academic economists.
I suppose it depends what's meant by "severe." The worst case scenarios I've read suggest a loss of 2.5% in GDP. That seems an acceptable level of risk to me.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I take it that the only "plausible predictions" you refer to are the ones that you agree with :-)
No, I think most of those are tosh as well, I think the people that predict it will make very little short term difference are most likely to be correct.
I'd say that a pretty inevitable consequence of a Brexit vote would be a weakening of the pound and a slowdown in business investment. The only issue is how long they would last. I guess for as long as there is uncertainty.
It will be absolute carnage if HMG have failed in their duty to plan for a Leave result.
What plan should they have made? EEA, for example? And what possible plan could they have, which doesn't depend on what our EU friends would accept, which can't be known until we get into negotiations?
You're saying there's been no contingency planning at all? Dereliction of Duty. Might as well give Corbyn a chance; it's becoming harder to see how he could possibly be any worse.
The premise behind that is that Cameron is lying. That may well be. But if you do believe that, you must surely accept that the Leave side is lying too.
Cameron isn't exactly lying, but he probably doesn't know the answer any more than you or I do, so he is taking the least plausible but most favourable to him of the future possibilities, that nothing will change. He would be more honest to say that he doesn't have the faintest idea what will happen in the next 5-10 years of the EU, but people don't look favourable on PMs that don't appear to be in command of the facts, even if not the country.
No, Cameron would say he has agreed a deal which would ensure that the UK is not forced to join a common border force, and EU Armey or single judicial system. You must believe that he is lying.
Well nothing in the "deal" says any of that, and those are all going to come under QMV. So maybe we will find out in due course that those were aspiration and not actually acheived, like pretty much everything in his Bloomberg Speech, and most of what he has said about immigration, and come to that quite a large chunk of his 2015 manifesto (Protecting child tax credit, only freezing child benefit for 2 years, electrifying the North's railways, building more affordable houses, launching tax-free childcare last year, giving workers 3 days' volunteer leave, launching a social care cap last year, opening up government, etc.)
Leaving that to one side, they mostly predict a downturn of 2-3% which is less bad than some years under Gordon Brown, but we managed to survive that and have an economy in the rude health it currently is. Your lack of faith in your country to do well out of short term adverse circumstances is disturbing. Or perhaps you are too advanced in years to care how well we might do in 5 years time
The scenario I was talking about - a non-EEA, non-freedom-of-movement option - is undoubtedly the most disruptive in the short to medium term. It might be the case that after 5 years or so things improved to the point that we ended up better off, although that seems highly optimistic, being based on what looks like wishful thinking about the benefit of individually-negotiated trade deals. Even if it turns out well in the end, we still have to get there, and the job losses in the meantime could be severe. No-one can be sure how severe, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if it is comparable with some of the worst downturns of the last few decades.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I shall continue to give my opinion, as usual, thank you. On this particular point my opinion is very much in the mainstream. If it pains you to read it, then I suggest you skip my posts, and also avoid reading the views of the IMF, CBI, G20 finance ministers, major investment banks, Bank of England, and academic economists.
I suppose it depends what's meant by "severe." The worst case scenarios I've read suggest a loss of 2.5% in GDP. That seems an acceptable level of risk to me.
It will be absolute carnage if HMG have failed in their duty to plan for a Leave result.
What plan should they have made? EEA, for example? And what possible plan could they have, which doesn't depend on what our EU friends would accept, which can't be known until we get into negotiations?
You're saying there's been no planning at all? Dereliction of Duty. Might as well give Corbyn a chance; it's becoming harder to see how he could possibly be any worse.
I suspect there are two plans.
Plan A: Win the referendum Plan B: If the referendum is lost invoke Article 50 and take two years to negotiate a new deal.
Plan B will not be the end of the world. It won't take two years to negotiate a new deal, especially if it's EEA-based.
That may be so, but he should be being quizzed as to what he would do as much as any leaver, more so in fact as it will be he who negotiates
(Snip)
Sorry, but that's rubbish on several levels. Cameron's position is that we should be in; what happens after will depend on:.. And all because leave are trying to include anti-immigration people along with the EEA'ers in a desperate fight for votes.
If leave are so incompetent as not to come up with firm proposals to the public, why should Cameron when he's on the other side of the debate. It's one colossal failure of responsibility by leave.
Leave is The Big Lie. it's disgraceful politics, and I can imagine the screeching from them if (say) the EU tried similar tactics.
