A couple of years ago May made this very point, as part of a comment as to why she wanted a deal with the EU, and in what even by his standards was hysterical and unhinged blustering Barnier accused her of threatening the EU (which given his subsequent behaviour has almost entirely consisted of bullying, threats and reneging on previous agreeements, would be funny if the consequences were not so serious).
I wonder what he will say in response to this?
There's no point wasting time trying to persuade Barnier that security co-operation would be a good thing all round. Take it off the table.
Well effectively it already is off the table isn't it? Their price for it is one that politically won't fly here, and they have shown no sign of bending from their positions in any way, so in effect it has already been ruled out. Time to focus on things where compromise is possible, even though admittedly that is a small number of things.
Services won't be part of the deal, not to worry services only accounts for 80% of the economy.
So the government proposes no change to trade in goods, in which the UK has a huge deficit with the EU, and to accept barriers to trade in services, in which the UK has a surplus.
Brilliant.
Yes, it is a good deal. We retain free access to the excellent European foods and goods, and regulations to keep out US agribusiness.
Speaking to a city fund manager today who had just returned from a recce trip to Brussels. He was surprised to find that there was a high level of preparedness for no deal - thick manuals for various industrial sectors apparently. He was told that the EU thinks it's far too late to begin talking about a bespoke deal even in the unlikely event of the UK government being able to agree on what it wants to put in such a deal. So it was either no deal, a Canada type FTA with an Irish Sea customs border or full participation in the single market. No other options are practical.
single market was voted down with a massive majority in Parliament.
The problem is that we all know what the vote was against, no one knows what it was for.
I compared it to Suez, but Suez was at least well planned on the military side, just incompetently on the political side.
that's because the establishment couldn't think of anything positive FOR the EU
all Brexit tells us is the numpties who run the country should have less jurisdiction in our every day lives since they cant organise a piss up in a urinal
I quite agree. The EU has a much better functioning government, but Westminster has now taken back control, with Henry VIII powers in addition.
Hang on to your seats, its going to be a bumpy ride.
I fear it is.
Perhaps neither side wants a deal.
The EU Commission wants to bring the UK to heel. My sense is that Merkel is still propping up the likes of Barnier and Selmayr, despite growing concerns from German business and Austria & Hungary breaking ranks, because it's personal to her too.
What’s your “sense” about Macron or Varadkar?
Macron is a pragmatist. He's done deals over Calais already, and an entirely separate Defence agreement with the UK. He also wants security cooperation. He probably wouldn't put his neck out on services, and would be interested in what he can get for Paris. He also wants France to be the new partner of the US in bridging into the EU.
Varadkar is a overgobby pipsqueak who thinks he matters, but actually he's a pawn being played by the EU. They'll be straight back on Eire and its corporation tax, post Brexit.
The fuss over security is odd. That is plainly a field where no deal hurts the rest of the EU more than it hurts us.
Very brave, given Trump's challenge to Europe over NATO.
By the end of next week the EU might well need to consider a post-NATO defence and security arrangement. That might focus some minds about striking a deal with the UK.
I saw her speak at a Brexit campaign meeting in Leicester. She is quite polished and very good at dodging questions. Not thick, or at least no thicker than the average politician.
While I of course have no experience of such high level events, speaking as someone who constantly has to draft things for others, then try to make it work for multiple competing interests somehow, several thoughts occur:
1) If the reaction to a proposal/drafting is 'horror' then no amount of fiddling with the wording is going to save it. It not a bad apple in the basket situation, the problem is clearly the orchard if that is the reaction.
2) When something is an obviously chopped together mess, it is not going to be persuasive to whoever you present it to - a watered down bowl of porridge is not going to be considered a grand breakfast to whoever you present it to, no matter if the three chefs who prepared it (each of whom wanted to present a different type of breakfast) swear it is the finest meal they've ever prepared.
3) Uniting behind bland, meaningless wording does not mean you are, in fact, united, and no one is fooled that you are, making the exercise rather pointless.
While I of course have no experience of such high level events, speaking as someone who constantly has to draft things for others, then try to make it work for multiple competing interests somehow, several thoughts occur:
1) If the reaction to a proposal/drafting is 'horror' then no amount of fiddling with the wording is going to save it. It not a bad apple in the basket situation, the problem is clearly the orchard if that is the reaction.
