And here’s the thing, you can’t tell that story without Brexit. Those saying that NI has always been unstable as if it’s exculpatory miss the point. It was exactly the point that NI was always fragile and that’s why so many urged caution when choosing a Brexit settlement.
But it’s not as if the alternative was any better. Once the decision was made that single market/customs union membership was unacceptable to the Tory Party and (to a lesser extent) May’s deal was unacceptable to Parliament, a border somewhere...
...and with it a destabilisation of the NI settlement was inevitable. And up to this point half the problem up to this point has just been to get politicians to accept that inescapable fact.
It is indeed sad that the EU chose to weaponise the NI border in the negotiations, rather than continue the project started by Enda Kenny to depoliticise the issue ahead of the Brexit talks.
Promising there'd be no effective border down the Irish Sea, then putting one there, and telling unionists and NI businesses that they'll face no new barriers to trade whatsoever, then dropping a load of such impediments right on top of them, was never going to end well, whatever the EU did or didn't do.
Being part of the EU was hugely helpful in sustaining our own country; not only the unusual status of Northern Ireland with republicans able to feel closer to Ireland within the EU, but also helping to keep a lid on separatism within Scotland, which could pull its weight as part of 'Europe of the Regions'. Similarly it helps make workable the semi-autonomous position of regions like Alto Adige in Italy, where most people don't even speak Italian: if Italy ever left the EU, any consequential barriers to trade or movement between SudTirolers and their Austrian cousins to the North would instantly become a huge political issue.
Our PM thought he could just ignore such considerations and press ahead regardless, making whatever promises he need to make to keep everyone happy meanwhile. As with his similar handling of women, such an approach to life comes back to bite, sooner or later.
Politics is about actual possible outcomes. What should Boris have done differently in terms of substance? (The rules being: It has to get through the EU and the Commons, and actually be Brexit.)
I wanted 'Norway for Now' but the Commons didn't, neither did most Brexiteers, and you can bet the DUP wouldn't either. So what should Boris have done?
Interesting Leicester side. Maddison, Perez and Choudhury not in the squad, carpeted for a covid party apparently, so kids and old timers on the bench. Good starting lineup though.
Leicester has a tough run in, so important points today. Odds look cheap on West Ham for the form they are in.
I’m not sure if anyone’s mentioned it but this tweet from Raab seems unusually strong...
The UK 🇬🇧 & US 🇺🇸 firmly oppose Russia’s campaign to destabilise Ukraine. @SecBlinken & I agreed Russia must immediately de-escalate the situation & live up to the international commitments that it signed up to at @OSCE. Our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty is unwavering.
The Greensill affair- more details in today's Sunday Times - gets worse and worse.
Potentially the corruption of the chumocracy is the Achilles heel of this government. It is something that Starmer should be very strong on, given his legal background. Likely to play well in the Purple Wall too. People don't like being ripped off.
And yet Labour are largely leaving it alone or misfiring - see my post the other day about the questions they ought to be asking instead of the few they are.
They could - and should! - also be asking where the money for PPE, sanitiser etc has gone. There is a less than pretty story to be told around some of that. Like Grayling and his ferries, but much worse.
There are also serious questions about why the government is going out to tender now on a scheme virtually identical to that Greensill was offering. Why? What is the advantage to taxpayers? Who benefits? And by how much?
To most of us, the Greensill story is that David Cameron tried unsuccessfully to lobby the Chancellor and government on behalf of this company.
Are there wider issues at play here, both in terms of finance and politics?
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
It is the new PB “Tory” consensus that it is the Irish who are to blame for...(reads notes)...putting a customs border in the Irish Sea.
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
And here’s the thing, you can’t tell that story without Brexit. Those saying that NI has always been unstable as if it’s exculpatory miss the point. It was exactly the point that NI was always fragile and that’s why so many urged caution when choosing a Brexit settlement.
But it’s not as if the alternative was any better. Once the decision was made that single market/customs union membership was unacceptable to the Tory Party and (to a lesser extent) May’s deal was unacceptable to Parliament, a border somewhere...
...and with it a destabilisation of the NI settlement was inevitable. And up to this point half the problem up to this point has just been to get politicians to accept that inescapable fact.
It is indeed sad that the EU chose to weaponise the NI border in the negotiations, rather than continue the project started by Enda Kenny to depoliticise the issue ahead of the Brexit talks.
