Post-Brexit Thread

[Ignitionnet]

Exclusive Costs at Virgin Media have so far risen by £7m this year following Brexit, due to increased import costs, the company revealed in a Q&A with staff this week seen by The Register.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09...ake_of_brexit/

No idea what the end result of that will be but makes sense given VM's equipment is purchased in US Dollars while their customers pay them in Sterling. That must be worth another quid a month in price rises

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I am losing my mind.

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/polit...-a3352386.html

George Osborne today put himself at the helm of the battle against a “hard Brexit” as the Tories teetered on the brink of a new outburst of bitter infighting over Europe.

The former chancellor branded Leave campaigners — who believe other EU countries with strong trading links with the UK will simply fall in line behind a good Brexit deal for Britain — as “naive”.

He also hit out at “false prophets” promising greater security if Britain goes it alone. Millions of people risked finding themselves “permanently poorer and more insecure” if the departure from the union is bungled, he added.

Speaking in Chicago, Mr Osborne said: “Brexit won a majority. Hard Brexit did not.

George Osborne. George bloody Osborne is sticking up for sensible positions while Labour are jumping on the bandwagon.

[Osem]

One thing's for sure and that is if we go into these negotiations as if we already feel we've lost the argument, that is what's more likely to happen.

What's required now isn't more delusional clap trap or hyperbole from either side, it's the determination and confidence to make the best of the decision which has been made. Some folks, it seems, will only be happy if we can manage to turn this situation into the disaster they claimed it would be and I feel that's quite perverse.

[Anypermitedroute]

We are going in to the negotiation without a damm clue about what we want nevermind feeling we lost the argument we are just lost as to what we want. Everyone has a different view as to what it means to them

I for one pray for it be a success, I never wanted this but neither do I want a disaster, I am just trying to make the best of the situation, both at home and at work I have too much to lose and whilst people think they have regain control, I'm just making sure what I do control today I don't lose

Originally Posted by Osem

One thing's for sure and that is if we go into these negotiations as if we already feel we've lost the argument, that is what's more likely to happen.

What's required now isn't more delusional clap trap or hyperbole from either side, it's the determination and confidence to make the best of the decision which has been made. Some folks, it seems, will only be happy if we can manage to turn this situation into the disaster they claimed it would be and I feel that's quite perverse.

I can't see I've seen any evidence of this - we have to be careful that if someone says 'this isn't going to be as easy or simple as some think', it isn't interpreted as 'it's all going to fail' or being a 'remoaner'...

Some people are applying extremely simplistic approaches to a very complex subject, and get upset when this is pointed out - there's a huge difference between being realistic and being defeatist, but the two things seem synonymous in some people's eyes...

[Qtx]

Originally Posted by Osem

One thing's for sure and that is if we go into these negotiations as if we already feel we've lost the argument, that is what's more likely to happen.

Perception of the situation is going to play a huge part as to how well of bad we do out of the brexit.

If opinion says that brexit will be great for us actually, investments will be made and the positive ball will start rolling. A negative opinion and no investments helps the fall the other way.

Who influences those perceptions? It will be the media that propagates the positive or negative vibe and it will spiral from there.

Business and the effects of leaving which are not based on perception, such as importing and exporting and price of the £, we obviously have to take note of and the effects are real. But allowing that to change perception more drastically than it needs to is just going to influence the perception based on how the media reports it too.

So much reliance on a banking system which I feel is fundamentally flawed in the way it works and how it influences everything.

[Osem]

Originally Posted by Qtx

Perception of the situation is going to play a huge part as to how well of bad we do out of the brexit.

If opinion says that brexit will be great for us actually, investments will be made and the positive ball will start rolling. A negative opinion and no investments helps the fall the other way.

Who influences those perceptions? It will be the media that propagates the positive or negative vibe and it will spiral from there.

Business and the effects of leaving which are not based on perception, such as importing and exporting and price of the £, we obviously have to take note of and the effects are real. But allowing that to change perception more drastically than it needs to is just going to influence the perception based on how the media reports it too.

So much reliance on a banking system which I feel is fundamentally flawed in the way it works and how it influences everything.

That's why so much of the reporting and comment in the days after the vote was so ridiculously over the top and irresponsible. The media almost has a vested interest in projecting the worst case scenario and that doesn't just apply to Brexit, we see it all the time when there's a need to fill the airwaves with something. Nobody sensible is arguing that the media should present only the positive but I think there's a need for the mainstream media to behave with some responsibility rather than hyping up everything negative, stirring up panic and thereby weakening our bargaining position.

