The anti terror budget is now between £12 & £15 billion or £259 million a week. Can we put that on the side of a bus.?
Off Topic The Politics Thread
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Sounds like there's finally been a breakthrough with the EU.
We are going to pay to have something nearly as good as we had before and we’ll control our banana laws. It’s a Brexit win- ring the bell!
Yep, hooray. Now let’s get on with it, we have spent far too much time bickering about this crap both with the EU and amongst ourselves. I suspect there will be a lot of discussion about what the word ‘alignment’ means. No actual agreement on the border, but a fallback in place.
15 pages of agreement. I’ll try and read it later, it’s actually quite an important historical document. £ up a bit.
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I’m told no deal is better than a bad deal so I look forward to reading about a good deal later.
Who said it’s a bad deal ? Surely some progress is a good thing....but I guess some will always look for the worst.
Don’t particularly mean you mate but just read 4 different articles about what ‘could’ happen after Brexit....the doom and gloom is just pissing me off a bit at the moment (along with trying to get two 8 year olds ready for school
)
Who said it’s a bad deal ? Surely some progress is a good thing....but I guess some will always look for the worst.
Don’t particularly mean you mate but just read 4 different articles about what ‘could’ happen after Brexit....the doom and gloom is just pissing me off a bit at the moment (along with trying to get two 8 year olds ready for school
No one has said that on here, at least not yet, but from the snippets I’ve seen on the dreaded social media it doesn’t sound great. I genuinely am looking forward to reading whatever is available over the weekend.
It’s Farage describing it as a ‘humiliation’. Also been fun listening to Gove on the wireless contradicting everything he said in the referendum campaign about the ECJ and cash to the EU.Who said it’s a bad deal ? Surely some progress is a good thing....but I guess some will always look for the worst.
Don’t particularly mean you mate but just read 4 different articles about what ‘could’ happen after Brexit....the doom and gloom is just pissing me off a bit at the moment (along with trying to get two 8 year olds ready for school
Progress is undoubtedly good mate. Keep your eye on the hard line Brexiteers.
For any anoraks like me here’s the report, so if we get into debate about it at least we have the source document to refer to. I haven’t read it yet.
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/joint_report.pdf
Sadly it’s rather complicated by the need to read about 30,000 other EU directives to make any sense of it, especially on citizens rights.
Interesting that, once you have gained permanent residency in the U.K. (or elsewhere in the EU if you are British) you can then leave your second country of residence for up to five years and still retain your rights. Also a lot of flexibility in allowing family members and ‘durable partners’ to join you in your second country.
Looks to me that the Irish thing has just been kicked down the road a bit, the principles set out will still be very difficult to implement without the U.K. staying in the Customs Union in all but name.
U.K. will continue to pay into EU budget ‘as if it had remained in the Union’ in 2019 and 2020. How Gove has the nerve to say an hour ago on Radio 4 that specifically in this period money will be released from what we pay to the EU for the NHS is utterly disgusting.
Leaving Euratom but we are committed to following its rules and standards in the future.
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/sites/beta-political/files/joint_report.pdf
Sadly it’s rather complicated by the need to read about 30,000 other EU directives to make any sense of it, especially on citizens rights.
Interesting that, once you have gained permanent residency in the U.K. (or elsewhere in the EU if you are British) you can then leave your second country of residence for up to five years and still retain your rights. Also a lot of flexibility in allowing family members and ‘durable partners’ to join you in your second country.
Looks to me that the Irish thing has just been kicked down the road a bit, the principles set out will still be very difficult to implement without the U.K. staying in the Customs Union in all but name.
U.K. will continue to pay into EU budget ‘as if it had remained in the Union’ in 2019 and 2020. How Gove has the nerve to say an hour ago on Radio 4 that specifically in this period money will be released from what we pay to the EU for the NHS is utterly disgusting.
Leaving Euratom but we are committed to following its rules and standards in the future.
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This is the significant bit regarding Northern Ireland......
49. The United Kingdom remains committed to protecting North-South cooperation and to its guarantee of avoiding a hard border. Any future arrangements must be compatible with these overarching requirements. The United Kingdom's intention is to achieve these objectives through the overall EU-UK relationship. Should this not be possible, the United Kingdom will propose specific solutions to address the unique circumstances of the island of Ireland. In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.
