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

[tonyh29]

i don't claim to be Caril Volderman when it comes to figures but , what am I missing ??

55-44 = 11

21- 7 = 14

[blandy]

3 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

i don't claim to be Caril Volderman when it comes to figures but , what am I missing ??

55-44 = 11

21- 7 = 14

Do you really want to know? Maths geek style? I will if you like, but it's a bit dull.

[tonyh29]

1 minute ago, blandy said:

Do you really want to know? Maths geek style? I will if you like, but it's a bit dull.

I want a numbers board setup in your living room whilst you prove my figures taking 2 from the top line , 3 from the second line and 1 from the next 2

[Risso]

19 hours ago, blandy said:

I agree on the first part. TTIP as currently being planned is bad. It's an indicator of much that is wrong with the EU. Unfortunately people generally aren't aware of the dangers. One of those IPSOS Mori people came round a while back and asked what I thought about a whole range of stuff. When I mentioned TTIP she said "what?" So someone surveying a load of people on political views had never heard of it, never heard anyone mention it.

We only know about it because a few MEPs, mainly Greens, have raised a stink about it, then others have cottoned on. Tories are generally (politicians I mean) strongly in favour and they are fine with what's being done. They opposed steps to exclude the NHS from it's provisions.

Pragmatically if we leave, England will be worse off on TTIP because the tories are more in favour of it than the EU generally. In the EU there's hope that the bad parts of it will be taken out. Leave and we're goosed.

That said the way it's being done to date by the EU is appalling, and in some ways enough to make me think "Leave".

I think a lot of people are very aware of the dangers, but have quietly gone about forgetting about them while the Brexit referendum takes place.  "Hey Mr Socialist, you claim that the EU is a force for good, but what about that secretive and evil TTIP you were banging on about a few months ago?"  "Look, a squirrel!"

[blandy]

5 minutes ago, Risso said:

I think a lot of people are very aware of the dangers, but have quietly gone about forgetting about them while the Brexit referendum takes place.  "Hey Mr Socialist, you claim that the EU is a force for good, but what about that secretive and evil TTIP you were banging on about a few months ago?"  "Look, a squirrel!"

Yeah, fair comment, though I still think in the wide world out there, it's barely registered with people.

Both sets of campaigns are massively ignoring things and shouting "squirrel" rather than openly debating and discussing the pros and cons. I bet if someone from one of the campaigns was asked to name 10 things the EU has done which support the other side's views, they'd be able to, but wouldn't actually dare say so.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, tonyh29 said:

15 years ago it was 55% so that suggests we have increased trade with other markets as the EU one has shrunk , what is to say outside of the EU we can't expand that 11% growth further ?

you say Germany and France account for less than 7% of their trade but we still account for 21% of the EU's  trade ... If Germany and France want to keep Europe in line I would imagine sabotaging those other nations 14% to prove a point won't go down well  ?

 

46 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

i don't claim to be Caril Volderman when it comes to figures but , what am I missing ??

55-44 = 11

21- 7 = 14

Oh go on then. Very simplistic answer: If 21% of the 27 other EU nations exports are to the UK, but France's export percent to UK  is 7%, and Germany's also 7%, then statistically the other nations would have to "make up" for the shortfall from France and Germany not pulling their weight. So the others would need to export more than 21% each (rather than the 14% you said) to bring the overall figure to 21%.

The actual figure is skewed in reality as France and Germany are much bigger traders than most of the other 25, so it would mean the other 25 on average sell us even more percentage wise.

(By the way the 21% figure is complete rubbish anyway, but the maths doesn't invalidate your post.  . If you want actual fact, rather than UKIP nobhead figures, then you can look at a  pdf file for 2014 on the EU website, then remove all the UK figures and re-do the sums, and you get 16%.)

Oh and there's a supposition in your first sentence which is wrong as well :), but I won't go there.

[OutByEaster?]

Obama's visit is pushing me towards out. I'm in favour of staying in an EU where it's possible to stop TTIP - but judging by the President's comments on how long it would take the UK to negotiate a separate trade deal, there's absolutely nothing that suggests it's not already a fait accompli. 

It's becoming increasingly clear as we go along that TTIP is the basis for the referendum and the reason why it's happening, immigration is the red herring being used by the press to occupy the public and influence the voting, but what matters to the politicians and the people they really represent is TTIP and the corporatisation of democracy. 

The President offers a choice, stay in and be part of the gang (under US corporate rule), or cling to freedom for another five or ten years and suffer the economical consequence - for me, I'll take the principal of freedom and hope something changes before we're individually consumed.

I'm still holding out for what I really want though which is to be part of an EU that isn't run by corporate America through TTIP.

 

 

[Xann]

25 minutes ago, blandy said:

Oh go on then...

