EU referendum

[EalingBlue2]

So you'd be happy with the UK becoming an equivalent of California, speaking German and using the Euro? We should have just let Hitler get on with and saved tens of millions of lives...

I think that comment unworthy of you or this board tbh. Hitler was never about uniting Europe or economic bodies he was about the racial supremacy of the aryan and he was prepared to do anything to get that. Not fighting hitler would never have saved tens of millions of lives it may have costed even more. If the best you can do is go back to stereotypes that all Germans are nazis and that being in an economic bloc even a union with today's Germany is the same as being taken over by one of the most vile regimes in history then you have given up -

 

[CityStu]

I think that comment unworthy of you or this board tbh. Hitler was never about uniting Europe or economic bodies he was about the racial supremacy of the aryan and he was prepared to do anything to get that. Not fighting hitler would never have saved tens of millions of lives it may have costed even more. If the best you can do is go back to stereotypes that all Germans are nazis and that being in an economic bloc even a union with today's Germany is the same as being taken over by one of the most vile regimes in history then you have given up -

So apart from the Hitler bit you'd be happy?

 

[The perfect fumble]

At least in the Out campaign, it is the future they have to predict - foreseeing potential trade partners, suggesting plausible trade deals with those partners and the amount of trade that would happen with each of them.

Telling us how much we trade with the EU and how much that would cost us if we weren't an EU country seems extremely simple by comparison.

The Out campaign has nothing except made up figures and fairy tale visions of how milk and honey trade deals will spring up by this time next Thursday, how we'll enjoy all the advantages of club membership with none of its obligations.

It is madness.

No rational person could possibly buy into their vision based on anything but their gut.

 

[CityStu]

The Out campaign has nothing except made up figures and fairy tale visions of how milk and honey trade deals will spring up by this time next Thursday, how we'll enjoy all the advantages of club membership with none of its obligations.

It is madness.

No rational person could possibly buy into their vision based on anything but their gut.

You're absolutely right. Every single country outside the EU is languishing in poverty because they don't have any bizarre free trade agreements requiring them to spend billions on a central government and allow every Tom, Dick and Harry into their country. The EU, in contrast, is a thriving community with absolutely no issues whatsoever.

Oh no, wait...

 

[Chippy_boy]

You're a 1% kinda guy.

Your happy servility always makes me smile.

Your failure to come up with cogent arguments is far more amusing. Even your burger flipping comment failed miserably.

 

[Chippy_boy]

You're absolutely right. Every single country outside the EU is languishing in poverty because they don't have any bizarre free trade agreements requiring them to spend billions on a central government and allow every Tom, Dick and Harry into their country. The EU, in contrast, is a thriving community with absolutely no issues whatsoever.

Oh no, wait...

I told you Bugsyblue. This is what you are up against.

The above argument is so borked, I can hardly be bothered to reply to it, but since CityStu misses even the bleedin obvious, I'll spell it out anyway. No other country, CityStu is so dependent on the EU. You may not like that (I don't), but that's the reality of where we are today. You can't just switch off 44% of your exports without completely wrecking your economy.

That is why, unless we get a trade agrement which protects those exports, we are screwed. And about 10 times on here already, I've explained why getting such an agreement will be very difficult indeed and will take years, perhaps a decade or more, and all the time UK businesses will be in limbo, not knowing whether to invest or not, to hire people or not. The economy will stall and go into recession. It's barely out of recession as it is.

Now if we only sold 10% of our exports went to the EU, it wouldn't be so bad. But that's not the reality. We NEED to be able to continue to trade with the EU in a tariff-free way, or we are screwed.

20 out of 27 member states need to agree the terms of any new trade deal. Most of them have nothing to gain and quite a bit to lose by agreeing to the sort of terms we want. Inevitably these will be difficult negotiations and inevitably that means (a) they will take time and (b) it will involve compromise on both sides. Almost certainly, we will have to agree to things we don't want to agree to, and I would not be remotely surprised if that included having to agree to free movement of labour, payment to the EU perhaps, the working time diretive and much of the same shite we have to put up with now.

 

[CityStu]

I told you Bugsyblue. This is what you are up against.

The above argument is so borked, I can hardly be bothered to reply to it, but since CityStu misses even the bleedin obvious, I'll spell it out anyway. No other country, CityStu is so dependent on the EU. You may not like that (I don't), but that's the reality of where we are today. You can't just switch off 44% of your exports without completely wrecking your economy.

