Brexit

[steveT350C]

Mrr T said:

steveT350C said:

Mrr T said:

Any number is a guess......


1- Investment Management - ........I would expect.......

2, EU Corporate Sales - ...... I would guess......

A few pages back you said you have 'seen' estimates of the job losses to be between 20 and 50k. Is what you have seen online? Link?

Whilst I guess and expect you to know more about finance than myself, guessing and expecting is not enough to convince me that UK financial services will suffer outside of EU.

I did look for links but cannot see them. Even if I did find them they are I have always said guesses.

What is clear is that while the "3m jobs depend on the EU" is clearly rubbish. The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services. Would result in a substantial number of UK financial services jobs moving to the EU. Since these tend to be higher paying jobs this will clearly have a negative effect on the UK economy. For this reason I consider Flexcit the only practical EU exit strategy.

Marvellous!

Everything is up for negotiation anyway and imho us Brits are more than capable of negotiating favourable trading agreements.

Would be nice to negotiate independently with all Commonwealth countries, who collectively are now economical larger that the EU, would it not?

Companies trade despite of, not due to, politicians. Imho this EU lot of politicians are the worst of an already tarnished bunch.

[Rovinghawk]

MarshPhantom said:

otolith said:

MarshPhantom said:

It's more meritocratic than the country being run by those with most expensive education.

I'm not really up on the social privilege of the European political elite, is it different to ours?

Me either, I can't believe many other countries are run by a bunch of school friends.

So you don''t actually know the facts but are making claims anyway?

Personally, I'd rather be governed by those with a good education than those less well educated. That's possibly just me, though.

[ATG]

s2art said:

MarshPhantom said:

otolith said:

MarshPhantom said:

It's more meritocratic than the country being run by those with most expensive education.

I'm not really up on the social privilege of the European political elite, is it different to ours?

Me either, I can't believe many other countries are run by a bunch of school friends.

France for one.
See http://www.economist.com/node/21549976

Quite. Indeed with knobs, bells and whistles on. Rotation of people from the same big school of thing btwn govt, BdF and state owned enterprises is seriously unhealthy. My old employer Credit Lyonnais apparently had a habit of making "patriotic" loans to state enterprises who would then default, then we'd get a bung in compensation from the French Treasury. Blimey, a cynic might think that was illegal state subsidies being washed through a supposed commercial bank. The clubby culture meant that the leadership really didn't see the distinction btwn Treasury, CL and state owned companies. Fortunately the EU did and a fair chunk of CL's loans got added to the national balance sheet. Which made me laugh.

[Mario149]

Rovinghawk said:

Mario149 said:

But as I understand it, I can lobby my MEP directly (MP equiv), who will lobby the Commissioners (cabinet equiv), who then put it to the European Parliament (Westminster equiv) where all MEPs vote. I'm not really seeing any extra layers here. I do see that other countries have input from Commissioner level onwards which I may not like, but that's not a layer.

Well if that's not accountability for their actions then I don't know what is.

I can't see how it's less accountable than the MP-->cabinet-->parliament we have at Westminster given that we vote for our MEPs

[davepoth]

Mario149 said:

I can't see how it's less accountable than the MP-->cabinet-->parliament we have at Westminster given that we vote for our MEPs

The big difference is that the EU parliament has no ability to introduce legislation - they can only vote on what's sent to them by the commission.

So, regardless of who you vote for, the legislative programme is determined by appointed civil servants who no EU citizen has any method of removing.

[v8250]

davepoth said:

The big difference is that the EU parliament has no ability to introduce legislation - they can only vote on what's sent to them by the commission.

So, regardless of who you vote for, the legislative programme is determined by appointed civil servants who no EU citizen has any method of removing.

Thank you, Dave...it's taken 11 pages of semi-bhin' before someone's finally explained to the part-educated precisely how the EU and EC elected system differs to independent national elections. How I wish PSE was compulsory at school...it would save an inordinate amount of time and enable the general populous to make properly informed decisions. Which, sadly, will not be the case of many come the time for Brexit and the urgent need to leave this shambolic organization.

[AJS-]

ATG said:

Every time we negotiate any deal between states we horse trade, compromise and are them bound by the agreement. That's how trade deals work, that's how UN deals are done, that's how things like the international criminal court get established. It's completely normal. How else can you conceive agreements between states being reached?

The EU is at heart a group of independent states that have agreed to abide by a set of treaties and which continues to make big decisions as a group of independent states.

Unless you think we should never be bound by any international treaty, I can't see why you'd single out EU treaties as a problem in principle. Unless of course you were just casting around for an argument to try to justify an instinctive dislike of the EU.

There definitely are things pushed through by other international deals which should not be. I would hope that outside the EU we would look at some of these and evaluate their usefulness too, and mostly likely throw some of them out.

What makes the EU stand out as more of a problem in practice and in principle is how thoroughly it supercedes national government in many areas. Compared with say NATO (which I also have reservations about, different topic) which is limited to defence cooperation, and ultimately the principle that we will stand together with our allies and treat an attack on one as an attack on all. It doesn't have a social chapter, a currency, a parliament and a commission. It doesn't make laws or raise taxes. It is an inter-government agreement, not a new level of government.

