Current Affairs EU In or Out

[hullefc]

How would a civil servant know what their masters in government are proposing, when they change their mind on what they want as much as the wind changes direction.

May is trying to appease two different and diametrically opposed views in the Tory party and different stances on the EU and it shows. Never mind the numerous u-turns she and her government has made over social care, energy price caps, national insurance contributions for the self employed etc..

But when they have to deal with reality as for instance the island of Ireland they prevaricate and are at a loss what to do. They say one thing - the Irish will have to check migrants before they come into Ireland - before it is pointed out that will not happen because of free movement. Then they say 'invisible' trade border - until it is pointed out that will not work because trade between EU and non EU countries carry a tariff. That is before they are told you cannot stop free movement of people on the island of Ireland as it is enshrined in the Good Friday Agreement.

It is no wonder that Davis begged the EU to put off any decision about the island of Ireland until 2019. But seeing that May is relying on the DUP to keep her government in power they keep bringing up that they want the north of Ireland to be treated the same as the rest of the UK and not have free movement, which puts the Tories in a right pickle with the government in the Republic. Which is then forced to say that there will not be a border on the island of Ireland and it will have to be in the North. Which in turn winds up the DUP which then threatens the Tories.

What can be said since June 2016 is that the Tories are in a mess over their EU 'negotiations'. And what can also be said is that there are financial jobs lost in the City of London. How many that eventually go, will depend on the Tories attempting to get their act together - highly unlikely. The sooner they own up and say they haven't a clue what to do the better for the UK. But unfortunately that will not happen and City jobs will keep moving abroad because of the indecision and with them the subsequent damage to the UK economy.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

How would a civil servant know what their masters in government are proposing, when they change their mind on what they want as much as the wind changes direction.

May is trying to appease two different and diametrically opposed views in the Tory party and different stances on the EU and it shows. Never mind the numerous u-turns she and her government has made over social care, energy price caps, national insurance contributions for the self employed etc..

But when they have to deal with reality as for instance the island of Ireland they prevaricate and are at a loss what to do. They say one thing - the Irish will have to check migrants before they come into Ireland - before it is pointed out that will not happen because of free movement. Then they say 'invisible' trade border - until it is pointed out that will not work because trade between EU and non EU countries carry a tariff. That is before they are told you cannot stop free movement of people on the island of Ireland as it is enshrined in the Good Friday Agreement.

It is no wonder that Davis begged the EU to put off any decision about the island of Ireland until 2019. But seeing that May is relying on the DUP to keep her government in power they keep bringing up that they want the north of Ireland to be treated the same as the rest of the UK and not have free movement, which puts the Tories in a right pickle with the government in the Republic. Which is then forced to say that there will not be a border on the island of Ireland and it will have to be in the North. Which in turn winds up the DUP which then threatens the Tories.

What can be said since June 2016 is that the Tories are in a mess over their EU 'negotiations'. And what can also be said is that there are financial jobs lost in the City of London. How many that eventually go, will depend on the Tories attempting to get their act together - highly unlikely. The sooner they own up and say they haven't a clue what to do the better for the UK. But unfortunately that will not happen and City jobs will keep moving abroad because of the indecision and with them the subsequent damage to the UK economy.

That's very much the case in the City at the moment. It's not a stampede by any means, but quite a few banks and financial institutions are shifting things outside the UK as a hedge against the indecision that is coming from Whitehall. The longer the indecision and uncertainty goes on, the bigger those hedges will become. This is an industry founded on an understanding of risk, and being kept in the dark has to be seen as a pretty big risk at the moment.

 

[bobbydigital]

You worked for the civil service. That's their raison d'etre. Don't explain anything if it can't be done in flow-chart form To be honest though, it's rather disappointing that I gave you the respect of providing a thought out reply, and you shrug your shoulders and say you can't be bothered.

He licked some stamps in a government department 30 years ago so that means he knows everything and there is an amazing secret plan going on that nobody needs to know anything about. You just have to accept everything will be fine and stop remoaning.

We are getting our white, no foreign language utopia back at the small cost of crippling the economy, you are too young to understand how good this will be so stop asking questions.

 

[Old Blue 2]

You worked for the civil service. That's their raison d'etre. Don't explain anything if it can't be done in flow-chart form To be honest though, it's rather disappointing that I gave you the respect of providing a thought out reply, and you shrug your shoulders and say you can't be bothered.

You asked for my view. I gave an overview; you went into the minutiae. Do you REALLY expect me to have all the minute details, Bruce? If you do, you're just taking the piss good-style!

The raison-d'être of the civil service is manifold. To advise, to draft, to implement, across the complete range of grades, across a complete range of Departments. Don't need flow charts when one is paying benefits, or collecting taxes. Facile, puerile, point, Bruce.

It's rather disappointing that you cannot simply see the point I make regarding the present position, and the fact that I cannot possibly see or know the in-depth details of ALL that has to be covered across a multitude of matters that are presently under consideration for discussion/agreement by our team(s) and the EU team(s).