Promising there'd be no effective border down the Irish Sea, then putting one there, and telling unionists and NI businesses that they'll face no new barriers to trade whatsoever, then dropping a load of such impediments right on top of them, was never going to end well, whatever the EU did or didn't do.
Being part of the EU was hugely helpful in sustaining our own country; not only the unusual status of Northern Ireland with republicans able to feel closer to Ireland within the EU, but also helping to keep a lid on separatism within Scotland, which could pull its weight as part of 'Europe of the Regions'. Similarly it helps make workable the semi-autonomous position of regions like Alto Adige in Italy, where most people don't even speak Italian: if Italy ever left the EU, any consequential barriers to trade or movement between SudTirolers and their Austrian cousins to the North would instantly become a huge political issue.
Our PM thought he could just ignore such considerations and press ahead regardless, making whatever promises he need to make to keep everyone happy meanwhile. As with his similar handling of women, such an approach to life comes back to bite, sooner or later.
Politics is about actual possible outcomes. What should Boris have done differently in terms of substance? (The rules being: It has to get through the EU and the Commons, and actually be Brexit.)
I wanted 'Norway for Now' but the Commons didn't, neither did most Brexiteers, and you can bet the DUP wouldn't either. So what should Boris have done?
Interesting language from EU’s Thierry Breton on EU vaccine export ban and implications for UK
“Our friends in the UK have two vaccine factories, only one produces.... In other words, the UK is largely dependent on the EU for its vaccination campaign.
It's also laughably wrong. We have 2 active sites manufacturing vaccine substance for AZ and one bottling site for it. For Novavax we have one site producing substance and another bottling it. For Valneva we have one making the substance and another planned bottling site. For CureVac a new manufacturing partner is being sought by GSK for domestic production of the gen 2 vaccine. So that's 5 sites for vaccines approved or nearing approval and maximum monthly capacity of 40m doses per month post ramp up plus 1 more commencing manufacturing of substance in the next few weeks now that the Valneva PII trial has been a huge success and another site planned for late this year for CureVac.
He was asked about the astra vaccine.
It's still wrong, we have two sites making vaccine substance and one site doing bottling.
Well maybe, but you were putting your usual anti EU spin by quoting stuff which was irrelevant to what he said.
Lol, so some EU chump lies about the UK's vaccine manufacturing capacity and the people pointing out the lies are wrong to do so?
You deluded idiot.
I may be deluded, but not by you. You are a typical right wing anti eu who has always had your own agenda on things. The article referred to Astra so you immediately spun it to suit your own agenda. Suffice to say that as far as astra is concerned, the company who makes it is a joint uk/belgian company. More were made in europe so the EU has exported more to the UK than the other direction. When Boris and his fanboys do things specifically to help uk only, then he is great. When VDL tries to do things to help eu only, then she's a villain. As I say, I know exactly what you are about.
Oh, and by the way, I would be careful who you label a deluded idiot, as I suspect as they years go by 17.8 million people will start to get annoyed with you.
You're a completely deluded idiot, I just wish you were in France waiting endlessly for a vaccine, given that you clearly hate this country and love the EU.
This “hate this country” line that a handful of PB’ers regularly trot out is very tiresome. It is perfectly possible to be very pro-European and still proud of being British. Indeed our country’s long and significant contribution to the development and direction of the EU is something about which to be particularly proud.
That's not what's happening though, we have people who will do absolutely anything to deny the blatantly fucking obvious that the EU has fucked this up and the UK hasn't, it's not the first time either. There's a certain section of society (and I'm not talking about you or the vast majority of people who voted remain) who want the UK to fail, they want to take revenge on this country for voting to leave and it hurts them inside to see the UK succeed outside of the EU.
The UK’s vaccination programme has been much more sensible, and more successful, than the EU’s, but let’s keep things in perspective. The approach the EU has taken has principally been down to the nation states asking the EU to take over responsibility, rather than a power grab by the EU itself, and - because there is only a finite amount of vaccine to go round - our favourable position owes something to the EU’s foul up.
And the advantage it gives us is a temporary one of a few months’ head start, not a permanent one. To offset against all our blunders heretofore.
The vaccination programme has very little to do with Brexit, in any case, and all the early signs are that Brexit is proving hugely damaging to many of our smaller import/export businesses, as well as to fishing and farming. If it weren’t for the pandemic I suspect this would be much higher up the news agenda right now.
I’m not sure if anyone’s mentioned it but this tweet from Raab seems unusually strong...
