I'll give my proper thoughts when I'm slightly less under the influence. What I will say now is that, after all that has happened, if the other 26 countries DON'T bring in a financial transaction tax I will forever refer to them as that group of criminals who meet in that Belgian city tantalisingly close to The Hague.
I love these threads, you can have a rant, but then someone suggests something that you either have not considered or you think is total bollox... to suggest that the ECHR has stopped summary arrest without trial, torture etc. is nonsense. The people of these Isles have fought against tyrants since the Magna Carta, through the abolition of slavery. What has become imbalanced is politicians and political judges deciding that an individuals rights are greater than the states - how can a person whose asylum claim was rejected on the basis of EU rules bit was overturned under the ECHR on the basis that he was established in this country as he had a pet cat! This is an industry created by the likes of Mrs Cherry Bliar who make millions out of the appeal cases...
As I see it, France and Germany's intentions towards the UK were very clear. There is no bigger guarantee of French or German swing voters than being perceived to have got one over the British. There is no bigger validation of the French or German economies than to be seen to be doing better than the British (the same holds true in Britain vs the German economy). A deal to stabilise the Euro was a foregone conclusion at some point in the last quarter of this year. They wanted to either make the UK by far the largest net contributor (or castrate the City whilst failing to do so), or to try to weaken the coalition. They've achieved neither, and if anything have made damn well sure that it will stick together for the full five years. They have also weakened confidence in the treaty, because the UK's "veto" has undermined it. Credit where credit's due though, they have spun this well. Put simply, we had no choice. While on balance I'm pro-EU, we can't blindly integrate at all costs. What they were asking from us was every bit as big a price to pay as an all-out Euro collapse. As much as I like the idea of hammering the bankers, the only way we can take more off of them is by keeping them here, not by shipping off the majority of our financial services sector to America and Singapore. Love them or loathe them, and I fit into the latter category, Boris Johnson was spot on yesterday. As far as the Conservative Party is concerned, Cameron has played a blinder. There is next to no chance of the coalition collapsing after this, and the harder Labour go on this, the more likely it will be to backfire.
Great thread and interesting. However I suggest we might well keep our powder dry until after Christmas. All that has happened is a load of leaders, some not elected and some about to leave office in weeks (e.g Zapatero of Spain) have met and agreed something which only with luck will offer a tiny amount of relieve from massive debt. When the folks back home in their individual countries realise what has been surrendered and how much unemployment there will be and how much taxes will rise and pensions and benefits will fall - then the ****e will hit the fan me thinks As for the Germans and French being annoyed with the UK. That surely is a sign that they are envious of our non Euro position . As for the others they simply are annoyed with the UK because we do not want to pay their debts for them. Enjoy one and all
Spot on KC - when the Manuel's and Jean-Luca's start to realise how much being in the Euro zone will hit their back pockets and the Jean-Paul's don't give a damn and all the Eric's want to do is keep on selling them Merc's, Beamers & Audi's - there will be blood on the streets. Yesterday at work I kicked off a project to determine what will we need to be done to update our billing, AP, AR, F&A and controls systems to cope with a country leaving the Euro...I expect for a really small country like Greece it will be difficult, but for a country like Italy will will cost a fortune in consultant fees alone....