You keep saying this, but I completely disagree.
If Farage or Boris, or any other LEAVE campaigner for that matter, said "This is what we will do if we vote LEAVE", what weight would that carry? How can any such promise be made without opposition saying "What authority do you have to make good on this?" to which the answer is "none". They might as well promise the moon on a stick or free gold bullion, it doesn't matter, because they cant deliver either
On the other hand, Cameron is the only one who has the authority to make any decision post Brexit, yet he hasn't outlined any plan and no one seems to ask him. Being PM he should be making it clear what he will do, and how big the margin is (realistically if it is LEVE it wont be that big) doesn't matter a jot
But you say the first is bad, but the second good. Very strange
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
At best, all one can do is outline alternatives, after a post-Brexit vote.
Incidentally, I'v not heard these anguished 'what we we voting for - leave are a disgrace' wails anywhere but here.
Most people understand that the vote is about leaving or staying. Different options of leave Coke after. Presumably after the likely necessary general election is called...
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I take it that the only "plausible predictions" you refer to are the ones that you agree with :-)
No, I think most of those are tosh as well, I think the people that predict it will make very little short term difference are most likely to be correct.
I'd say that a pretty inevitable consequence of a Brexit vote would be a weakening of the pound and a slowdown in business investment. The only issue is how long they would last. I guess for as long as there is uncertainty.
If the pound weakens then inward investment will look more attractive wont it, you will get more bangs for your buck/rouble/renminbi so to speak.
Why do we bother playing both Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid btw ? I'll ask this before the inevitable "two overs each" Why not just Moeen ? His bowling goes for no more than Rashid and he is the better batsman.
Paying £350m seems cheaper than losing 25000 direct and indirect jobs.
Go on then. Will you be paying cash or cheque? I didn't know you had £350m spare, but if you do, I'm sure the Indian board of Tata will appreciate it...
...oh, you wanted somebody else to pay the money. Ah. Awkward pause...
OK, less glibly for the moment. If government uses tax money to subsidise uneconomic industries, then it is taking money from economic industries to do so, so it makes the economy worse off. There is also an opportunity cost: money spent on uneconomic industries is money not spent elsewhere. There is also the problems inherent in focussing resources on producing goods that people don't want to buy in enough numbers to make it profitable to make them: you end up with stockpiles, shoddy goods, or worse
We tried this in the post-war period for about thirty years, and we ended up with industries that spent a lot of money making stuff that we didn't want to buy because we could buy them cheaper and better from abroad.
The 25,000 people you refer to will eventually find other jobs. Given their ages and skillsets they will not necessarily be good jobs and the transition process will be painful (to say the least!) but mostly they will. If you genuinely want to help (and I assume you do: I'm not being sarky here) then offer things like tax rebates, special development areas, redundancy payments, genuine sympathy, and let them work their own way out. The people are not stupid and - given enough help[1] - they'll find solutions eventually.
[1] That bit's important
The government currently takes taxes from struggling business like steel to subsidise profiable businesses like Starbucks and Google. They do it through paying benefits to their workers. That doesn't appear to disturb you too much.
Indeed. My lefty pals can't understand how I am therefore anti tax credit but pro proper disabled payments. I can't understand how they are so stupid as to not get the difference.
Yes, I've been banging on about this for a long time, paying people who work seems stupid We need a system where those who fall on hard times are given support, but once they are back in work we shouldn't keep subsidising them or their employers who don't pay enough.
Oh right! Well in that case, for them to make the claims that you dismiss as ludicrous is the perfectly sensible option
Possibly so, although bear in mind that someone is going to have to attempt to deliver this stuff. Faced with the choice of voters angry at the severe economic damage, and voters angry at being signed back in to what they thought they had voted to leave, I expect that whoever is in charge from the Leave side of the Conservative Party will have no choice but to go for the former. I don't expect it to be a pleasant time, politically, TBH.
Will you stop with the "severe" economic damage horse shit, the worse plausible predictions we have seen so far are equivalent to a typical medium bad year or two under a typical Labour government, and we have survived plenty of those before. You don't need to try Project Fear on these boards, no one believes it, and it does your credibility, such as it is on this matter, no good.
I take it that the only "plausible predictions" you refer to are the ones that you agree with :-)
No, I think most of those are tosh as well, I think the people that predict it will make very little short term difference are most likely to be correct.
I'd say that a pretty inevitable consequence of a Brexit vote would be a weakening of the pound and a slowdown in business investment. The only issue is how long they would last. I guess for as long as there is uncertainty.
