Cont: Brexit: Now What? The Perfect 10.

[Airfix]

The problem with the Common Security and Defence Policy and the attached military staff of the External Action Service, is that it is wholly unnecessary and contrary to the intention of making Europe more secure, it is antagonistic.

And through antagonism, makes Europe less safe.

Back in 2013 the EU was trying to negotiate a free trade deal with Ukraine, DCFTA.
In Title II of that treaty, Ukraine was proposed to be included in the Common Security and Defence Policy.
https://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2016/november/tradoc_155103.pdf

Elected President Viktor Yanukovych refused to sign it.

Instead of defusing the situation and offering to renegotiate the terms and making the deal more palatable the EU supported those who rose up.

During the "Euromaidan" protests, various Neo Nazi groups were involved including Right Sector, Congress of Ukraininan Nationalists and UNA-UNSO.

They weren't just protesting, they were armed and using weapons.

The President was deposed.
The treaty was signed.
A conflict of interests was created, the Russians had a defence treaty with Ukraine and rights to keep the Black Sea fleet in Crimea.

As a result, a counter revolution took place in Crimea and Donetsk.

Both the EU and Russia are to blame for the violence as well as Nazis and pro Russian Ukrainians.

Just imagine how much worse things would have been if EU troops had been involved in fighting inside Ukraine.

Sometimes might is wrong and dialogue is right.

Militarisation of the EU represents a dangerous shift in external policy away from diplomacy.

 

[Airfix]

Ah the usual Brexiteer lies. That covers only 'goods' not services. Maybe you've heard of the tertiary sector?

You are mistaken as the following quote proves:

But the share of UK exports of goods and services going to the EU has fallen, from 54% in 2000 to 43% in 2016.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindu...ade/articles/whodoestheuktradewith/2017-02-21

The 43% of exports is the WHOLE of our exports to the EU.
Not just goods, goods plus services.

Later in that it is stated:

Almost half (48%) of UK goods exports went to the EU in 2016. UK goods exports to the EU were worth £145 billion in 2016, or 7.4% of GDP.

Meanwhile, 37% of UK service exports went to the EU in 2016, down from 40% in 2015. Financial services contributed more than a quarter of the UK’s services exports to the EU (£27 billion out of £90 billion).

 

[Lukraak_Sisser]

Come to think of it, there was a nice new EU law a few years back that prevented mobile phone carriers from ripping you off with massive roaming charges the moment you crossed a border.
Does anyone know if the UK sovereigned its way out of that too?

 

[Darat]

Come to think of it, there was a nice new EU law a few years back that prevented mobile phone carriers from ripping you off with massive roaming charges the moment you crossed a border.
Does anyone know if the UK sovereigned its way out of that too?

Yep - the mobile phone companies can again charge you if they wish.

And please don’t give me that “they won’t because of competitors”, those charges brought in tens and tens of millions of profit.

 

[catsmate]

I now have to fill out and attach a customs declaration form to anything I send to Europe.

A lot of the smaller things I sell through my web shop and ebay are just at the right price to attract duty.
I have had to put extra postage on for items going to the EU, they are the same as the 'rest of the world' now.

But now you're free from the evil, undemocratic EU bureaucracy.,....

 

[catsmate]

You know it's impossible to have an independent trade policy, don't you?

Brexiteers often display an ignorance of reality, in favour of their imperial delusions.

 

[Airfix]

So not being part of a supranational union is an Imperial delusion is it ?

Maybe if your side hadn't assumed it could just insult people, and started listening, we'd never have reached a point of needing a membership referendum in the first place.

But your side had to call anyone who wouldn't go along with the policies, ignorant or racist or Imperialistic.

Don't you understand why you keep losing ?

Don't you understand why the ERG are now in charge of the Tory party ?

Bullying does not win people over to your cause.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Bullying does not win people over to your cause.

No, telling huge lies and making promises you have no intention of keeping seems to be the way to go.

