Brexit Referendum Superthread

Capt'n Midnight

murphaph wrote: »

There seems to be more and more talking the British media about potentially leaving the single market but remaining in the customs union. What are your thoughts on how this scenario would affect us?

That's "have your cake and eat it" talk.

Turkey is in the customs union. but the reality of the situation is
https://infacts.org/briefings/turkish-option/

The snag is that Turkey does not have any vote on which free trade deals the EU pursues and so no way of making sure they satisfy its interests. Nor do the EU’s trading partners necessarily have an incentive to open their markets to Turkey, as they can simply cut deals with the EU and get access to the Turkish market by sending goods to the EU and then on to Turkey.

also customs union does nothing for services

Capt'n Midnight

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

That's "have your cake and eat it" talk.

Turkey is in the customs union. but the reality of the situation is
https://infacts.org/briefings/turkish-option/

also customs union does nothing for services

Is it though? This Guardian article that I posted earlier seems to suggest that a customs union dealing with physical goods could be enacted between the EU-UK, allowing the UK to pursue its own deals with regards to services, which is what it's economy seems to rely on anyway.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jul/02/new-customs-union-with-eu-after-brexit-is-still-an-option-analysts-say

steddyeddy

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Is it though? This Guardian article that I posted earlier seems to suggest that a customs union dealing with physical goods could be enacted between the EU-UK, allowing the UK to pursue its own deals with regards to services, which is what it's economy seems to rely on anyway.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jul/02/new-customs-union-with-eu-after-brexit-is-still-an-option-analysts-say

TBH I think the EU are sick of Britain at this stage. Better to let them self destruct at this stage. There was a woman on Question Time last week stating that "Britain survived on its own for hundreds of years and it can do it again". Seriously gets annoying to hear that after a while.

Enzokk

Fratton Fred wrote: »

And the Germans, RWE own a big chunk as well.

That's a side effect of having a large liberalised energy market though.

Which seems ridiculous now when you have a deficit but are paying the German and French government for services that should be your own responsibility. That I think is privatisation taken way too far by the previous governments. Its now become accepted that this is the way to go because its been like that for many years, yet it is giving up control that so many crave. You tell them that their own government doesn't control the basic services they rely on and they willingly sold it to the highest bidder and weren't forced by the EU.

Deleted User wrote: »

Is it though? This Guardian article that I posted earlier seems to suggest that a customs union dealing with physical goods could be enacted between the EU-UK, allowing the UK to pursue its own deals with regards to services, which is what it's economy seems to rely on anyway.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jul/02/new-customs-union-with-eu-after-brexit-is-still-an-option-analysts-say

In your link is the following quote,

Privately, officials in Brussels are said to be much more open to the idea of a wide-ranging new customs union with Britain, as long as it respects existing common market rules and has a dispute resolution mechanism such as the European court of justice.

So will the UK accept the ECJ as a dispute resolution mechanism when they have publicly stated they want to be rid of the ECJ and its rulings? Will the electorate accept that? Also in the same quote, will the UK accept and respect existing common market rules? Is this not why they want to leave?

We also have to ask, whats in it for the EU? What benefits are there for the EU to have the UK have free trade in goods without accepting the rules of the union? Seems this is again more wishful thinking from civil servants more than what is actually possible.

Zubeneschamali

Enzokk wrote: »

Will the electorate accept that?

Ha ha!

As if they have a f*cking clue!!

Enzokk

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

Ha ha!

As if they have a f*cking clue!!

Let me rephrase, will the media accept this or will they spin it into their own truth for their readers.

murphaph

Enzokk wrote: »

Which seems ridiculous now when you have a deficit but are paying the German and French government for services that should be your own responsibility. That I think is privatisation taken way too far by the previous governments. Its now become accepted that this is the way to go because its been like that for many years, yet it is giving up control that so many crave. You tell them that their own government doesn't control the basic services they rely on and they willingly sold it to the highest bidder and weren't forced by the EU.





In your link is the following quote,



So will the UK accept the ECJ as a dispute resolution mechanism when they have publicly stated they want to be rid of the ECJ and its rulings? Will the electorate accept that? Also in the same quote, will the UK accept and respect existing common market rules? Is this not why they want to leave?

We also have to ask, whats in it for the EU? What benefits are there for the EU to have the UK have free trade in goods without accepting the rules of the union? Seems this is again more wishful thinking from civil servants more than what is actually possible.

