Brexit Thread V - The Final Countdown?!?

[Silurian]

I'm must be much more tired than I thought, as the answer is clearly closer to 8 than 3 and yet I didn't catch that when making the post.

However, given that that number also includes those who were stopped in France, I can only assume that either our entire border defence teams are grossly incompetent or Sajid Javid is specifically manufacturing a fake crisis for political benefit.

I also liked how Sajid Javid was complaining that the refugees did not claim asylum in France because that is the rule. But he did not mention that that is an EU rule, Dublin regulation, which will no longer apply on 30/03/2019.

Wasn't it more like 6,000 BC?

My town has been occupied on and off for nearly forty thousand years. No records exist of their views on leaving Europe in 6,000 BC!

Meanwhile in Ramsgate a new pizza delivery place is set to open.

From Guardian

First, it emerged that the “startup” company hired to operate extra ferries as part of no-deal Brexit planning had no ships.

Now, new questions are being asked about the readiness of Seaborne Freight to handle the £13.8m contract after it turned out that terms and conditions on its website appeared to be intended for a food delivery firm.

“It is the responsibility of the customer to thoroughly check the supplied goods before agreeing to pay for any meal/order,” read part of the text on the company’s website.

https://www.theguardian.com/politic...-firm-appears-all-geared-up-to-deliver-pizzas

 

[innonimatu]

Currently I'm more curious about what Ireland is doing to deal with a hard brexit. Have they woken up to the fact that their backstop ploy is likely to backfire? Because if it does then Ireland is going to have a big problem in its hands: the EU demanding that it seal the border or else. An open border is a problem from the EU's perspective. Ireland's concerns will then receive as much consideration as Greece's...

To be fair, I don't believe that the terms of the backstop were set by Ireland. But if a hard brexit happens because of it, I'll be presented by the EU as "Ireland demanded it and we went along, now they must do their part". Getting the irish border closed in the event of a hard brexit without taking responsibility for it was a goal for many people in Brussels, and Ireland's government walked right into it.

 

[really]

It's a bit late so I will give the official Irish response sometime tomorrow later in the morning.

 

[Arakhor]

A goal for many people, eh? Do you have any citation for that, Innonimatu?

 

[Takhisis]

On the Irish shituation, the UK is going for a tried-and-tested tactic, preparing to deploy 1,000 specially-trained police officers from England and Scotland, the Guarniad claims.

Have they woken up to the fact that their backstop ploy is likely to backfire?

Also, a) why is it ‘a ploy’? and b) why is it ‘likely to backfire’?

Meanwhile, No-deal Brexit would severaly disrupt UK farming, says Gove

 

[Takhisis]

It's a bit late so I will give the official Irish response sometime tomorrow later in the morning.

Irish PM says he has escalated no-deal Brexit preparations

 

[Kyriakos]

No deal is better than any deal re having an interesting show. So the tall and tans are to return?

 

[Hrothbern]

The agility of May and Corbyn doing their splits is exceptional:
Both trying to stay in one piece with the overwhelming majority of their party members wanting the exact opposite on Brexit as their party leaders !

Corbyn avoiding to say that Labour favors Remain while 88% of his party members want to vote for Remain in a seconf referendum.
May trying to force her deal through Parliament while 64% of her party members want a cliff edge no-deal and 29% support her deal..
When the choice for Conservative members would be between no-deal and Remain, 76% would choose no-deal

https://www.theguardian.com/politic...believe-corbyn-should-back-second-brexit-vote
https://www.theguardian.com/politic...ers-would-choose-no-deal-over-may-brexit-plan

 

[Kyriakos]

If only the eu could illegally lock atms in britain; sadly it is missing its best 'diplomacy'.

 

[Silurian]

If only the eu could illegally lock atms in britain; sadly it is missing its best 'diplomacy'.

Unlike Greece the UK does not have the Euro, so we will not be following the Greek government in imposing bank withdrawal limits on Euro's. We will not be leaving the Euro so people fearing Brexit will not be able to stock pile Euro's, as the Greek government feared.

 

[Kyriakos]

Unlike Greece the UK does not have the Euro, so we will not be following the Greek government in imposing bank withdrawal limits on Euro's. We will not be leaving the Euro so people fearing Brexit will not be able to stock pile Euro's, as the Greek government feared.

If all else fails, there is always ireland for the eu to bully. For the irish i sincerely hope it wont get to that. But they should be under no illusion that it will happen if 2 countries interests are at risk.
After all that is what eu means in sanskritic: "two countries"

 

[really]

The Irish government hasn't really made it clear what it intends to do at the border in the event of no deal. I imagine they don't want to give ammunition to one side or the other in the UK.

They have recruited extra customs and vetinary officers and the month of March has been allocated to enacting emergency legislation.

