Getting brexit done!

[Strokes]

2 hours ago, Saxondale said:

The number of people working in the fishing industry is absolutely tiny.

 

If you want to talk about the fishing industry, how about the inescapable fact that the majority of the fish and seafood that we catch in British waters is exported overseas - including to the EU. The fish we actually eat (cod basically) is imported.

 

So now they'll be tariffs on fish imports and exports. What's that going to do to the fishermen?

We catch more than we eat here, it’s not like we catch shit fish, Bass, Cod, Salmon etc. If we end up eating more of our own fish then it’s less of a carbon foot print, so it’s either good for the environment or good for the taxman. It’s a left wingers wet dream.

[Spudulike]

9 hours ago, Saxondale said:

The number of people working in the fishing industry is absolutely tiny.

 

If you want to talk about the fishing industry, how about the inescapable fact that the majority of the fish and seafood that we catch in British waters is exported overseas - including to the EU. The fish we actually eat (cod basically) is imported.

 

So now they'll be tariffs on fish imports and exports. What's that going to do to the fishermen?

There's been plenty of talk about who holds the cards in this 'negotiating' saga but what has become crystal clear is the UK hold one of the aces. Economically fishing is tiny but its politically supercharged. The EU made a huge mistake at the beginning by declaring that no FTA would be agreed without continued access to UK waters. The leverage was handed over and whilst Macron tries to protect his domestic vote he has now begun to soften his stance. He has to as his position is clearly ludicrous (Angela has more or less said so). As things stand, the French (and others) fishing fleets have no access whereas the UK offered some access on its terms. 

 

Who'd have thought that such an insignificent industry could carry so much clout. Frost has played a blinder and the EU know it. 

[Alf Bentley]

On the face of it, both the EU and UK have a lot of reasons to compromise on these final issues:

- It makes sense for the EU to compromise and accept reduced access to British waters, rather than risk having no access, causing a lot of strife at home

- It makes sense for the UK to compromise and allow guaranteed but reduced access to British waters, rather than risk losing the main market for their own catch & ending up with a more damaging deal on wider trade & other issues

- I presume that the "level playing field" problem is more like a sliding scale on which the UK needs to decide whether it wants (a) high-volume, low-friction EU-UK trade, dependent on fairly close alignment; or (b) the ability to diverge much more on social & environmental standards, state aid etc. at the cost of facing more tariff and non-tariff barriers to trade, risking loss of trade (unless British firms retain competitiveness by facing lower standards, receiving more state aid or whatever).

- It should surely be possible to resolve the issue of the UK not wanting to be subject to EU standards & supervision? It is surely possible for the UK to draft its own standards, with imports dependent on EU approval, and for the 2 parties to devise a joint supervisory body, with the ability of either one to give notice to terminate the trade agreement if either the UK feels that the EU is trying to impose unreasonable expectations or the EU feels that the UK is not engaging in fair competition, as agreed?

 

It really would be madness to end up on all sides to end up with No Deal at this point, particularly in the middle of a pandemic-induced economic crisis. It's not just the potential economic damage & logistical chaos on both sides (worst for UK & for Ireland). I joked yesterday about a second Cod War (older posters will remember clashes between British & Icelandic ships in the 70s) but that could fuel greater hostility between the EU and UK. Together with the wider trade friction, it could spill over into harm in other fields like data sharing & joint projects to combat crime and terrorism, joint diplomatic initiatives etc.

 

I was just reading how, if we end up with No Deal, it won't even be an "Australia-type deal". Not only is Australia already in negotiations with the EU for a FTA, I didn't realise that it already has a number of specific agreements.....which the UK wouldn't have under No Deal. The article said that No Deal would actually be closer to an "Afghan-type deal".....but that doesn't make for such impressive (and misleading) PR for Bullshit Boris. 

[davieG]

24 minutes ago, Alf Bentley said:

On the face of it, both the EU and UK have a lot of reasons to compromise on these final issues:

- It makes sense for the EU to compromise and accept reduced access to British waters, rather than risk having no access, causing a lot of strife at home

- It makes sense for the UK to compromise and allow guaranteed but reduced access to British waters, rather than risk losing the main market for their own catch & ending up with a more damaging deal on wider trade & other issues

- I presume that the "level playing field" problem is more like a sliding scale on which the UK needs to decide whether it wants (a) high-volume, low-friction EU-UK trade, dependent on fairly close alignment; or (b) the ability to diverge much more on social & environmental standards, state aid etc. at the cost of facing more tariff and non-tariff barriers to trade, risking loss of trade (unless British firms retain competitiveness by facing lower standards, receiving more state aid or whatever).

- It should surely be possible to resolve the issue of the UK not wanting to be subject to EU standards & supervision? It is surely possible for the UK to draft its own standards, with imports dependent on EU approval, and for the 2 parties to devise a joint supervisory body, with the ability of either one to give notice to terminate the trade agreement if either the UK feels that the EU is trying to impose unreasonable expectations or the EU feels that the UK is not engaging in fair competition, as agreed?

