Sadly, This Is What Our Once Great Democracy Is Coming To

I don't need to live in the UK to know that the country has recently signed trade deals with countries such as Switzerland and Chile...even though you stated NO trade deals had been signed.

I don't have to live in the UK to access GDP figures. etc etc etc

By the way, I find it interesting that if I comment on football in the UK I don't know what I'm talking about as I don't live in the UK, and yet you happily comment on the NFL despite not living in the US.

Likewise, if I comment on political or social issues that in some form involve the UK I don't know what I'm talking about as I don't live in the UK, and yet you happily comment on political and social issues pertaining to the US even though you don't live there.

Hmm, so how do you explain Chile's recent trade deal with the UK. Maybe Argentina and Spain forgot to talk to them!

Would that be the one where we export £571 million in exports to Chile and they export £718 million in imports to us...?

Wow, that's setting the world on fire. And besides that, in the EU we already had a trade deal with Chile that was worth more in exports than imports.

Yep.... old Liam "Air Miles" Fox really set up a good 'un there.

to put things another way, in the EU Britain had £117 billion in trade arrangements with the countries that we are currently attempting to set up trade deals with. So far only £16 billion of that has been secured. So, we're £101 billion down before we start..!! Nice one, Liam.

Another great deal that good old "Air Miles" has secured is with the Faroe Islands. We export £16 million to them and import £229 million from them. Whoopee...!!

Before the Referendum, David Davis (former DExEU Minister) promised " There will be 40 ready to sign trade deals in our back pocket when they haul the Union Flag down in Brussels "

So far, only 7 of the 69 countries we had automatic deals with in the EU are agreed (the other 5 are Mauritius, Madagascar, Zimbabwe, The Seychelles and Switzerland). In all those cases, we will import more than we export. They're getting the better half of the deal..!! .

And that doesn't include the 27 EU member states who it is becoming more and more likely by the day if Britain leaves the EU without a departure agreement (the "No Deal" scenario) we will have to conduct individual talks with after Brexit. That means having to conduct 27 sets of individual negotiations with 27 individual countries because we will have reneged on the divorce bill and the Irish backstop.

The Irish border question will STILL not have gone away.

I suggest you read the piece I've linked to by Bonnie Greer about how much trouble we could be stirring up with the US over Ireland. I'm hoping the Americans on here will have something to say about that because if Brexit with No Deal is bad, then it's going to be worse if we upset the Americans too.


Culled from The Guardian 13 Feb 2019

Only £16bn of the UK's £117bn trade deals have been secured post-Brexit

Country UK Goods exports, £m % of UK goods exports UK Goods imports, £m % of UK goods imports Post-brexit trade agreement?

Chile 571 0.2% 718 0.2% Yes


Full article:

Trade Deals - If You Can Call Them That.

Now, I've indulged you enough for today. I have to get to pick my daughter up from school...... that's a place where you go to learn things, such as, oh, for instance.... what "analogy" means.

An even more accurate analogy would be that the husband planned and paid for a trip his wife wanted to go on, but then she met a guy down the street while he was off working in the mines, started having a fling and decided she didn't want to go on holiday as the cost would come out of her divorce settlement as she kicked him out, falsely accused him of committing indeceent acts with the children and took half of his salary, the house and car.

I think I'll stick with my analogy, thanks. It's the accurate one.

Although Shadey is getting a little closer to the truth. Yes, for sure we have found the administrative issues more challenging.... or those who voted for Brexit have.

Remainers were trying to get their message out about the Irish Border problem, trade issues, the economy, disaster capitalists, the certain crisis in the NHS when all the migrant doctors and nurses have finally left, the loss of security co-operation with EU security agencies, and the fact that the EU is a rules based organisation that cannot discard its' rules to benefit the one that is leaving to the detriment of the 27 that remain so there could be no "cake and eat it" scenario.

Leave campaign told the country that we would leave the EU and retain all the benefits of being in it such as frictionless trade and OUR freedom of movement in Europe even though we were going to deny FOM to EU citizens, and other benefits of membership such as being a part of multi-national research and development projects. Also we would lose our fishing and agriculture payments which means fishermen and farmers who rely on that money would no longer get it. The government has not committed to replacing those funds from Exchequer sources.

We would get all this for nothing because (quoting now) "We hold all the cards in the negotiations" Here was another winner: "Europe needs us more than we need them." And I've saved the best for last: "We will get the easiest trade deal in history with the EU when we leave."

Yeah.... it's really worked out that way, eh..?



All our warnings were dismissed as "Scaremongering" and "Project Fear". And yet these are the issues that are staring us in the face now.



So yes.... for a sizeable part of our population the difficulties have been more problematic than THEY anticipated, but for the sole reason that they believed the pack of lies that Leave Campaign fed the public.

I didn't swallow any of that BS for a moment.

If you don't believe me, read the words of Pascal Lamy, the former Director General of the World Trade Organisation under whose rules UK may soon have to trade:

Former WTO Leader Says A No Deal Brexit Is Like Jumping Off A Cliff Without A Parachute

Snip from article..

“What happens in the next days is you move down from first league to fourth league, and you have to apply tariffs, borders, controls and I’m not talking about specific arrangements of airlines, capital markets, nuclear safety. It’s not ready, nobody is ready, for a no deal, which is by the way the reason I think it will not happen. People are wise enough not to jump off the cliff without a parachute,” Lamy said.


Still scaremongering...?
Still Project Fear...?