Can't believe you made Pete do that on a Sunday, Tony

 

Edited April 24, 2016 by Xann

[tonyh29]

41 minutes ago, blandy said:

 

Oh go on then. Very simplistic answer: If 21% of the 27 other EU nations exports are to the UK, but France's export percent to UK  is 7%, and Germany's also 7%, 

 

Tbf that was me misreading the OP and thought 7% was combined rather than each ... Rather than my bad maths 

 

Edited April 24, 2016 by tonyh29

[blandy]

3 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

Tbf that was me misreading the OP and thought 7% was combined rather than each ... Rather than my bad maths 

FFS - can't read, can't count 

[tonyh29]

3 minutes ago, blandy said:

FFS - can't read, can't count 

That reads like several of my school reports ..

Edited April 24, 2016 by tonyh29

[chrisp65]

2 hours ago, tonyh29 said:

15 years ago it was 55% so that suggests we have increased trade with other markets as the EU one has shrunk , what is to say outside of the EU we can't expand that 11% growth further ?

you say Germany and France account for less than 7% of their trade but we still account for 21% of the EU's  trade ... If Germany and France want to keep Europe in line I would imagine sabotaging those other nations 14% to prove a point won't go down well  ?

Dept for Business Innovation & Skills - UK Trade Performance

Quote

UK imports and exports of goods and services totalled 1,256 billion USD in 2009, equivalent to 4.3% of world trade. Over the decade of 1998-2008, UK’s exports of goods and services increased 99.8%

That report takes us up to and including the crash. Even accounting for the 2008 crash, that still left trade with the EU massively increased over where it had been a decade earlier. As a percentage, yes, trade with the EU has shrunk since 2001. As a figure, it's increased. We export more to the EU now than we did in 2001. But we also export even more than we did to the rest of the world. 

But the EU is not a shrinking market, it's growing slower than others.

thanks, I'll get my coat....

 

[HanoiVillan]

1 hour ago, Risso said:

I think a lot of people are very aware of the dangers, but have quietly gone about forgetting about them while the Brexit referendum takes place.  "Hey Mr Socialist, you claim that the EU is a force for good, but what about that secretive and evil TTIP you were banging on about a few months ago?"  "Look, a squirrel!"

Nope, that's not it. 

'Save Britain from TTIP' is not an option on the ballot paper, nor is 'Save the NHS'. There is no option for saving Britain from TTIP. If you vote REMAIN, you have to hope that the worst of TTIP is curbed in Brussels and/or that the Tories negotiate certain opt-outs. If you vote LEAVE, well then you get a government of Tories (who are totally, to a man woman and child, in favour of TTIP) negotiating trade deals with every developed and developing country on Earth. There's no reason to assume that Boris Johnson's government is going to be any less amenable to lobbying multinational corporations than the current one is, the only difference is we'll be negotiating from a position of considerably less strength. 

[blandy]

58 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

There is no option for saving Britain from TTIP.

To be fair, if we leave, then we will not be part of TTIP between EU and America....but, you're right that if (as the Out people claim) the US will rush to do a deal with the UK, then as we have a Tory Gov't, the same flaws with TTIP would apply to any UKTTIP,  probably to worse effect. But if the Out people are talking rubbish (they are) about the US and UK rapidly agreeing a deal, it may be that by the time we come to do one, the flaws in it, as they impact the continent will be more widely apparent and so no such deal would happen.

[HanoiVillan]

8 minutes ago, blandy said:

To be fair, if we leave, then we will not be part of TTIP between EU and America....but, you're right that if (as the Out people claim) the US will rush to do a deal with the UK, then as we have a Tory Gov't, the same flaws with TTIP would apply to any UKTTIP,  probably to worse effect. But if the Out people are talking rubbish (they are) about the US and UK rapidly agreeing a deal, it may be that by the time we come to do one, the flaws in it, as they impact the continent will be more widely apparent and so no such deal would happen.

My point is that a bad deal doesn't have to be named TTIP, or negotiated with the US, for it to be a bad deal. In the event of Brexit, we will need to renegotiate trade deals with a large number of countries. The people who will be doing that renegotiating, on our behalf, are the very same people who are enthusiastically ushering in TTIP because it fulfills all their wet dreams. 

[Risso]

7 hours ago, blandy said:

FFS - can't read, can't count 

What do you do?

 

[snowychap]

..

Edited April 25, 2016 by snowychap

[blandy]

11 hours ago, Risso said:

What do you do?

This n' that. More this than that. Why?

[tonyh29]

2 hours ago, blandy said:

This n' that. More this than that. Why?

Adam Ant Fail  .. Don't worry @Risso , one of us got it  

 

[blandy]

26 minutes ago, tonyh29 said:

Adam Ant Fail  .. Don't worry @Risso , one of us got it  

I'd wondered if it was a FFS song and actually looked up the album track listing, and when I found nothing gave up on that score. There was a title I could have used in response (track 12) but I didn't want Risso to take it in the wrong way.