It's not a case of shrugging my shoulders and saying I can't be bothered. I've given time to type up and explain things as best I could, and you are dismissive, even scathing of me. Take a look at yourself, Bruce...

 

[Old Blue 2]

He licked some stamps in a government department 30 years ago so that means he knows everything and there is an amazing secret plan going on that nobody needs to know anything about. You just have to accept everything will be fine and stop remoaning.

We are getting our white, no foreign language utopia back at the small cost of crippling the economy, you are too young to understand how good this will be so stop asking questions.

If you haven't got anything better to say about my time in the civil service, best you keep your mouth shut. You haven't a clue about the roles I was in during my time as a civil servant.

There is no amazing 'secret plan' (as you put it) going on. As I stated earlier, if you had bothered to read my posts properly (which I strongly suspect you haven't), discussions and plans for eventual negotiations with the EU will not be aired in public as a matter of course ever before we sit down with our EU counterparts and start those discussions/negotiations. If you think they should/would be, then you are naive in the extreme. I suggets YOU go lick some stamps. It would appear that's all your comments are fit for...

And if you don't like the piss-taking, don't indulge in it in the first place...

 

[bobbydigital]

If you haven't got anything better to say about my time in the civil service, best you keep your mouth shut. You haven't a clue about the roles I was in during my time as a civil servant.

There is no amazing 'secret plan' (as you put it) going on. As I stated earlier, if you had bothered to read my posts properly (which I strongly suspect you haven't), discussions and plans for eventual negotiations with the EU will not be aired in public as a matter of course ever before we sit down with our EU counterparts and start those discussions/negotiations. If you think they should/would be, then you are naive in the extreme. I suggets YOU go lick some stamps. It would appear that's all your comments are fit for...

And if you don't like the piss-taking, don't indulge in it in the first place...

I read your posts and the lad wasn't getting your point so I summarised your whole argument for him.

You can waste time arguing there is no secret plan, then in the very next sentence say there is a plan but the public can't know about it if you really want. You can also waste time trying to connect the irrelevance of the fact you worked as a civil servant (regardless of what you did) to the Brexit negotiations if you want, but at the end of the day you need to get to the point so I helped you with that.

 

[Old Blue 2]

I read your posts and the lad wasn't getting your point so I summarised your whole argument for him.

You can waste time arguing there is no secret plan, then in the very next sentence say there is a plan but the public can't know about it if you really want. You can also waste time trying to connect the irrelevance of the fact you worked as a civil servant (regardless of what you did) to the Brexit negotiations if you want, but at the end of the day you need to get to the point so I helped you with that.

1. Who's the 'lad'?

2. I don't know of any 'secret plan', do you? All I can say/said is that things will be moving behind the scenes. Is that not self-evident?

3. I didn't work as a civil servant to Brexit (and I never said I did), but I did work on several national plans at HQ level, some of which were implemented, others not.

4. I don't believe you helped me with anything. Don't flatter yourself that you did...

 

[peteblue]

We all could have been French.

https://www.theatlantic.com/interna...inkname=bbcnews_merger_newsuk_merger&ns_fee=0

When Britain and France Almost Merged Into One Country
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On June 16, 1940, with Nazi Germany on the brink of crushing France, British prime minister Winston Churchill and French undersecretary of defense Charles de Gaulle met for lunch at the Carlton Club in London. These two great symbols of patriotism and national independence made an incredible agreement: Britain and France should be united into a single country called the “Franco-British Union.”

This was just two weeks after British and French troops were rescued from the beaches of Dunkirk, where they had become surrounded by German troops—a story captured in the new Christopher Nolan film Dunkirk. Although that battle story is fairly well known, the accompanying political drama that almost saw Britain and France merge is now largely forgotten. But the drama of that near-fusion can help explain the origins of European integration—and the reasons why Britain ultimately pulled away from the European Union in the decision we know as Brexit.

The scheme was born of crisis. On May 10, 1940, Germany had begun a relentless Blitzkrieg assault on France, and within a month, French resistance had largely collapsed. Defeatism was rife in France, and a dramatic step was needed to encourage the country to keep fighting from its colonies, and to stop the French fleet from falling into German hands.

A European Union flag is waved in front of Big Ben outside the Parliament in London on March 28, 2017.
The plan that emerged—to unify Britain and France into a single state—was not entirely new: The idea of integrating the European countries had floated around political circles for a few years, but always seemed fantastical. Catastrophe was about to turn impossibility into official policy.

On June 14, German troops entered Paris. During the next 48 hours, British and French civil servants drafted a proposal for a “Declaration on Franco-British Union.” This was no beefed-up wartime alliance, or a plan for partial integration similar to today’s European Union. The goal was to effectively create one country. The document stated: “At this most fateful moment in the history of the modern world, the Governments of the United Kingdom and the French Republic make this declaration of indissoluble union and unyielding resolution in their common defense of justice and freedom against subjection to a system which reduces mankind to a life of robots and slaves.” This meant: “France and Great Britain shall no longer be two nations, but one Franco-British Union.”

