Brexit

jawafour wrote:

Moggy wrote:...We no longer live in the 1800s. The world is bound up in countless treaties, organisations and agreements that stop any nation having “full management of law”.

True, and I accept that some of the bodies you mention are critical for helping to maintain cohesion amongst countries.

But, yes, I would prefer the UK to have as much responsibility and accountability as possible for law, rather than defer aspects of it to another body.

Then I say again, where do you draw the line?

Scottish independence?

Cornish independence?

London independence?

A small village getting independence?

One house?

Why is the UK being subject to laws (while being a full decision maker) in the EU any different to Westminster making laws over the whole of Britain? Why should representatives from Birmingham, Bolton and Bodmin have an equal say over laws that have an impact on the people of Bristol?

Trade agreements are a form of political integration, no two large economies are ever going to say "let's open up our market to each other" without a long list of demands. Remember when the US used NAFTA to push Hollywood-designed IP laws on its neighbours? (I was only a year and a bit old at the time but Jawa might!) The TPP included provisions designed to help Malaysia improve its human rights record. TTIP contains clauses so controversial we aren't allowed to read the negotiating drafts, probably including mechanisms for the US to undermine socialist healthcare in Europe. ACTA encroaches on our right to privacy and criminalises generic medicine. Not all of these things are bad (I am happy that Malaysia cracked down on human trafficking!) but many of them are -- we deal with it because at the end of the day trade and growth are important.

By contrast, at least the EU gives the average person a little say in which laws are created (via MEPs) and has demonstrated flexibility towards us in the past (the US definitely won't be as accommodating!).

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I don't really understand what you mean by 'the centre of law', I don't want to offend you but it seems like a phrase that doesn't actually mean anything. The UK government is and has always been and will continue to be the ultimate arbiter of whether we accept into our laws any agreement struck or proposed by any international organisation. We could reject directives from the EU, from NATO, from the WTO, from the UN (and so on) if we wanted to. No-one is going to come and arrest the Prime Minister if we withdraw from those agreements because we don't like something they proposed. (But we would lose all the benefits of being in those organisations.)

I don't think we should pre-emptively withdraw from all those obligations just in case they might do something later on which might cause us to have to withdraw from them. That seems like a tortuous chain of logic and not particularly rational to me, and I think you'll see that if you think about the UN, so I don't see why the EU is a special case.

jawafour wrote:Moggy, I need to run out the door now so forgive me for not fully quoting - but the “line” that I draw for UK law is the UK borders. Some folk may not agree with that (i.e. folk who want, say, Scottish or Cornwall independence) but personally I am comfortable with the UK government devising and administering law for countries in the UK.

And that’s why the “I want the UK to decide for itself” thing doesn’t make logical sense to me. Why stop at reversing things back to just the UK? The UK isn’t that old, why not go back to England and Scotland? Mercia and Wessex? City states? Wandering tribes?

The world moves forward, going back to being a little island by ourselves probably won’t mean the collapse of the entire country, but we will be left behind. Less economic clout, less secure, less influence and just lesser. And for what? Making all of our own laws (we can’t, see my list of treaties and organisations)? Making our own trade deals (it’s all only a possibility and will involve handing over further lawmaking power)?

A debate can be had as to whether, if we are going to have to compromise a bit on our laws to have free trade with a big power, it would be better to compromise with the EU or the US. The EU are in general pretty similar to us (socialised healthcare, welfare safety nets, sensible labour laws, some degree of environmental awareness, etc.). Meanwhile, I personally think the US is in a really bad place politically speaking and I would be mortified if they had any more influence on us than they already do. I think we might eventually (after decades of economic damage...) end up with a free trade agreement with the US and I fear by that point we'll be so desperate we'll agree to some really horrible terms.

jawafour wrote:

Hyperion wrote:...if you believe that the UK government is going to become a shining beacon of the creation of laws for the benefit of the majority of its citizens...

Would the EU be that shining beacon for UK citizens? Don’t get me wrong; I do like some of the laws delivered through the EU i.e. maximum working hours and working rights.

