Off Topic The Politics Thread

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Should the UK remain a part of the EU or leave?

  • Stay in

    Votes: 56 47.9%

  • Get out

    Votes: 61 52.1%
  • Total voters
    117
  • Poll closed .
West WindsR said:
We’re certainly more likely to get a deal on ovens than he ever was to having an oven-ready deal.

My uneducated guess is we’ll achieve a last minute utterly pointless deal no better than what rEmAiNeR May would have got and nowhere near what we had and it’ll be celebrated like VE day in Boston and Grimsby.
Click to expand...

It'll save £11 billion a year for a start
 
I look at Brexit like a football club and losing their best player.
Basically the club wants to keep the player but the player wants to move on and further his career. The club and fans will try to stop him but ultimately he will move on.
 
bobmid said:
Fair play but let's not get up in arms about fishing when half of our quota is owned by foreign companies anyway.
Click to expand...
Bob there are many many small family run Fishing businesses that we don’t need to let down mate. I wish I could remember the news item/program that discussed this. Listening to those people really made me think. I felt gutted for them.
 
ELLERS said:
Bob there are many many small family run Fishing businesses that we don’t need to let down mate. I wish I could remember the news item/program that discussed this. Listening to those people really made me think. I felt gutted for them.
Click to expand...

I see what you did there.
 

That's just a wind up aimed at all you gammons - it's a negotiation for ****'s sake. It's the Level Playing Field that's the main sticking point for the EU, not fishing. We're going to have to agree to the Level Playing Field (something we've already committed to) and they'll let us have our fishies back.

These are Barnier's introductory remarks to a press conference held after the latest set of talks.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The need for a Level Playing Field is not going to go away.

Even if the UK continues to insist on a low-quality agreement on goods and services only.

It is a non-negotiable pre-condition to grant access to our market of 450 million citizens, given the United Kingdom's geographic proximity and the intensity of our economic exchanges.

We are asking for nothing more, but nothing less, than what Prime Minister Johnson committed to in our joint Political Declaration last October, together with the 27 EU leaders.

Here is a small reminder of those commitments – which were also endorsed by the current UK Parliament, by the way, and supported by the European Parliament.

In particular, paragraph 77, where we agreed that :

  • I quote: Our future agreement must encompass “robust commitments to prevent distortions of trade and unfair competitive advantages”;
  • And, I continue to quote: we should “uphold the common high standards applicable in the Union and the UK at the end of the transition period in these areas: state aid, competition, social and employment standards, environment, climate change, and relevant tax matters”.


Ladies and gentlemen,

That is what modern trade policy is about.

Not just lowering tariffs and removing quotas.

It's about finding agreement – between sovereign parties – on the rules that will govern future trade.

As Commissioner Phil Hogan often says, a modern trade policy must contribute to upholding – or even raising – rights and standards, in the interest of citizens, consumers and sustainable development.

We hear the British government's concerns about maintaining its sovereignty and its regulatory autonomy.

And we respect that.

But no international agreement was ever reached without the parties agreeing to common rules.

And I can predict with absolute certainty: this will also be the case of trade agreements between the UK and other partners in the future, such as the United States, Japan or Australia.



Ladies and gentlemen,

Apart from the question of a Level Playing Field, there are still many other areas where progress is needed. For example:

  • Fisheries, where we have made no progress whatsoever on the issues that matter.
  • Governance, where we are still far from agreeing on the essential issue of dispute settlement.
  • Law enforcement, where we still struggle to agree on the necessary guarantees to protect citizens' fundamental rights and personal data.
  • Mobility and social security coordination, where our positions also remain far apart.
Nonetheless, to be fully objective, I should add that, in some of the ten tables that convened this week, we were able to make progress on technical issues.

For example, on energy cooperation, participation in Union programmes, and anti-money laundering, among others.

This will be useful when it comes to consolidating, together, a final text – provided we are able to agree on fundamentals first.

However, too often this week, it felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards.

Given the short time left, what I said in London in July remains true:

Today, at this stage, an agreement between the United Kingdom and the European Union seems unlikely.

I simply do not understand why we are wasting valuable time.
 
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Stroller said:

​

That's just a wind up aimed at all you gammons - it's a negotiation for ****'s sake. It's the Level Playing Field that's the main sticking point for the EU, not fishing. We're going to have to agree to the Level Playing Field (something we've already committed to) and they'll let us have our fishies back.

These are Barnier's introductory remarks to a press conference held after the latest set of talks.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The need for a Level Playing Field is not going to go away.

Even if the UK continues to insist on a low-quality agreement on goods and services only.

It is a non-negotiable pre-condition to grant access to our market of 450 million citizens, given the United Kingdom's geographic proximity and the intensity of our economic exchanges.

We are asking for nothing more, but nothing less, than what Prime Minister Johnson committed to in our joint Political Declaration last October, together with the 27 EU leaders.

Here is a small reminder of those commitments – which were also endorsed by the current UK Parliament, by the way, and supported by the European Parliament.

In particular, paragraph 77, where we agreed that :

  • I quote: Our future agreement must encompass “robust commitments to prevent distortions of trade and unfair competitive advantages”;
  • And, I continue to quote: we should “uphold the common high standards applicable in the Union and the UK at the end of the transition period in these areas: state aid, competition, social and employment standards, environment, climate change, and relevant tax matters”.


