Cont: Brexit: Now What? The Perfect 10.

[The Don]

We're abut half-way from February first and December 31. Is there a summary piece anywhere on where the negotiations stand? Is there mandatory, regular reporting so that UKers can know how it's going? Does the EU do any reporting on progress from their perspective?

Brexit just doesn't get much coverage here in the colonies lately. I just wonder how things are proceeding.

Negotiations are stalled. The UK is happy with a no deal so aren't really trying. There are rumours in the right wing media that the UK's hard line is just about to trigger a raft of unilateral concessions from the EU. Then again, they've been saying the same thing all along.

The only definitive statement from the UK government is that the transition period will not be extended under any circumstances.

Continued from here.. You may quote freely from previous editions of this thread

Posted By: Agatha

 

[Pixel42]

Is there mandatory, regular reporting so that UKers can know how it's going?

As I recall one of the first things this government did when it was returned with a decent majority was remove the requirement to report progress regularly to Parliament.

 

[Explorer]

Negotiations are stalled. The UK is happy with a no deal so aren't really trying. There are rumours in the right wing media that the UK's hard line is just about to trigger a raft of unilateral concessions from the EU. Then again, they've been saying the same thing all along.

The only definitive statement from the UK government is that the transition period will not be extended under any circumstances.

Great approach by the UK. Treat our future trading partners as adversaries, be stubborn and arrogant, time limit the negotiations in the middle of a pandemic. I just wonder at what point soon Barnier will say just do one.

 

[The Don]

Great approach by the UK. Treat our future trading partners as adversaries, be stubborn and arrogant, time limit the negotiations in the middle of a pandemic. I just wonder at what point soon Barnier will say just do one.

That's exactly what the UK government wants. That way they can have the no-deal the architects of Brexit want but can blame all negative consequences on Barnier's intransigence.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

That's exactly what the UK government wants. That way they can have the no-deal the architects of Brexit want but can blame all negative consequences on Barnier's intransigence.

Isn't that exactly what people were being called paranoid or scaremongers for predicting over the last three years? Project Fear indeed.

 

[Darat]

We're abut half-way from February first and December 31. Is there a summary piece anywhere on where the negotiations stand? Is there mandatory, regular reporting so that UKers can know how it's going? Does the EU do any reporting on progress from their perspective?

Brexit just doesn't get much coverage here in the colonies lately. I just wonder how things are proceeding.

As planned.

Unfortunately.

 

[Andy_Ross]

sleepwalking to disaster. to coin a phrase.

 

[Giordano]

That's exactly what the UK government wants. That way they can have the no-deal the architects of Brexit want but can blame all negative consequences on Barnier's intransigence.

Plus COVID-19?

 

[Mojo]

As planned.

I think “planned” is giving them way too much credit.

 

[Darat]

Yeah more like “as they wanted”.

 

[McHrozni]

That's exactly what the UK government wants. That way they can have the no-deal the architects of Brexit want but can blame all negative consequences on Barnier's intransigence.

I find it amazing some people will simultaneously believe a new deal is easy, that all UK has to do is play hardball and EU will surely yield and then blame the EU for not yielding to UK.

That's like saying "yeah, we lost the war, but it's not our fault, the enemy wasn't supposed to fight". Sure you can say that, but it does make you look Stupid^TM.

McHrozni

 

[The Don]

I find it amazing some people will simultaneously believe a new deal is easy, that all UK has to do is play hardball and EU will surely yield and then blame the EU for not yielding to UK.

That's like saying "yeah, we lost the war, but it's not our fault, the enemy wasn't supposed to fight". Sure you can say that, but it does make you look Stupid^TM.

McHrozni

If the EU would only "play by the rules" then they would yield to the UK. Instead they are "sneaky foreigners" who break the rules and hence don't yield.

Part of it is that there are two distinct groups involved in Brexit.

The architects of Brexit (Cummings, Dyson, Putin et al) are aware that the UK won't prevail simply by being obstructive and are actively using this to engineer a no-deal Brexit.

The foot-soldiers of Brexit (the UKIPpers, rank and file of the Conservative Party and Labour voters of the industrial wastelands) think that the EU will yield, simply because the UK cannot be denied.

 

[McHrozni]

If the EU would only "play by the rules" then they would yield to the UK. Instead they are "sneaky foreigners" who break the rules and hence don't yield.

Part of it is that there are two distinct groups involved in Brexit.

The architects of Brexit (Cummings, Dyson, Putin et al) are aware that the UK won't prevail simply by being obstructive and are actively using this to engineer a no-deal Brexit.

The foot-soldiers of Brexit (the UKIPpers, rank and file of the Conservative Party and Labour voters of the industrial wastelands) think that the EU will yield, simply because the UK cannot be denied.