No, but I have more confidence in it than the UK government. Think of a recent law you like, probably down to the EU rather than the UK, and would a UK government have brought it in outside of the EU?

jawafour wrote:Even so, it feels like a reasonable position to choose that the government is the centre of law for the UK rather than through a wider political body.

It is, and it is.

I am also a bit sad that Jawa is ignoring me.

The best argument against Brexit I have heard is the microchip industry.

Every UK microchip has parts from all over the world, that all have to be regulated and tested to the same standards. Under current rules, that is done seemlessly, but with Brexit every single one of these regulations has to be undone and re-agreed for every tiny part of a microchip, and theres definitely no guarentee that those deals could remain the same, considering you'd have to negotiate each deal seperately with each country. Thats a perfect example of where EU regulations without a shadow of a doubt work.

David Davis has no clue what he is talking about. That is the scariest thing of all.

DML wrote:The best argument against Brexit I have heard is the microchip industry.

Every UK microchip has parts from all over the world, that all have to be regulated and tested to the same standards. Under current rules, that is done seemlessly, but with Brexit every single one of these regulations has to be undone and re-agreed for every tiny part of a microchip, and theres definitely no guarentee that those deals could remain the same, considering you'd have to negotiate each deal seperately with each country. Thats a perfect example of where EU regulations without a shadow of a doubt work.

David Davis has no clue what he is talking about. That is the scariest thing of all.

Pffft we’ll just use oven chips instead.

TTIP's a very good example of the benefits of EU membership whereas two years ago it would've looked the opposite - enough pressure came to bear that the original legislation (horrendous by all accounts though we've only seen opinions and leaks) was thrown out. Whereas when it rears its head again in another form once Britain has fully left the EU we will have absolutely no clout whatsoever to reject it, as a tiny country requiring trade deals with a superpower (the US).

As an aside I've just sorted a British contract when i was initially meant to be living in the Netherlands simply because it was so difficult to relocate there (plus they offered me a direct conversion of salary from Euros to GBP based on last week's rates so please don't sack Hammond, May), which puts to lie the argument of how we couldn't control our borders. I know no-one will probably contest me on this but I'm certain some reading it will have voted leave because, partly, of border control. And countries like the Netherlands, pretty liberal by all accounts, throw up so many hurdles that although not written into law you really have to have a good job, decent flat which allows registration, fair stack of money, and time (up to 5 weeks) in which you can afford to live while not being allowed to work. Which i could have managed but just thought strawberry float all that noise.

Whereas in contrast my girfriend is moving to Scotland to work for a bit and it's so unbelievably simple in comparison. Which is obviously great for me and my pro-inmigration views but really shows how unnecessary it was to leave the EU to 'control our borders'.

Rocsteady wrote:TTIP's a very good example of the benefits of EU membership whereas two years ago it would've looked the opposite - enough pressure came to bear that the original legislation (horrendous by all accounts though we've only seen opinions and leaks) was thrown out. Whereas when it rears its head again in another form once Britain has fully left the EU we will have absolutely no clout whatsoever to reject it, as a tiny country requiring trade deals with a superpower (the US).

As an aside I've just sorted a British contract when i was initially meant to be living in the Netherlands simply because it was so difficult to relocate there (plus they offered me a direct conversion of salary from Euros to GBP based on last week's rates so please don't sack Hammond, May), which puts to lie the argument of how we couldn't control our borders. I know no-one will probably contest me on this but I'm certain some reading it will have voted leave because, partly, of border control. And countries like the Netherlands, pretty liberal by all accounts, throw up so many hurdles that although not written into law you really have to have a good job, decent flat which allows registration, fair stack of money, and time (up to 5 weeks) in which you can afford to live while not being allowed to work. Which i could have managed but just thought strawberry float all that noise.

Whereas in contrast my girfriend is moving to Scotland to work for a bit and it's so unbelievably simple in comparison. Which is obviously great for me and my pro-inmigration views but really shows how unnecessary it was to leave the EU to 'control our borders'.