[davepoth]

Mrr T said:

I did look for links but cannot see them. Even if I did find them they are I have always said guesses.

What is clear is that while the "3m jobs depend on the EU" is clearly rubbish. The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services. Would result in a substantial number of UK financial services jobs moving to the EU. Since these tend to be higher paying jobs this will clearly have a negative effect on the UK economy. For this reason I consider Flexcit the only practical EU exit strategy.

An EU without the UK would drift to the left on finance - I'd imagine the transaction tax would become compulsory, and more expensive, and that would probably leave London as a quite attractive place to do business, even without EU membership.

[don4l]

ATG said:

don4l said:

If you think that I am wrong, then why don't you do a little research and give us some facts.

You are not likely to convince anyone with hysterical nonsense.

Here are some facts.

Last year (2014) 44.5% of our exports went to the EU. 55.5% went to the rest of the world. On that basis, the rest of the world is more important to us.

In 2014, the UK had a trade deficit of £61.6Bn with the rest of the EU, up from £11.2Bn in 1999. This tells me that we are more important to them. We are also becoming more important with each passing year.

The problem is getting worse because the UK economy is growing much faster than the rest of Europe. That means that we are buying more stuff, whic leads to an increase in imports. The rest of Europe are not buying more stuff. So our exports to Europe are not growing by as much as our imports.

Please explain which bits of the above are bks.

Anyway answered above by Bluebarge and The Economist article I linked to earlier.

The economist article was an opinion piece, and in any case it didn't dispute any of the facts that I laid out.

Your inability to highlight any errors in what I have written speaks volumes.

I've laid out some clear data. If you think that I am writing "bks" then you should be able to point out my errors.

Otherwise you risk being perceived as a bulstting bufoon.

[Mrr T]

davepoth said:

Mrr T said:

I did look for links but cannot see them. Even if I did find them they are I have always said guesses.

What is clear is that while the "3m jobs depend on the EU" is clearly rubbish. The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services. Would result in a substantial number of UK financial services jobs moving to the EU. Since these tend to be higher paying jobs this will clearly have a negative effect on the UK economy. For this reason I consider Flexcit the only practical EU exit strategy.

An EU without the UK would drift to the left on finance - I'd imagine the transaction tax would become compulsory, and more expensive, and that would probably leave London as a quite attractive place to do business, even without EU membership.

The FTT is a tax on equity trading (I think they are discussing covering equity derivatives as well but that will be difficult). So it will be payable where ever the trade takes place. It funny the UK Government is so against it but refused to remove the UK FTT called SDRT.

It really does not matter if London is an "attractive place". The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services would mean UK financial service businesses can no longer deal with EU companies.

[Scuffers]

Mrr T said:

It really does not matter if London is an "attractive place". The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services would mean UK financial service businesses can no longer deal with EU companies.

put simply, that's never going to happen.

[Mario149]

davepoth said:

The big difference is that the EU parliament has no ability to introduce legislation - they can only vote on what's sent to them by the commission.

So, regardless of who you vote for, the legislative programme is determined by appointed civil servants who no EU citizen has any method of removing.

Can our MEPs/own government not vote down, or just remove, the commissioner that represents us? If so, it doesn't seem like we can't get rid of our commissioner if we don't like him.

As for not being able to introduce legislation, fair enough, but it seems a main complaint about the EU is that there is too much legislation. If we can be part of voting down new legislation, that seems more important than where it comes from in that context

[Mrr T]

Scuffers said:

Mrr T said:

It really does not matter if London is an "attractive place". The fact is leaving the EU without remaining in the EEA or some form of agreement with the EU on financial services would mean UK financial service businesses can no longer deal with EU companies.

put simply, that's never going to happen.

I would agree but many on here seem to think we can leave the EU and the EEA and do not need any other agreements.

That's not true even for trade outside financial service where mutual standards agreements will be needed. For financial services not having an agreement with the EU would be costly.

Now the EU might agree to this but they do not have agreements covering financial services with any other country so it would not be easy.

I remain convinces Flexcit remains the only way.

[Scuffers]

Mrr T said:

I would agree but many on here seem to think we can leave the EU and the EEA and do not need any other agreements.

That's not true even for trade outside financial service where mutual standards agreements will be needed. For financial services not having an agreement with the EU would be costly.

Now the EU might agree to this but they do not have agreements covering financial services with any other country so it would not be easy.

I remain convinces Flexcit remains the only way.

still think that's over-stating it.

we have no mutual standards agreement with the US for cars, yet we still sell thousands of them there.

standards is all about complying with whatever market you want to sell into.

[FiF]

Mario149 said:

davepoth said:

The big difference is that the EU parliament has no ability to introduce legislation - they can only vote on what's sent to them by the commission.

So, regardless of who you vote for, the legislative programme is determined by appointed civil servants who no EU citizen has any method of removing.

Can our MEPs/own government not vote down, or just remove, the commissioner that represents us? If so, it doesn't seem like we can't get rid of our commissioner if we don't like him.

