Agree on that - their privatisation enthusiasm is very misguided imho. Some decent individuals amongst them, but as with most things, good and bad ideas in there. If only we had a grown up political system that allowed us to pick & choose the good bits rather than slavish following of a particular dogma.
In EFTA you can. Norway do - one of the big fallacies of the whole referendum was that no-one has influence if outside the SM .
Surprisingly the EU has trading deals with pretty much eve The eu has 'free trade' deals that cover 38 non eu countries. So we currently, as members if the eu, have a free trade deal with 38 other countries as well as those within the eu. The eu also trades with countries outside of this ( so we do too) but on less favourable terms. So we do, as members of the eu trade all over the world.
Ok then. We can only trade with the EU and the countries they say we can outside if it. Still restrictive isn't it?
It is restrictive in the sense we are tied to the union and therefore the trade deals It isn't half bad though is it? A tiny island but the 6th wealthiest nation on the face of the earth, we are already punching well above our weight.
I'm not saying it isn't bad. But as a country if we want to trade with for example Mexico. (Not sure if they are in the EU agreed list or not or if it is worth it) if we can't because it has to be via the EU first and they reject it we restrict ourselves. Granted we would have to now setup all the new trade deals but be free to do our own terms. Either way we should be masters of our own destiny and not what brussells say. The EU has done us a lot of good. But for balance we can't do things we might want to (good and bad) Everyone can put arguments on both sides and have done quite effectively. But we should be a nation that determines our own rules. By our own democratic processes (granted they ate not always brilliant) but we can vote out a party and not necessarily a Brussels imposed one. Swings and roundabouts and all that
We can trade with anyone, just there are some tariffs to trade with some countries. Exactly the same as Germany, who can trade with the rest of the world a lot better than we can. Even though they are bound by the same restrictive rules that stop us from trading... And the French, who must also be much better than us... and the Italians, etc, etc. So either the Germans are fantastic salesmen, or the UK are crap salesmen - and if we are crap, then no amount of trade deals will fix the problem. Which, given that trade deals will take upwards of 5 years to complete will probably kill off most of our remaining industry that isn't beaten by the flood of zero-tariff imports from the far East if they government go down that route. In April 2019, less than 10 countries in the world will not be part of a larger trading bloc. With the exception of China, who are large enough to take on anyone by themselves, the others are great trading nations, like North Korea, Mongolia, Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria.... See a pattern here?
The ironic thing is that companies have been leaving the Uk to mainland Eu and nominated countries for a number of years, Ford, Caburys, nestle, Land Rover from the top of my head causing the loss of 1000s of jobs in the Uk. 300 last week in Wales due to a trailer bar company ******* off to Romania. Can't remember any uproar over them.. Anyway in answer to your question. Yes. Political self determination should always be be at the forefront of the Uks ambitions not forelock tugging to the federal state of Europe which is what Brussells ultimate goal is. The problem is the Eu have no intention of negotiating as they risk losing the cash cow and there's too many people in the UK who want to get on the golden teat to do a proper job of getting the Uk out.
http://www.politico.eu/article/eu-india-trade-germany-pushes-for-post-brexit-deal/ It’s us that stop a lot of trade deals. Whatever your views on the EU trade would be the last reason to leave. We will do much worse out of it. Unless of course we open or borders to say the Indians or sell off the NHS to Americans.
Im sure an english rather than brit flag would be best suited on it..(?) I think we all knew why folk voted out the eu. Made no difference as the Tories.. UKIP ..libdemz and Labour etc are all for immigration.. politically UK apart from scotland and ireland is still on a Rightward turn... dread to see where it goes..
I think much of the right wing campaigning was the classic tory view of wanting to be in control of whatever terrible decisions they make, and the odd british trait of not being dictated to.... even if its a good idea and the best route forward. We're very good at walking around noseless with spiteful faces, just to be proud of saying we made the decision. However shocking it is. I think some of what he touches on may be over egged, but others not. If brexit happens to coincide with a spike in interest rates and high unemployment, we're in for something we've never faced before, and it won't be remotely pretty at all. The report the other day about lack of productivity shows the true weakness of our economy and how the figures of employment aren't a true measure at all. We're losing jobs already in preparation, I've heard of several mergers afoot (which always follows with job losses) and Frankfurt, Dublin, Riga, Paris and Luxembourg are making big moves to attract bigger companies from here and shift HQ. If we exit Europe completely, there is going to be some very bad feeling and that's going to hurt us even more and for future generations to rebuild trade, cooperation and collaboration. But hey, if the tories are briefly in charge of a burning pyre, i'm sure they'll love that! Then a bit of boosted spending with no trade ability under Labour, then .... IMF bailout maybe?
We do the majority of our trade within europe. Notwithstanding free trade it costs much less logistically to transfer goods within europe, simply through geograp How do you, or we know that though? If we weren't part of it we could have slipped well down the table, or we could have remained in the top 10 without. Pure supposition either way. The fact remains though that we are up there so one cannot truly argue that being a member of the eu has diminished our earning capacity.
I find that fascinating as someone who has believed in many causes over the years that you are so wedded to a cause you literally don't care if it financially cripples the country and our people become impoverished. I take my hat off to you it's at the point of human suffering that I usually withdraw. I guess it's an almost religious belief is that fair to say?
Don't know who he is but he talks carp. Scares the sh*t out of everybody then says it'll be alright. Git.
You pay for access and input into the regulations thereof. The judgement call is whether or not the benefits of SM access are value for what is paid, as opposed to the consequences of not having unfettered access to the SM. Or internal market in reality.