I imagine if push comes to shove we will impose a border of sorts, checking some goods and all food and animals to protect our place in the EU and our food brand.

Our customs officials were always more present and diligent at the border than their UK counterparts from what I gather - a combination of us needing the money and the customs agents not being as afraid for their lives. Northern nationalists won't like this.

Domestically our politicians have been united in 'the national interest' so far - I imagine this will continue but a border might be a stick to beat the government with.

Our economy is going well and the state returned a budget surplus last year for the first time since 2006, employment is up and the Industrial Development Authority had a very good year increasing employment from multinationals partially directly from Brexit.

Farmers and small businesses haven't a clue what is going to happen. Multinationals aren't bothered. The UK is still very important as an export market but thanks to sterling and Brexit it's importance has been falling.

A hard Brexit will be painful for us especially in employment intensive areas like agriculture and food but no government will give the UK a trade deal that includes a hard border on this island.
There are a few of the usual malcontents and people who only consume British media grumbling about the EU but I imagine the vast majority recognise that it is the UK that is putting us in this position.

I don't think those outside of this country realise how emotive this is to us: the UK leaving hurts us and reminds us of the bad days when London made all the decisions. The fact that we are digging our heels in shouldn't be surprising to anyone familiar with our history. We are not being played by the EU.
Some in the UK have tried to play us and have failed miserably in the face of national unity and a greater understanding of history.

 

[EnglishEdward]

The agility of May and Corbyn doing their splits is exceptional:
Both trying to stay in one piece with the overwhelming majority of their party members wanting the exact opposite on Brexit as their party leaders !

Yes; it is really quite bizarre.

However Jeremy Corbyn is quite right to do little when there is such a difference between what the Labour party members want now,
what Labour voters wanted or want now and what the country voted for at the last UK referendum and the last UK general election.

Irish PM says he has escalated no-deal Brexit preparations

From that article:

The Irish agriculture minister, Michael Creed .......... said Ireland’s demand for aid from Brussels in the event of no deal would be substantial. “You’re
looking at hundreds of millions,” he told the Irish Independent. “Between the beef industry and the fishing industry we’re talking mega-money.”

EU law allows emergency aid for farmers affected by sudden market shocks; the EU released more than €1bn to help farmers cope with Russia’s
2014 ban on imports of EU produce. But officials said they would only respond to a formal request from the Irish government, if the UK left without a deal.

As the UK has no plans to ban food from Eire, I think they may need a tall story to get that dosh.

but no government will give the UK a trade deal that includes a hard border on this island.

Doesn't bother me, the UK hasn't asked for that.

 

[Arakhor]

You've been screaming about Project Fear for two years now, Edward, but you're apparently backing Project Ignorance, right? It's perfectly in line with the Govt, of course, so it's hardly unprecedented, but still...

 

[Hrothbern]

From that article:
The Irish agriculture minister, Michael Creed .......... said Ireland’s demand for aid from Brussels in the event of no deal would be substantial. “You’re
looking at hundreds of millions,” he told the Irish Independent. “Between the beef industry and the fishing industry we’re talking mega-money.”

EU law allows emergency aid for farmers affected by sudden market shocks; the EU released more than €1bn to help farmers cope with Russia’s
2014 ban on imports of EU produce. But officials said they would only respond to a formal request from the Irish government, if the UK left without a deal.

As the UK has no plans to ban food from Eire, I think they may need a tall story to get that dosh.

When that no-deal happens we will soon see quite some big shuffle of all kinds of non-essentials.
For example crossborder cheddar cheese going in two directions replaced by UK cheddar to UK retail and Irish cheddar going to Irish retail, with the Irish excess going to EU and else.
A re-wiring of many logistical streams decreasing the consumer's choice in the retail. The retail very busy doing that early transformation part with re-wiring.
What is left after that first stage (1 year or so ?) will be mainly the semi-essential and essential goods and services. Some non-essentials becoming more of a luxury product.
This will also reduce somewhat the transactional customs bottlenecks.

Which all will not prevent a big mess at household level.
The real disruptions will be of another nature needing timely real plans and coherent strategies. Quite a bit more solid than the current pipedream visions aimed at the public in case of a second referendum.
It needs to be based on a reality analysis what economical elements, building blocks, the UK is going to miss when not connected anymore to the EU fabric...
And (lol) the more that analysis, because of "political correctness", will skew away from reality... the worse those real plans and strategies will be.

Back to the imminent mess:
When I look at the no-deal support from our Dutch government to our (especially) small companies:
It consists ofc out of transactional info and aid money, and more importantly also out of govt aid money and other flanking actions towards these companies for finding new customers. The mechanisms were developed with the Russia sanctions needing lots of vegetables export re-wiring.
Will be interesting to see how and how fast we, especially all those relatively small companies, will adapt.