As for not being able to introduce legislation, fair enough, but it seems a main complaint about the EU is that there is too much legislation. If we can be part of voting down new legislation, that seems more important than where it comes from in that context

Let's not forget qualified majority voting and enhanced co-operation, systems introduced because of the difficulty getting anything approved, and in direct contravention of one of the original reasons for the opt out. Basically it was a principle that nothing would get enacted that was directly to the detriment of a single nation. That's pretty much gone now.

Then there's soft law and the open method of coordination, all interference that isn't dealt with through MEPs, but nevertheless results in shaping what controlling influences nationally. This refers to such as communications, declarations, recommendations, resolutions, statements, guidelines and special reports of the EU institutions. Nothing to do with elected representatives.

[Mario149]

I think I see what you're getting at, but there doesn't seem to be anything more outrageous than you might experience as a resident of County/Constituency X where you get something foisted onto you from Westminster that no-one in your area would ever want of their own accord.

From my PoV as someone who leans towards staying in (I genuinely feel European as well as British - lived here all my life - because of my mixed background), but is genuinely unsure of how they'd vote, the "we lose our democratic rights" argument doesn't seem to quite be stacking up as bad as I would have thought given the amount of attention it attracts.

From the info I have garnered so far, I'd be happy with the status quo (in terms of the democratic process in the EU) with say a mandatory referendum on whether the UK wants to stay in say once every 10 years.

I do think that the running of the EU lacks transparency, but not in the sense of undemocratic shady deals. For me it's the sense we don't get the visibility of the EU government that we do of Westminster. We have no "buy in" to the process that's going on like we do in our national gov. We see news on what politicians in the HoC are discussing/voting on, but hardly ever hear anything on what our MEPs are doing. And who seriously looked up the MEP they voted for the last time? I know I didn't. And I consider myself quite politically active: I follow what's going on in Westminster politics, what the issues of the day are and what positions people hold.

If we were all engaged more on EU level politics/debates/votes, I suspect we would feel less like we didn't have a voice.

Anyway, just my 2p worth

[PRTVR]

Mario149 said:

I think I see what you're getting at, but there doesn't seem to be anything more outrageous than you might experience as a resident of County/Constituency X where you get something foisted onto you from Westminster that no-one in your area would ever want of their own accord.

From my PoV as someone who leans towards staying in (I genuinely feel European as well as British - lived here all my life - because of my mixed background), but is genuinely unsure of how they'd vote, the "we lose our democratic rights" argument doesn't seem to quite be stacking up as bad as I would have thought given the amount of attention it attracts.

From the info I have garnered so far, I'd be happy with the status quo (in terms of the democratic process in the EU) with say a mandatory referendum on whether the UK wants to stay in say once every 10 years.

I do think that the running of the EU lacks transparency, but not in the sense of undemocratic shady deals. For me it's the sense we don't get the visibility of the EU government that we do of Westminster. We have no "buy in" to the process that's going on like we do in our national gov. We see news on what politicians in the HoC are discussing/voting on, but hardly ever hear anything on what our MEPs are doing. And who seriously looked up the MEP they voted for the last time? I know I didn't. And I consider myself quite politically active: I follow what's going on in Westminster politics, what the issues of the day are and what positions people hold.

If we were all engaged more on EU level politics/debates/votes, I suspect we would feel less like we didn't have a voice.

Anyway, just my 2p worth

The EU has just decided to give Turkey lots of money also give its residents travel rights throughout the EU, who do you complain to if you disagree with this action?
Who made the decision? Do you know who makes the decisions in the EU? Did you elect them? Democracy and the EU do not sit together well.

[Scuffers]

PRTVR said:

The EU has just decided to give Turkey lots of money also give its residents travel rights throughout the EU, who do you complain to if you disagree with this action?
Who made the decision? Do you know who makes the decisions in the EU? Did you elect them? Democracy and the EU do not sit together well.

exactly.

much the same as when we handed over the £1.7Bn (actually over £2B in reality) last year for no good reason.

Anybody that thinks the EU is a democracy is living in La-La land.

(I find it funny that we keep having wars in the Gulf to spread democracy, but seem to be heading the other way within the EU).

[Mario149]

PRTVR said:

The EU has just decided to give Turkey lots of money also give its residents travel rights throughout the EU, who do you complain to if you disagree with this action?
Who made the decision? Do you know who makes the decisions in the EU? Did you elect them? Democracy and the EU do not sit together well.

My MEP? Our EU Commissioner?

The main issue it seems is not one of democracy, just that we don't like some of the decisions that are being made because we don't have a "majority" or veto. That is fair enough but that and alleged lack of democracy are 2 separate issues. It's a larger version of an MP for a constituency other than my one voting a way I don't like to impose a law on me I don't like - and me not being able to vote him away.

It seems we can complain to our MEPs/Commissioner or have them removed/changed every 5 years, we just don't like that other countries have a say over things that affect us.

If you don't like other countries voting on our things, fair enough, you should vote to leave. But it shouldn't be dressed up as saying it's undemocratic and that we don't as a country have a say over what goes on in the EU

[Scuffers]

If you think the Commissioners are elected, please tell us, who ever voted for Kinnock as a Commissioner?