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Politics, politics, politics

That's the only two EU agencies in Britain though - so that's limited and entirely expected.

In the context of losing 1500 jobs at these two places, 8000 new civil service jobs have been created to help the country operate post-independence.

Scarabot alert. Though a fair and well reasoned point :)

But we'll have a larger bloated government. Our Ministries are already poorly managed on the whole and inefficient. We'll lose all the knock on effects of Brits running the meds and financial agencies, the visitors, hotel facilities etc etc. In short London the UK is moving from the centre to a more peripheral position in global affairs.
 
Scarabot alert. Though a fair and well reasoned point :)

But we'll have a larger bloated government. Our Ministries are already poorly managed on the whole and inefficient. We'll lose all the knock on effects of Brits running the meds and financial agencies, the visitors, hotel facilities etc etc. In short London the UK is moving from the centre to a more peripheral position in global affairs.

Planned economy over neo-liberal economy = good

London becoming more peripheral in global affairs, and more importantly UK affairs = good

London is already the Singapore of Europe. It needs taming and some of the wealth that passes through it being used for the good of UK society instead.
 
we appear to be bending over for every hurdle on the Brexit negotiations - it was quite predictable as one side had an agenda set on principles (agree with them or not they set them out at the outset) while the other had no idea on what it really wanted or how to get it.

What cards are we actually holding?
 
we appear to be bending over for every hurdle on the Brexit negotiations - it was quite predictable as one side had an agenda set on principles (agree with them or not they set them out at the outset) while the other had no idea on what it really wanted or how to get it.

What cards are we actually holding?

That we fund 20% of the entire EU project. Without us they either have to scale back their operations significantly, or have to pass on the extra £15b pa to German taxpayers.
 
We are leaving though so that is already gone
It's part of the negotiations still - it's the bit they're insisting we give away before going on to any other topics.

If those negotiating have any sense (not a given), then they will not agree a figure before it has been used to negotiate the EU into a position we want.
 
It's part of the negotiations still - it's the bit they're insisting we give away before going on to any other topics.

If those negotiating have any sense (not a given), then they will not agree a figure before it has been used to negotiate the EU into a position we want.

Based upon how the negotiations have been going previously how likely do you think it will be that the EU will agree to move onto Trade without settling the "bill" first - binding rather than dependent upon the outcome.

I personally do not think the EU are being inflexible, they have set out the framework on what is negotiable and what is not and have stuck to this. There is flexibility in the what we chose within this framework.

We will see how it progresses as the December round is coming up fast.
 
Based upon how the negotiations have been going previously how likely do you think it will be that the EU will agree to move onto Trade without settling the "bill" first - binding rather than dependent upon the outcome.

I personally do not think the EU are being inflexible, they have set out the framework on what is negotiable and what is not and have stuck to this. There is flexibility in the what we chose within this framework.

We will see how it progresses as the December round is coming up fast.
That's not a reasonable framework by anyone's standards. You can accurately translate it to "We will discuss how many of your bargaining chips you're going to give away first, then we will discuss ours".

That's not a negotiation, that's a Diktat.

The UK position absolutely has to be that our financial contribution will be entirely dependant on the deal we have for Brexit. That if we are to be close trading nations with no tariffs then the success of the EU is in our interest and of course we will contribute to their development. If we are to be arm's length traders with no regard for our current trading relationship then fudge them, we don't pay a thing. We absolutely have to be prepared to walk if they won't move past the budget.
 
That's not a reasonable framework by anyone's standards. You can accurately translate it to "We will discuss how many of your bargaining chips you're going to give away first, then we will discuss ours".

That's not a negotiation, that's a Diktat.

The UK position absolutely has to be that our financial contribution will be entirely dependant on the deal we have for Brexit. That if we are to be close trading nations with no tariffs then the success of the EU is in our interest and of course we will contribute to their development. If we are to be arm's length traders with no regard for our current trading relationship then fudge them, we don't pay a thing. We absolutely have to be prepared to walk if they won't move past the budget.

I'm a remainer but yeah I agree with this. if we really are leaving then budget contributions need to be linked to the access we have to the common market. If there is no access then we should pay the legal minimum... but i suppose thats what they are negociating right?
 
That's not a reasonable framework by anyone's standards. You can accurately translate it to "We will discuss how many of your bargaining chips you're going to give away first, then we will discuss ours".

That's not a negotiation, that's a Diktat.