 

[Airfix]

Almost all politicians tell huge lies and make promises they've no intention of keeping.
Welcome to politics.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Anyone with a Blairite interventionist mindset.

Blair never seemed to care about the Charter of the United Nations or NATO obligations.



Look how Iraq went.

So you're saying a British prime minister who was bound by the obligations you say you would be reassured by, carried out the kind of act you fear. So... what's your point?

 

[Manger Douse]

Almost all politicians tell huge lies and make promises they've no intention of keeping.
Welcome to politics.

The self-aware wolfs are howling tonight

 

[Airfix]

So you're saying a British prime minister who was bound by the obligations you say you would be reassured by, carried out the kind of act you fear. So... what's your point?

Whilst we cannot kick out Commissioners as they aren't elected, we can kick out PMs and hold governments accountable.
Labour lost seats in 2005 and lost power in 2010.
They have been wondering what they did to deserve defeat ever since.
Just about every form of insult conceivable has been levelled at those who would not vote for them.

A few factors brought down Labour.
Extreme Europhilia with a perception that skeptics are "ignorant" "racist" "bigoted Europhobes".
War.
Extreme deficit spending.
Contempt for voters.

If Labour want to regain power, that must change and they must stop seeing Brexit as a bad thing.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/ukne...d-start-seeing-its-huge-potential/ar-BB1cngLQ

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Whilst we cannot kick out Commissioners as they aren't elected, we can kick out PMs and hold governments accountable.
Labour lost seats in 2005 and lost power in 2010.
They have been wondering what they did to deserve defeat ever since.
Just about every form of insult conceivable has been levelled at those who would not vote for them.

A few factors brought down Labour.
Extreme Europhilia with a perception that skeptics are "ignorant" "racist" "bigoted Europhobes".
War.
Extreme deficit spending.
Contempt for voters.

If Labour want to regain power, that must change and they must stop seeing Brexit as a bad thing.

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/ukne...d-start-seeing-its-huge-potential/ar-BB1cngLQ

Even if Brexit is a bad thing? Interesting insight into your viewpoint.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Brexit is a bad thing.

You still haven't managed to give me one thing that Brexit will do to improve your life or that is a benefit.

 

[Airfix]

All you've shown is that you're ideologically wed to the idea of being part of a large political union.

Smaller democracies are healthier.
Power is closer to the voter, policy changes are easier for voters to achieve.

I'm all for free trade and friendship with other countries and migrants are welcome but we don't need political union with other countries in order to achieve free trade, friendship and have immigration.

 

[Delphic Oracle]

The problem with the Common Security and Defence Policy and the attached military staff of the External Action Service, is that it is wholly unnecessary and contrary to the intention of making Europe more secure, it is antagonistic.



And through antagonism, makes Europe less safe.



Back in 2013 the EU was trying to negotiate a free trade deal with Ukraine, DCFTA.

In Title II of that treaty, Ukraine was proposed to be included in the Common Security and Defence Policy.

https://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2016/november/tradoc_155103.pdf



Elected President Viktor Yanukovych refused to sign it.



Instead of defusing the situation and offering to renegotiate the terms and making the deal more palatable the EU supported those who rose up.



During the "Euromaidan" protests, various Neo Nazi groups were involved including Right Sector, Congress of Ukraininan Nationalists and UNA-UNSO.



They weren't just protesting, they were armed and using weapons.



The President was deposed.

The treaty was signed.

A conflict of interests was created, the Russians had a defence treaty with Ukraine and rights to keep the Black Sea fleet in Crimea.



As a result, a counter revolution took place in Crimea and Donetsk.



Both the EU and Russia are to blame for the violence as well as Nazis and pro Russian Ukrainians.



Just imagine how much worse things would have been if EU troops had been involved in fighting inside Ukraine.



Sometimes might is wrong and dialogue is right.



Militarisation of the EU represents a dangerous shift in external policy away from diplomacy.

I'm sorry I asked...

 

[gypsyjackson]

There's all kind of flaws in the Common Agricultural Policy the worst of which have adverse effects on the environment.