 

It really would be madness to end up on all sides to end up with No Deal at this point, particularly in the middle of a pandemic-induced economic crisis. It's not just the potential economic damage & logistical chaos on both sides (worst for UK & for Ireland). I joked yesterday about a second Cod War (older posters will remember clashes between British & Icelandic ships in the 70s) but that could fuel greater hostility between the EU and UK. Together with the wider trade friction, it could spill over into harm in other fields like data sharing & joint projects to combat crime and terrorism, joint diplomatic initiatives etc.

 

I was just reading how, if we end up with No Deal, it won't even be an "Australia-type deal". Not only is Australia already in negotiations with the EU for a FTA, I didn't realise that it already has a number of specific agreements.....which the UK wouldn't have under No Deal. The article said that No Deal would actually be closer to an "Afghan-type deal".....but that doesn't make for such impressive (and misleading) PR for Bullshit Boris. 

All well and good Alf but you’re not a politician.

[Saxondale]

6 hours ago, Spudulike said:

Who'd have thought that such an insignificent industry could carry so much clout. Frost has played a blinder and the EU know it. 

The problem is that The UK’s approach is “give us our propaganda-friendly fishing rights or we’ll walk away”, which is not a strong hand to play when the UK will be damaged more from no deal being reached. 

 

Plus, this government is less interested in achieving something remotely decent for the country and more interested in ‘achieving’ something that can be sold as a strongman victory to the electorate. Such as the fish bollocks.

[Saxondale]

15 hours ago, davieG said:

To be fair it didn’t used to be tiny until we joined the Common Market and Heath lied to them to get their votes promising that nothing would change. Now we have the whole of the EU fishing in waters that used to be just for British Fishermen.

I concede that it did used to be larger (though this will have been in part due to the eating habits of British people), but it was still only ever tiny in relation to any of the other industries. It’s not like we were ever like Iceland, who actually rely on fishing to sustain their economy.

[Spudulike]

3 hours ago, Saxondale said:

The problem is that The UK’s approach is “give us our propaganda-friendly fishing rights or we’ll walk away”, which is not a strong hand to play when the UK will be damaged more from no deal being reached. 

 

Plus, this government is less interested in achieving something remotely decent for the country and more interested in ‘achieving’ something that can be sold as a strongman victory to the electorate. Such as the fish bollocks.

Eh? Not a strong hand, you must be kidding (or French). If it wasn't so then Macron wouldn't be getting so hot under his beret. Propaganda works not only in the UK. 

 

The UK is not asking for its own fishing rights, it already owns them. Barniers opening gambit was to tell the UK there would be no FTA without continued access to British waters. So who is going to walk away if they don't get them? 

[davieG]

3 hours ago, Saxondale said:

I concede that it did used to be larger (though this will have been in part due to the eating habits of British people), but it was still only ever tiny in relation to any of the other industries. It’s not like we were ever like Iceland, who actually rely on fishing to sustain their economy.

Well it was twice as big even in 1990 (see image) and of course it may have been 'tiny in relation to other industries but we were then one of the worlds largest manufacturing countries.

 

I'm not sure where you get the eating habits from, I've no doubt we're probably eating less fish & chips from the chippy but we're consuming a larger, healthy variety of fish now.

 

How can a nation surrounded by sea be turned into a net importer of fish?

1990: UK exported 53% more fish than it imported

2018: UK imported 78% more fish than it exported

 

 

 

https://facts4eu.org/news/2020_jun_filleting_eu

 

Admittedly from a pro-brexit site but I'd like to think the facts stated are true.

[l444ry]

 

Brexit trade deal: Who really owns UK fishing quotas?

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/52420116

[Alf Bentley]

14 minutes ago, l444ry said:

 

Brexit trade deal: Who really owns UK fishing quotas?

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/52420116

 

A very detailed Greenpeace history of the mismanagement of the fishing industry by British Govts over decades, setting up systems that allowed UK quotas to be bought up en masse by super-rich corporations & foreign fishing interests....

https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2019/03/07/fishing-brexit-uk-fleetwood/

 

Some jaw-dropping stats in here:

 

"An Unearthed investigation last autumn found that around half of England’s quota is held on Dutch, Spanish, or Icelandic-owned “flagships”, so called because they sail under a British flag. One Dutch multinational alone controls around a quarter of English quota. By comparison, the UK’s small scale, “inshore” vessels must fish from a pool of quota amounting to less than 2%, despite making up around 79% of the UK fishing fleet. But in truth, the decline of the British fishing industry began some years before the EU’s common fisheries policy (CFP) took effect. And the quota hoppers are better understood as a symptom of a larger problem: decades of mismanagement by UK governments, which have seen fishing rights first commodified and then consolidated in the hands of a small and wealthy elite".

 

"An Unearthed investigation published last autumn found that well over a quarter of the UK’s fishing quota – 29% – was in the hands of just five families on the Sunday Times Rich List. The reach of this tiny domestic elite dwarfs the holdings of the many quota hoppers, who in total hold 13% of UK quota. Overall, more than two thirds of the UK’s fishing quota is now in the hands of just 25 companies". 