I'm not so sure. The UK is heavily dependent on services being sold into the EU. This would diminish if they are outside the single market. The EU however is more dependent on selling goods into the UK and this trade should not be harmed if the UK remained in the customs union. Ireland is the odd man out in that we import more from the UK than we export to them. For the EU as a whole it's the other way around and if you factor out service exports then the EU exports even more to the UK.

Personally I think this "least worst deal" from the UK's perspective could hugely benefit Ireland as our agro food sector could continue to export tariff-free to the UK while UK services companies who need an EU base (because the UK is outside the single market) could relocate to Ireland.

Britain shooting itself in the foot instead of the head could inadvertently massively benefit Ireland. Of course we do not want the UK economy itself to tank as then there'll be little exporting of anything to them.

The whole thing is not being looked at sanely in the UK. The impetus is on leaving the EU and salvaging the best deal. The best deal is not to leave of course but that seems politically impossible in the UK now.

ancapailldorcha

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

Ha ha!

As if they have a f*cking clue!!

Enzokk wrote: »

Let me rephrase, will the media accept this or will they spin it into their own truth for their readers.

Post more constructively than this please. There have been enough warnings lately.

Fratton Fred

murphaph wrote: »

I'm not so sure. The UK is heavily dependent on services being sold into the EU.

Is it?

I have been trying to find out what the actual value of these services are and what makes up these services (It could be anything from providing air traffic control services, insurance and loans to Ed Sheeran's latest album) but I have found it quite difficult to locate.

This seems to be a common assumption, but I haven't found anything to back it up or that provides a breakdown of what these services actually are.

murphaph

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Is it?

I have been trying to find out what the actual value of these services are and what makes up these services (It could be anything from providing air traffic control services, insurance and loans to Ed Sheeran's latest album) but I have found it quite difficult to locate.

This seems to be a common assumption, but I haven't found anything to back it up or that provides a breakdown of what these services actually are.

Fair question. Perhaps I have made a false assumption but it is generally accepted that the UK economy is more dependent on services than the EU economy generally and it is known that the UK has a balance of trade deficit with the EU so I assumed that the service sector is making up most of the UK's numbers.

Enzokk

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Is it?

I have been trying to find out what the actual value of these services are and what makes up these services (It could be anything from providing air traffic control services, insurance and loans to Ed Sheeran's latest album) but I have found it quite difficult to locate.

This seems to be a common assumption, but I haven't found anything to back it up or that provides a breakdown of what these services actually are.

murphaph wrote: »

Fair question. Perhaps I have made a false assumption but it is generally accepted that the UK economy is more dependent on services than the EU economy generally and it is known that the UK has a balance of trade deficit with the EU so I assumed that the service sector is making up most of the UK's numbers.

Different websites have different figures for trade. One website has the UK trade with the EU at 56% in 2014 and then another has this at 44% in 2016. Could it have declined that much in 2 years? In any case it seems that the services constitutes about 80% of the UK's trade so if you take the 44% numbers in 2016 which would have trade with the EU at £240b, then 80% of that will be around £196b, right?

Now getting a breakdown of the actual services may be difficult, but there at least is an idea of the amount.

79% of UK Gross Domestic Product (GDP) came from the service sector in 2013

Five facts about… the UK service sector

About 44% of UK exports in goods and services went to other countries in the EU in 2016—£240 billion out of £550 billion total exports.

Everything you might want to know about the UK's trade with the EU

In 2014, 40 per cent of Britain’s services trade, and 56 per cent of its goods trade, was with other European Economic Area members, meaning that the overall fall in British exports would be 24 per cent for services and 20-25 per cent for goods.

Brexit risks 60% drop in service sector exports

Fratton Fred

Enzokk wrote: »

Different websites have different figures for trade. One website has the UK trade with the EU at 56% in 2014 and then another has this at 44% in 2016. Could it have declined that much in 2 years? In any case it seems that the services constitutes about 80% of the UK's trade so if you take the 44% numbers in 2016 which would have trade with the EU at £240b, then 80% of that will be around £196b, right?

Now getting a breakdown of the actual services may be difficult, but there at least is an idea of the amount.




Five facts about… the UK service sector



Everything you might want to know about the UK's trade with the EU




Brexit risks 60% drop in service sector exports

That last one is behind a pay wall, so I can't access it.

The other two I have read already, but they don't give a breakdown of actual services exports and what those services are.

The BBC, for example, sells over £2bn of television each year, such as Dr Who and Top Gear. God knows what the British music industry is worth, but that must be a few quid.