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

It's way easier to go without something entirely than to lose it. We keep hearing we're a trading, maritime nation, we'll be just a maritime nation.

I have no idea why you're so blase about this unless you genuinely have no idea what it all entails. If we cock it up, and all signs are that we're doing our utmost to, it really won't be fine. The Tories in charge of Brexit have made it abundantly clear that they have no idea what they are doing and would rather play to the audience. Businesses have a duty to their shareholders to start looking at relocating some of their enterprise right now.

We'll go from having free trade in goods and services with the EU-27 and nominally free trade with a collection of others to having free trade with no-one, no protection from the WTO, no structure to trading, and being unable to strike free trade agreements for a period. This may just make businesses somewhat more reluctant to do business here.

Free trade agreements aren't made for fun. The WTO doesn't exist for fun. Clearly countries enter into such things for a reason, and anything that makes life harder will cost money.

These aren't my opinions, they are the opinions of experts from constitutional and trade law, and it's way past project fear time now. I appreciate that no-one cares about experts anymore, just their own ill-informed opinions, but it's always worth reading them so you know what to ignore.

We can blow sunshine up our own arses and pretend that we're this magical, unicorn tipped miracle that doesn't need any of these because we've taken back control or we can get our heads out of said arses and perhaps encourage politicians to take theirs out too and get the best deal for the country rather than whatever they thing will win them the most votes.

I've pretty much given up on any prospect of being in the EEA now with Labour deciding to play UKIP probably putting an end to it, but an abrupt end to our current arrangements with no transition is, according to pretty much everyone bar politicians, a bad idea.

About the only thing we can do to ameliorate this is to render the years of austerity pointless by going on a spending and tax cutting spree and running deficits, which will be awesome. Over half a decade of austerity made pointless by a vote to self-harm.[COLOR="Silver"]

What's wrong with EFTA ,we can apply to join with effect the day after we exit and there is absolutely no reason why the current members would object, we can take advantage of the free trade between the members and all the other free trade agreements already in place for non members around the world and lets not forget that the EU has a large number of treaties in place with developing countries that currently apply to us as an EU member ,there is no reason at all that we cannot simply continue those arrangements after exit .All we need is access to the single market we do not under any circumstances want to be a member of the single market,it is too restrictive and harms our trade with other countries outside the EU which is growing at a faster rate .

From wiki

The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is a regional trade organisation and free trade area consisting of four European states: Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland.[1] The organisation operates in parallel with the European Union (EU), and all four member states participate in the EU's single market.

Originally Posted by Hugh

I can't see I've seen any evidence of this - we have to be careful that if someone says 'this isn't going to be as easy or simple as some think', it isn't interpreted as 'it's all going to fail' or being a 'remoaner'...

Some people are applying extremely simplistic approaches to a very complex subject, and get upset when this is pointed out - there's a huge difference between being realistic and being defeatist, but the two things seem synonymous in some people's eyes...

As a country we can make it as hard or as difficult as we like .All of the countries we have been trading with as a member of the EU will still want our goods and services ,there is absolutely no reason why that would stop .You may think that some people have a simplistic outlook towards Brexit ,maybe that is whats needed instead of people keep saying how complicated or difficult it's going be .

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Originally Posted by Hugh

From wiki

and your point is ?

[Pierre]

It's ********. We voted to come out, the terms in which we come out were not on the table. We're out that's it. Let the government that we elected to govern sort it out.

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by martyh

What's wrong with EFTA ,we can apply to join with effect the day after we exit and there is absolutely no reason why the current members would object, we can take advantage of the free trade between the members and all the other free trade agreements already in place for non members around the world and lets not forget that the EU has a large number of treaties in place with developing countries that currently apply to us as an EU member ,there is no reason at all that we cannot simply continue those arrangements after exit .All we need is access to the single market we do not under any circumstances want to be a member of the single market,it is too restrictive and harms our trade with other countries outside the EU which is growing at a faster rate .

The EFTA countries bar Switzerland, which has a ton of bilateral agreements that are equivalent and was a founding member of the organisation, are within the EEA. You objected to the EEA here and emphasised said objection here and here.

Your first phrase is to ask what's wrong with EFTA, your last sentence lists basically what you think is wrong with EFTA, given the entire point of it was free trade with the EU's predecessors, which is actually not the case. There is zero evidence I'm aware of that being within the EFTA has harmed the trading relationships its members have.

