PM Boris forms a government

Originally Posted by Sephiroth

... splitting hairs again? Why do you think the IMF analysis didn't bother with minnow economies in the EU but did include the UK as a discrete item?

Splitting hairs? - the discussion was about contrasting future GDPs of the U.K. and the EU, which you then goal-post shuffled to being the Eurozone, which is only 2/3rds of the EU, and made a substantial difference to the GDP figures.

Nice try...

[jfman]

Originally Posted by nomadking

So following EU rules without having a say(not that we have much of one anyway), applying EU set tariffs, obeying the EU and the ECJ, no outside trade deals allowed, having to submit to conditions of other EU trade agreements, eg Vietnam but in only one direction ie imports to UK, and all still with customs delays and massive extra costs.

A customs union for goods wouldn't have the same level of delays and extra costs.

Originally Posted by Sephiroth

Someone's downturn is sometimes someone's uplift.

Btw, I just watched the Boris press conference at Biarritz and he was not the buffoon that many would expect him to be.

??

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49470831

Boris Johnson had said pork pies are exported to Thailand and Iceland, but cannot be to the US due to red tape.

However the Melton Mowbray Pork Pie Association said the pies were not even exported to Thailand and Iceland.

Downing Street insisted pies were exported, citing producer Walker & Son - but the company said this was not correct.

Walker & Son told the BBC it had previously exported a "tiny amount" of pork pies to Singapore, but had not done so for "at least two years" and is now "entirely focused on the UK market".

[GrimUpNorth]

Originally Posted by Hugh

??

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49470831

So is someone telling porky pies...... I'll get my coat

[nomadking]

Originally Posted by jfman

A customs union for goods wouldn't have the same level of delays and extra costs.

Tell that to Turkish exporters to the EU.

---------- Post added at 23:40 ---------- Previous post was at 23:30 ----------

Originally Posted by GrimUpNorth

So is someone telling porky pies...... I'll get my coat

Or he has been supplied with duff info. The core issue remains, could they be exported to Thailand or Iceland, but not to the US?
Link

Asked if the PM’s claim was “not true”, he added: “Not that I know of, I’m afraid.”

Officials pointed to published comments from the firm’s export executive Henry Bowles, in which he said: “Exports currently account for less than 1% of our annual turnover, with small shipments being sent to Iceland, Thailand, Singapore and the Caribbean.”

Puts a very different light on things. The never ending distortion by the media.

[Sephiroth]

.... and Hugh in this case.

If BoJo’s point was that Melton Mowbray pork pies *can* be sold to Southeast Asia but *can’t* be sold to the USA, then the information on the company website backs him up, and he’s not lying.

Whether they presently do so, or the quantity that is sold, wasn’t the issue. He was talking about trade barriers. Funny how people claim to be so interested in facts when all they’re really interested in is a very thinly disguised straw man.

I've also seen suggestions that it is sold in those places and the guy was a former Labour candidate....

---------- Post added at 08:00 ---------- Previous post was at 07:56 ----------

Originally Posted by Sephiroth

.... and Hugh in this case.

Hardly Hugh's fault if the Head of thing is saying it's not true, that would normally be decent enough evidence. The BBC report as correctly quotes him as saying that rather than claiming independently that's it's not true.

Originally Posted by nomadking

Tell that to Turkish exporters to the EU.

---------- Post added at 23:40 ---------- Previous post was at 23:30 ----------


Or he has been supplied with duff info. The core issue remains, could they be exported to Thailand or Iceland, but not to the US?
Link

Puts a very different light on things. The never ending distortion by the media.

You appear to have accidently missed out the preceding lines in your quote...

Asked if Mr Johnson was right, Mr O'Callaghan replied: "Not really. With all of these things there is a little bit of give and take. We don't actually export to Thailand or Iceland."

When pressed again, Mr O'Callaghan said: "Not that I know of I'm afraid.

"It is certainly available in Iceland the shop."

