I agree we'd be shunted down the pecking order, but I'd guess that 10 years down the road deals would all be done.
10 years of uncertainty for exporters doesn't sound like the kind of shot-in-the-arm that our economy needs. Whilst the non-EU deals may or may not be better, the one thing we can be sure of is that the EU deal, which currently covers 45% of our exports, will be no better an will almost certainly be worse.
The costs of a putative 10 year exercise to negotiate all our major trading agreements is also going to be considerable and will like as not involve two, if not three, changes of government whilst it's being carried out with all the attendant changes in priority and terms that will involve.
So an expensive 10 year exercise during which there will be considerable doubt and at the end of which we're not certain to end up with a better deal for 55% or our exports and we're highly likely to end up with a worse deal for 45% doesn't seem very good to me.
ISome deals would be worse, some would be better. It would probably average out to be more or less the same as we have now in the end. I think that there are lot of laudable things about the EU and that a post Brexit UK would keep in place a lot of those things anyway. e.g. standards for manufactured goods. It would take a lot of time and effort to retool to a different standard so for most things keeping the present ones makes sense. There are outliers that need addressing, but there aren't many of them.
If we want to continue to export to the EU (and why wouldn't we, they're the largest market in the world and our closest) then we will still need to manufacture goods to EU standards. The only difference is that we currently have influence over those standards, post-Brexit we won't.
U.K. manufacturing keeps telling us that they're having a hard time of it, lumping another set of costs on them will just make life harder.
All? How much risk?
Yes we'd export less stuff to the EU post Brexit. I doubt that we'd lose 50% of our GDP essentially overnight though.
From my perspective, my largest single client, a very large German software company, has stated very clearly that post-Brexit they will switch to an E.U. supplier. I guess that we could relocate the company to France or Germany but I, and I suspect most if not all of my employees, want to keep living in the UK.
This is one of the bits that I don't really understand. We're going to significantly reduce out exports to our single largest trading partner but this is somehow a good thing. I still have to be convinced that the deal that Britain, as a middle-ranking economy, could cut with China would be so much better than the one the EU, as the largest economy in the world, has.
Our dealings so far seem to be very one-sided with China doing very well out of any trade negotiations.
Big companies are going to do whatever they have to do to maximise their returns to their shareholders. If some of them move elsewhere that opens up gaps in the market here for smaller companies to exploit.
The only thing I read from the Remain supporters is "It'll wreck the economy" my argument is that it'll hurt the economy for a while but in the longer term having more control over our own affairs will benefit the economy in the long run. A smaller company can move faster in response to changing market conditions. The same should be true of a smaller country.
It can but on the other hand there lots of industries that rely on economy of scale and which have large initial investments. The car industry is an excellent example of one which is likely to experience a large contraction post-Brexit. Toyota, Nissan, Honda and so on have stated very clearly that post-Brexit they will move new models to their EU plants.
There really is no such thing as a "startup" volume car manufacturer.
I'm also not clear which or "our own affairs" would benefit from Brexit. Are we suggesting that we would steal a march on our EU competitors by manufacturing lower quality goods, providing a more dangerous workplace, removing employee protections or allowing companies to pollute more ?
We don't need to renegotiate "sweet deals" - we need to negotiate deals that are "good enough" It'd be easy for example to implement an online visa system to allow the free movement of most people between the EU/UK. If you pass a CRB check or equivalent and pay the nominal fee, you're good. Cause any trouble while you're here and it's easy too for the authorities to revoke your visa. Voila we allow 'free movement of people in principle' and that should satisfy that checkbox on EU trading partners checklists.
This is typical of Brexit thinking. Constructing a unilateral fantasy where the EU meekly agrees to all the UK's demands, where complicated systems are immediately and perfectly put into place and where there are no consequential costs associated with your plans.
For me this is about control. We take back full control over our laws, we are free to implement the good EU ideas/regulations/standards. Which is most of them. We can ignore the bad ones.
There are some really bad EU directives, and once bad laws are on the books they're much harder to change than bad UK laws would be.
....except that it would seem that we wouldn't take back control of our laws as long as we want to continue to do business with the EU, remain part of the council of Europe or a variety of other things.
), Jeremy Corbyn's historic and well publicised opposition to the EU was due to the fact that he felt that the EU was too corporatist and did not provide sufficient protection for workers. I can understand why Jeremy Corbyn has revised his position, a post-Brexit UK would be far worse for workers than a UK in the EU.