This is what has annoyed me the most. The vast majority who voted to leave did so due to border controls and immigration as they believed the problem was the EU. But what annoys me isn't that they thought that it's that successive governments have failed to explain this to the public, they've spent years implying that the problem was the EU when in fact it was our governments choice as to what we did with immigration. I believe that they felt our economy needed this immigration but they didn't want to explain to the public that it was their choice and instead blamed the EU which in the end backfired. Even when it got as far as the brexit debates the remain side just stood there and took the all the flak on immigration, they never explained it the real situation and processes and how we could have a lot more control over our borders if we wanted to but we've chosen not to.

I reckon there is a fairly good chance that the UK could join the US after Brexit. I'm guessing that a lot of Brexiters would strawberry floating love it.

lex-man wrote:I reckon there is a fairly good chance that the UK could join the US after Brexit. I'm guessing that a lot of Brexiters would strawberry floating love it.

We could become a US territory. Working out great for Puerto Rico.

lex-man wrote:I reckon there is a fairly good chance that the UK could join the US after Brexit. I'm guessing that a lot of Brexiters would strawberry floating love it.

There's not

twitter.com/AllieHBNews/status/918589221371342848

The Mail seems absolutely desperate here. It's like an ideological purging is on the cards for any 'non-believers' in the cabinet.

Is it also wise to reference their own strawberry float up during the election?

Just read that the government is sitting on economic impact reports for this. Brexshit continues to deliver, maybe?

I would hate to be any of the Brexiteers who helped persuade the public to vote for this mess. Negotiations are going far worse than I though they would and I was pessimistic to begin with. Anyone who lied to the public about how easy and wonderful this would be better be careful about where they go and how late they stay out in future, otherwise they could be found floating in the nearest canal. There is going to be millions of dangerously pissed off leave voters if the economic impact of leaving with no deal hits them hard enough. The vote was mainly swayed by frustration at the current status quo so imagine how folks will feel when it blows up in their faces.

Return_of_the_STAR wrote:

Rocsteady wrote:TTIP's a very good example of the benefits of EU membership whereas two years ago it would've looked the opposite - enough pressure came to bear that the original legislation (horrendous by all accounts though we've only seen opinions and leaks) was thrown out. Whereas when it rears its head again in another form once Britain has fully left the EU we will have absolutely no clout whatsoever to reject it, as a tiny country requiring trade deals with a superpower (the US).

As an aside I've just sorted a British contract when i was initially meant to be living in the Netherlands simply because it was so difficult to relocate there (plus they offered me a direct conversion of salary from Euros to GBP based on last week's rates so please don't sack Hammond, May), which puts to lie the argument of how we couldn't control our borders. I know no-one will probably contest me on this but I'm certain some reading it will have voted leave because, partly, of border control. And countries like the Netherlands, pretty liberal by all accounts, throw up so many hurdles that although not written into law you really have to have a good job, decent flat which allows registration, fair stack of money, and time (up to 5 weeks) in which you can afford to live while not being allowed to work. Which i could have managed but just thought strawberry float all that noise.

Whereas in contrast my girfriend is moving to Scotland to work for a bit and it's so unbelievably simple in comparison. Which is obviously great for me and my pro-inmigration views but really shows how unnecessary it was to leave the EU to 'control our borders'.

This is what has annoyed me the most. The vast majority who voted to leave did so due to border controls and immigration as they believed the problem was the EU. But what annoys me isn't that they thought that it's that successive governments have failed to explain this to the public, they've spent years implying that the problem was the EU when in fact it was our governments choice as to what we did with immigration. I believe that they felt our economy needed this immigration but they didn't want to explain to the public that it was their choice and instead blamed the EU which in the end backfired. Even when it got as far as the brexit debates the remain side just stood there and took the all the flak on immigration, they never explained it the real situation and processes and how we could have a lot more control over our borders if we wanted to but we've chosen not to.

The more i think about it i think part of the blame also lies with people like us on here.

I remember many of us laughing off the concerns of immigrants coming over but if Blair,.Brown or Cameron had made it substantially harder for immigrants to come we wouldn't have collapsed our economy and be facing down the barrel of a gun. Perhaps a lesson that we need to learn is to listen more to the general public and give some concessions to opinion when appropriate. Otherwise it all boils over, which looks something like this.

I don't think we should blame ourselves for not being racist.