If the pound weakens then inward investment will look more attractive wont it, you will get more bangs for your buck/rouble/renminbi so to speak.
And SeanT In Thailand? Or should we leave that alone?
Leaving that to one side, they mostly predict a downturn of 2-3% which is less bad than some years under Gordon Brown, but we managed to survive that and have an economy in the rude health it currently is. Your lack of faith in your country to do well out of short term adverse circumstances is disturbing. Or perhaps you are too advanced in years to care how well we might do in 5 years time
The scenario I was talking about - a non-EEA, non-freedom-of-movement option - is undoubtedly the most disruptive in the short to medium term. It might be the case that after 5 years or so things improved to the point that we ended up better off, although that seems highly optimistic, being based on what looks like wishful thinking about the benefit of individually-negotiated trade deals. Even if it turns out well in the end, we still have to get there, and the job losses in the meantime could be severe. No-one can be sure how severe, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if it is comparable with some of the worst downturns of the last few decades.
We appear to have moved into the area of handwaving. "wishful thinking" "could be severe" "I wouldn't be at all surprised" etc. If "No-one can be sure how severe" the answer might be not at all and you just prefer scarey stories because it suits your narrative.
That may be so, but he should be being quizzed as to what he would do as much as any leaver, more so in fact as it will be he who negotiates
(Snip)
snip
You keep saying this, but I completely disagree.
If Farage or Boris, or any other LEAVE campaigner for that matter, said "This is what we will do if we vote LEAVE", what weight would that carry? How can any such promise be made without opposition saying "What authority do you have to make good on this?" to which the answer is "none". They might as well promise the moon on a stick or free gold bullion, it doesn't matter, because they cant deliver either
On the other hand, Cameron is the only one who has the authority to make any decision post Brexit, yet he hasn't outlined any plan and no one seems to ask him. Being PM he should be making it clear what he will do, and how big the margin is (realistically if it is LEVE it wont be that big) doesn't matter a jot
But you say the first is bad, but the second good. Very strange
There seems to be this odd notion that Leave have some chivalrous obligation to make their opponents' job easier for them.
This is a binary choice. Not a competing set of manifestos.
So we should see everything that those on the Leave side say as being aspirations? Maybe they should make that clearer. Thus a vote to quit the EU would not be a vote to take back control of our borders, it might be a vote to take them back. We might negotiate some free trade agreements, but we might not. Sovereignty may be restored to Parliament, but then again it's quite possible it won't be. And so on.
At best, all one can do is outline alternatives, after a post-Brexit vote.
Incidentally, I'v not heard these anguished 'what we we voting for - leave are a disgrace' wails anywhere but here.
Most people understand that the vote is about leaving or staying. Different options of leave Coke after. Presumably after the likely necessary general election is called...
Aside from this site, I haven't heard anyone talking about the Referendum at all, in any pub, restaurant or bar. I'm not sure many people are really that interested, and anyone who suggests otherwise is being 'inventive'.
Indeed. My lefty pals can't understand how I am therefore anti tax credit but pro proper disabled payments. I can't understand how they are so stupid as to not get the difference.
Yes, I've been banging on about this for a long time, paying people who work seems stupid We need a system where those who fall on hard times are given support, but once they are back in work we shouldn't keep subsidising them or their employers who don't pay enough.
While I've banged on about this repeatedly here, it's not a subsidy to employers. Tax credits that depend on family (not individual) income and most importantly number of children have nothing to do with employers.
If I hire a team of married adults with no children and they get no tax credits then does that mean I'm paying a good wage? If I hire a team of single parents with mutliple children and pay them the same wages and the government gives them tax credits then am I paying a bad wage?
As an employer who wants to pay a good wage what are you proposing I do? Refuse to hire single parents with children?
Leaving that to one side, they mostly predict a downturn of 2-3% which is less bad than some years under Gordon Brown, but we managed to survive that and have an economy in the rude health it currently is. Your lack of faith in your country to do well out of short term adverse circumstances is disturbing. Or perhaps you are too advanced in years to care how well we might do in 5 years time
The scenario I was talking about - a non-EEA, non-freedom-of-movement option - is undoubtedly the most disruptive in the short to medium term. It might be the case that after 5 years or so things improved to the point that we ended up better off, although that seems highly optimistic, being based on what looks like wishful thinking about the benefit of individually-negotiated trade deals. Even if it turns out well in the end, we still have to get there, and the job losses in the meantime could be severe. No-one can be sure how severe, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if it is comparable with some of the worst downturns of the last few decades.
