** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

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roubaixtuesday
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by roubaixtuesday »

On AstraZeneca, the company I work for:

“If a transition deal does not make clear what will happen in the future, we will maintain our decision not to invest,” Leif Johansson told France’s Le Monde newspaper.

“A Brexit agreement will need to ensure that Britain does not become an isolated island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean,” he added.


https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-brita ... KKCN1MP1Q9

We currently employ 6,500 UK staff and export goods worth £4.7 billion.

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/c ... 82/382.pdf
pete75
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by pete75 »

meic wrote:
Wonder why the Brexit supporters who are always banging on about democracy are strangely quiet about a party with just 10 MPs having so much say on how the country is run.


I wonder why anybody is actually making it into an issue.
That is the way our representative "democracy" works. Just as it would be if Labour and SNP went into alliance and Plaid Cymru was extracting a pound of flesh while holding swaying votes.

The 10 MPs have no bigger votes than anybody else, if the 600 hundred odd other MPs were to act with one mind then the DUP would be totally insignificant.
It isnt 10 MPs deciding how the country is run, it is 10 MPs agreeing with another 300 or so on an agreed way forward supported (begrudgingly) by over 300 MPs.

As everybody knows. Left, right, Brexit, remain.


The 10 MPs are very significant because the PM needs them to prop up her administration. It's more like 300 MPs agreeing with 10 who will not accept a sensible way of solving the problem of the Irish border. That seems to have been a major sticking point causing the negotiations to fail time and again.
'Give me my bike, a bit of sunshine - and a stop-off for a lunchtime pint - and I'm a happy man.' - Reg Baker
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661-Pete
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by 661-Pete »

Look at the political make-up in Israel and you will see how an extremist minority in coalition can hold the apparently democratically-elected main parties to ransom...
Suppose that this room is a lift. The support breaks and down we go with ever-increasing velocity.
Let us pass the time by performing physical experiments...
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Psamathe
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by Psamathe »

I've gradually beginning to think the supporters of brexit are just pushing and pushing for as hard a Brexit as they can get. Given a little and they'll push for even further. e.g. Walk out on the EU at lunchtime and they'll be threatening to topple May unless she walks out on then before breakfast.

Interesting quote from Farange
Speaking on BBC Question Time in Lincoln, 17 January 2013 wrote:"Wouldn't it be terrible if we were like Norway and Switzerland?" Really? They're rich. They're happy. They're self governing.

Yet for him now Norway is a diabolical solution.

Ian
Psamathe
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by Psamathe »

I see it reported today that the supporters of brexit/ERG are trying to block a completely unrelated bit of legislation as a "show of strength". New law before Parliament to ban .50-calibre weapons due to terrorist risk and ERG is trying to block it through amendments just to show May of their strength.

Has this now got out of hand? I appreciate you always get a few MPs who play silly-buggers but it normally with private members bills not with mainstream legislation where that have no objection to the actual legislation but are just disrupting/blocking as a posturing exercise.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/oct/19/tory-rightwingers-seek-to-embarrass-may-over-high-powered-rifles-ban wrote:Tory rightwingers seek to embarrass May over high-powered rifles ban
ERG members aim to stymie .50-calibre weapons ban to show strength before vote on Brexit deal
...
Hard Brexit Tories will use a Commons vote to try and overturn Home Office plans to ban high-powered military-grade rifles in a show of political defiance aimed at Theresa May.
...
Members of the hard-Brexit ERG have been looking for a chance to show Theresa May they are unhappy with her Brexit strategy, and the bill is the first available opportunity.

Their aim is to warn the prime minister they have the numbers to vote down any Brexit deal based on Chequers. If more than 15 Tory MPs are prepared to vote alongside Labour, the SNP and other opposition parties, May’s deal would almost certainly be voted down.


Ian
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mjr
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by mjr »

Psamathe wrote:I see it reported today that the supporters of brexit/ERG are trying to block a completely unrelated bit of legislation as a "show of strength". New law before Parliament to ban .50-calibre weapons due to terrorist risk and ERG is trying to block it through amendments just to show May of their strength.

Has this now got out of hand? [...]

I'm not sure. On the one hand, I think we always knew that ERG would put their desire for a hard Brexit above national security in all senses, not only economic security; on the other, it's surprising that they're actually doing this with a terrorism law first, which seems completely despicable. Maybe the ERG have NRA-style pro-gun-ownership sympathies too?
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PDQ Mobile
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by PDQ Mobile »

Psamathe wrote:I've gradually beginning to think the supporters of brexit are just pushing and pushing for as hard a Brexit as they can get. Given a little and they'll push for even further. e.g. Walk out on the EU at lunchtime and they'll be threatening to topple May unless she walks out on then before breakfast.

Interesting quote from Farange
Speaking on BBC Question Time in Lincoln, 17 January 2013 wrote:"Wouldn't it be terrible if we were like Norway and Switzerland?" Really? They're rich. They're happy. They're self governing.

Yet for him now Norway is a diabolical solution.

Ian


Both in the Schengen free movement area.
And EEA.

Some people are rich in both.
But there is a deal of near poverty too especially amongst some older people. Inflation has eaten what they had.

Switzerland has 40 years of reciprocal agreements and negotiations with the EU.
It's wealth depends very much upon such agreements.

Happiness is of course a subjective thing, but for many years Switzerland had one of the highest European suicide rates.

So I would say Farage is talking uninformed tosh.
Plus ça change.
pete75
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by pete75 »

PDQ Mobile wrote:
Psamathe wrote:I've gradually beginning to think the supporters of brexit are just pushing and pushing for as hard a Brexit as they can get. Given a little and they'll push for even further. e.g. Walk out on the EU at lunchtime and they'll be threatening to topple May unless she walks out on then before breakfast.