2) When something is an obviously chopped together mess, it is not going to be persuasive to whoever you present it to - a watered down bowl of porridge is not going to be considered a grand breakfast to whoever you present it to, no matter if the three chefs who prepared it (each of whom wanted to present a different type of breakfast) swear it is the finest meal they've ever prepared.
3) Uniting behind bland, meaningless wording does not mean you are, in fact, united, and no one is fooled that you are, making the exercise rather pointless.
Mixing metaphors for the win.
I agree, and to be honest, if the PM has lost Javid, Williamson and Cairns as well as the Brexiteers, it isn't going to fly.
I saw her speak at a Brexit campaign meeting in Leicester. She is quite polished and very good at dodging questions. Not thick, or at least no thicker than the average politician.
Today's Tesco Strawberry score is once again an eight:
Aberdeenshire Angus Perthshire Lancashire Staffordshire Cambridgeshire Surrey Kent
Only notable new thing were some cauliflowers which were prominently labelled as 'Cornish Cauliflowers'.
Now I've heard of Cornish pasties, sardines and cream ties but not Cornish cauliflowers - are they some sort of delicacy I've been unaware of ?
Still no sign or the predicted lettuce shortage.
zzzzzzzzz
This attempt to create a strawberry meme is utterly tiresome.
Would you prefer a tweet claiming that the crops were rotting in the fields ?
Or Vince Cable's ravings twelve months ago:
' “This week Wimbledon is being launched and the people who normally produce the strawberries can’t produce them because the labour force has disappeared because of anxiety about their future status in Britain,” he told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme. '
It was a discussion group of 50 who did not see immigration as a problem but cannot remember the source. Age catching me up together with two strained hamstrings and lots of knee pain
Which reminds me: how's your belly these days? You had an op some time back, if memory serves.
Just so I'm clear, we're still discussing the "backstop" plans here, we've not yet moved on to discussing any potential FTA?
This is more about the post Brexit trade/customs situation; IMO the Irish backstop is a red herring for the EU's attempt to force us to stay in the SM/CU and therefore not need to have an FTA.
Just so I'm clear, we're still discussing the "backstop" plans here, we've not yet moved on to discussing any potential FTA?
The Cabinet are leisurely taking several weeks in deciding in excruciating detail the exact size, shape and tone of the white paper which the EU will reject in about five minutes.
And we are paying them hundreds of thousands of pounds each to do so.
I saw her speak at a Brexit campaign meeting in Leicester. She is quite polished and very good at dodging questions. Not thick, or at least no thicker than the average politician.
King's Lynn not giving her an easy time.
She does have to tailor her message for her constituents in Witham - or *hitham as it is more commonly known in Essex. It's famous for being smelly due to a local sewage works.
It will all look different in 24hrs. A cabinet united around a great new plan, with May leading the nation into a new chapter of its history.
Mind you by Sunday, it will be back to BAU.
Enjoy the rickety rollercoaster, that is modern UK politics.
Problem is the facade is increasingly less convincing each time, so it feels like a rollercoaster than has slowed to a crawl and they just refuse to let us get to the end already, in the vain hope that will prevent us from being dissatisfied.
It feels like, with our governments, you can only have 2 of 3 from competent, incorrupt and united. I wish we had Mrs T back sometimes. You might not have liked her but by god we were led.
Problem is the facade is increasingly less convincing each time, so it feels like a rollercoaster than has slowed to a crawl and they just refuse to let us get to the end already, in the vain hope that will prevent us from being dissatisfied.
It feels like, with our governments, you can only have 2 of 3 from competent, incorrupt and united. I wish we had Mrs T back sometimes. You might not have liked her but by god we were led.
At the very least her administration drove the Cabinet, not vice versa
I saw her speak at a Brexit campaign meeting in Leicester. She is quite polished and very good at dodging questions. Not thick, or at least no thicker than the average politician.
Tories doing badly in two middle-class cathedral cities, Bath and Lichfield. A pity we don't have a by-election in Nuneaton tonight to see how things are going with that type of demographic.
Nothing will get sorted tomorrow. That’s my prediction. I forecast plenty of meaningless tweets from Laura Kuen beginning with the word Told or Hearing and sod all to happen. First football match 3pm.
