Brexit discussion thread XIV (Please read OP before posting)

Professor Moriarty

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

Right wing media will claim success regardless of facts or reality

Just look at recent vaccines hoopla forgetting one of the most disastrous death tolls in Europe

EU was never defined by external 3rd parties, it’s just wishful thinking on behalf of Brexiteers that they are center of universe. Same as Russians thinking they are still relevant when the country turned into a backwater

Do you not think that a UK that is seen to be prospering outside the EU would not encourage and fuel anti-EU populists such as Le Pen and Salvini? I do.

ujjjjjjjjj

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

The EU crumbling would be awful for Ireland. Much worse than than having the UK limp along for a while as a warning to others.

Do you honestly believe if Britain does well economically in the next decade the EU will crumble ?

I hope both the EU and Britain do well as it's good for all and when economies are doing well extremist politics generally doesn't thrive and people are better off and happier.

I don't think the concept of scaring countries to stay in the EU is a good state of mind. Countries either see EU membership as a positive benefit or they don't.

Professor Moriarty

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

Do you honestly believe if Britain does well economically in the next decade the EU will crumble ?

I hope both the EU and Britain do well as it's good for all and when economies are doing well extremist politics generally doesn't thrive and people are better off and happier.

I don't think the concept of scaring countries to stay in the EU is a good state of mind. Countries either see EU membership as a positive benefit or they don't.

I hope everyone prospers, naturally. My concern is latent nationalism across the EU and how it might be manipulated just as it was in the UK. It's not so much what countries decide as how they vote in elections and what is presented to the electorate as important. Brexit being a classic example of that. But I repeat myself. We can agree to differ.

Leroy42

What was the effect of stockpiling in December?

I see plenty of commentators mention it is regards to the drop in exports in January but what is the actual number,

ujjjjjjjjj

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

I hope everyone prospers, naturally. My concern is latent nationalism across the EU and how it might be manipulated just as it was in the UK. It's not so much what countries decide as how they vote in elections and what is presented to the electorate as important. Brexit being a classic example of that. But I repeat myself. We can agree to differ.

This in itself is a dangerous state of mind as you are basically saying the electorate can't be trusted to make the right decision........

In time we may see Le Pen or Salvini rise in France or Italy or other countries in time may review EU membership - we may not but if we do the first question to ask is where did the EU fail as if it is working as an institution extremist politics or nationalism have trouble gaining traction.

You can either view Britain as a crazy bunch of nationalist morons or is it a warning flag that all may not be right in the EU. It makes sense to look at the latter purely from the perspective of trying to see where improvements can be made. Run down the Rabbit Hole of the the first option and you can easily get distracted and miss problems.

No problem agreeing to differ.

ujjjjjjjjj

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

Do you not think that a UK that is seen to be prospering outside the EU would not encourage and fuel anti-EU populists such as Le Pen and Salvini? I do.

They will only gain enough traction if there are genuine problems in those countries (usual hot potatoes of unemployment, cost of living, lack of opportunity and perceived or real unfairness in society) and the EU will have responsibility for this to a significant degree.

timetogo1

Leroy42 wrote: »

What was the effect of stockpiling in December?

I see plenty of commentators mention it is regards to the drop in exports in January but what is the actual number,

I don't get how the UK stockpiling in December is reducing exports in the new year.

Professor Moriarty

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

They will only gain enough traction if there are genuine problems in those countries (usual hot potatoes of unemployment, cost of living, lack of opportunity and perceived or real unfairness in society) and the EU will have responsibility for this to a significant degree.

Yet it gained traction in the UK, a country that was motoring along nicely until Johnson and Farage dog whistled latent nationalism. Such a dynamic could easily happen in France, Italy, Holland etc. It's not just about economics, it's about identity, immigration, nationalism etc.

Leroy42

timetogo1 wrote: »

I don't get how the UK stockpiling in December is reducing exports in the new year.

Either do I but it has been oft mentioned, including in this thread, so just wondering what the actual numbers are.

Professor Moriarty

Leroy42 wrote: »

Either do I but it has been oft mentioned, including in this thread, so just wondering what the actual numbers are.

FWIW, in January, UK exports to the EU dropped 41% while exports to non-EU countries actually rose slightly. Exports to Ireland dropped 47%.

