EU referendum - Brexit

[smilodon]

Me thinks Mr. Freak missed a :norty: off of that post



There's actually a petition with 67,000 votes and counting for The London Mayor to claim independence from the UK for London, become a City State and rejoin the EU again. It's a thought.

https://www.change.org/p/sadiq-khan-declare-london-independent-from-the-uk-and-apply-to-join-the-eu

[Chaosphere]

Australia is a wonderful place you know.

[Gone_Away]

Don't patronise me - I do my own research, and his past behaviour whilst working in journalism is well known and easily checked from multiple sources.

lol.. the article that he wrote about Guppy? The sensationalism he wrote about Brussels? Do you honestly believe that every politician elected to office is pure as the driven snow? What about all the lies spun by the remain campaign? My favourite is the one about the UK being plunged into recession if we exit and the government response would be to raise taxes and stop spending... Take off your rose tinted glasses. There's nothing wrong with being a skilled politician and aiming for the "top job". Is there?

Which bothers you most?  The exit, the prospect the Johnson will become PM or that Cameron has realised his failure is now absolute and has run for cover?

I gave you more credit than that.

[Blunt]

[video=youtube;iDJWkS2A9T0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDJWkS2A9T0[/video]

[smilodon]

Disclosure, I have no real strong opinion either way about being in or out of the EU. I was able to make an informed decision about staying in as we have 40 years of history of being in the EU. I don't much care for the EU in it's current form, it's a broken system that at the very least needs a massive overhaul and a total rethink.

 I had no idea what being out would be like and to be honest none of the leave campaigners were able to give me a straight answer. I'm a little scared by what the future holds and a bit excited about what opportunities we might make for ourselves. But on the day I erred on the side of caution and voted to stay.... but only just.

What I would be really interested in is to ask anyone who voted leave and who was certain about their position.... what happens now?

What do you think will happen to immigration? Up or down? What happens to the EU citizens who work and own businesses in the UK, whose kids go to school here? What will happen to them?

What about our trading relationship with Europe? What sort of deal will we strike. Will the EU be kind to us in the hope that the EU itself will remain stable or will they butcher us to show other countries that might consider a referendum what the terribly consequences are for anyone who chooses to turn their back on Europe?

Who will it hurt? Who will we trade with now the 50% of our export market is behind trade barriers?

How many of the EU rules that we already have to abide by will we still be willing keep in order to retain access to the EU markets?

Will like Norway and Switzerland, we have to agree to still allow free movement of EU Citizens across our borders?

How will leaving the EU protect us from terrorism as most terrorists acts in the UK attempted and successful were carried out be UK citizens?

It's seems that most economists are saying there will be some short to medium term pain for us now. Some say we'll never recover and become a major world power again. How much pain are you expecting? Will there be another recession for us? Who will it hit? Who will it hurt?

Who will we trade with now the 50% of our export market is behind trade barriers?

How much are we actually now at the mercy of the Central Banks of the world and the major markets? Are we basically at the mercy of their reactions to this rather than in control of our own destiny?

Was the leave vote fuelled by a serious desire to change the way the UK works or was it a xenophobic reaction to us not liking Johnny Foreigner and his meddling in our affairs?


Personally I have no idea at all about any of these. But clearly people who were serious supporters of the leave campaign much have some idea what they were voting for? I genuinely would be interested to hear?

[Tutonic]

There were lots of issues to consider, but if you want one solid reason I voted to Remain and am seriously concerned about what's happened this is a good one....

My job involves working with, amongst other public & private clients, the intelligence services. Every single analyst I've spoken to, every single one, has said that leaving the EU will significantly compromise our security. These aren't politicians, they have nothing to gain from this. These are front line intelligence analysts who work extremely hard to try and keep us all safe.

In my opinion, it was foolish in the extreme not to listen to them.

[albert]

I believe if a country is to nurture an innovative trade and service economy it will attract customers naturally through quality  for the export of these. So being in the EU does simplify tariffs but if you have nothing for sale that anyone wants to buy you become obsolete. We cannot negotiate trade deals for Britian that are already in place with the EU. Now we can do this for ourselves to benefit our businesses and not general half useful EU blanket agreements. The UK has a good record of workers rights even with the Thatcher years blighting things, we're still fairer and more flexible in equal measures than most countries. That will not change.
We can check our own governments spending and view their decision making live and on the Internet. No European decision is open for the population to witness. It's all done behind closed doors sometimes without MEPs that are elected being involved.
I am not even remotely worried and I have a home in Europe and most of my savings in Euros, but will come back home in a few years.

These are the reasons I voted leave.

Sent from my LG-H962 using Tapatalk

[Tutonic]

Fair enough Albert - a well reasoned argument.





Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

[Gorion]

Regarding export market barriers. The UK can negotiate with each country and come to an agreement.

Doesn't need the EU to do that as far as I'm aware. Takes some time to sort out, but there shouldn't be anything stopping you..