The UK 🇬🇧 & US 🇺🇸 firmly oppose Russia’s campaign to destabilise Ukraine. @SecBlinken & I agreed Russia must immediately de-escalate the situation & live up to the international commitments that it signed up to at @OSCE. Our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty is unwavering.
irrelevant. The West will do f all if Russia invades Ukraine and Putin knows it.
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
It is the new PB “Tory” consensus that it is the Irish who are to blame for...(reads notes)...putting a customs border in the Irish Sea.
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
As a general rule Brexiteers try to blame* all of its problems on err... people who warned them of the problems.
*and it is blame that they seek, showing a degree of insight.
I’m not sure if anyone’s mentioned it but this tweet from Raab seems unusually strong...
The UK 🇬🇧 & US 🇺🇸 firmly oppose Russia’s campaign to destabilise Ukraine. @SecBlinken & I agreed Russia must immediately de-escalate the situation & live up to the international commitments that it signed up to at @OSCE. Our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty is unwavering.
No it isn't. There is no commitment to help of any sort. Nor, I suggest, will there be. The statement crucially lacks the 'unless' clause or the 'if X then we shall Y' sentence.
Russia will in due course annexe part, but only part, of Ukraine via surrogates without western opposition.
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
It is the new PB “Tory” consensus that it is the Irish who are to blame for...(reads notes)...putting a customs border in the Irish Sea.
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
Most of these problems are down to the Uk not taking the compromise option of a soft Brexit, when it was available.
Blame for that rests with intransigent leavers, and also with intransigent remainers. At a guess, I’d apportion responsibility in the ratio 52%:48%.
What the clown’s fanclub hope to achieve by trying to palm blame off onto the EU is a mystery, since they mostly seem to be talking to themselves.
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
It is the new PB “Tory” consensus that it is the Irish who are to blame for...(reads notes)...putting a customs border in the Irish Sea.
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
As a general rule Brexiteers try to blame* all of its problems on err... people who warned them of the problems.
*and it is blame that they seek, showing a degree of insight.
Looking at substance for a moment, where would you put it, and would all relevant parties have agreed to it?
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
It is the new PB “Tory” consensus that it is the Irish who are to blame for...(reads notes)...putting a customs border in the Irish Sea.
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
As a general rule Brexiteers try to blame* all of its problems on err... people who warned them of the problems.
*and it is blame that they seek, showing a degree of insight.
Looking at substance for a moment, where would you put it, and would all relevant parties have agreed to it?
Leavers need to own their vote and the impact it’s had on NI instead of trying to dump the blame on the EU.
The least worst option at the moment is a border in the Irish Sea. There are no good options because Brexit and NI was always going to be a car crash unless the UK had gone for much closer ties with the EU .
The DUP went for a hard Brexit when they could have pushed for something softer during Mays tenure . They are now hoping to inflame tensions so as to effectively force the ditching of the protocol and to dump the problem on the EU .
Bozo screwed the DUP and lied about the protocol as going into an election on a no deal platform would have caused problems for his campaign.
The Bozo Cult in here seem very happy to slag off Starmer at every turn which is rather nauseating seeing as their posterboy is a pathological liar who doesn’t give a fig about NI .
And here’s the thing, you can’t tell that story without Brexit. Those saying that NI has always been unstable as if it’s exculpatory miss the point. It was exactly the point that NI was always fragile and that’s why so many urged caution when choosing a Brexit settlement.
But it’s not as if the alternative was any better. Once the decision was made that single market/customs union membership was unacceptable to the Tory Party and (to a lesser extent) May’s deal was unacceptable to Parliament, a border somewhere...
...and with it a destabilisation of the NI settlement was inevitable. And up to this point half the problem up to this point has just been to get politicians to accept that inescapable fact.
It is indeed sad that the EU chose to weaponise the NI border in the negotiations, rather than continue the project started by Enda Kenny to depoliticise the issue ahead of the Brexit talks.
Promising there'd be no effective border down the Irish Sea, then putting one there, and telling unionists and NI businesses that they'll face no new barriers to trade whatsoever, then dropping a load of such impediments right on top of them, was never going to end well, whatever the EU did or didn't do.
