The now-enacted will of (some of) the people

[ml1dch]

4 minutes ago, Genie said:

As I wrote to @LondonLax I’m in no position to benefit from what I write on here. 

Its like suggesting those who comment in the dead pool thread are murderers.

And no part of this shared global experience is making you think "actually, all this petty bullshit about who beats the other side at trade and politics really doesn't matter at all"?

Not everything in life needs to have winners and losers. 

[Genie]

11 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

And no part of this shared global experience is making you think "actually, all this petty bullshit about who beats the other side at trade and politics really doesn't matter at all"?

Not everything in life needs to have winners and losers. 

It was just speculation about how the remainder of the Trade Agreements might play out given this major shift in the landscape. It wasn’t about winning, it was about how the UK could come out of this as a non-EU member as opposed to being a member.

I apologise if you think it was in bad taste. I’ve nothing to gain from it. Just thought it was worthy of discussion/debate. None of us in this forum are going to solve the virus crisis (as far as I am aware).

[tonyh29]

1 hour ago, ml1dch said:

And no part of this shared global experience is making you think "actually, all this petty bullshit about who beats the other side at trade and politics really doesn't matter at all"?

Not everything in life needs to have winners and losers. 

I don’t think he was waving the flag for “we’ve won , in your face Europe ” , I think he was speculating on a forum that likes to speculate / cut and paste from twitter  , about an outcome and looking for some discussion 

timing might not be great but I don’t think the intent was as it’s being received 

 

edit - or I could have read the next post before posting and seen that I didn’t need to respond as the OP has already done so 

Edited March 15, 2020 by tonyh29

[limpid]

3 hours ago, ml1dch said:

Mate, it's a public forum

No it is not.

[HanoiVillan]

Those who were worried that the powerful forklift of British state power would be delayed in crashing through the foam brick wall of European obstinacy on the way to 'getting brexit done' as a result of the pandemic will be relieved to learn from today's lobby briefing that:

• David Frost has recovered from coronavirus and has resumed negotiating, and of course
• We're not going to extend the transition period

[snowychap]

[bannedfromHandV]

It’s good to see we’re still intent on completely debilitating ourselves further in a time of socio-economic catastrophe.

Well done to all involved, particularly those who voted for it.

[HanoiVillan]

50 minutes ago, snowychap said:

Where do you stand on how likely they are to actually go through with this? I can't make my mind up.

[blandy]

11 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Where do you stand on how likely they are to actually go through with this? I can't make my mind up.

Guessing not that likely, personally. There are two weasel ways, perhaps? Either delay at the last moment and use virus as an "excuse" (relatively likely), or madder still, don't delay and blame the ensuing catastropork on the EU and the virus. The sane thing is to extend, obviously, especially now people have largely stopped throbbing about Leave and remain. The country will be effed enough as it is without further unnecessary Brexit damage.

[HanoiVillan]

10 minutes ago, blandy said:

Guessing not that likely, personally. There are two weasel ways, perhaps? Either delay at the last moment and use virus as an "excuse" (relatively likely), or madder still, don't delay and blame the ensuing catastropork on the EU and the virus. The sane thing is to extend, obviously, especially now people have largely stopped throbbing about Leave and remain. The country will be effed enough as it is without further unnecessary Brexit damage.

My previous assumption was the same as the one you expressed the other day - ie, for political reasons they would deny that they would ask for an extension until literally the 11th hour, when they finally succumbed to the inevitable. However, they have raised the rhetorical stakes a lot since then, by saying they wouldn't accept it even if the EU asked for it. I don't see how they've given themselves a lot of wiggle room. Of course, they could just ask for it anyway - it's not like this announcement has the force of law or anything - but they seem to be determined to raise the real possibility that we will be piling on a shift to trading on WTO rules on top of the coronavirus disaster.

Edited April 16, 2020 by HanoiVillan

[OutByEaster?]

If we have more time, people will expect us to be able to have made a plan.

 

 

[blandy]

2 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

My previous assumption was the same as the one you expressed the other day - ie, for political reasons they would deny that they would ask for an extension until literally the 11th hour, when they finally succumbed to the inevitable. However, they have raised the rhetorical stakes a lot since then, by saying they wouldn't accept it even if the EU asked for it. I don't see how they've given themselves a lot of wiggle room. Of course, they could just ask for it anyway - it's not like this announcement has the force of law or anything - but they seem to be determined to raise the real possibility that we will be piling on a shift to trading on WTO rules on top of the coronavirus disaster.

Yeah, I agree. They did the same with No Deal Brexit last year - they seem to think that it strengthens their negotiating position. It doesn't. 