Zubeneschamali

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

Look bottom line is I personally hope the UK booms as it can only be good for Ireland but I understand there is a pack of hyenas in Ireland who just want it all to come crashing down in a giant steaming pile of sh*te despite it being a bad thing economically for Ireland.

I hope the UK prospers, but what we hope or say here wont affect that.

They cannot prosper by imposing trade sanctions on themselves they way they seem determined to do.

ujjjjjjjjj

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

Yet it gained traction in the UK, a country that was motoring along nicely until Johnson and Farage dog whistled latent nationalism. Such a dynamic could easily happen in France, Italy, Holland etc. It's not just about economics, it's about identity, immigration, nationalism etc.

Yes to a degree but the EU needs to look at itself though as well as its most Euro sceptic member at the time was looking for reform of EU institutions to slow the move to a federal Europe and didn't act.

It's easy to dismiss all Brexiteers as easily influenced plebs but the reality is a little different. If the EU had listened to calls for reforms from the UK Brexit wouldn't have happened. The narrative about populism is an easy one to push and doesn't get the EU to look inwards and deflects issues.

CelticRambler

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

If the EU had listened to calls for reforms from the UK Brexit wouldn't have happened.

Really? :rolleyes: Brexit was won on the back of "Europe" problems that didn't exist, and domestic problems that had nothing to do with the EU, and which the British government chose not to fix. Brexit happened because the UK's political system is dysfunctional and easily manipulated.

Blaming the EU for not listening to calls for vague and ill-defined reforms from a country that can't stick to a set of rules it agreed only a few weeks previously is real cloud-cuckoo stuff.

And the cherry on the cake is that the Tory party has recreated in London all the worst aspects of the EU that it supposedly wanted reformed.

timetogo1

timetogo1 wrote: »

I don't get how the UK stockpiling in December is reducing exports in the new year.

Importers from the UK were also stockpiling, so they all had full warehouses in January.

View

Professor Moriarty wrote: »

None of those countries were members of the EU. If the UK, a significant member of the EU and the first member of the EU to leave, is seen to prosper outside the EU, this will encourage populist nationalists such as Le Pen and Salvini to push for exit. It's how Johnson got elected - an anti-EU stance. They will happily copy his playbook to get elected.

No, that doesn’t follow as each country and its circumstances is unique.

The U.K. could flop badly outside the EU whereas another country could succeed (or vice versa). You can’t say that the U.K. succeeding outside the EU proves a case that France or Ireland would also succeed anymore than the examples of Norway or Iceland does.

View

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

Yes to a degree but the EU needs to look at itself though as well as its most Euro sceptic member at the time was looking for reform of EU institutions to slow the move to a federal Europe and didn't act.

It's easy to dismiss all Brexiteers as easily influenced plebs but the reality is a little different. If the EU had listened to calls for reforms from the UK Brexit wouldn't have happened. The narrative about populism is an easy one to push and doesn't get the EU to look inwards and deflects issues.

We have had several reform Treaties in the EU over the last few decades (Amsterdam, Nice, Lisbon). When those Treaties were up for negotiation and ratification, the U.K. was not pushing for reforms, rather it was hostile to them and was pushing for repeated opt-outs on issues.

And the guff about “the move to a federal Europe” was covered by the special agreement that Cameron got prior to the referendum and getting it didn’t make one iota of difference to Brexiters’ rabid hatred of the EU.

Capt'n Midnight

View wrote: »

No, that doesn’t follow as each country and its circumstances is unique.

The U.K. could flop badly outside the EU whereas another country could succeed (or vice versa). You can’t say that the U.K. succeeding outside the EU proves a case that France or Ireland would also succeed anymore than the examples of Norway or Iceland does.

Greenland left the EU.

Norway's main exports are raw materials, food and energy.
Turkey is in the customs union except for the above.


If you've an economy like the UK which imports raw materials, food and energy and pays for it with exports of services then you don't have the EU over a barrel. For other goods the flow is more even except the UK imports more.

fash

ujjjjjjjjj wrote: »

It's easy to dismiss all Brexiteers as easily influenced plebs but the reality is a little different.