The UK position absolutely has to be that our financial contribution will be entirely dependant on the deal we have for Brexit. That if we are to be close trading nations with no tariffs then the success of the EU is in our interest and of course we will contribute to their development. If we are to be arm's length traders with no regard for our current trading relationship then fudge them, we don't pay a thing. We absolutely have to be prepared to walk if they won't move past the budget.

That's not Diktat that is outlining things which are negotiable and those that are not - there is nothing wrong with this approach and I would suggest if it really is the case its good practice (for both) to get this out in the open at the outset.

We can have that position and if we believe it to be right we should walk away - we can have principles that we wont back down from as well as we believe they are right. However it does not seem we have that position or we do not have the strength in our convictions as we have backed down consistently. From the way the negotiations are going I would suggest it implies we need them more than we do them.


*for example, I wont do anal but if you pay me for the hand job like you said you would I might do oral - this is still a negotiation.
 
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I'm a remainer but yeah I agree with this. if we really are leaving then budget contributions need to be linked to the access we have to the common market. If there is no access then we should pay the legal minimum... but i suppose thats what they are negociating right?

Legal minimum is probably zero - The EU are stating that this is payment for historical liabilities (Pensions) and things we agreed to while in the EU and future liabilities (including pensions) rather than payment for continued access (which I imagine will also come at a price). I don't actually agree with a lot of the costs the EU are adding, infrastructure projects that wont start until we leave for example, but they have been consistent that without it being sorted they will not move to phase 2. They said this at the outset and have not altered this position, it would appear that they are ok with WTO more than we would be.
 
Legal minimum is probably zero - The EU are stating that this is payment for historical liabilities (Pensions) and things we agreed to while in the EU and future liabilities (including pensions) rather than payment for continued access (which I imagine will also come at a price). I don't actually agree with a lot of the costs the EU are adding, infrastructure projects that wont start until we leave for example, but they have been consistent that without it being sorted they will not move to phase 2. They said this at the outset and have not altered this position, it would appear that they are ok with WTO more than we would be.

You are correct they would be in a much better possition with WTO tarrifs than we would be. In fact I haven't seen anything that suggest that WTO would be anything less than a clusterfudge for us.

Politically for them, it maybe better for us to be under WTO as well. As the undoubted pain we would go through would act as a huge warning for anyone else who even thought about leaving.

But if we are going to to go to WTO I don' want to pay for it as well.
 
But if we are going to to go to WTO I don' want to pay for it as well.

This is a decent position to have and one we could have - we offer £Xbn but only on completion of a deal otherwise we walk away. They have said this is non-negotiable and to then either accuse them of bullying or villainising them for having principles and sticking to what they said at the outset seems a bit pathetic, especially if we then collapse.
 
That's not Diktat that is outlining things which are negotiable and those that are not - there is nothing wrong with this approach and I would suggest if it really is the case its good practice (for both) to get this out in the open at the outset.

We can have that position and if we believe it to be right we should walk away - we can have principles that we wont back down from as well as we believe they are right. However it does not seem we have that position or we do not have the strength in our convictions as we have backed down consistently. From the way the negotiations are going I would suggest it implies we need them more than we do them.


*for example, I wont do anal but if you pay me for the hand job like you said you would I might do oral - this is still a negotiation.
A better example is "Let's negotiate how much you're paying now. Once we've done that then I'll let you know what you're getting for it"
 
This is a decent position to have and one we could have - we offer £Xbn but only on completion of a deal otherwise we walk away. They have said this is non-negotiable and to then either accuse them of bullying or villainising them for having principles and sticking to what they said at the outset seems a bit pathetic, especially if we then collapse.

Is that not what's been negotiated then? Is there a chance that we could pay 50bn and then go to WTO?

If so this is worse than I thought.
 
Is that not what's been negotiated then? Is there a chance that we could pay 50bn and then go to WTO?

If so this is worse than I thought.

I don't think so. We're not going to pay the money up front. It will be instalments (probably our usual £15b a year) through 2019-21
 
Is that not what's been negotiated then? Is there a chance that we could pay 50bn and then go to WTO?

If so this is worse than I thought.
I assume nothing's binding until the end when it's all signed.

No reason why we can't promise them £50B to get discussions moving, and then at the end knock off £30B in return for all of what they're not giving us. Not my way of doing things but Levy uses it successfully apparently.
 
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