Perhaps I should add here that the Dutch government made sure to have a detailed analysis on a Brexit already before June 2016, up to our economical sectors (Germany IFO BTW in 2015).
And considering that the attitude of our government has been from the very start on Brexit that (while respecting ofc that sovereign choice) leaving the EU would be brain-dead stupid. We did not bother that much to influence the kind of Brexit, but focussed more (as usual as small country) to adapt to the changing environment from damage control to new opportunities. The RABO bank report (that 18% long term damage for the UK mainly from missed innovation wealth increases) was also to highlight how important R&D, innovation, and the subsequent industrialisation & marketing is for our country's economy growth. With a nearby UK disconnected for proximity synergies, this got extra attention the last years. (If you look into the EU funded projects you can see that we allocate 40% of that EU funding to innovation, against for example the UK 20%, or 5-10% in South & East EU countries).
It is not that I want to do grandstanding here (as too small country anyway for that), but if the UK is to develop after the knowledge disconnect, it really needs massive and coherent planning and strategies. And my guess for now is that for the interim 9 months bare bone WTO relation after the no-deal, the Parliament and the newsmedia will be fully absorbed by getting a long term WTO deal with the EU (in time !!!), The quick fix temporary FTA's with the US and others and all the blaming of the mess ad hominem to politicians, with lots of infighting being worthy of Shakespeare.

The problem is not the immediate mess... the real problem is that you have no real coherent plan for a stand-alone UK.
With a 2-4 year transition period you stand at least a chance to develop in time such a plan.
A no-deal cliff edge is really a brain-dead way forward.

 

[Silurian]

From that article:

The Irish agriculture minister, Michael Creed .......... said Ireland’s demand for aid from Brussels in the event of no deal would be substantial. “You’re
looking at hundreds of millions,” he told the Irish Independent. “Between the beef industry and the fishing industry we’re talking mega-money.”

EU law allows emergency aid for farmers affected by sudden market shocks; the EU released more than €1bn to help farmers cope with Russia’s
2014 ban on imports of EU produce. But officials said they would only respond to a formal request from the Irish government, if the UK left without a deal.

As the UK has no plans to ban food from Eire, I think they may need a tall story to get that dosh.

Ireland has about 4.9bn Euro of agricultural exports to the UK, about 38%.
It exports about 32% to the rest of the EU.

https://www.teagasc.ie/rural-economy/rural-economy/agri-food-business/agriculture-in-ireland/
https://www.bordbia.ie/industry/buyers/industryinfo/agri/pages/default.aspx

If there is no deal the UK will be putting tariffs on Irish food imports plus there will be increased administrative costs at the border and ports. So the cost of Irish farm products will increase.

Under WTO rules the UK will have to apply the same tariffs on all imports (but different rates for different goods).
The UK could chose to have zero tariffs on food but that would apply to food from Ireland, the rest of the EU and Timbuktu.
(I have no idea what are the EU tariffs from Mali)

The EU will not want to have zero tariffs on food from Timbuktu so it will be forced to apply tariffs on food exports from the UK.

So less UK food will be exported increasing domestic supply and reducing the price that UK farmers can get from UK supermarkets.

So Irish food will lose market share in the UK because it costs more than UK produced food.
Even if the UK decided to allow tariff free imports Ireland would loses market share because of the reduction on UK exports increasing domestic supply.

The Irish exports to the rest of the EU are likely to cost more due to increased administration costs moving out of the EU through the UK and back into the EU. There most likely will be increased traffic on the direct ferry route to France.

 

[Kyriakos]

The pizza ferry is a bonus which imo alone dwarves any negatives from no deal brexit.

 

[Silurian]

The government has hired 150 lorries and is going get them to drive from its planned holding area at Manstead airfield near Ramsgate to Dover. They want to find how long it will talk them to get there.

@Kyriakos
I do not know if they will be carrying pizza.

 

[Hrothbern]

The government has hired 150 lorries and is going get them to drive from its planned holding area at Manstead airfield near Ramsgate to Dover. They want to find how long it will talk them to get there.

@Kyriakos
I do not know if they will be carrying pizza.

Good timing to do that now.
May is indeed making quite a show out of her "no-deal" preparations.
Next week a propaganda offensive information campaign on how households have to prepair for Brexit. Just in time before the Commons vote on her deal on Jan 14..
Though she still needs some more ammo from the GBP and the London Stock Exchange going down just before Jan 14.
Perhaps she saves that ammo for her second vote on her deal, when GBP and stocks go down after the first vote fails.
What more does she has in mind ?

 

[EnglishEdward]

May is indeed making quite a show out of her "no-deal" preparations.

The impresson I get is that Theresa May is not doing anything in the way of making no-deal preparations.

I think that some of her ministers are getting jittery and realise that the risk of taking
the blame for lack of preparedness is less than the risk of being sacked by her.