CAP subsidies were based on the amount of land owned and required land to look agricultural.
Features such as ponds, wide hedges, woodland, reedbeds, and salt marshes were ineligible for subsidy.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/21/waste-cash-leavers-in-out-land-subsidie

Not quite. I was one of the UK negotiators on the CAP, though I confess my memory isn’t what it used to be!

In order to be eligible for the basic payment scheme, I think you had to leave 7% of your land in ecological focus areas. IIRC some of the things you describe could be used for EFAs, provided your country had good enough land mapping. Ponds, I think not, because why would you be eligible for a farming subsidy on a pond?

The move to land based subsidy instead of production based subsidy was UK policy. That was to get rid of butter mountains, wine lakes etc, which artificially kept prices high for consumers while still favouring large producers over small.

Farmers who owned less than 5 hectares were ineligible for subsidy.
https://assets.publishing.service.g...ile/367701/cap-reform-october-2014-update.pdf

Again, this was UK policy. The subsidy involved for very small farms could be more than the administrative cost of issuing the subsidy. It was actually up to member states to set the cutoff point. Malta chose 0.3 hectares, paying out 30 euros as a minimum payment, Austria chose 1.5 ha, Sweden 4 ha...

My comment, not UK policy, for thought - If you only have 5 hectares, are you really a farmer? If that was covered in wheat, you’d have grown on average about 40 tonnes of wheat a year (probably less, because that average is brought up by big farms, but for ease of figures...). That would have brought income - not profit - of £6000 a year assuming a very generous price of £150 per tonne. Tough to live on even with an extra grand in subsidy.

In Romania there's been a mass felling of trees in order to qualify for CAP subsidies. If we're going to criticise Brazil and it's destruction of rainforests, we need to criticise the EU and the destruction of forests that the CAP has caused.

Yeah, that’s not good. While in, the UK managed to get changes to CAP to make it more environmentally friendly. Now it will be Sweden leading the charge, with 27 fewer votes in Council to rely on.

We have an opportunity now to show them another way.

The new policy insists on environmentalism.
https://www.fwi.co.uk/news/farm-pol...oves-agriculture-bill-will-reshape-uk-farming

It's a big step forwards.

This was the sort of thing the UK was trying to do in the EU - moving payments from Pillar 1 (direct payments) to Pillar 2 (environmental payments), as well as reducing the overall percentage of EU money going to the CAP. We had some success, but progress was slow.

You might be interested to know the Agriculture Bill you referred to fell in 2019 due to the election, but a similar one passed 2 months ago, the Agriculture Act 2020. I haven’t read it, as I don’t do agriculture any more.

 

[Vixen]

Huh? And this?



This includes a call to action to people who can actually do something (Labour MPs) whereas you said such things don't happen in the UK press.

Link

That is not really a news item, it is an 'Opinion' piece.

Show me which of the press reported the following news which shows the public are not happy with the deal, which the mainstream media are 'hailing' as 'freedom to make our own laws'.

 

[Vixen]

Seriously, let's dissect this hard-hitting polemic that nobody has heard of in the UK:



Is this hard-hitting?


Is it news to anyone that David Cameron campaigned poorly or that the Tories had been riven with anti-EU sentiment? Is this the kind of thing that nobody but a Guardian reader would have known?



Is this something that nobody had heard about? Is it not common bloody knowledge?

.

I bet you never heard about that in the UK!



More secrets that only the Germans knew about, presumably! I wish they had told us this! I wish someone had let us in on these things!




Wow! Hard-hitting! Someone has pointed out that Boris de Pfeffel Bullingdon Club Classics at Oxford Etonian Johnson was some kind of posh bloke! Why has nobody told us this??? Why has it remained a secret? Was there a D notice?

Of course. Anyone who uses the term 'claque' must be an extreme member of the Spartacus League.

 

[Vixen]

Perhaps the UK should abandon FPTP and embrace representative democracy?

Don't be silly. That would take away the Conservative majorities in low population leafy areas.