At a stroke, hundreds of years of constitutional history would be swept away. There would be joint control of defense, foreign policy, finance, and economic policy. The two parliaments would be united, presumably with French representatives sitting in the House of Commons in London. Churchill’s private secretary said, “We had before us the bridge to a new world, the first elements of European or even World Federation.”

Events moved fast. On June 16, Churchill was personally skeptical but presented the idea to the all-party British Cabinet. He was swept along by a wave of enthusiasm. “I was somewhat surprised,” wrote Churchill, “to see the staid, solid, experienced politicians of all parties engage themselves so passionately in an immense design whose implications and consequences were not in any way thought out.” Churchill put his doubts aside and told the Cabinet, “In this crisis we must not let ourselves be accused of lack of imagination.”

Charles de Gaulle, who had arrived that morning in London, also had qualms about ending the country of France as he knew it. But de Gaulle embraced the plan as a grand move to change the course of history: “The gesture must be immediate.”

At 4:30 pm, de Gaulle telephoned Paul Reynaud, the French prime minister, who had fled the advancing Germans, going from Paris to Tours and then Bordeaux. Reynaud listened to the proposal for a Franco-British Union with mounting excitement, as he scribbled down the details. Here lay possible salvation for France. According to one eyewitness, “His eyebrows went up so far they became indistinguishable from his neatly brushed hair.” Reynaud suddenly interrupted de Gaulle. “Does he agree to this? Did Churchill give you this personally?” De Gaulle handed the receiver to Churchill, who assured Reynaud that he approved. Reynaud was “transfigured with joy.”

In London, Churchill boarded a train along with leaders of the major parties, ready for a rendezvous with destiny. The train would travel to the coast, and then the party would sail by ship to meet the French government and sign the Act of Union.

The train never left the station. The scheme collapsed as quickly as it arose. In the days prior to June 16, the French government had become consumed by defeatism, as well as anger at Britain for the perceived abandonment at Dunkirk (over 100,000 French troops had been rescued but thousands more were left behind on the beach, where they were forced to surrender to the Germans). Reynaud presented the proposal to the French Council of Ministers, but it was rejected as a British plot to seize the French empire. Marshal Pétain, 84 years old and the great hero of World War I, believed it was his duty to save France from total destruction and accept an armistice with Germany. Britain was doomed, he said, and union would be “fusion with a corpse.” Another minister concluded: “Better be a Nazi province. At least we know what that means.” Reynaud later wrote in his memoirs, “Those who rose in indignation at the idea of union with our ally were the same individuals who were getting ready to bow and scrape to Hitler.”

Looks like the French finally got what they wanted......

 

[peteblue]

I posted this yonks ago in one of these threads, but there have been a number of studies looking at the values etc. of people from around the world, and it's quite telling that in Europe, there is more division nationally than there is internationally. In other words, a resident of London (or Liverpool) has more in common with residents in Paris or Prague than they do with residents in Boston or Lincoln. That held across nations.

In a global world, the very idea of nationhood seems a bit of an anachronism to be honest.

In this Global world, can you name one nation that is actually willing to give up its nationhood....

 

[Bruce Wayne]

In this Global world, can you name one nation that is actually willing to give up its nationhood....

Come now Pete, why would a national government wish to give that up? It's akin to turkeys voting for Christmas. If you ask citizens however, then I would say things are much more fluid.

 

[peteblue]

Come now Pete, why would a national government wish to give that up? It's akin to turkeys voting for Christmas. If you ask citizens however, then I would say things are much more fluid.

I'm not so sure Bruce. I take your point about the political and ruling class who are mostly just in it for themselves, but they are the very ones who would give it up in an instance for the lure of greater power, wealth. Tony Blair wouldn't think twice about doing away with the UK if he got to be president of the EU. It's the people who generally wish to preserve their own identity, history and culture......

 

[Joey66]

I notice the Euro,against the £ has dropped to its lowest at £1-10 just as the holiday period started?

 

[Harryflashman]

I notice the Euro,against the £ has dropped to its lowest at £1-10 just as the holiday period started?

Wasn't it 1.30 euro hours before the Brexit vote ? Still got a little way to go then.

Also I'm sure I kept reading that Sterling falling was great for the economy? Isn't it a bad thing it's rallying now then , should I worry ?

 

[Joey66]

Wasn't it 1.30 euro hours before the Brexit vote ? Still got a little way to go then.

Also I'm sure I kept reading that Sterling falling was great for the economy? Isn't it a bad thing it's rallying now then , should I worry ?

It was up to 1-17 a few weeks back on the Euro- its fell back mysteriously yet gone up against the dollar at 1-30 in the same period - who says the money markets are not fixed!

 

[Brennan]

I notice the Euro,against the £ has dropped to its lowest at £1-10 just as the holiday period started?

It's great for European countries like Croatia, which is where I've just been. 1 pound gets you 8 kuna but 1 Euro only gets you 7, bizarrely.