Pro Brexit, anti single market Corbyn manages to pick up a few UKIP votes in a local council by election that is how.
Even William Hague won council by elections every Thursday when he was Tory leader, my goodness if the Leader of the Opposition cannot even gain a few seats in council by elections what is the point of them at all?
No-one in the country cares anymore about Brexit, the focus is on the football. I called this on Tuesday night, after the game. May should use the distraction to perform a business friendly EEA style fudge. Open door.
I suspect a good 50% of the electorate is far from being focussed on the football!
Nothing will get sorted tomorrow. That’s my prediction. I forecast plenty of meaningless tweets from Laura Kuen beginning with the word Told or Hearing and sod all to happen. First football match 3pm.
Who do you think will win that match? I guess France is more likely.
There's simply no reason ( In Brexit outcome terms ) for anyone to die on a Hill on July 6th. We know End State negotiations won't start till the Transition period which is 9 months away. All May needs is enough clarity on Customs to fudge the NI Border issue but the crunch on that is October at the earliest. The White Paper just isn't important enough not to fudge if necessery.
There are of course non Brexit outcome reasons to blow up May's government. The Sucession. But Friday is take out the trash day and the England game means even a major resignation wouldn't dominate news cycles.
Davis and Clark are the two most philosophically and tempermentally likely to walk in my view depending on which side May eventually plumps for. But it's hard to see why a fudged White Paper is a hill anyone will die tomorrow. Next week at the earliest when the World Cup dynamic is clearer and more people are watching news.
Tariffs worth $34 billion imposed by the US on Chinese goods and China on US goods come into force today, if there really is no deal and hence EU tariffs on UK goods and UK tariffs on EU goods as well as the US tariffs on EU goods and EU tariffs on US goods already planned we would be heading for a global trade war amongst the biggest economies
Comments
Varadkar is a overgobby pipsqueak who thinks he matters, but actually he's a pawn being played by the EU. They'll be straight back on Eire and its corporation tax, post Brexit.
If England win no-one will give a flying fuck.
King's Lynn not giving her an easy time.
1) If the reaction to a proposal/drafting is 'horror' then no amount of fiddling with the wording is going to save it. It not a bad apple in the basket situation, the problem is clearly the orchard if that is the reaction.
2) When something is an obviously chopped together mess, it is not going to be persuasive to whoever you present it to - a watered down bowl of porridge is not going to be considered a grand breakfast to whoever you present it to, no matter if the three chefs who prepared it (each of whom wanted to present a different type of breakfast) swear it is the finest meal they've ever prepared.
3) Uniting behind bland, meaningless wording does not mean you are, in fact, united, and no one is fooled that you are, making the exercise rather pointless.
Mixing metaphors for the win.
https://youtu.be/_DrsVhzbLzU
Or Vince Cable's ravings twelve months ago:
' “This week Wimbledon is being launched and the people who normally produce the strawberries can’t produce them because the labour force has disappeared because of anxiety about their future status in Britain,” he told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme. '
https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/foreign-affairs/brexit/news/87184/hard-brexit-threatens-strawberry-shortage-wimbledon-vince
https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/1014996402865364995?s=19
And we are paying them hundreds of thousands of pounds each to do so.
Mind you by Sunday, it will be back to BAU.
Enjoy the rickety rollercoaster, that is modern UK politics.
http://www.braintreeandwithamtimes.co.uk/news/13924143.___At_night__I_wake_up_choking_____Ivy_fears_more_homes_will_make____horrendous____smell_even_worse/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i99k7nCnVwM
https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/1015003531445710848?s=19
I think the Royal Crescent is in this one.
Even William Hague won council by elections every Thursday when he was Tory leader, my goodness if the Leader of the Opposition cannot even gain a few seats in council by elections what is the point of them at all?
But this needs settling one way or the other.
There is still too much can-kicking road left for TM to use up before we get to the crunch point.
There are of course non Brexit outcome reasons to blow up May's government. The Sucession. But Friday is take out the trash day and the England game means even a major resignation wouldn't dominate news cycles.
Davis and Clark are the two most philosophically and tempermentally likely to walk in my view depending on which side May eventually plumps for. But it's hard to see why a fudged White Paper is a hill anyone will die tomorrow. Next week at the earliest when the World Cup dynamic is clearer and more people are watching news.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44707253