Being part of the EU was hugely helpful in sustaining our own country; not only the unusual status of Northern Ireland with republicans able to feel closer to Ireland within the EU, but also helping to keep a lid on separatism within Scotland, which could pull its weight as part of 'Europe of the Regions'. Similarly it helps make workable the semi-autonomous position of regions like Alto Adige in Italy, where most people don't even speak Italian: if Italy ever left the EU, any consequential barriers to trade or movement between SudTirolers and their Austrian cousins to the North would instantly become a huge political issue.
Our PM thought he could just ignore such considerations and press ahead regardless, making whatever promises he need to make to keep everyone happy meanwhile. As with his similar handling of women, such an approach to life comes back to bite, sooner or later.
Politics is about actual possible outcomes. What should Boris have done differently in terms of substance? (The rules being: It has to get through the EU and the Commons, and actually be Brexit.)
I wanted 'Norway for Now' but the Commons didn't, neither did most Brexiteers, and you can bet the DUP wouldn't either. So what should Boris have done?
Telling lies about the consequences of your decisions is rarely an approach that minimises the eventual consequences. Being a bit more honest and facing, rather than dodging, your responsibilities as a national leader would have been a good start.
Either remaining within the CU or taking May’s deal would have been better for NI. But then neither of those would have helped the clown rise to the top of the greasy pole.
OT comment and question about trade. Now weve left the single market, ive found buying things from china to be much more expensive, but it seems like some fishy was going on. Aliexpress is an example. Postage costs are often phenominal to ship to uk but free for delivery to countries within the EU. The costs are so great there are closer to that of what might be VAT.
The UK I understand now requires countries selling goods to the UK over a certain amount to collect VAT on their behalf.
My suspicion is that huge volumes of goods get drop shipped into the EU, dont get customs checked and VAT is not actually levied within the EU from the Chinese website, and that control of our borders means that enforcement is now actually happening... Unfortunately to uk consumers this means we end up actually paying more.
Any thoughts or insight into this?
The buyer-pays-VAT reforms that came in here at the start of the year to deal with eg VAT-avoidance on Ebay/Amazon Marketplace are I think due to come in in the EU sometime this year.
That will make a difference, but not to transport costs.
I think the 'transport costs' are a cover to hide the differential pricing. From what you say about the avoidance, it looks like buyers within the EU are been sold goods without VAT been charged, but vat is getting levied for purchases to the UK, and the difference is getting pushed as delivery/transport costs.
I can't see how that works (at least for the consumer). Transport costs (courier/postage) on imports have been included as VATable by HMRC in my experience. To hide it as transport risks paying VAT twice over ...
I wondered if things were being complicated by a reverse Rotterdam effect. When we were in the SM and EU Customs union it probably made sense to deliver most of our imports there first on very large container ships and then distribute within the SM. Now it is more complicated and there may be an incentive to deliver directly to the UK avoiding the EU complications. But this may be not quite as efficient, at least until it is better organised.
As I see it some perceived problems have been caused by the VAT change happening at the same time as Brexit, with different parts of new border complexity / unfamiliarity due to both.
Some people have blamed the whole caboodle on Brexit.
My reference to transport costs is that part of the overall increase is due to Brexit surcharges added for fees and extra time required at eg Dover.
When the EU change their VAT arrangements that will make changes there as well, and that part of the difference should unwind.
However, the EU will still mainly be a single market, so for an exporter in eg France there will not need to be separate VAT registrations in Spain, France, Italy etc.
However one will be needed for the UK, which is genuinely a VAT situation less favourable relative to the EU on top of border issues.
I see the usual suspects are out blaming the EU for 'politicising' the Irish border. Jonathan Powell, whatever you think of him, has written a good piece in the Observer.
The first couple of paragraphs are pretty succinct:
'The Northern Ireland conundrum over Brexit was always insoluble. As John Major and Tony Blair pointed out in the referendum campaign, if the UK left the single market and customs union there had to be a border somewhere, either on the island of Ireland or in the Irish Sea. In either case, someone’s rights were going to be hurt: nationalists or unionists.
In December 2019, Boris Johnson opted to put the border in the Irish Sea to get his Brexit deal over the line. He then chose to lie about it, live on TV, saying there would be no border and that no one would have to fill in any forms. At first, the unionist response was muted. Arlene Foster even said NI had the best of both worlds.'
Of course there is a border. You then figure out how to make it noninvasive and invisible to the vast majority
Interesting language from EU’s Thierry Breton on EU vaccine export ban and implications for UK
“Our friends in the UK have two vaccine factories, only one produces.... In other words, the UK is largely dependent on the EU for its vaccination campaign.