[snowychap]

3 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

Where do you stand on how likely they are to actually go through with this? I can't make my mind up.

I'm in the same boat as you, I think. That is, I can't make my mind up.

I really fear that they just will bluntly say no (there's the stuff about hiding any bad Brexit effects under the Covid carpet) but I'm also sympathetic to the rational approach like this from Lewis Goodall:

 

Although everything is, to some extent, relevant to a negotiating position, I do think this is likely more an intransigent position than a gambit.

One point made by someone in one of the replies to that thread was the idea that there might be an 'interim' trade deal which largely tries to replicate the de facto of the transition period and then something more substantial is arrived at during the expected timescales thereafter, i.e. over a decade or so. That might well turn out to be the case but I don't think it solves all of the problems. It certainly doesn't solve the issue surrounding the NI Protocol - though neither would extending the transition period.

Edited April 16, 2020 by snowychap

[ml1dch]

Peter Foster on the money, as he has been pretty much since 2016.

 

 

[Enda]

Boris said he’d rather die in a ditch than extend Brexit past Oct 31.

Boris is a bluffer. Always has been. Why would the EU start taking him seriously now?

[blandy]

1 hour ago, snowychap said:

I'm in the same boat as you, I think. That is, I can't make my mind up.

An estimable one too, as with HV.

There's 2 different aspects aren't there - there's the one outlined in the twitters @ml1dch  posted above - that clearly there's no way on earth that the end of Dec is remotely sane, and that this is not hard to see, even for the numpties in the Gov't. By that measure alone extending is inevitable....But

The second thing is the behaviour of the Throbbers and Johnson (Johnson isn't a throbber, he's an opportunist). The throbbers might carry on Francoising their mentalist Union Jack propaganda, true. So that's not encouraging. But, Johnson isn't stupid. He knows what will happen (as per the twitter thread). And he's carrying the can. It's his legacy. And he's going to be back in charge. So whatever weaselling the throbber might be brewing up, I feel that the human behaviour "risk" from the throwers is at least equalled by the (unlikely as it sounds) imperative for Johnson not to fail on his key policy thingummy and have that as his legacy.

That's how I sort of came to my 75% likely (at least) to extend.

Sorry, just riffing on thought patterns really.

 

[snowychap]

25 minutes ago, blandy said:

An estimable one too, as with HV.

There's 2 different aspects aren't there - there's the one outlined in the twitters @ml1dch  posted above - that clearly there's no way on earth that the end of Dec is remotely sane, and that this is not hard to see, even for the numpties in the Gov't. By that measure alone extending is inevitable....But

The second thing is the behaviour of the Throbbers and Johnson (Johnson isn't a throbber, he's an opportunist). The throbbers might carry on Francoising their mentalist Union Jack propaganda, true. So that's not encouraging. But, Johnson isn't stupid. He knows what will happen (as per the twitter thread). And he's carrying the can. It's his legacy. And he's going to be back in charge. So whatever weaselling the throbber might be brewing up, I feel that the human behaviour "risk" from the throwers is at least equalled by the (unlikely as it sounds) imperative for Johnson not to fail on his key policy thingummy and have that as his legacy.

That's how I sort of came to my 75% likely (at least) to extend.

Sorry, just riffing on thought patterns really.

 

I think the hiding any economic impact might be a bigger deal than I was seeing earlier.

If they were to go for an extension to the transition and the rebound is later and/or not quite as big as thought (not going on OBR forecasts but just the idea that the recession from Covid will be very much temporary - questionable, I accept) then some sort of rebound which was followed by a subsequent dip caused by an even reasonably sorted out FTA could be utterly fatal to the government that oversaw it.

All of that is political.

On a wider note, is there not a possibility that a second, delayed shock to the UK economy (that other economies wouldn't be feeling - at least as harshly) would completely screw it?

[blandy]

11 hours ago, snowychap said:

If they were to go for an extension to the transition and the rebound is later and/or not quite as big as thought ...followed by a subsequent dip caused by an even reasonably sorted out FTA could be utterly fatal to the government that oversaw it.

Yes. Equally a Covid dip compounded by a Brexit no agreement cliff edge dip post December, being the final straw for many businesses etc. when other countries are recovering would be just as fatal - The combo of a badly handled virus and a badly handled Brexit.

[snowychap]

Also stuff in that tweet thread about the rejection of an EU office in Belfast and that the EU will continue to push for it.

[chrisp65]

Why on earth would they not allow an EU office in Belfast?

It’s almost like it’s just a political dick swinging game to some of them, not a solemn attempt to improve our trade income globally like wot they said.