Certainly- there are also those Brexiters who are charlatans, those who only supported Brexit because it is a grift that sells, those who actively wish to damage the UK and/or EU, xenophobes, racists, those hard of thinking, the naive, the stupid and those who get to gain personally and don't care about the impoverishment of the rest of UK society.
I think that covers everything - can you think of any other categories?

fash

View wrote: »

We have had several reform Treaties in the EU over the last few decades (Amsterdam, Nice, Lisbon). When those Treaties were up for negotiation and ratification, the U.K. was not pushing for reforms, rather it was hostile to them and was pushing for repeated opt-outs on issues.

And the guff about “the move to a federal Europe” was covered by the special agreement that Cameron got prior to the referendum and getting it didn’t do make one iota of difference to Brexiters’ rabid hatred of the EU.

Exactly this. It's also funny to see to what extent brexiters accusations against the EU are literally projections about how they act, behave and intend to behave - from threatening to starve Ireland, weaponising Northern Ireland through to corruption (look at the UK's procurement or test and trace scandal) to unelected bureaucrats (Frost, Cummings) to a democratic deficit (stuffed house of lords), neutered parliament, barrels democratic voting system, propaganda soaked Press etc etc).

Enzokk

timetogo1 wrote: »

I don't get how the UK stockpiling in December is reducing exports in the new year.

Leroy42 wrote: »

Either do I but it has been oft mentioned, including in this thread, so just wondering what the actual numbers are.

Seems obvious, if companies in the UK stockpiled to avoid tariffs and barriers that would be introduced in the new year then companies that buy from the UK would have done the same in the EU.

Peregrinus

Enzokk wrote: »

Seems obvious, if companies in the UK stockpiled to avoid tariffs and barriers that would be introduced in the new year then companies that buy from the UK would have done the same in the EU.

Mmm. Purchasers in the EU would have less need/incentive to stockpile, since the even of UK>EU trade being impeded the would have had many alternative sources of supply. That's not to say that they wouldn't have done any stockpiling but, all other things being equal, you'd expect a lower rate of stockpiling in anticipate of Brexit by EU purchasers of UK goods than you would by UK purchasers of EU goods.

But the actual rate of stockpiling should be relatively easily identified. Were there above average imports to UK from EU, or vice versa, in the couple of months before the end of transition. If not, where's your stockpiling?

Leroy42

Enzokk wrote: »

Seems obvious, if companies in the UK stockpiled to avoid tariffs and barriers that would be introduced in the new year then companies that buy from the UK would have done the same in the EU.

Yeah, it certainly seems to make sense.

But being possible doesn't mean it happened.

It should be easy enough to show a spike in December and a dip in Jan, such that both are in line with expected.

But it seems to me like a line thrown out there as a fact without any actual evidence.

Zubeneschamali

fash wrote: »

charlatans, those who only supported Brexit because it is a grift that sells, those who actively wish to damage the UK and/or EU, xenophobes, racists, those hard of thinking, the naive, the stupid and those who get to gain personally and don't care about the impoverishment of the rest of UK society.

Perhaps you think they are covered in the above categories, but I think the English nationalists are worth a mention. I think English nationalism is only warming up, Brexit is their first win, and they like winning.

timetogo1

Enzokk wrote: »

Seems obvious, if companies in the UK stockpiled to avoid tariffs and barriers that would be introduced in the new year then companies that buy from the UK would have done the same in the EU.

Is that an assumption or are there numbers to back that up.

They must have stockpiled a lot of meat (down 59%), dairy (down 50%) and seafood (down 83%). How long can you stockpile that stuff for, and where? I don't know. It seems like a lot.

From the ONS results for December exports increased by 0.4 billion in December (I think that's in total, not just to the EU)

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/uktrade/december2020#main-points

From the ONS results for Jan they decreased by 5.6 billion to the EU.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/uktrade/january2021#main-points

Peregrinus

It's complicated, because there's generally a degree of stockpiling that goes on in Nov/Dec anyway, to prepare for (a) increased Christmas/New Year demand for many goods sold by retail, plus (b) reduced flow of goods over the Christmas/New year period because so many people take h holidays, and transport links have reduced capacity. As against that there's a short-term reduction in demand for many goods that are used as input in manufacturing or other industry, because so many factories or workshops are closed, or working at lowered capacity, so they need less inputs. All has to be netted out.