Then of course, there is the television rights to the most watched football league in the world which again, are worth billions.

All these are services and none of which will be greatly affected by Brexit i wouldn't have thought.

FrancieBrady

Fratton Fred wrote: »

That last one is behind a pay wall, so I can't access it.

The other two I have read already, but they don't give a breakdown of actual services exports and what those services are.

The BBC, for example, sells over £2bn of television each year, such as Dr Who and Top Gear. God knows what the British music industry is worth, but that must be a few quid.

Then of course, there is the television rights to the most watched football league in the world which again, are worth billions.

All these are services and none of which will be greatly affected by Brexit i wouldn't have thought.

TV executives think differently. They are very worried about the effect Brexit will have.
http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/brexit-the-tv-industry-reacts/5103078.article
The Music industry is worried too. Interesting to see from this article how far reaching the effects of Brexit may be on the british Music industry.
http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/31705/1/what-would-brexit-mean-for-the-music-industry

ancapailldorcha

FrancieBrady wrote: »

TV executives think differently.
http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/news/brexit-the-tv-industry-reacts/5103078.article
The Music industry is worried too.
http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/31705/1/what-would-brexit-mean-for-the-music-industry

Mod: Please provide a summary or comment on each link you share.

Enzokk

Fratton Fred wrote: »

That last one is behind a pay wall, so I can't access it.

The other two I have read already, but they don't give a breakdown of actual services exports and what those services are.

The BBC, for example, sells over £2bn of television each year, such as Dr Who and Top Gear. God knows what the British music industry is worth, but that must be a few quid.

Then of course, there is the television rights to the most watched football league in the world which again, are worth billions.

All these are services and none of which will be greatly affected by Brexit i wouldn't have thought.

Like you say I also haven't found anywhere where there is a breakdown of the services and amount related to that. The last link also doesn't give a breakdown of the services, just the amount that I have quoted in my post.

I am not sure though, if the UK sees a general lower investment you would think this would affect all industries. The effect may not be felt for a few years but surely it will drip down into all of the economy eventually. But the UK could always try and become even more friendly for services by reducing tax or adding more tax breaks. You do wonder what effect this would have on their income tax to spend on social services.

Fratton Fred

Enzokk wrote: »

Like you say I also haven't found anywhere where there is a breakdown of the services and amount related to that. The last link also doesn't give a breakdown of the services, just the amount that I have quoted in my post.

I am not sure though, if the UK sees a general lower investment you would think this would affect all industries. The effect may not be felt for a few years but surely it will drip down into all of the economy eventually. But the UK could always try and become even more friendly for services by reducing tax or adding more tax breaks. You do wonder what effect this would have on their income tax to spend on social services.

I have been reading this https://www.thecityuk.com/assets/2016/Reports-PDF/Key-facts-about-UK-financial-and-related-professional-services-2016.pdf

Which states that the UK financial services and related professional services accounts for around 12% of the UK economy (£190bn)

Lloyds have stated that EU business is worth around 11% of their revenue https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/sep/22/brexit-vote-imajor-lloyds-insurance-markets-profits-rise

So if this is typical of the industry in general, then the eu is worth around £20bn to the UK financial sector. The UK's total exports to the rest of the eu are around £240bn, so around 8%.

That then begs the question, what makes up the rest?

Water John

You cannot take one company Lloyds and extrapulate their figures to the whole insurance/financial services sector.
Totally unreliable.

Fratton Fred

it looks like I wasn't that far off

http://colresearch.typepad.com/colresearch/2016/08/how-important-is-uk-financial-services-trade-to-the-eu.html

Importance of financial services

Financial services (FS) and insurance make up the largest proportion of the UK’s services trade, accounting for £22.7bn (26%) of services exports to the EU. Once again, it is the larger economies in the EU that are the dominant markets for UK financial services exports, with France (£4.7bn), Netherlands (£3.5bn) and Germany (£3.3bn) being the biggest recipients

Water John

There is a big gap between 11/12% and 26%.

ambro25

Enzokk wrote: »

Like you say I also haven't found anywhere where there is a breakdown of the services and amount related to that. The last link also doesn't give a breakdown of the services, just the amount that I have quoted in my post.

I am not sure though, if the UK sees a general lower investment you would think this would affect all industries. The effect may not be felt for a few years but surely it will drip down into all of the economy eventually. But the UK could always try and become even more friendly for services by reducing tax or adding more tax breaks. You do wonder what effect this would have on their income tax to spend on social services.

