Effect of Brexit

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superhorns said:
The growth in the rest of the world has moved on, it makes the EU look very sluggish. Most countries manage extremely well governing themselves, they don't appear to need fiddling eurocrat types from other countries interfering with their governance.

Can we expect a German government soon? Is there more horse trading or back to another election, seems extremely chaotic.
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There is nothing chaotic about it SH. The existing coalition rules until a new government is formed, and there is a time limit for that which they are within. Britain is not used to this type of thing but nearly all other EU. countries are governed by coalitions - some of which involve more compromise than others. My own personal feeling is that the Greens will not enter such a coalition (they will lose a lot of members, including myself, if they do) - so it will probably mean new elections. This will probably lead to a result which is in no way different to the present, and costs a lot of money. So the only solution may be a minority government - in other words a government based on topics rather than party.

I should add that it is better to take the time now, than to rush into a coalition which could break down in a year's time.
 
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colognehornet said:
There is nothing chaotic about it SH. The existing coalition rules until a new government is formed, and there is a time limit for that which they are within. Britain is not used to this type of thing but nearly all other EU. countries are governed by coalitions - some of which involve more compromise than others. My own personal feeling is that the Greens will not enter such a coalition (they will lose a lot of members, including myself, if they do) - so it will probably mean new elections. This will probably lead to a result which is in no way different to the present, and costs a lot of money. So the only solution may be a minority government - in other words a government based on topics rather than party.
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Yes it took Belgium 19 months to form a government, 541 days of negotiations. I much prefer the UK's 'strong and stable' system. :emoticon-0105-wink:
 
oldfrenchhorn said:
I don't think I would wish to talk about extremely chaotic governments if I lived in the UK at present.
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France looks pretty chaotic, riots yesterday and unemployment rising again, double the UK rate. The Macron boy is losing support daily, he might have to join his investment banker mates again.
 
Prime minister Leo Varadkar wants a formal promise of no hard border between Northern Ireland and Republic. Just how low has the UK sunk when he says that he will not accept anymore vague promises, but requires it in writing? At one time you could be certain that if a verbal promise were made, it would be binding, but seemingly this is not good enough anymore.
 
oldfrenchhorn said:
Prime minister Leo Varadkar wants a formal promise of no hard border between Northern Ireland and Republic. Just how low has the UK sunk when he says that he will not accept anymore vague promises, but requires it in writing? At one time you could be certain that if a verbal promise were made, it would be binding, but seemingly this is not good enough anymore.
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Does he not realise that he's dealing with the Tory party - a party whose promises, either written or spoken, need to be taken with a pinch of salt?
 
There is a political mess in Germany with an extremely weak and unstable government. Merkel is now fighting for her survival. The far right party, AfD, already the third largest, is tipped to increase its presence if another election is called.
 
superhorns said:
There is a political mess in Germany with an extremely weak and unstable government. Merkel is now fighting for her survival. The far right party, AfD, already the third largest, is tipped to increase its presence if another election is called.
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It simply means that coalition talks have broken down. To an extent this has been a sleeping problem for a long time which was only patched over by the ability of the CDU/CSU to rule together with the SPD (the equivalent of a Conservative/Labour coalition). We have 6 parties in the Bundestag (7 if you include the CSU as separate) - 2 of which are scorned by all others in terms of possible coalition (quite wrongly in the case of Die Linke) - these 2 make up 20% of the vote. So forming any coalition is extremely difficult (other than the big 2) and I cannot see new elections producing a result which is any easier to work with. Anywhere else this would be catastrophic but in Germany less so because of the extreme decentralization of the country - the individual Federal States here are even capable of signing International agreements independently of Berlin.
On the one hand I am glad that talks have fallen through - because the Greens have come out of it well. We came over as willing to compromise and the talks were ended by the FDP and so they will take the can for this, and not us. It's also better for a coalition to fail at the negotiation stage rather than later.
But why are you so happy about the perceived fall of Merkel ? She is, after all, the leader of a sister party of the Tories.
 
colognehornet said:
It simply means that coalition talks have broken down. To an extent this has been a sleeping problem for a long time which was only patched over by the ability of the CDU/CSU to rule together with the SPD (the equivalent of a Conservative/Labour coalition). We have 6 parties in the Bundestag (7 if you include the CSU as separate) - 2 of which are scorned by all others in terms of possible coalition (quite wrongly in the case of Die Linke) - these 2 make up 20% of the vote. So forming any coalition is extremely difficult (other than the big 2) and I cannot see new elections producing a result which is any easier to work with. Anywhere else this would be catastrophic but in Germany less so because of the extreme decentralization of the country - the individual Federal States here are even capable of signing International agreements independently of Berlin.
On the one hand I am glad that talks have fallen through - because the Greens have come out of it well. We came over as willing to compromise and the talks were ended by the FDP and so they will take the can for this, and not us. It's also better for a coalition to fail at the negotiation stage rather than later.
But why are you so happy about the perceived fall of Merkel ? She is, after all, the leader of a sister party of the Tories.
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You need to concentrate a bit more, I have not shown any preference for Merkel or otherwise, just stating how much weaker she is and how the UK political system is so much better.
 