We appear to have moved into the area of handwaving. "wishful thinking" "could be severe" "I wouldn't be at all surprised" etc. If "No-one can be sure how severe" the answer might be not at all and you just prefer scarey stories because it suits your narrative.
He sounds no different to the various Labour luvvies vowing to leave the UK in the event of a Tory election win, as the sky would collapse in on everyones heads.
'On this particular point my opinion is very much in the mainstream'
No it isn't.
A possible decline in GDP of 1-2% is not 'severe', especially if you are talking about the medium to long-term. Some of the bodies you keep on referencing have made this clear in their work e.g.
And that is even if you accept those estimates, many of which are based on questionable assumptions.
If the transition is from EU to EEA/EFTA, I would say those sorts of numbers are at the far end of the likely range of outcomes, with the outcome most likely to be +/-0.5% over ten years or so. Which is a rounding error and could easily be offset by policy changes.
Comments
Your argument fits into what SeanF says above: you want Cameron to do your job for you. Pure laziness.
The leave groups coming up with a solid position would carry a heck of a lot of weight: it wouldn't bind whoever has to do the renegotiation, but it would be hard for them to deviate from it. After all the people's choice would have been clear.
But we all know why leave don't want that ...
Please tell is what developments will happen in the EU over the next 5-10 years, we want to know what we are signing up for. Will there be a common border force, common judiciary, common police force, EU army. What powers will the Eurozone demand as it federalises, what powers and costs will be taken on to solve the financial problems in the southern countries. They voters should know what they are voting for, because whatever it is, it isn't the status quo.
Well, not as much as an assassin's bullet anyway.
>
I don't know what your last line means.. been out of the game of smart arse arguments for a month or so....
But all I say is that its down to the elected PM to decide what we do in either scenario; it just seems obvious. What anyone else promises is immaterial.. Cameron could decide to pass a law that everything stays exactly as it was if he wanted
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/26/did-jfk-say-he-was-a-doughnut_n_3500307.html
http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/
At which point one would expect Cameron to call a General Election to elect a more competent government.
Leaving that to one side, they mostly predict a downturn of 2-3% which is less bad than some years under Gordon Brown, but we managed to survive that and have an economy in the rude health it currently is. Your lack of faith in your country to do well out of short term adverse circumstances is disturbing. Or perhaps you are too advanced in years to care how well we might do in 5 years time
Or, in the vanishingly unlikely event that the people voted for Jeremy Corbyn, we would be lumbered with a government that is possessed of all of this government's faults, while being possessed neither of its intellectual firepower* or its experience of governing.
In either scenario, we still end up more royally screwed than one of Messalina's bodyguards.
*'Intellectual firepower' being a relative term in this case.
In addition, it gives them more power after the vote as they can complain the people aren't getting what they voted for (despite not having made it clear what the people were voting for in the first place)
As for your last paragraph: he (or whoever is in charge of the negotiations) can be guided by what people chose. At the moment, that choice is as clear as mud.
Plan A: Win the referendum
Plan B: If the referendum is lost invoke Article 50 and take two years to negotiate a new deal.
Plan B will not be the end of the world. It won't take two years to negotiate a new deal, especially if it's EEA-based.
Most people understand that the vote is about leaving or staying. Different options of leave Coke after. Presumably after the likely necessary general election is called...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Why do we bother playing both Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid btw ?
I'll ask this before the inevitable "two overs each"
Why not just Moeen ? His bowling goes for no more than Rashid and he is the better batsman.
NEW THREAD NEW THREAD
If I hire a team of married adults with no children and they get no tax credits then does that mean I'm paying a good wage?
If I hire a team of single parents with mutliple children and pay them the same wages and the government gives them tax credits then am I paying a bad wage?
As an employer who wants to pay a good wage what are you proposing I do? Refuse to hire single parents with children?
No it isn't.
A possible decline in GDP of 1-2% is not 'severe', especially if you are talking about the medium to long-term. Some of the bodies you keep on referencing have made this clear in their work e.g.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-35862774
And that is even if you accept those estimates, many of which are based on questionable assumptions.
If the transition is from EU to EEA/EFTA, I would say those sorts of numbers are at the far end of the likely range of outcomes, with the outcome most likely to be +/-0.5% over ten years or so. Which is a rounding error and could easily be offset by policy changes.