Not highly detailed, but perhaps a bit more authoritative and helpful to the discussion, and hot off the press: House of Commons Library, Briefing Paper, "Statistics on UK-EU trade", 04 July 2017.

The summary is worth excerpting:

• The UK had an overall trade deficit of £71 billion with the EU in 2016. A surplus of £24 billion on trade in services was outweighed by a deficit of £96 billion on trade in goods.
• The UK had a trade surplus of £34 billion with non-EU countries. A surplus of £73 billion on trade in services outweighed a deficit of £38 billion on trade in goods.
• Services accounted for 40% of the UK’s exports to the EU in 2016. Financial services and other business services are important categories of services exports to the EU.

Fratton Fred

ambro25 wrote: »

Not highly detailed, but perhaps a bit more authoritative and helpful to the discussion, and hot off the press: House of Commons Library, Briefing Paper, "Statistics on UK-EU trade", 04 July 2017.

The summary is worth excerpting:

I'm not sure that tells us anything we hadn't already ascertained, does it?

Jaggo

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-european-union-eu-steve-baker-theresa-may-wholly-torn-down-libertarian-alliance-a7820721.html

New brexit minister saying that the whole eu needs to be brought down (from 2010).

wes

Jaggo wrote: »

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-european-union-eu-steve-baker-theresa-may-wholly-torn-down-libertarian-alliance-a7820721.html

New brexit minister saying that the whole eu needs to be brought down (from 2010).

I do wonder if May is trying to destroy the UK, with this kind of carry on. Incompetence can only explain so much.

Professor Moriarty

Jaggo wrote: »

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-european-union-eu-steve-baker-theresa-may-wholly-torn-down-libertarian-alliance-a7820721.html

New brexit minister saying that the whole eu needs to be brought down (from 2010).

Tucked away at the very end is this little nugget (from 2017):

Mr Baker is also under pressure to reveal his links to a group that donated £435,000 to the DUP to campaign for Brexit during last year’s referendum.
The MP was handed £6,500 by the obscure Constitutional Research Council, the body which used a legal loophole to channel the money to the DUP.

Fratton Fred

Jaggo wrote: »

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-european-union-eu-steve-baker-theresa-may-wholly-torn-down-libertarian-alliance-a7820721.html

New brexit minister saying that the whole eu needs to be brought down (from 2010).

I don't agree with Steve Baker, but he raises some interesting points, especially about economic nationalism raised from national, to continental levels.

Professor Moriarty

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I don't agree with Steve Baker, but he raises some interesting points, especially about economic nationalism raised from national, to continental levels.

In what way is that interesting?

ambro25

Fratton Fred wrote: »

I'm not sure that tells us anything we hadn't already ascertained, does it?

Considering your preceding exchanges and links with Enzokk and Water John, it at least tells you the state of play as of 2016 insofar as UK-EU services are concerned, wholesale rather than financial services-focused:

UK exports to the EU were £241 billion (44% of all UK exports).
Services accounted for 40% of the UK’s exports to the EU in 2016.

Meaning £96bn of UK exports to the EU were services

The UK had an overall trade deficit of £71 billion with the EU in 2016. A surplus of £24 billion on trade in services was outweighed by a deficit of £96 billion on trade in goods.

Meaning the UK imported £72bn's worth of EU services

Now putting your earlier link and quote in context:

Importance of financial services

Financial services (FS) and insurance make up the largest proportion of the UK’s services trade, accounting for £22.7bn (26%) of services exports to the EU. Once again, it is the larger economies in the EU that are the dominant markets for UK financial services exports, with France (£4.7bn), Netherlands (£3.5bn) and Germany (£3.3bn) being the biggest recipients

that tells us this 'largest' FS proportion is the high-profile tree which hides the £73bn forest.

Now there are no tariffs on services...but a s**tpot full of non-tariff barriers. Hell yes. As a UK service exporter, I can vouch -and tell you- that we're staring them in the face right now, and working furiously at getting around them (-meaning, creating jobs and added value in the EU, not the UK :pac:) in advance.

Fratton Fred

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

In what way is that interesting?

is that what has happened? Have we gone from national protectionism, to continental protectionism?

Professor Moriarty

Fratton Fred wrote: »

is that what has happened? Have we gone from national protectionism, to continental protectionism?

I was hoping you'd tell me and your opinion!

Fratton Fred

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

I was hoping you'd tell me and your opinion!

I am open minded about it, it is something I had never really thought of before.