[albert]

The EU should not be given credit for commerce that is actually down to the the Internet age. It just so happens that what is making is easier for European companies to trade across border is basically a good product or service and Internet presence with secure payments. We do this with Asia or the US perfectly well without being in their trade zone.

For example, it is possible for an Asian company to sell Asian products (of which the British buy more than any other regions goods), phone variants and computers into Europe without the customer incurring customs tax by the company having warehousing in country. I used http://www.eglobalcentral.eu/ recently to buy my LG V10 phone, a Taiwan variant with minimal bloatware and double the memory of the UK and NL version. â,¬430. These guys are a Hong Kong registered company who have a warehousing agreement in the UK and Holland and they self support repairs via a UK company and honor warranties themselves like UK shops do. My phone was sent from Amsterdam, 3 days delivery, same price as in Asia, no customs tax and better spec than Europe. Good communications, ok like all sites they have some complaints but I was personally contacted every step of the way by a person not an automated email system. The EU didn't enable this. In fact the rate the EU negotiate trade agreements it would take 5 years to get something in place to cover this. Warehouse rules I believe are local to the country so Dutch  and British rules enabled this.

Take away the Internet would you mail order German or French goods via a catalog? Doubtful, so technically the ease of doing business isn't really improved by the EU to the largest extent, it's the Internet that achieves this.

[gromit83]

The EU should not be given credit for commerce that is actually down to the the Internet age.

Let me just burst that bubble for you. Nobody pays no VAT whatsoever. It is paid in one way or another. Physical products you buy from the internet has to be shipped from somewhere. As you stated the phone was sent from Amsterdam. Since the UK at the moment is in the EU and this is regarded as the inner market. The VAT you paid for the phone where most likely paid to the Netherlands. Aka no customs and tariffs for you in the UK. This is how the inner market of the EU works in a nutshell. (There are some exceptions like car taxes etc).

Now since you voted to leave you will most likely end up with some sort of EEA agreement like Norway. That means you will have to pay importfees for everything coming in from abroad. Even if you paid VAT in the sender country. All packages sent to Norway with a value above 350 NOK included shipping costs ends up getting a 110 NOK Importfee and 25 % VAT on the value and shipping.

Also the EEA agreement means paying a lot of money to get access to the inner market without restrictions for most goods(amount, not tolls necessary. Agriculture and fishing exempt) without having anything to say about it. We are a defacto EU country with none of the really good bits like access to the inner market for citizens. We have ratified more EU rules than most EU countries. Even Germany.

Norway will pay 391,45 million Euros per year between 2014-2021 just for having access to the EUs markets.Thats 77 euros per citizen per year.

Lets to the math for the UK. 61,1 million peoples aka 77 euros per citizen equals 4,87 billion euros per year to just to have access and not the other goods like being a part of the inner market or actually being able to sit at the table and discuss the use of those funds. The net contribution by the UK is 8.5 billion euros. You can also subtract 1.4 billion euros of that sum in research grants given to private companies in the UK from the EU. So the real figure is 7,4 billion euros.

So lets have a discussion on what those 7,4 billion euros are used for. They make it possible for students across Europe to attend universities. The Erasmus agreement. They go to invest in infrastructure in the poorer developed EU nations to bring them up to speed. etc etc.

The whole idea about the EU is to make every member state just as good. This requires the more wealthy nations to contribute to the poorer to get them up and running. This is not a new thing. Where would we have been after WW2 if not for the US funded Marshall aid?

The whole Leave campaign statistics was deceitful and Rupert Murdochs newspapers flat out lying was painful to watch. Hell. Nigel Farage said that the NHS promise is not valid anymore. So the EU is not perfect, but in my opinion the other option is worse. Europe has prospered with the EU. We will not prosper as a continent if we go back to the isolationist state before WW1.

[albert]

Let me just burst that bubble for you. Nobody pays no VAT whatsoever. It is paid in one way or another. Physical products you buy from the internet has to be shipped from somewhere. As you stated the phone was sent from Amsterdam. Since the UK at the moment is in the EU and this is regarded as the inner market. The VAT you paid for the phone where most likely paid to the Netherlands. Aka no customs and tariffs for you in the UK. This is how the inner market of the EU works in a nutshell. (There are some exceptions like car taxes etc).

I think you missed my point, of course VAT was paid, someone has to cover that. What I was saying is that it was inclusive in the price, not charged at entry to the country as it would be if shipped from Hong Kong. ;-) I know how VAT works.

If you feel Norway should go all in and increase their bill to 7.4 Billion Euros then start a Join campaign! Certainly will make beer cheaper out there ;-).

I still don't feel this will hurt the UK, after all we get more paying Chinese Students in the UK that Europeans getting cheap education. I think both sides lied and failed to cite a source of their information so many times it was criminal. The rule applies, the remain campaign tried to scare people and that back fired.