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Comments
I think you will find it averages out at around 10b. The drop in the pound because of the Tories again must mean we are using more pounds to convert into Euro
My major gripe is the political issue. People rightly criticise our political system in the UK. European federalists have long complained that the UK is holding them back. Well now they can take their foot off the break once we are gone. One size fits all Europe doesn't work with the British mind set. We are not in schengen or the euro. Europe needs to reform politically and democratically. I had hoped for more signs of this but it is run by fundamentalist federalists who's only solution to every problem is more Europe.
The free trade agreement with the USA wanted a closed door set of lawyers to do that. The ECJ has been quite advantageous to the UK remember the ruling about clearing in Euros in London.
In trade agreements size matters which is why it is mad that we are leaving the most successful trading group on the planet and to probably result in trade barriers being put up. Complete madness justified on a tissue of lies from the likes of Boris and co.
Thanks for the guardian link. As I am sure you are aware there are articles saying the complete opposite.
You mention the EU-Japan treaty as a reason for hope that the UK will be able to have a similar treaty with Japan. The PM has also suggested this, noting that the EU treaty with Japan should be the model! If we're just photocopying EU treaties then what's the point of leaving those EU treaties?
You say that we will be able to have different standards while trading with other countries - this is the point that Brexiters keep missing. If we want barrier-free access to the Single Market then no, we cannot vary our standards as the EU will be concerned that lower-standard goods will make their way into the Single Market. They have insisted on this from the beginning, people need to stop ignoring it. It's why we have a customs unions - the Single Market is more than just a free trade area.
You also say that we buy more from the EU than they do from us. That's true (when you ignore services, anyway), but the UK is still a small fraction of their overall exports, whereas they are a very large percentage of ours. The German car manufacturers, which Brexiters have hilariously insisted will save the day against all evidence, have repeatedly insisted that the integrity of the Single Market is more important to them than the threat of barriers between them and the UK.
I don't think the democracy argument holds either. The EU is directed by the Council, which consists of representatives of the democratically elected Member States. Decisions need to be approved by the Parliament, which is directly elected. You seem to think that one country, Britain, should be able to override the pooled democratic sovereignty of 27 other countries. That isn't democracy, it's the opposite. Stop seeing things through a nationalist prism.
The point of leaving is so we can make as many decisions as possible for British people in Britain rather than some far away capital where 27 nations must agree.
Then we will leave the single market and re enter on certain terms for various sectors like Japan.
Yes we are a small part of European exports. But they have entered into an agreement with Ukraine and Japan which is even smaller.
The public are not engaged actively with politics in the EU it is far too remote and distant from the little people. It's an extra unesessary, beurocratic and costly layer. It needs to have it's powers seriously restricted and it's size shrunk. There is no need for it to do a great deal of what it does as that can be done by national or local governments. It seems to be an experiment in destroying the nation state democracies in some kind of bizarre assumption that if nationalist feeling is slowly wiped away there will be not be another world war two.
Arkady. It's bad enough having the morons in Westminster but as least we have some kind of say in kicking them out every now and again. How can I kick out Tusk or Juncker? Hardly anyone votes for their MEP or has a clue what the european parliament is dicussing because it is too remote. The more that the EU tenticles grasp little bits of the UK the less we as people will be able to have a fair say. Let's not be part of some evil empire.
Brussels is 200 miles from London so hardly far away.
Your argument that people don’t vote in EU Parliament elections because it is all to far away is false if you look at the numbers. For the most recent elections:
EU Parliament: EU average turnout 42% UK turnout at 35.6 %
UK local elections average turnout 31% so this suggests that the converse to your argument is in fact what has happened.
On the so called massively staffed EU it employs approximately 46k people working for 28 countries
UK Civil servants number nearly 440k and council employees are approx. 1 million in number.
It must be inherently more efficient to have one set of agreed rules across 28 than 28 different sets. You seem to imply that the UK has no say which again is nonsense as we are represented just like everybody else. I am not sure why you mention Junker, he was elected by political groupings in the parliament. Hague took the Tories out of the centre right group in the EU to a much more far right grouping to please the usual Tory right wingers. That completely lost Cameroons influence when the decision was made. The Tories have also consistently empty seated in EU institutions as well.
One great thing with the EU is that it very difficult to lobby it in the way that happens in the UK. How many time has Murdoch come out of the back door of no 10 with a great big grin on his face. I see Leverson 2 will not take place because of this.
It seems to be that your quite nostalgic to some sort of past that probably never existed
The rest of your post is still trapped by viewing everything through a nationalist framework. It wouldn't be democratic if the UK alone could get rid of Junker - only a majority of the Council (made up of reps of the democratically elected governments), with the approval of the democratically-elected European Parliament, has that power. The UK being able to depose Junker alone would be like Liverpool council being able to choose the UK Prime Minister over the objections of the rest of the country.
