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Cont: Brexit: Now What? 7th heaven...

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ceptimus said:
Many of the current EU standards originated as British Standards.

It's a shame we can't just have worldwide standards. Engineers would much prefer that, and there is a gradual move towards it - but the move is glacially slow. We blame politicians for that.
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Not exactly world wide - but close
They cover a wide range of topics,manufactured products and technology to food safety, agriculture and healthcare
 
Captain_Swoop said:
Are you sure?
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Fairly sure about the standards concerning the industry I work in - and those standards were in turn adopted as world (ISO) standards - the EU standards now just essentially reference the ISO ones.

I guess there are other EU standards for different industries that have been adopted from other countries. I think when the committees meet, they look at all the candidate standards and if one of those encompasses the others and is not too onerous, that becomes the agreed standard of the organisation.

The committees all agree that the more people adopting the same standards the better - but of course they don't want to do themselves out of a job, so they're reluctant to just say, 'Use world (ISO) standards, and you don't need us any more.' :)
 
Of course the thing about trade agreements is that they get complicated. As you make each one, it constrains future deals you might want to make. If you agree a zero tariff deal to trade widgets with Albania, you won't then get the same deal with Zambia if there's a tariff in place to stop Albanian widgets flooding the Zambian market, because traders would just use you as a route from A to Z.

My point of course is that it's ludicrous to complain that having an open border and a free trade deal with the entire EU (and through it to multiple more countries) constrains your ability to make other deals because of course it does.

What did the likes of Liam Fox imagine would happen if they were in fact able to conclude anything like the scale of trade deals they initially told us would be a piece of cake (but turned out to be surprisingly harder than they had somehow supposed)?
 
Nessie said:
Standards vary from country to country. The EU and western world countries tend to have strict and detailed standards. Other countries less so.

Manufacturing exporters have always had to comply with what ever the standard is, there is no real chnage there.
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Except they really don't in practice- international standards are a mish-mash generally but there are only really a few bodies that are creating standards and most others just take something off the shelf.

In the real world the only ones that really matter are EU, China, US and maybe Japan who sometimes have oddball standards on things.

In truth there is a lot of alignment across all of these standards anyway as generally they are all based on each other with maybe a few additions or amendments.
 
ceptimus said:
Many of the current EU standards originated as British Standards.

It's a shame we can't just have worldwide standards. Engineers would much prefer that, and there is a gradual move towards it - but the move is glacially slow. We blame politicians for that.
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You can also blame manufacturers who can't agree on what the correct standards should be. There are also genuine differences between countries on how things are used that might mean standards should be different.

What is clear is that the UK will end up in a situation where it is having to comply with standards which it doesn't have input into.
 
Nessie said:
Indeed, to what standard we make our goods for export is not affected in the slightest by leaving the EU.

The only change is that after leaving, the UK has no say what so ever in the EU standards, whereas before, we had a say.
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Spot on. I'm amazed more people don't get this.
 
ceptimus said:
I know trade is complex. Please don't patronize.
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Then why don't you understand why the UK and Canada are different situations? Not to mention that the Canada deal took forever to agree.

It is possible to have a FTA with the EU and UK. It will no doubt exist at some point. It will take several years to agree and implement (anything up to a dozen seems par for the course) and it will likely not cover all products and services that are traded.

It will not solve the border problem. Goods travelling to from the UK/EU will need to be checked and this will cause issues at ports. The land border between the EU and UK will remain an issue because despite claims to the contrary you can't have free unchecked movement of goods and people over a land border between the UK and the EU while also maintaining separate arrangements for customs and other things.

A better example of this in operation is the EU-Ukraine border but even there it seems the Ukraine has a much deeper alignment (and wish to strengthen ties with the EU) than most Brexiteers wish.

I can't imagine there is very much goodwill within the EU towards the UK anymore. Especially with BJ in charge and Farage back on the scene. So any deal that gets done is going to be done on the sole basis of it being in the interests of the EU to do it.

And the best possible practical outcome would be one that gets us close to where we originally were before we voted to leave.

So well done Brexiteers for creating years of chaos for absolutely nothing more than flag waving jingoism and sticking it to the man
 
Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Then why don't you understand why the UK and Canada are different situations?
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I do understand. The UK does much more trade with the EU, is much closer, and right now is 100% compliant with all their standards. Therefore it stands to reason that the EU should offer the UK a much better trade deal than the one they've agreed with Canada.

But the EU is worried about other nations wanting to leave their club, so they have to be careful not to offer the UK a very good deal. They will be prepared to negotiate a deal that harms their own interests somewhat, providing that it harms UK interests much more.
 
Wudang said:
It was not my intent to patronize. No offense intended. But you do seem to maintain a belief that trade and standards should be simpler than they are. This article written by Leavers begins to illustrate what reality is like.
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Thank you. Trade with the EU is also complex, in that it prevents free trade with countries outside the EU.

At its heart, the EU is a protectionist trade bloc, so it has to ensure that things like oranges, which can be grown in Spain, aren't allowed to be imported to the EU too cheaply. Now the UK, where climate change notwithstanding there is little chance of growing oranges, doesn't need to protect its own orange industry, so it could negotiate better deals (on orange imports) with non-EU countries if it were allowed.