Yeah. I can understand architects of Brexit, they're either motivated by personal greed and wish the UK to become a disaster zone they can loot, or else scheming politicians that wish to see UK become disaster zone so it's less of a threat. This later group also wishes to see EU damaged, so Brexit serves two purposes. I don't support them, in fact I think Azkaban is too good for them, but I understand their goals and motivations.

But the grunts, those I'll never understand. Look, the architects told you a plethora of lies, not one of their major Brexit claims has turned out to be factual. Why do you still believe them?

Cognitive dissonance and sunk costs suck

McHrozni

 

[Mojo]

Yeah. I can understand architects of Brexit, they're either motivated by personal greed and wish the UK to become a disaster zone they can loot, or else scheming politicians that wish to see UK become disaster zone so it's less of a threat. This later group also wishes to see EU damaged, so Brexit serves two purposes. I don't support them, in fact I think Azkaban is too good for them, but I understand their goals and motivations.

But the grunts, those I'll never understand. Look, the architects told you a plethora of lies, not one of their major Brexit claims has turned out to be factual. Why do you still believe them?

Cognitive dissonance and sunk costs suck

McHrozni

Don’t underestimate the role of xenophobia and stupidity.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Also exceptionalism and ignorance. If you have all those things it's easy to believe that the UK is in a strong position, because the UK is great. Eng-ger-land!

But the UK has far less power than the EU here. Simply because losing a single country as a trading partner may be harmful to the EU, but nowhere near as harmful as losing the entire trade infrastructure will be to the UK.

I think this time next year when there are food shortages* and medicine shortages that a portion of Brexiteers will finally start to understand what it is that they've wreaked upon this country.

*By which I don't mean that there will be nothing to eat, but that people won't be able to just eat whatever they want whenever they want. For example, we can currently eat pasta because when people panic-bought it Italy stepped up exports to the UK. If trading with Italy is borked and there are no imports to replace them, then people are going to have to get used to not having pasta every night and will have to seek out alternatives instead.

 

[The Don]

Yeah. I can understand architects of Brexit, they're either motivated by personal greed and wish the UK to become a disaster zone they can loot, or else scheming politicians that wish to see UK become disaster zone so it's less of a threat. This later group also wishes to see EU damaged, so Brexit serves two purposes. I don't support them, in fact I think Azkaban is too good for them, but I understand their goals and motivations.

Yup

But the grunts, those I'll never understand. Look, the architects told you a plethora of lies, not one of their major Brexit claims has turned out to be factual. Why do you still believe them?

Cognitive dissonance and sunk costs suck

McHrozni

The grunts don't believe that the Brexit claims have turned out not to be factually accurate. Indeed, they were told that things would go badly wrong post-Brexit and instead, basically nothing has changed. Of course this is because we're still in the transition period and so, in effect, are still in the EU but they choose not to acknowledge that.

Other things, like the fact that an extra £350m a week hasn't suddenly turned up in NHS coffers, can be blamed on the previous government which apparently has nothing to do with the current one, and that money will soon be made available.

From their perspective Project Fear is a busted flush and none of the bad things have happened and the benefits are yet to come....

 

[Andy_Ross]

You can’t keep a bad man down - but we can try.
Sacked for being a Little Englander Racist he goes on to form year another Blackshirts Lite Party AKA The Reform Party.

Now he's planning to reform the Brexit Party because he thinks Boris is losing control of Brexit.

Nothing to do with LBC dropping his radio show of course.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

You can’t keep a bad man down - but we can try.
Sacked for being a Little Englander Racist he goes on to form year another Blackshirts Lite Party AKA The Reform Party.

Now he's planning to reform the Brexit Party because he thinks Boris is losing control of Brexit.

Nothing to do with LBC dropping his radio show of course.

Context?

 

[McHrozni]

The grunts don't believe that the Brexit claims have turned out not to be factually accurate. Indeed, they were told that things would go badly wrong post-Brexit and instead, basically nothing has changed. Of course this is because we're still in the transition period and so, in effect, are still in the EU but they choose not to acknowledge that.

Yeah, but that was just one aspect of what was promised.

The other was that UK would retain all the benefits of membership, including frictionless trade with EU.

https://www.theguardian.com/politic...ds-entering-uk-will-not-apply-until-july-2021
Nope.

That's not really a minor issue, it was a promise by architects of Brexit that was broken for all to see.

How will the Irish border work, by the way?

McHrozni

 

[McHrozni]

Don’t underestimate the role of xenophobia and stupidity.

Also exceptionalism and ignorance. If you have all those things it's easy to believe that the UK is in a strong position, because the UK is great. Eng-ger-land!

Yes, yes, definitely. Those all played a major role

Germany needed two world wars to get those out of their system. UK will need Brexit, followed perhaps by Scotxit and maybe Breentryasajuniortradepartner (tacky abbervision pending) to do the same.

What will USA and China need, I wonder? Dread, even.

McHrozni