advertisement


Brexit: give me a positive effect (2023 ‘Epic Fail’ box set edition)

eternumviti said:
Enough now.


Well, we know you love a bit of that.

You still in Paris?
Click to expand...
Heading back this week.. Had to pop back to Edinburgh for a few days to sort something out. Meeting two old friends for dinner tomorrow night, he’s Tory anti-Brexit, she is Tory pro-Brexit but we try not to speak about it and stick to art and music and we’re fine.
 
PsB said:
All true. I would have thought that the romantic in you would agree that there's nothing wrong with a bit of art (or even artifice) now and then. More seriously, what's wrong with fabricating new structures when needed? The EU is a newfangled construction, definitely work-in-progress, but it serves many useful purposes, as we've argued before:
Click to expand...
I'd missed this, bullet points and all. I dread to think that there might be a powerpoint presentation coming down the line!

If it's a summary of what the EU does, it is remarkable if only for the considerable number of omissions! Or is it just a summary of the EU's 'useful' purposes', as you put it?

PsB said:
  • It drafts, agrees and administers common rules for a single market where people, goods and services can move, work and live reasonably freely
Click to expand...
Fairly uncontentious, at least at face value.

PsB said:
  • It negotiates and enforces FTAs with trade partners wanting to sell into this SM
Click to expand...
Quite interesting, because was been one of the areas in which the EU has been uncharacteristically actually democratic. It of course makes absolute sense that the Commission would represent the countries of the EU (for which, as you said above, it administers the Single Market) in negotiating trade deals with 3rd countries. The (democratic) issue is that the negotiated deals then have to be voted on and approved in 38 national and regional parliaments within the EU. Given that the member countries (and relevant regions) each have their own interests to play in the bigger game, it has rendered the EU notably inefficient at completing and ratifying FTAs. Sure, it has signed off many deals, but mostly with small and either fairly or very insignificant economies, and even they often took years. Until, I think, 2010, it hadn't scored any really major players - San Marino, Serbia, Montenegro, Faroe Islands anybody? Andorra, St.Kitts? Yay!

In 2010 South Korea was signed, but didn't wrangle its way into full ratification until 2015. There followed a slightly unseemly post-brexit rush to complete and ratify a number of major players. Canada was held up over investment protection clauses not dissimilar to those which thankfully scuppered the proposed TTIP, and nearly shot down in flames by plucky Wallonia. Even now it hasn't completed the hurdles of ratification, though it is in force. Then, with Singapore and Vietnam, the Commission, with the collusion of the ECJ, carried out a power grab designed to exclude the consent of the member states from the process (almost) altogether. The Commission first 'split' the deals into trade and investment protection components, (extended to 'political co-operation' with the still uncompleted Mexico & Mercosur deals). The ECJ then used a ruling with the Singapore deal to decide that national parliaments would have to approve those components of the deal that didn't relate to trade, thus releasing the trade components to bypass national parliaments and be approved purely at Commission level - a sleight of hand that harked back to the early days of the EEC when the ECJ (then manned by a selection of ex-Nazi and Vichy administrators) was the dominant force in the process of the centralisation of power. And with the ECJ/Commission, where there's precedent, there will always be consolidation.

Now you might think that the exclusion of national parliaments, and thus democracy, from the very complex process of drawing up and approving trade deals is a good thing, but were it the case, then we would already have the TTIP. You may indeed think that would be a good thing, but if so, you're out on your own.

PsB said:
  • It generally provides member states with some added clout in a world increasingly dominated by superpowers
Click to expand...
One could argue that the EU's foreign policy record is 'lacking'. It is a superpower for sure, but largely only a regulatory one.

PsB said:
  • and deals with the occasional member that wants to re-negotiate or leave.
Click to expand...
Its record there is, dare I say, rather better.

PsB said:
The existing organization has come a long way. Most members think it does a useful job for a reasonable budget. If it didn't exist, somebody would certainly have to invent it.
Click to expand...
God, I'd hope they'd make a better job of it!

Of course, the EU does very much more than you included in your bullet point list, but that's for another day, and who knows, perhaps a powerpoint presentation!
 
TheDecameron said:
Heading back this week.. Had to pop back to Edinburgh for a few days to sort something out. Meeting two old friends for dinner tomorrow night, he’s Tory anti-Brexit, she is Tory pro-Brexit but we try not to speak about it and stick to art and music and we’re fine.
Click to expand...
Much to be said for that. Perhaps we ought to try it.
 
eternumviti said:
Much to be said for [sticking to art and music]. Perhaps we ought to try it.
Click to expand...
If only it were that simple ;). Here's some art:
170508114704-banksy-brexit-2-super-tease.jpeg

And here's some (quite dreadful) music:
 
UK was outward looking for 3 centuries. There was a military leading edge to it unfortunately, but there was also a confidence, some awareness of fair-play and openness to the world.
Seems to me that is finally gone now. The UK seems inward looking, short-term and small-minded.
 
“The Govt is committed to providing the most advanced border in the world”. They’ll begin by reclassifying EU fruit and vegetable imports as higher than the currently defined risk. This will automatically add £200 million in new red tape in this sector alone, which you and I will pay.


Welcome to the world’s most advanced turnip monarchy
 
A few updates:

Lord Forst has been appointed to some important parliamentary committee on climate. He is a climate denier (or very close to being one).

New Brexit trade checks scheduled for later this month are projected to cost £330 million. That would pay for a few nurses.

And as has been noted up-thread, our exceptional trade negotiators have been out-foxed by the Canadians. Time to send in the King.
 
Sue Pertwee-Tyr said:
To be fair, I completely agree that hormone treated beef is a red line we should not waver on holding firmly to. I hope that practice, and the associated US practice of treating livestock with antibiotics, never find acceptance over here.
Click to expand...
Of course, absolutely. But it's just another failure in a series of failures, and we weren't getting hormone treated beef pre-Brexit!
 
Sue Pertwee-Tyr said:
To be fair, I completely agree that hormone treated beef is a red line we should not waver on holding firmly to. I hope that practice, and the associated US practice of treating livestock with antibiotics, never find acceptance over here.
Click to expand...
That line is a sound one, but as long as the UK sticks to it that FTA with Canada could remain elusive. It took the EU more than a decade to negotiate CETA without caving on hormone beef.

EV, is it time to make ironic comments about how long it's taking the UK to get a good FTA signed with Canada? It should take less time than with the unwieldy EU, surely? No Wallonia or Romania to slow things down.
 
PsB said:
That line is a sound one, but as long as the UK sticks to it that FTA with Canada could remain elusive. It took the EU more than a decade to negotiate CETA without caving on hormone beef.

EV, is it time to make ironic comments about how long it's taking the UK to get a good FTA signed with Canada? It should take less time than with the unwieldy EU, surely? No Wallonia or Romania to slow things down.
Click to expand...
CETA isn't uncontroversial, as there are potential issues with the investor state tribunal mechanisms which potentially allow Canadian (and US corporations with Canadian subsidiaries) to sue EU states over non-discriminatory obligations, the biggest bone of contention with the TTIP deal. As far as the time it took, negotiations commenced with its antecedant in 2004, and with CETA itself in 2008. The deal was completed in 2014 and signed in 2016, but ratification is still only partial, so about 20 years so far.

It is in many respects a better deal for Canada than the one obtained by the UK with the EU, and was carried out with a small but very effective Canadian negotiating team whose services were informally offered to the UK post 2016 as I recall, but turned down, presumably on account of the unswerving brilliance of our own people such as David Davis and Laird Frost.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.


advertisement


Back
Top