All the more reason to get out on the streets of London on Saturday.
https://peoplesmarch4eu.org/
Rise up and get out there !!!!!
Skilled technical armed forces folks don't have much trouble getting jobs that pay considerably more in civvy street than when in service up to 42% more.
There are loads of issues with lots of ex services personnel and there are great charities that help.
Barrett's will cherry pick to avoid those issues as they will mainly be interested in the bottom line.
If you want to get an idea of these issues have look at this.
https://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/-/media/Files/.../Foresight_report_9_veterans.pdf
There are round 1,000 ex service men sleeping rough and 2,500 end up in prison.
About 20,00 people leave service a year.
I don't think you should mix this up with Brexit and you should be asking the question What is the government is doing about this? , not much !
To get back on subject there will be massive issues making it more difficult for EU nationals coming here and working, you must have heard organisation after organisation saying this since the leaked Home Office papers.
Are you happy for British citizens working in the EU to be subject to biometric screening and fingerprinting?
Firms (and homeowners) exploit this source of labour and then purport the myth that British workers are lazy and rip people off because they need to pay a mortgage or rent.
It is also easy to segregate the foreign workers this way and exploit them further.
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Naturally the racism card is very handy to whip out when people state such disgusting facts.
The government (Mr D Green) has been trying to tell the "lie" again today.
This provides the background
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/impact-of-immigration-on-native-wages-infinitesimally-small-a7545196.html
This issue always goes back to the terrible productivity in the UK. France only has to work 4 days to produce the same that it takes the UK 5 days to do.
I guess when the shortages of employees start to bite that's might change as to stay in existence will mean automation so there will be less need for employees.
Also where is the export boom that Boris told us was an upside of the big devaluation of the £ due to Brexit.
Amazing how the free marketeers are suddenly all for stopping the market from determining supply and demand. You want to bet the government will be more competent than the market at 'controlling' labour supply?
Germany and Scandinavia have vastly higher numbers of immigrant workers as a percentage of the workforce, without the stagnation in wages we've seen in the UK and America. That's due to our bad choices concerning our economic model and the weakness of the unions. But no no, easier to blame immigrants despite the total lack of evidence. Dreadful.
I completely agree that our economic model, top up type benefits and the weakness (nay destruction) of the unions is the contributor but the exploitation of foreign labour is a tool that companies use, it is simple economics.
If it is not then why would they go to the expense of recruiting directly from abroad (English people must be lazy right)?
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By the way when i worked on a building site (over 15 years ago) a large firm was paying English Carpenters X and Foreign Carpenters Y.
This is because the English Carpenters could not afford to live on Y so would not work for that rate.
How long do you think it took the firm to find enough people to not pay X?
Also i wonder how whoever does these studies puts price work, cash payments, tax avoidance etc into the equation.
The dreadfulness is a general sentiment at the direction of travel. Brexit is a colossal.and costly mess with few benefits, which won't give us more sovereignty, and the problems that seem to have motivated the result - to the extent that they are real - could have been remedied by our own government without leaving.
All I am saying is i have seen firms exploit people first hand which a study says does not happen.
So according to the mainstream media i am lying, dreaming or something else?
I am simply pointing out an example of wages being eroded.
Anyway that's enough for me, I'm sure 15 links from the grauniad are heading my way.
I do agree that the tendency of people to post links from within their own media bubble to support their arguments is unpersuasive.
Of course they could be sorted out within the current model... but they are not.
I have given a first hand experience of issues, so again i am either lying or that is what happened (wage reduction via exploitation), study or no study.
As for the positives of Polish immigration, i can now get Pierogi and Bigos in Green Lane and Tyskie in the Cart and Horses in Stratford, it don't come much more positive that that (for me anyway)!
Yeah, you're right they're not. Leaving the EU will make it even harder to remedy those problems - unless we go for the very softest of Brexits we'll have to deregulate further in an attempt secure trade deals on bad terms with bad countries. Inequality, wage growth, and standards will all have to take a hit.
By the way I'm not accusing you of lying - no-one disputes that there are individual examples of undercutting - as there has always been regardless of immigration (which is why trade union are useful). The point is that the evidence shows that this is a) balanced by the additional demand created by immigration and is therefore not the cause of wage stagnation overall and b) is not an inherent problem of immigration anyway if you have the right enforcement in place.
Or just go with the normal approach and call him a thick racist.
I think (even more) deregulation has been the ultimate aim for a very long time actually.
She made that statement again the other day so she should publish the evidence.
The conversation about Brick Layer has made me notice bricks on the cycle home. I wonder how many billions there must be in London as they are absolutely everywhere and an awful lot of people must of laid them over the years.
A genuine question: Why has Vince Cable released this data now?
I know politics is probably about timing but it just genuinely seems a strange time to me if he knew this straight after the coalition ended \ when the vote was happening and is so pro-remain.