That is why, unless we get a trade agrement which protects those exports, we are screwed. And about 10 times on here already, I've explained why getting such an agreement will be very difficult indeed and will take years, perhaps a decade or more, and all the time UK businesses will be in limbo, not knowing whether to invest or not, to hire people or not. The economy will stall and go into recession. It's barely out of recession as it is.

Now if we only sold 10% of our exports went to the EU, it wouldn't be so bad. But that's not the reality. We NEED to be able to continue to trade with the EU in a tariff-free way, or we are screwed.

Over 90% of the UK's economy is not involved with the EU, since the vast majority doesn't involve importing or exporting. Also, you need to look at the trend of EU/RoW exports (graph below); that 44% is ever decreasing as we trade more and more with non-EU countries. You also assume that leaving the EU will reduce EU trade to zero, which won't be the case. Once exit agreements are triggered (which need not be immediately after the referendum) there is a 2 year grace period where trade would carry on as before to acclimatise to the exit and agree new trade deals. It's in both party's interests to get that sorted.

 

[The perfect fumble]

Your failure to come up with cogent arguments is far more amusing. Even your burger flipping comment failed miserably.

I'll cede my claim to humour as you've ceded yours to rational argument.

 

[bugsyblue]

I told you Bugsyblue. This is what you are up against.

The above argument is so borked, I can hardly be bothered to reply to it, but since CityStu misses even the bleedin obvious, I'll spell it out anyway. No other country, CityStu is so dependent on the EU. You may not like that (I don't), but that's the reality of where we are today. You can't just switch off 44% of your exports without completely wrecking your economy.

That is why, unless we get a trade agrement which protects those exports, we are screwed. And about 10 times on here already, I've explained why getting such an agreement will be very difficult indeed and will take years, perhaps a decade or more, and all the time UK businesses will be in limbo, not knowing whether to invest or not, to hire people or not. The economy will stall and go into recession. It's barely out of recession as it is.

Now if we only sold 10% of our exports went to the EU, it wouldn't be so bad. But that's not the reality. We NEED to be able to continue to trade with the EU in a tariff-free way, or we are screwed.

20 out of 27 member states need to agree the terms of any new trade deal. Most of them have nothing to gain and quite a bit to lose by agreeing to the sort of terms we want. Inevitably these will be difficult negotiations and inevitably that means (a) they will take time and (b) it will involve compromise on both sides. Almost certainly, we will have to agree to things we don't want to agree to, and I would not be remotely surprised if that included having to agree to free movement of labour, payment to the EU perhaps, the working time diretive and much of the same shite we have to put up with now.

It basically goes back to that old Great Britain mentality, the blinkered belief that we are somehow still an empire. Suddenly changing the way we trade, the way we do business, our globally political position etc will take decades to right, as you've pointed out above mate. We aren't the US, we aren't an emerging power like Brazil, we aren't a lone ranger like Switzerland, we have been ingrained in EU markets and politics for too long and make no mistake if we leave, do people really think the remaining power players in the EU, Germany and France, will give us favourable deals! Of course not, they will use it for their own benefit. If people think leaving the EU will suddenly make us less dictated to by Brussels, think again. We will be less powerful, less rich and have a much weaker hand to do trade deals. Unless all our trade is suddenly going to come from South America and Asia then we will be reliant on the European market just as we are now.

And if we start to impose visa restrictions on EU worker, trust me we will lose them eventually to growing countries in the EU that will take our slice of the pie. Then we will no doubt open our borders to workers from even more disadvantaged countries to come and clean our streets, mend our roads and serve in our restaurants and culturally, politically and financially that could prove even more complicated than some of the issues we face with EU migrants.

People always like to think the grass is greener but I just can't see how it is in this case.

 

[The perfect fumble]

You're absolutely right. Every single country outside the EU is languishing in poverty because they don't have any bizarre free trade agreements requiring them to spend billions on a central government and allow every Tom, Dick and Harry into their country. The EU, in contrast, is a thriving community with absolutely no issues whatsoever.

Oh no, wait...

This sums up the absolute vacuity of the Out argument. Point at countries outside the EU that are doing OK and say look they're alright so we'll be alright.

Why didn't I think of that? Right! I remember now, because it makes no sense.