Mr O'Callaghan said there was a possibility that pies could be exported frozen to the US or Australia and cooked in the country.

Speaking about trading with the US, Mr O'Callaghan said: "A Melton Mowbray pork pie is a delicate fresh meat product so the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), like most other countries in the world, are very aware of meat products and you have to go through all the regulations to get them over there.

However, when contacted by the BBC, Walker & Son - which says it makes and bakes 80% of all of the UK's Melton Mowbray pork pies - said it no longer exports pork pies.

"We are entirely focused on the UK market," a spokeswoman said.

The company said it used to export a "tiny amount" to Singapore - but had not done so "for some time".

"Because of the short shelf life it is not really viable economically."

You would have thought the people who actually make and sell the pork pies would be believed...

The BBC also spoke to the British owner of one independent retailer in Singapore, who said they previously stocked pork pies, but that their distributor "unfortunately doesn't do them now, due purely to demand rather than restrictions".

[nomadking]

Originally Posted by Hugh

You appear to have accidently missed out the preceding lines in your quote...

You would have thought the people who actually make and sell the pork pies would be believed...

He doesn't make ALL pork pies. A company DID complain about problems exporting pork pies to the US, and used Thailand and Iceland as 2 of their 4 examples of countries that didn't have those problems. Thailand and Iceland weren't plucked out of the air.
Guardian

But Walker and Son was reportedly used as an example in a 2015 briefing document from the British-American Business Group, during the TTIP negotiations. It is understood that a small number of pies were sent to Iceland and Thailand as part of a trial in 2015, but Walker and Son have not exported pies to either country for at least a couple of years.

In response to Mr O'Callaghan, No 10 said the PM was correct when he said that Melton Mowbray pork pies are exported to Thailand and Iceland.
His remarks, it added, were based on a briefing note from the Department for International Trade, which said the company Walker & Sons exports small shipments to Iceland, Thailand, Singapore and the Caribbean.
It said the information came from a document produced by Walker & Son.

It's in this presentation document from 2015 in connection with TTIP. They only started exporting in August 2014.

[OLD BOY]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Splitting hairs? - the discussion was about contrasting future GDPs of the U.K. and the EU, which you then goal-post shuffled to being the Eurozone, which is only 2/3rds of the EU, and made a substantial difference to the GDP figures.

Nice try...

Nobody is trying it on. Would you mind telling us what the difference is if you use the GDP for the whole of the EU? You are conspicuous by your silence on this point.

I used the Eurozone figures because these were set out in the IMF schedule.

Incidentally, did I mention that Germany now looked like going into a recession? The grass is not as green in the EU as some of you think.

---------- Post added at 14:48 ---------- Previous post was at 14:47 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

If BoJo’s point was that Melton Mowbray pork pies *can* be sold to Southeast Asia but *can’t* be sold to the USA, then the information on the company website backs him up, and he’s not lying.

Whether they presently do so, or the quantity that is sold, wasn’t the issue. He was talking about trade barriers. Funny how people claim to be so interested in facts when all they’re really interested in is a very thinly disguised straw man.

Correct, and press reports are now confirming that these pies have indeed been sold to them in the past.

[papa smurf]

Are these pork pies or pedant pies
Thank [insert deity] Boris didn't mention pukka pies,we might well be in the midst of a civil war by now.

Originally Posted by Hugh

You appear to have accidently missed out the preceding lines in your quote...

You would have thought the people who actually make and sell the pork pies would be believed...

You would have thought you would have ditched the straw man argument by now.

BoJo’s point was on the issue of trade barriers, not the current export quantities to any particular country.

The information he has relied on hasn’t been contradicted and supports his claim. The people who actually make and sell the pork pies, meanwhile, are answering a different question entirely, either due to the agenda of the querying journalist or one of their own.

[Pierre]

Who gives a flying.............

If we’re arguing over pork pies, we have surely jumped the bexit shark.

Well make some allowances for it being silly season ...