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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
I think that's an answer for convenience to set up the remainder of your arguments. As a member of NATO, the UK yielded no sovereignty; it merely participated in a mutual defence pact with no such matters as fishing rights, judicial superiority etc.
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No, it's the addition of valid examples to move it from the purely theoretical to the practical. Membership of those organisations may not impact fishing rights but it can lead to loss of sovereignty in other areas. We can't for example, go out and buy arms from Russia or China. And in missions, UK troops may end up reporting to superiors from other countries, and vice versa.
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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
If we do a deal with the EU, and they drop their bullying approach, then we will be able to roll over agreements the EU made with other countries. But my real point here is that had the EEC remained as a pure trading bloc without all this federalisation crap, I'd have been perfectly happy. Your point is not entirely without merit.
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I obviously disagree with you on the bullying label. I think that's a slightly weak description of negotiations where people are now finally accepting that the UK is holding a weaker hand than that decribed by Farage et al four years ago.
I do understand your point about the EU and its closer relationships between states than that between those of other trading blocs. But I understand the reasons for this - the need to prevent wars recurring and the need to be strong against the CIS.
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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
[That's where Remainers and Leavers differ. It is not a small price to pay if, by remaining, we remain under the Brussels heel and the ECJ.
If we can't forge our own path, then all we could have done in the EU is to hang onto their coat tails. There is nothing the EU can do about their High Street and they'd be no help in dealing with ours had we remained. Yours is highly spurious argument, I'm sorry to say.
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You misunderstand the high street reference. I brought it up as one example amongst a few of areas that we can spend the that greater wealth we will get with a close relationship on. Enhanced economic performance is not an abstract concept and it can help address the problems the country faces.
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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
I really do despair of the plummet in the quality of your argument in the above paragraph. "Force compliant nations"? Utter rubbish and tosh. Very disappointing.
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That was how it worked with the Commonwealth - it had a monopoly and there were high tariffs on selling into Commonwealth countries from outside. Old-fashioned protectionism which aided strikes and low productivity.
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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
I wasn't aware of that. Isn't that the problem with the EU?
Artificially high internal process because they're a tariff laden bloc with a few trade deals?
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The UK employs far more civil servants than the EU. They have far more trade deals with other blocs than anyone else so the average external tariffs are very low.
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Originally Posted by Sephiroth
That's what Barnier said - we had to be realistic. The EU are bullies, plain and simple. They accused us of wanting our cake and eating it; now, as exemplified by the fishing rights and level playing field, they want exactly the same. We really must shed ourself of the EU yoke. If we caved in with extensions and giving way on our sovereignty, they'll be pssing all over us laughing their heads off for years to come.
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It wasn't the EU who asked us to leave, it was the other way round. They're just reacting to the situation. You must know now negotiations work and so to label this as bullying is unhelpful to anyone trying to understand the real dynamics of the situation.
The EU is not asking for an extension so it would not be a case of caving in. It would give us a reasonable chance to negotiate something closer to what you want rather than the caving-in which Boris will do without an extension. I'm confident this will indeed happen as our Brexit plans are not sufficiently in place but I would like us to have a stronger stab at negotiating with the EU and wearing them down for an extra 12 months to see if we can improve on the deal.