You didn't mention it but may not like that EFTA membership carries with it membership of the Schengen agreement though, unless the other members are feeling very accommodating of course.

The EFTA nations have 27 free trade agreements as a block and the individual members have bilateral ones too. Iceland, an EEA-EFTA member, was the first state in Europe to sign a free trade agreement with China, and another EFTA member, Switzerland has one. Norway are in the process of negotiating theirs. They are among relatively few states to have them so evidently EEA/EFTA membership and membership of the Single Market hasn't harmed them too much.

It is incredibly unlikely that we would be admitted to EFTA without offering equivalence of Switzerland's bilateral agreements, or requesting full EEA membership. It's incredibly unlikely we'd receive EEA membership without serious concessions. There's really no point in our being there with that in mind; it's EU membership without the political structures and with a couple of conditions on migration and regulations. The EU would be idiotic to let us in there as the first thing we'd do is start misusing those conditions for political reasons. EFTA nations would regard an application from us without a request to join the EEA pointless. A country wanting to join an institution whose entire purpose is being a collection of nations with membership of the Single Market and common trading policy without wanting to be in the Single Market.

I will repeat something from earlier: the EEA is not the Customs Union, and hopefully the below will make it all more clear so there's no further confusion.

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

The EFTA countries bar Switzerland, which has a ton of bilateral agreements that are equivalent and was a founding member of the organisation, are within the EEA..................snip...........

You know what i give up ,you asked the question and every time someone tries to answer it you shout them down .Joining EFTA is an option ,it would mean we would not have to be in the single market but would benefit from some of the FTA's already in place ,or we could simply trade under WTO rules or we could negotiate our own FTA with the EU,the latter could be negotiated over the 2 year period and start the day after Brexit.There are options and we will take one and it will be ok simply because we are the 5th largest trading nation in the world,the EU need us to continue pretty as before for their own stability ,we already have all the needed regulations and infrastructure in place .You really need to get over yourself and stop trying to convince everyone that the end of the world is nigh simply because we kicked the failed EU into touch.Most of the world manage without EU membership, so will we .

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

Is that because you can't answer straight forward questions and prefer instead to rely on blind optimism? I keep hearing how we're going to make it work but no one ever says how.

this might come as a shock but mrs may did not choose me as a cabinet member ergo i am not privy to the brexit negotiations ,if you want answers ask HM gov i'm sure they wont mind showing all their cards before the game starts .

[Osem]

Originally Posted by martyh

You know what i give up ,you asked the question and every time someone tries to answer it you shout them down .Joining EFTA is an option ,it would mean we would not have to be in the single market but would benefit from some of the FTA's already in place ,or we could simply trade under WTO rules or we could negotiate our own FTA with the EU,the latter could be negotiated over the 2 year period and start the day after Brexit.There are options and we will take one and it will be ok simply because we are the 5th largest trading nation in the world,the EU need us to continue pretty as before for their own stability ,we already have all the needed regulations and infrastructure in place .You really need to get over yourself and stop trying to convince everyone that the end of the world is nigh simply because we kicked the failed EU into touch.Most of the world manage without EU membership, so will we .

Correct. It's perfectly OK to question what'll happen and be concerned that we get it right but we need to have confidence that we can do perfectly well without the constraints, political and otherwise, that EU membership requires. IMHO the biggest failure imaginable would be for us to appear to have lost the confidence to manage our own future and find ourselves cobbling together an unsatisfactory deal which almost gives us the worse possible outcome.

The EU is in a mess with massive, I believe terminal, problems ahead and we need to remind ourselves that no matter what the bluster from Brussels might convey we don't need or wish to be joined at the hip to all of that and their inexorable lemming like drive to oblivion. That's the reality folks, the EU isn't interested in the reforms we would like, their only answer to the problems they've created is to insist that they haven't gone far enough. It's almost like they're trying to recreate the Soviet Union and with the same outcome.

[techguyone]

Anyone would think certain sections would like us to fail just to do a 'told you so' and making it a self fulfilling prophecy.

Whilst it's democratically correct to allow dissenters to dissent, it would be wise for all concerned to appreciate that we have legitimately voted and chosen this path and if we all swam in the same direction and actually pulled together, we'd get a positive result rather better than the doom and gloom laden one predicted by many.

Perception is reality in many cases and whilst I'm not suggesting it's going to be smooth and easy - something so many of the 'instant now' lot seem to fail to grasp. If we believe we're going to fail, we WILL fail, we need to be united, is that so hard to do?