Oranges are just one trivial example - anything that the EU grows or makes internally is protected against world competition by import tariffs. There are many cases where the UK could do better for itself were it not shackled by EU rules.
 
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Greebo said:
Not exactly world wide - but close
They cover a wide range of topics,manufactured products and technology to food safety, agriculture and healthcare
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Can you imagine the horror among the less sophisticated, low information, easily led portions of the country at a worldwide standard. The European one, in which we had some say, made their tiny brains fall out. A Worldwide one, in which we necessarily had less say would cause apoplexy in every daily mail 'reading' household in the country.
 
ceptimus said:
The EU negotiated trade deals with Canada, and other countries, without requiring them to join the EU customs union.
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Being Canadian I’m actually quite familiar with Canada. ;) Do you know what Canada also has? Borders. If you want to cross into Canada you need to go though customs, it doesn’t matter if you are coming in via an airport a sea port or a border crossing you need to go though customs to enter the country. Even traffic coming from the US where there is a free trade agreement in place needs to go though customs, and you may need to pay duty on products brought in from the US.

Do you know why you need to stop at a border checkpoint and go though customs? Because Canada isn’t part of a common customs area or customs agreement.
 
ceptimus said:
I do understand. The UK does much more trade with the EU, is much closer, and right now is 100% compliant with all their standards. Therefore it stands to reason that the EU should offer the UK a much better trade deal than the one they've agreed with Canada.
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And the EU very well might offer a better trade deal than the one with Canada. But as you are well aware, this can only negotiated after the UK has left the EU. And in the interest of keeping the current situation (where the UK is 100% compliant and able to continue trading as is) you need a (transition) period where the UK is formally out of the EU but has an agreement in place that ensures that and which further ensures that other treaties/agreements involving the UK, the EU and it's member states are honoured (thus the withdrawal agreement).

But the EU is worried about other nations wanting to leave their club, so they have to be careful not to offer the UK a very good deal. They will be prepared to negotiate a deal that harms their own interests somewhat, providing that it harms UK interests much more.
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Of course any deal offered by the EU will not provide the same benefits but none of the disadvantages that membership of the club provides. That however doesn't mean that the EU cannot offer a good deal.

But as mr. Barnier pointed out in his diagram back in 2017, every type of deal has a different cost and different benefits. It's up to the UK to decide which type of deal they eventually want to end up with.
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ceptimus said:
I do understand. The UK does much more trade with the EU, is much closer, and right now is 100% compliant with all their standards. Therefore it stands to reason that the EU should offer the UK a much better trade deal than the one they've agreed with Canada.
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Well right away you have shown you don't understand. Since none of those three things are very relevant to whether or not they offer a good deal or a better deal than Canada.

But the EU is worried about other nations wanting to leave their club, so they have to be careful not to offer the UK a very good deal. They will be prepared to negotiate a deal that harms their own interests somewhat, providing that it harms UK interests much more.
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The EU will be able to offer a deal on terms that the members agree to. No more and no less. But it will take a long time to negotiate.

So far no trade deal has even begun to be negotiated because the UK can't agree a deal to leave. Because the leavers won't agree to leave.
 
ceptimus said:
At its heart, the EU is a protectionist trade bloc, so it has to ensure that things like oranges, which can be grown in Spain, aren't allowed to be imported to the EU too cheaply. Now the UK, where climate change notwithstanding there is little chance of growing oranges, doesn't need to protect its own orange industry, so it could negotiate better deals (on orange imports) with non-EU countries if it were allowed.

Oranges are just one trivial example - anything that the EU grows or makes internally is protected against world competition by import tariffs. There are many cases where the UK could do better for itself were it not shackled by EU rules.
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From the article I referred to
What the WTO Option advocates have done is make a very basic but fatal mistake. They’re so obsessed with tariffs, they haven’t begun to focus on non-tariff barriers.
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ceptimus said:
Thank you. Trade with the EU is also complex, in that it prevents free trade with countries outside the EU.
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Except where it facilitates it by having substantial FTAs in place with places like Korea, Japan, Canada, etc.

At its heart, the EU is a protectionist trade bloc, so it has to ensure that things like oranges, which can be grown in Spain, aren't allowed to be imported to the EU too cheaply. Now the UK, where climate change notwithstanding there is little chance of growing oranges, doesn't need to protect its own orange industry, so it could negotiate better deals (on orange imports) with non-EU countries if it were allowed.
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Who is the World's number 1 producer of oranges? Brazil
Who is currently negotiating an FTA with Brazil? The EU
Who would have to apply WTO tariffs to any imports of oranges from Brazil? The UK

Are there countries which import Oranges to the EU in substantial numbers?

Why yes. South Africa (who have an FTA) and Egypt (who have an FTA)

Oranges are just one trivial example - anything that the EU grows or makes internally is protected against world competition by import tariffs.
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Except they aren't. And in any case, its much better to favour Spanish oranges over Brazilian or South African oranges because we want to reduce food miles.

There are many cases where the UK could do better for itself were it not shackled by EU rules.
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No they're really aren't. Oranges certainly aren't one of them. Only about a third of UK fruit imports come from the EU the rest from South America and Africa predominantly.


So overall grade on your analysis a C-. Much improvement needed.
 
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