Enda

If you like checks and balances, then you should not like monarchies. Lizzie is, by all accounts, an outstanding lady and a fine representative for your country. What if she weren't, and if her offspring was a bit of a knob? Very hard to place a check and balance on that. Presidents are elected, are placed up for re-election, and their kids are not deigned to be the best person for the job. I accept the current monarch is a good one, but the system is terrible. Unless you don't trust people to vote for presidents, but then there are words to describe that too. Widely used by academics, but refuted right here on VT. Come on snowy, you're being argumentative for the sake of it.

Lads, your a monarchy can be both constitutional and theocratic. Those two things are not exclusive. Your monarch is the head of the Established/official church, and Catholics are forbidden from holding the post. How is that not theocratic? What adjective would you use to describe that, other than theocratic?

Right, right. So you're arguing that conventions (which fwiw are typically unwritten, and almost certainly judicially unenforceable) as the basis of your written constitution rather than accept the well-established point that constitutions that are in any way reliant on unwritten conventions are referred to as "unwritten constitutions"? Are you a member of the UK's Brexit negotiating team?

Who said anything about foolproof? Great, can you link to it as a PDF please? Head of State, by genetic line, automatically made leader of the established church. Not a monarchical theocracy, but the UK is a theocratic monarchy.

Your Irish neighbour politely suggests you lot abolish your theocratic monarchy, adopt a written constitution, and implement a system of PR. (Isn't it weird how such sensible suggestions are absolutely hated by hardline English nationalists?)

After winning man of the match in the Ireland match at the weekend, he's just opened the scoring against Georgia with a beauty of a free kick.

Maybe. Bruce can still turn the team around, he's only had two years, give him time

Bit harsh on Tony there, snowychap. I think he was sort of thinking out loud in a "sure everyone is biased to some degree" kind of way.

This has been clear since the EU announced its requirements for the WA. Obviously we can't just let the UK undermine the entire customs union. You joking?

Not quite. Ireland, as part of the EU, will enforce a border if the UK/NI departs from EU customs rules. That's accepted as a reality, we don't care about the cost it's not that expensive in the grand scheme of things to hire a few hundred customs agents. The thing is we will not agree to a preferential deal (i.e. non-WTO) with you that will require a border.

I'm seriously considering just buying matches from other clubs' websites. Middlesbrough's streaming service offering the game today for a pound less than Villa.

The bar closes in an hour, and the owner is preparing to close up shop. The British Parliament says it wants to keep drinking all night long, and told the PM to make it happen... but refused to sign the extension forms she brought back.

Jack's beard keeps reminding me of this.

Did that commentator just say "MON is well thought of at Aston Villa, having really turned the club around?" Lol.

I think that's two matches in a row where he's mucked up his control and had to take a yellow card to prevent a goalscoring opportunity.

That tackle

He is good at football.

A thumping victory.

Forgot we had a match today, did I miss anything?

As someone from a smaller nation, I strongly disagree that France and Germany run it for themselves. The EU is quite a weak institution. That's not an accident. It's limited in its ability to affect change outside of its narrowly defined remit.

Schengen, EMU, "ever closer union". You boys got more slack from the EU than anyone. You literally even got a discount on membership!

For all we know Japan might bring in new regulations next year requiring all beef sold in their country be free range, organic, and be certified as having taken 6 hours of cow yoga -- in which case no EU farmer could sell beef to Japan, and tariffs just aren't that relevant in that scenario. So, not quite. Someone asked why Japan would have more bargaining power if the UK wanted low tariffs. My original point was that the EU has different standards to Japan. Not saying good or bad, just different. And with different standards, tariffs aren't the real issue. I accept the horse meat in Tesco thing wasn't the best example.

Good thread. I never knew South America had a formal customs union, nevermind that Argentina had inserted clauses about the Falklands into it. Smart move by them, in fairness. Northern Irish Border, Part Deux.

Agreed. I have been thinking about the UK media's complaints about "EU red tape" -- something tells me it raises standards in Latvia and Romania (no offence to these countries) far more than it does in the UK or France. Nobody really makes the argument that the majority of EU regulations come from the the likes of the UK dictating to poorer countries which minimum standards they'll accept.

It's not about tariffs. Tariffs are a small part of modern FTAs. It's also about things like food standards. The EU has regulations in place so you can trace your steak from Tesco back to the farmer. This isn't cheap but the members of the EU have (rightly or wrongly) agreed that the extra cost is worth it for food safety. I doubt Japan has these costly regulations, giving it a bit of an advantage of EU farmers. So we need to negotiate a compromise on food safety standards -- maybe something like the exporter has to be able to trace it to the farmer, but not necessarilky the retailer. Then there's debate about what hormones you allow to be injected into cattle, and which chemicals you allow in fertilizer. There's no point in zero tariffs on Japanese beef if we wouldn't let it in on food safety grounds. It's also about fair competition. Let's suppose Japan are subsidising their solar panels like mad. Letting them flood the EU/UK market with solar panels would kill domestic industry. But both countries probably agree that green energy should get promoted, so you need to agree a "reasonable" amount of subsidy for solar panels. That "reasonable" amount is up for negotiation. It's also about information sharing. Generally speaking, VAT is refundable for intermediate goods when it crosses an international border. At a minimum that might require the Japanese customs people to email the EU/UK a spreadsheet with a list of all tax compliant companies in Japan, and the EU/UK to email them back a list of goods imported/exported by them. But then you might want to exempt small companies (say, less than 10 employees) from all that paperwork. The EU and Japan might have different ideas about what's a small company (5 employees versus 25 employees). That's negotiable. It's also about dispute mechanisms. You need some panel to settle arguments. Who gets to pick the independent member(s)? What happens if the panel rules against you? What happens if the Green Party get elected in Japan and want to increase subsidies for solar panels? Can you appeal to the WTO? Again, all negotiable.