Interesting quote from Farange
Speaking on BBC Question Time in Lincoln, 17 January 2013 wrote:"Wouldn't it be terrible if we were like Norway and Switzerland?" Really? They're rich. They're happy. They're self governing.

Yet for him now Norway is a diabolical solution.

Ian


Both in the Schengen free movement area.
And EEA.

Some people are rich in both.
But there is a deal of near poverty too especially amongst some older people. Inflation has eaten what they had.

Switzerland has 40 years of reciprocal agreements and negotiations with the EU.
Their wealth depends very much upon such agreements.

Happiness is of course a subjective thing, but for many years Switzerland had one of the highest European suicide rates.

So I would say Farage is talking uninformed tosh.
Plus ça change.

Here's a suicide map of Europe. Switzerland is nowhere near the highest rate.

Image
'Give me my bike, a bit of sunshine - and a stop-off for a lunchtime pint - and I'm a happy man.' - Reg Baker
PDQ Mobile
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by PDQ Mobile »

It was though 10 or 20 years ago.
As I said one of the highest in Europe.
It was for years higher than that of the UK.

Still is all of those things according to the map.
mr bajokoses
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by mr bajokoses »

PDQ Mobile wrote:So I would say Farage is talking uninformed tosh.
Plus ça change.


Talking of uninformed tosh, when Michel Barnier said today:
Michel Barnier wrote:There is no added value in Brexit. It is a negative negotiation. No-one has been able to show me any added value in Brexit, not even Mr Farage, when I met him in my office at his request and I asked him ‘Show me how the decision to leave the EU provides solutions to the anxieties, discontents and sometimes the anger of the British people’.


... this is what Mr Farage had to say in response:
Nigel Farage wrote:Mr Barnier would never understand the value of freedom and democracy.
Vorpal
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by Vorpal »

PDQ Mobile wrote:
Psamathe wrote:Interesting quote from Farange
Speaking on BBC Question Time in Lincoln, 17 January 2013 wrote:"Wouldn't it be terrible if we were like Norway and Switzerland?" Really? They're rich. They're happy. They're self governing.

Yet for him now Norway is a diabolical solution.

Ian


Both in the Schengen free movement area.
And EEA.

Some people are rich in both.
But there is a deal of near poverty too especially amongst some older people. Inflation has eaten what they had.
Happiness is of course a subjective thing, but for many years Switzerland had one of the highest European suicide rates.

PDQ Mobile wrote:It was though 10 or 20 years ago.
As I said one of the highest in Europe.
It was for years higher than that of the UK.

This paper shows data from 2007, when Switzerland had a much higher suicide rate than it currently does https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3367275/

Norway is among the countries with the lowest poverty rates, not just for average, but across all groups.

As for happiness, I think most people are thinking of https://www.bbc.com/news/world-39325206

If seen 'reports' from people who have come to Norway to find out why it's the 'happiest country' and gone away unsatisfied. If I had the chance to talk to them, I'd tell them that 37,5 hour work week is a big part of it. People go home at 4:00 pm and spend time with their families.
“In some ways, it is easier to be a dissident, for then one is without responsibility.”
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pete75
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by pete75 »

PDQ Mobile wrote:It was though 10 or 20 years ago.
As I said one of the highest in Europe.
It was for years higher than that of the UK.

Still is all of those things according to the map.


That map is from 6 years ago. There's over 20 countries with a higher suicide rate than Switzerland. So hardly one of the highest in Europe. Perhaps you could produce relative figures for European countries which may prove your point.
'Give me my bike, a bit of sunshine - and a stop-off for a lunchtime pint - and I'm a happy man.' - Reg Baker
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mjr
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by mjr »

mr bajokoses wrote:
PDQ Mobile wrote:So I would say Farage is talking uninformed tosh.
Plus ça change.


Talking of uninformed tosh, when Michel Barnier said today:
Michel Barnier wrote:There is no added value in Brexit. It is a negative negotiation. No-one has been able to show me any added value in Brexit, not even Mr Farage, when I met him in my office at his request and I asked him ‘Show me how the decision to leave the EU provides solutions to the anxieties, discontents and sometimes the anger of the British people’.


... this is what Mr Farage had to say in response:
Nigel Farage wrote:Mr Barnier would never understand the value of freedom and democracy.

I suspect Mr Farage will never understand that the EU is freer and more democratic than the UK - or at least never admit to it in public. I'm sure Mr Barnier can understand one of the costs of democracy, though - populist swivel-eyed loons can get elected as MEPs under the fairer more-proportional more-democratic EU elections, which they can't in the less fair UK elections!
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Mick F
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by Mick F »

Map of Europe?

When I woz at skool, Russia was in Asia, and Turkey was in Asia Minor.
What's changed? Continental drift?
Mick F. Cornwall
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Re: ** The Brexit Thread ** - 'Brexit Means Brexit'

Post by PDQ Mobile »

pete75 wrote:
PDQ Mobile wrote:It was though 10 or 20 years ago.
As I said one of the highest in Europe.
It was for years higher than that of the UK.

Still is all of those things according to the map.


That map is from 6 years ago. There's over 20 countries with a higher suicide rate than Switzerland. So hardly one of the highest in Europe. Perhaps you could produce relative figures for European countries which may prove your point.


But many countries higher are Eastern block.
Considering the relative wealth of Switzerland the rate is pretty high.
And I am correct in saying it used to be even higher. Vorpal cites a paper.

Still the basic point was that wealth alone does not equal happiness.
It is in these modern monetarist "The Apprentice" times a somewhat unfashionable idea.
Yet I know it to be true.
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