It's also laughably wrong. We have 2 active sites manufacturing vaccine substance for AZ and one bottling site for it. For Novavax we have one site producing substance and another bottling it. For Valneva we have one making the substance and another planned bottling site. For CureVac a new manufacturing partner is being sought by GSK for domestic production of the gen 2 vaccine. So that's 5 sites for vaccines approved or nearing approval and maximum monthly capacity of 40m doses per month post ramp up plus 1 more commencing manufacturing of substance in the next few weeks now that the Valneva PII trial has been a huge success and another site planned for late this year for CureVac.
He was asked about the astra vaccine.
It's still wrong, we have two sites making vaccine substance and one site doing bottling.
Well maybe, but you were putting your usual anti EU spin by quoting stuff which was irrelevant to what he said.
Lol, so some EU chump lies about the UK's vaccine manufacturing capacity and the people pointing out the lies are wrong to do so?
You deluded idiot.
I may be deluded, but not by you. You are a typical right wing anti eu who has always had your own agenda on things. The article referred to Astra so you immediately spun it to suit your own agenda. Suffice to say that as far as astra is concerned, the company who makes it is a joint uk/belgian company. More were made in europe so the EU has exported more to the UK than the other direction. When Boris and his fanboys do things specifically to help uk only, then he is great. When VDL tries to do things to help eu only, then she's a villain. As I say, I know exactly what you are about.
As I mentioned in another reply, while the article mentions AZN, the reply was referring to all vaccines. You can see that in the use of the 37 million dose statistic that he used.
And the EU were/are chucking contract law in the bin to solve their problems. Not that we haven't see this behaviour before. Just look at what happened to the PPE from France.
Which PPE, the useless stuff which Boris/Matt decided to spend money on (really giving the money to their mates?).
I dont agree that the article refers to all vaccines either.
This was the first article on google fir “France impounds ppe”
Sandpit - the EU took the approach it did to NI because the Irish government insisted upon it. They were determined not to see the return of a practical border in Ireland. All 27 governments agreed on a common negotiating position to give to Barnier. The idea that the EU was the driving force behind the Irish border issue is just brexiteer fiction.
What you might say is that they insisted on a border with a party that wasn't in the customs union. But again that was more about preserving their own market and is what happens all over the world.
The Greensill affair- more details in today's Sunday Times - gets worse and worse.
Potentially the corruption of the chumocracy is the Achilles heel of this government. It is something that Starmer should be very strong on, given his legal background. Likely to play well in the Purple Wall too. People don't like being ripped off.
And yet Labour are largely leaving it alone or misfiring - see my post the other day about the questions they ought to be asking instead of the few they are.
They could - and should! - also be asking where the money for PPE, sanitiser etc has gone. There is a less than pretty story to be told around some of that. Like Grayling and his ferries, but much worse.
There are also serious questions about why the government is going out to tender now on a scheme virtually identical to that Greensill was offering. Why? What is the advantage to taxpayers? Who benefits? And by how much?
Which one? The nhs provided advance wage scheme could have some advantages if managed properly
I’m not sure if anyone’s mentioned it but this tweet from Raab seems unusually strong...
The UK 🇬🇧 & US 🇺🇸 firmly oppose Russia’s campaign to destabilise Ukraine. @SecBlinken & I agreed Russia must immediately de-escalate the situation & live up to the international commitments that it signed up to at @OSCE. Our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty is unwavering.
irrelevant. The West will do f all if Russia invades Ukraine and Putin knows it.
Interesting language from EU’s Thierry Breton on EU vaccine export ban and implications for UK
“Our friends in the UK have two vaccine factories, only one produces.... In other words, the UK is largely dependent on the EU for its vaccination campaign.
It's also laughably wrong. We have 2 active sites manufacturing vaccine substance for AZ and one bottling site for it. For Novavax we have one site producing substance and another bottling it. For Valneva we have one making the substance and another planned bottling site. For CureVac a new manufacturing partner is being sought by GSK for domestic production of the gen 2 vaccine. So that's 5 sites for vaccines approved or nearing approval and maximum monthly capacity of 40m doses per month post ramp up plus 1 more commencing manufacturing of substance in the next few weeks now that the Valneva PII trial has been a huge success and another site planned for late this year for CureVac.
He was asked about the astra vaccine.
It's still wrong, we have two sites making vaccine substance and one site doing bottling.