superhorns said:
You need to concentrate a bit more, I have not shown any preference for Merkel or otherwise, just stating how much weaker she is and how the UK political system is so much better.
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If by 'better' you mean less democratic then I would agree with you. Naturally, forming coalitions is sometimes difficult, but it is worth spending time on it to ensure that governments actually have the support of the majority of the electorate - time which is well worth spending in my opinion. I would rather have that than a situation where the majority are always against the government, as in the UK. It is no particular compliment to say that the UK. is the only one party state left in the EU. (where 38%-40% = majority) - North Korea is also a one party state, and has that 'strong and stable' government which you crave.
 
colognehornet said:
If by 'better' you mean less democratic then I would agree with you. Naturally, forming coalitions is sometimes difficult, but it is worth spending time on it to ensure that governments actually have the support of the majority of the electorate - time which is well worth spending in my opinion. I would rather have that than a situation where the majority are always against the government, as in the UK. It is no particular compliment to say that the UK. is the only one party state left in the EU. (where 38%-40% = majority) - North Korea is also a one party state, and has that 'strong and stable' government which you crave.
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Most in the UK are happy with our political system, it will not change. In our system the political extremes are nowhere near power which is why there is always a moderate government. Comrade Corbyn and his Marxist mate could prove the exception, hopefully not.
 
superhorns said:
Most in the UK are happy with our political system, it will not change. In our system the political extremes are nowhere near power which is why there is always a moderate government. Comrade Corbyn and his Marxist mate could prove the exception, hopefully not.
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You say that the political extremes are nowhere near power, yet Farage managed to get the whole Tory party wetting their knickers and forced the PM into a totally unnecessary referendum. Farage has had more influence than the AfD will ever have. You appear to imply that the AfD are a far right political extreme yet will not concede the same about Farage ? - yet he actually helped the AfD during their last election campaign.
 
colognehornet said:
You say that the political extremes are nowhere near power, yet Farage managed to get the whole Tory party wetting their knickers and forced the PM into a totally unnecessary referendum. Farage has had more influence than the AfD will ever have. You appear to imply that the AfD are a far right political extreme yet will not concede the same about Farage ? - yet he actually helped the AfD during their last election campaign.
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Political opponents in Germany have described the AfD as being riddled with Nazis, extremists such as these were not allowed in UKIP, which incidentally has no presence in the UK parliament.

The AfD has 94 seats in the Bundestag, they will hugely affect policy, in government or not. Farage and UKIP became successful because there was a ground swell of support, mainly about excessive immigration.
 
The Electoral Commission has re-opened an investigation into Vote Leave's EU referendum spending.

The campaign paid £625,000 to clear bills allegedly run up by university student Darren Grimes with a digital agency days ahead of last June's vote.

A separate group, Veterans for Britain, received £100,000 from Vote Leave.

The campaign denies attempting to get round spending limits.
 
Jsybarry said:
I don't know if Ak reads this thread, but if he does, is Brexit strengthening the position of those in Iceland who want to stay out of the EU?
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Jsybarry I do read some of this column sometime.

This is good to understand our relation with EU. And in English.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/03/09/from-bust-to-boom-is-iceland-a-brexiters-paradise/
https://www.express.co.uk/news/poli...n-Iceland-EU-parties-abandon-membership-dream

We were moving away from joining now trying to get in is dead. Iceland is part of Schengen agreement and we have to allow free movement of people to have access to the ESB single market and we also pay to be in! EU only wants money and the fish. We are not in EU as that would give access to our seas and we could not defend against the Spanish fishers and from Portugal also.

With our small membership of EU I think this is too much even.

Returning to answer the question. I do not think so. We are independent and see the ESB as taking that away. The political groups who wished to join had a big smack in the last election here so they are stopping the idea of joining as well, the population does not want this. We may be little but we deal with EU on our terms not theirs as much as we can. There were people on both sides of the argument wanting a vote so we could either show we wanted to join or more obviously to show we did not.
I know no person who wants to join EU and the view has not changed because of EU acting like the school bully to Britain trying to take your lunch money. We had problems and have got out of them, I do not think if we had been in the EU we would, the power would stop us like they do with Grikkland. Being a member of EU might be good if we were on european land but we are an island a long way away even then I see no reason to join.

Others may disagree. One thing I see is some of the people who want to join are not tolerant of those who do not agree with them and use some very insulting language.
 
Angela Merkel says she would prefer to have fresh elections rather than try and run a minority government. Some reports I have seen suggest that a new election could run into months, and delay the whole Brexit process. I have also seen that some opinion in Germany thinks this would actually strengthen her hand as blame will be placed not on her but the parties that refused to enter government with her. As a non-resident there however I am relying on UK and French news.
 
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