50. In the absence of agreed solutions, as set out in the previous paragraph, the United Kingdom will ensure that no new regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, unless, consistent with the 1998 Agreement, the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly agree that distinct arrangements are appropriate for Northern Ireland. In all circumstances, the United Kingdom will continue to ensure the same unfettered access for Northern Ireland's businesses to the whole of the United Kingdom internal market.
Looks like a fudge to me. Out of the Single Market and Customs Union but abiding by all their rules?
49. The United Kingdom remains committed to protecting North-South cooperation and to its guarantee of avoiding a hard border. Any future arrangements must be compatible with these overarching requirements. The United Kingdom's intention is to achieve these objectives through the overall EU-UK relationship. Should this not be possible, the United Kingdom will propose specific solutions to address the unique circumstances of the island of Ireland. In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.
50. In the absence of agreed solutions, as set out in the previous paragraph, the United Kingdom will ensure that no new regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, unless, consistent with the 1998 Agreement, the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly agree that distinct arrangements are appropriate for Northern Ireland. In all circumstances, the United Kingdom will continue to ensure the same unfettered access for Northern Ireland's businesses to the whole of the United Kingdom internal market.
Looks like a fudge to me. Out of the Single Market and Customs Union but abiding by all their rules?
Good news on Brexit, work in progress but hopefully a lot of the heat has been taken out of the debate with EU citizens rights more settled, the hole in the EU budget filled, agreement by Ireland north and south etc. Interesting that when Sir David Owen was interviewed by Nick Ferrari on LBC this a.m., he said Theresa May had done well. And when pressed between "well" and "very well", Owen said "very well", in finding a solution on the Irish impasse. Hopefully, after that election debacle, she'll get some credit for this.
I don't think the Northern Ireland issues have gone away, Goldie, but at least, having acceded to all of the EU's demands, we can move on to talks about a trade deal. Excellent.
Yes, Strolls, time will tell. I agree it's one thing to add words to an agreement, another to see how an arrangement works on the ground. I'm content for the UK regulations to substantially shadow those of the EU (though no legal obligation, except perhaps for Northern Ireland if that's agreeable to them), but the UK must be free to make its own trade agreements with the rest of the world and control its borders. It's interesting this precursor deal is agreed the day after Martin Schulz, leader of the second largest party in Germany, calls for a federal Europe by 2025, and for any country that won't agree to be kicked out of the organisation.
To change the subject, the Bitcoin bubble continues to expand, briefly touched $20k yesterday, before falling back to over $15k, still a massive rise in a few weeks, and a 1,500% rise this year.
Plenty of historical precedent to show where this will end, though this has now surpassed the tulip bulb bubble (seriously) of the 1630s as the biggest ever, just a matter of time before it bursts. I hope it’s soon, some private investors will suffer (some will also get very rich if they get out at the right time) and a lot of dodgy characters will suffer, without too much damage to the real economy. Hackers are apparently ‘stealing’ these fantasy chunks of value all the time, as I took great joy in pointing out to an expensive and very stupid management consultant I had the misfortune to be working with yesterday who got very moist about using the ‘block chain’ technology on which Bitcoin is built in health care.
No sympathy from me, greed never learns.
Plenty of historical precedent to show where this will end, though this has now surpassed the tulip bulb bubble (seriously) of the 1630s as the biggest ever, just a matter of time before it bursts. I hope it’s soon, some private investors will suffer (some will also get very rich if they get out at the right time) and a lot of dodgy characters will suffer, without too much damage to the real economy. Hackers are apparently ‘stealing’ these fantasy chunks of value all the time, as I took great joy in pointing out to an expensive and very stupid management consultant I had the misfortune to be working with yesterday who got very moist about using the ‘block chain’ technology on which Bitcoin is built in health care.
No sympathy from me, greed never learns.
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As long as ‘agreeable to them’ is interpreted as the people of Northern Ireland and not just the DUP.
Schulz, thankfully, is a busted flush, had a disastrous election in Germany, including a personal meltdown in public, and, after ruling out going back into coalition with Merkel, is now discussing doing just that.
Yes, agree on NI. All will become clearer as trade talks develop.
A coalition in Germany would be wind to Schulz's sails. As a past president of the European Parliament, he still has influence, and what he is saying is full square with what Junckers has been saying. It all looks as if it's going one way, but there again, not the UK's problem, and we'll deal with the EU in any form they choose for themselves