Between the jigs and the reels, though, in a typical year there is a noticable degree of increased import/export activity in the the last two or three months (relative to the rest of the year) and a sharp drop in import/export activity in January (again, relative to the rest of the year). What we know is that in the UK in January 2021 this drop was much, much greater than usual, and this was almost entirely accounted for by a greater drop in trade with EU countries, which strongly suggests that it's Brexit-related. The claim that it's offset by an equally greater-than-usual rise in import/export activity in the last quarter of 2020, representing anticipatory Brexit-related stockpiling, would be easily evidenced by producing the trade figures for those months.

(the picture is complicated by Covid, which has also led to higher than usual stockpiling levels as business seek to guard agains possible disruption of supply chains. But we can screen for that by just focussing on what happened in the October 2020-January 2021 period; the Covid pandemic had been ongoing since March 2020, and nothing happened in Q4 2020 to lead to furhter increases in Covid-related stockpiling.)

McGiver

ujjjjjjjjj wrote:

Speculation that is largely due to massive stock piling in the previous month and initial paperwork and procedure problems which will smooth out.

Yeah sure and YTY UK GDP January 2020 vs January 2021 is -9.2% (vs -7.8 predicted). That's the worst drop in GDP since before the WW2.

Surely it's nothing to do with Brexit, it's Covid and stockpiling.

Try harder.

Enzokk

Leroy42 wrote: »

Yeah, it certainly seems to make sense.

But being possible doesn't mean it happened.

It should be easy enough to show a spike in December and a dip in Jan, such that both are in line with expected.

But it seems to me like a line thrown out there as a fact without any actual evidence.

I wasn't commenting on it happening or the levels of it, just that it is easy to explain as a reason why the numbers look bad for the UK for January. It will be harder to explain the lower trade numbers in February and March, but I am sure there will be a reason given for why it was not Brexit.

rock22

54and56 wrote: »

The Tories, particularly their current leadership, don't like the GFA but are forced to accept it through gritted teeth.

...
Without strong bi-partisan support in the US for the GFA the Tories would quite happily water it down in pursuit of their great isolationist Brexit project.

I might be guilty of reading more into this press briefing than is warranted but I am less than overwhelmed by the support from the WH in US M. Martin has gotten regarding the UK breach of NI protocol.

Listening on RTE this morning and I don't feel that the US, at least the White House, really understand the threat to the GFA and how the UK position in suspending the NI protocol could undermine it.

At a Q&A session with M Martin and Jen Psaki (white house spokesperson) there was no criticism of UK . These was just an encouragement to "both the European Union and the UK government to prioritise pragmatic solutions", implying a failure on both sides.

Additionally, she seemed to direct Martin to "speak to those governments directly" , presumably not understanding that Ireland is the EU and that the problem is not with the EU side but rather with a UK government who are happy to tear up agreements as soon as the ink is dry.

It is hard to know if this is the US signalling that it wants a hands-off approach , or if it hasn't been well briefed by our diplomats. Or that UK has managed to brief much better. But any idea that Biden would be a shiny knight to come to the rescue of Ireland (and the EU) in this argument seems misplaced.

correct horse battery staple

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

That would show up as a spike in December, there wasn’t one.

They've been stockpiling since about August in anticipation, but only for non perishable products.
Those that didn't ran out of stock.

Professor Moriarty

rock22 wrote: »

I might be guilty of reading more into this press briefing than is warranted but I am less than overwhelmed by the support from the WH in US M. Martin has gotten regarding the UK breach of NI protocol.

Listening on RTE this morning and I don't feel that the US, at least the White House, really understand the threat to the GFA and how the UK position in suspending the NI protocol could undermine it.

At a Q&A session with M Martin and Jen Psaki (white house spokesperson) there was no criticism of UK . These was just an encouragement to "both the European Union and the UK government to prioritise pragmatic solutions", implying a failure on both sides.

Additionally, she seemed to direct Martin to "speak to those governments directly" , presumably not understanding that Ireland is the EU and that the problem is not with the EU side but rather with a UK government who are happy to tear up agreements as soon as the ink is dry.

It is hard to know if this is the US signalling that it wants a hands-off approach , or if it hasn't been well briefed by our diplomats. Or that UK has managed to brief much better. But any idea that Biden would be a shiny knight to come to the rescue of Ireland (and the EU) in this argument seems misplaced.

In September last year, Biden and Pelosi said that there would be no FTA with the UK if the GFA was breached.