[st albans fox]

The fishing aspect is just a red herring (sorry)

 

both sides are using fishing as being the sticking point as both sides are prepared to do a deal over the fishing (it’s not a big deal financially so a compromise of sorts can be painted as a win ) 

 

the ‘level paying field’ is a far larger problem .......

[lgfualol]

[Kopfkino]

It makes you wish you'd been born German. 

 

Why, in the middle of a pandemic and the worst economic crisis for 300 years, we are teetering on completely ripping up our biggest trading relationship because we refuse to detail future subsidy regimes and hold some fantasy about the government funding trillion-dollar tech companies is beyond me. And don't get me wrong, any chance to stick two fingers up to the French is wonderful, but sacrificing a trading relationship for an industry that isn't coming back (it needs access to European markets anyway) isn't sticking two fingers up to them.

 

Off to start the campaign for a referendum for Germany to take over the UK

[Fightforever]

Why did we actually leave the EU. I know we voted for it but baring wanting all laws to be made in the UK what other good reasons were there to leave? Immigration is a dumb reason since most of it came from the outside of the eu. Fishing is about 0.5% of our economy. It just didn't seem a smart idea.

[Strokes]

5 hours ago, Fightforever said:

Why did we actually leave the EU. I know we voted for it but baring wanting all laws to be made in the UK what other good reasons were there to leave? Immigration is a dumb reason since most of it came from the outside of the eu. Fishing is about 0.5% of our economy. It just didn't seem a smart idea.

Well it was about neck and neck in 2016 actually and it’s not about stopping immigration, that would be madness. It’s about being able to control it. EU migration could be anything as it’s unrestricted, no skill, low skill, medium or highly skilled. I do think some who voted for it thought it would stop Asylum Seekers though, which is what frightens most, and people believe we can rip up the human rights act (a requirement of EU membership) and limit or stop this type of migration. 
There were many other reasons too which we’ve been over and over in countless threads and I have very little appetite to go over again but the question I would ask, is why did we join in the first place and how did it ever get to this position?

[Spudulike]

5 hours ago, Fightforever said:

Why did we actually leave the EU. I know we voted for it but baring wanting all laws to be made in the UK what other good reasons were there to leave? Immigration is a dumb reason since most of it came from the outside of the eu. Fishing is about 0.5% of our economy. It just didn't seem a smart idea.

https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/will-uk-leave-eu?utm_source=url_link

[fuchsntf]

5 hours ago, Spudulike said:

https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/will-uk-leave-eu?utm_source=url_link

All well & good, but like spudulike asks....but WHY....!!

Edited 19 October 2020 by fuchsntf

[RoboFox]

Theresa May has apparently taken to openly showing her disdain for the amount of bollocks her former colleagues are coming out with.

 

 

[lgfualol]

13 hours ago, Fightforever said:

Why did we actually leave the EU. I know we voted for it but baring wanting all laws to be made in the UK what other good reasons were there to leave? Immigration is a dumb reason since most of it came from the outside of the eu. Fishing is about 0.5% of our economy. It just didn't seem a smart idea.

People were sold a fantasy.

[Fightforever]

8 hours ago, Strokes said:

Well it was about neck and neck in 2016 actually and it’s not about stopping immigration, that would be madness. It’s about being able to control it. EU migration could be anything as it’s unrestricted, no skill, low skill, medium or highly skilled. I do think some who voted for it thought it would stop Asylum Seekers though, which is what frightens most, and people believe we can rip up the human rights act (a requirement of EU membership) and limit or stop this type of migration. 
There were many other reasons too which we’ve been over and over in countless threads and I have very little appetite to go over again but the question I would ask, is why did we join in the first place and how did it ever get to this position?

To stop the chances of another world war happening by making Europe closely tied together?

[Spudulike]

1 minute ago, Fightforever said:

To stop the chances of another world war happening by making Europe closely tied together?

That'll be the United Nations (not EU). 

[Strokes]

1 minute ago, Fightforever said:

To stop the chances of another world war happening by making Europe closely tied together?

It can’t even stop war happening on its doorstep, Bosnia anyone.

[Fightforever]

3 minutes ago, Spudulike said:

That'll be the United Nations (not EU). 

I know that European union started off as trading block but didn't it start after WW2. I know it was a crucial part of the thinking that lead to making it happen.

Edited 19 October 2020 by Fightforever

[Fightforever]

2 minutes ago, Strokes said:

It can’t even stop war happening on its doorstep, Bosnia anyone.

I never said they were good at it.

[Alf Bentley]

15 minutes ago, Strokes said:

It can’t even stop war happening on its doorstep, Bosnia anyone.

 

That was a poor advert for EU diplomacy - though it didn't involve EU nations and was a tough task sorting out murderous tensions between different ethnicities within a collapsing ex-communist state.

 

But the pre-EU history was of 2 murderous and destructive conflicts in 40 years between all the main players in Europe, in which countless millions died or had lives ruined.

Before that, there were centuries of on-off conflict between those main nations of Europe (Britain, France, Germany/Prussia, Russia, Spain, Ottomans etc.)....