Ladies and gentlemen,

That is what modern trade policy is about.

Not just lowering tariffs and removing quotas.

It's about finding agreement – between sovereign parties – on the rules that will govern future trade.

As Commissioner Phil Hogan often says, a modern trade policy must contribute to upholding – or even raising – rights and standards, in the interest of citizens, consumers and sustainable development.

We hear the British government's concerns about maintaining its sovereignty and its regulatory autonomy.

And we respect that.

But no international agreement was ever reached without the parties agreeing to common rules.

And I can predict with absolute certainty: this will also be the case of trade agreements between the UK and other partners in the future, such as the United States, Japan or Australia.



Ladies and gentlemen,

Apart from the question of a Level Playing Field, there are still many other areas where progress is needed. For example:

  • Fisheries, where we have made no progress whatsoever on the issues that matter.
  • Governance, where we are still far from agreeing on the essential issue of dispute settlement.
  • Law enforcement, where we still struggle to agree on the necessary guarantees to protect citizens' fundamental rights and personal data.
  • Mobility and social security coordination, where our positions also remain far apart.
Nonetheless, to be fully objective, I should add that, in some of the ten tables that convened this week, we were able to make progress on technical issues.

For example, on energy cooperation, participation in Union programmes, and anti-money laundering, among others.

This will be useful when it comes to consolidating, together, a final text – provided we are able to agree on fundamentals first.

However, too often this week, it felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards.

Given the short time left, what I said in London in July remains true:

Today, at this stage, an agreement between the United Kingdom and the European Union seems unlikely.

I simply do not understand why we are wasting valuable time.
Click to expand...

What date was this? It refers to Hogan who has been gone for some time. The fisheries ultimatum was made by Barnier in the last few days. We don't get to discuss level playing field unless we concede on fishing (where, coincidentally, a big interest comes from Barnier's fellow countrymen in France)
 
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Stroller said:

​

That's just a wind up aimed at all you gammons - it's a negotiation for ****'s sake. It's the Level Playing Field that's the main sticking point for the EU, not fishing. We're going to have to agree to the Level Playing Field (something we've already committed to) and they'll let us have our fishies back.

These are Barnier's introductory remarks to a press conference held after the latest set of talks.

Ladies and gentlemen,

The need for a Level Playing Field is not going to go away.

Even if the UK continues to insist on a low-quality agreement on goods and services only.

It is a non-negotiable pre-condition to grant access to our market of 450 million citizens, given the United Kingdom's geographic proximity and the intensity of our economic exchanges.

We are asking for nothing more, but nothing less, than what Prime Minister Johnson committed to in our joint Political Declaration last October, together with the 27 EU leaders.

Here is a small reminder of those commitments – which were also endorsed by the current UK Parliament, by the way, and supported by the European Parliament.

In particular, paragraph 77, where we agreed that :

  • I quote: Our future agreement must encompass “robust commitments to prevent distortions of trade and unfair competitive advantages”;
  • And, I continue to quote: we should “uphold the common high standards applicable in the Union and the UK at the end of the transition period in these areas: state aid, competition, social and employment standards, environment, climate change, and relevant tax matters”.


Ladies and gentlemen,

That is what modern trade policy is about.

Not just lowering tariffs and removing quotas.

It's about finding agreement – between sovereign parties – on the rules that will govern future trade.

As Commissioner Phil Hogan often says, a modern trade policy must contribute to upholding – or even raising – rights and standards, in the interest of citizens, consumers and sustainable development.

We hear the British government's concerns about maintaining its sovereignty and its regulatory autonomy.

And we respect that.

But no international agreement was ever reached without the parties agreeing to common rules.

And I can predict with absolute certainty: this will also be the case of trade agreements between the UK and other partners in the future, such as the United States, Japan or Australia.



Ladies and gentlemen,

Apart from the question of a Level Playing Field, there are still many other areas where progress is needed. For example:

  • Fisheries, where we have made no progress whatsoever on the issues that matter.
  • Governance, where we are still far from agreeing on the essential issue of dispute settlement.
  • Law enforcement, where we still struggle to agree on the necessary guarantees to protect citizens' fundamental rights and personal data.
  • Mobility and social security coordination, where our positions also remain far apart.
Nonetheless, to be fully objective, I should add that, in some of the ten tables that convened this week, we were able to make progress on technical issues.

For example, on energy cooperation, participation in Union programmes, and anti-money laundering, among others.

This will be useful when it comes to consolidating, together, a final text – provided we are able to agree on fundamentals first.

However, too often this week, it felt as if we were going backwards more than forwards.

Given the short time left, what I said in London in July remains true:

Today, at this stage, an agreement between the United Kingdom and the European Union seems unlikely.

I simply do not understand why we are wasting valuable time.
Click to expand...

No deal it is then.

Thanks.

Cheerio.
 
Goldhawk-Road said:
What date was this? It refers to Hogan who has been gone for some time. The fisheries ultimatum was made by Barnier in the last few days. We don't get to discuss level playing field unless we concede on fishing (where, coincidentally, a big interest comes from Barnier's fellow countrymen in France)
Click to expand...

Stroller won't have a bad word said about Barnier or the EU you know that.
It's only this country he has a problem with.
 
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