Well maybe, but you were putting your usual anti EU spin by quoting stuff which was irrelevant to what he said.
Lol, so some EU chump lies about the UK's vaccine manufacturing capacity and the people pointing out the lies are wrong to do so?
You deluded idiot.
I may be deluded, but not by you. You are a typical right wing anti eu who has always had your own agenda on things. The article referred to Astra so you immediately spun it to suit your own agenda. Suffice to say that as far as astra is concerned, the company who makes it is a joint uk/belgian company. More were made in europe so the EU has exported more to the UK than the other direction. When Boris and his fanboys do things specifically to help uk only, then he is great. When VDL tries to do things to help eu only, then she's a villain. As I say, I know exactly what you are about.
Oh, and by the way, I would be careful who you label a deluded idiot, as I suspect as they years go by 17.8 million people will start to get annoyed with you.
You're a completely deluded idiot, I just wish you were in France waiting endlessly for a vaccine, given that you clearly hate this country and love the EU.
OIC, we are reduced to the "hate this country" arguement. How sad. I can criticise the government as much as I want, that's democracy. For your information, I love my country as much as anyone else, and I like the EU, which you obviously don't. Have you discovered a new irregular verb?
I am deluded, You are completely deluded the 17.8 million are deluded idiots?
I have to jump in on behalf of pedantry here. That is a regular verb.
Comments
I wanted 'Norway for Now' but the Commons didn't, neither did most Brexiteers, and you can bet the DUP wouldn't either. So what should Boris have done?
Interesting Leicester side. Maddison, Perez and Choudhury not in the squad, carpeted for a covid party apparently, so kids and old timers on the bench. Good starting lineup though.
Leicester has a tough run in, so important points today. Odds look cheap on West Ham for the form they are in.
The UK 🇬🇧 & US 🇺🇸 firmly oppose Russia’s campaign to destabilise Ukraine. @SecBlinken & I agreed Russia must immediately de-escalate the situation & live up to the international commitments that it signed up to at @OSCE. Our support for Ukraine’s sovereignty is unwavering.
Are there wider issues at play here, both in terms of finance and politics?
Some twit upthread even valiantly has a go at blaming Tony Blair and John Major.
It’s the kind of ingenious double-thinking last seen in the Soviet Union.
And the advantage it gives us is a temporary one of a few months’ head start, not a permanent one. To offset against all our blunders heretofore.
The vaccination programme has very little to do with Brexit, in any case, and all the early signs are that Brexit is proving hugely damaging to many of our smaller import/export businesses, as well as to fishing and farming. If it weren’t for the pandemic I suspect this would be much higher up the news agenda right now.
*and it is blame that they seek, showing a degree of insight.
Russia will in due course annexe part, but only part, of Ukraine via surrogates without western opposition.
Blame for that rests with intransigent leavers, and also with intransigent remainers. At a guess, I’d apportion responsibility in the ratio 52%:48%.
What the clown’s fanclub hope to achieve by trying to palm blame off onto the EU is a mystery, since they mostly seem to be talking to themselves.
The least worst option at the moment is a border in the Irish Sea. There are no good options because Brexit and NI was always going to be a car crash unless the UK had gone for much closer ties with the EU .
The DUP went for a hard Brexit when they could have pushed for something softer during Mays tenure . They are now hoping to inflame tensions so as to effectively force the ditching of the protocol and to dump the problem on the EU .
Bozo screwed the DUP and lied about the protocol as going into an election on a no deal platform would have caused problems for his campaign.
The Bozo Cult in here seem very happy to slag off Starmer at every turn which is rather nauseating seeing as their posterboy is a pathological liar who doesn’t give a fig about NI .
Either remaining within the CU or taking May’s deal would have been better for NI. But then neither of those would have helped the clown rise to the top of the greasy pole.
Some people have blamed the whole caboodle on Brexit.
My reference to transport costs is that part of the overall increase is due to Brexit surcharges added for fees and extra time required at eg Dover.
When the EU change their VAT arrangements that will make changes there as well, and that part of the difference should unwind.
However, the EU will still mainly be a single market, so for an exporter in eg France there will not need to be separate VAT registrations in Spain, France, Italy etc.
However one will be needed for the UK, which is genuinely a VAT situation less favourable relative to the EU on top of border issues.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.euronews.com/amp/2020/03/06/coronavirus-french-protective-mask-manufacturer-scraps-nhs-order-to-keep-masks-in-france
Varadkar looked to take advantage of it