I believe you blocked me some time ago, but that's ok. I thought I'd respond anyway.

Of course this is not "project fear." The UK should be terrified of leaving the EU.

How could the UK ever possibly exist alone in the world? It needs to give up its own democracy and sovereignty to an unaccountable group of anti-democracy leaders in the EU because the world is a scary place and England could never make it on its own...

I mean, sure, Australia, New Zealand, America, China and most countries in the world can and do, but the Uk couldn't possibly!

[/sarcasm]

I don't think I've ever blocked anybody on here. Not even Shadey..!! and Lord knows I'd have good reason to do it.

Bloody hell.... I didn't even block Boxer and he was utterly vile. Shadey's only guilty of being an "Aussie Male" and that's not his fault, it's just an accident of birth and a cultural anomaly.*

I get your sarcasm and to be honest, you're not really very good at it so I won't bother retorting in that vein.

Rather, I'll give the forum this to be going on with....

Corrupt Referendum Cannot Be Legally Challenged Because The Outcome Was Advisory, Not Legally Binding

In short, the Leave Campaign have already been found guilty of malpractice during the referendum and legal proceedings against others, including Aaron Banks who financed a major Leave programme are being investigated by the Serious Crime Agency.

But a Barrister who wanted to have the referendum result annulled on the grounds of the corruption and criminality already proven has NOT been given leave to challenge the outcome by the Court of Appeal.

It goes like this: If the referendum vote had been legally binding, it would already have been declared null and void. There is no doubt whatsoever that criminal activity took place which clearly affected the outcome. No doubt at all.

But the government was not under any legal obligation to implement the referendum result. Instead, they put the result to Parliament who, at that time, knew nothing of the criminality.

Parliament, in ignorance at that time of what had gone on, accepted the referendum result and in effect, ratified it.

The Court of Appeal verdict states that because Parliament voted to accept the referendum result, it must stand.

OK.... that's the law and we have to go with it, but it still doesn't alter the fact that we are being taken out of the EU by criminality and corruption.

Is there not therefore a moral duty to hold a second referendum....? The first result is clearly tainted and unreliable as a genuine vote. A banana republic wouldn't accept the outcome in those circumstances.

Not only that, a precedent has now been set that gives a green light to any corrupt agency to unlawfully affect the outcome of a future public vote on any issue. This verdict is a loophole that must be plugged. And soon.

The (alleged) "Will Of The People" is meaningless if the people were affected by corrupt practices or were lied to.....as we were on both counts.





*Aussie / Pom banter.... he understands and can handle it..... it's all a part of our love / hate relationship.

So the argument goes that because the leave campaigners spent too much in fighting the overwhelming pro remain propaganda the vote should be void because that extra spending duped the people?

It sounds like that old trope about how anyone who disagrees with me is an idiot that the left love to push on the unwary and the weary.

And yet despite living 12,000 miles away, and despite not receiving "non-stop 24 hour...coverage", I knew that the UK had signed trade agreements before you did!

Umm, that would be the trade deal that you so confidently stated didnt exist!


Your above statement was made AFTER the trade deal with Chile was publicly announced!

You do realise that Chile is a South American country? Funny how the UK signed a trade deal with this South American country without the Falklands being put on the negotiating table. Maybe Spain and Argentina didnt realise Chile was in South America.

Hmmm, interesting. Now one of my points was that you were wrong when you said that the UK had not completed ANY trade deals. How did I know you were wrong? I did a bit of research (took less than 5 mins to find multiple sites detailing trade deals). Then, you finally do a little bit of research (something you should have done BEFORE your original post) of your own re UK trade deals. This research was presumably done to debunk my assertion that you were wrong and that trade deals had infact been completed. And what did you find? Well it's clear by your post that you - like me - found that the UK had made trade deals with a number of countries. Maybe you just don't understand what "debunk" means. Anyway, rather than admit that you were wrong you then go off on a rant attacking the trade deals that you had insisted didnt exist. And I am out of my depth!!!

I would suggest that either you weren't paying attention in class or you had a really bad teacher. For an analogy to effective the two things being compared must be similiar on a base level. In your analogy they aren't.

Let's have a look at your analogy. Firstly you start by comparing the UK with a family, which is fair enough. You then however compare voting to leave the EU with booking a holiday to Somalia. This is where things start to fall apart. When you book a holiday you do so with the intention of traveling to a particular destination, or destinations, for a finite period of time before returning home. When the MAJORITY of people voted for the UK to leave the EU they weren't voting for the UK to leave the EU for a while and then return. Rather they were voting for the UK to leave the EU on a permanent basis. So not a holiday then. A better analogy would be that of a family who decided that they don't like the direction the country is headed and decide therefore to live somewhere else.

In your analogy a post Brexit UK is compared to Somalia, a place your family don't know anything about when they book their holiday. However, for most of the UK's history it has not been a part of the EU. Furthermore, many people who voted to leave the EU grew up in a UK that wasn't a part of the EU. In addition to this most countries in the world don't belong to the EU. Indeed, a number of European countries don't belong to the EU. So infact your family not only knew a reasonable amount about the country they intended on moving to, but they actually grew up in that country and know people who live in countries nearby.

Of course you chose Somalia to represent an economic wasteland that awaits the UK post Brexit. This is consistent with the remain's fear campaign. As a part of their end of the world warnings they would regularly quote the BoE. The same BoE that failed to predict the 2008 financial crisis. The same BoE that predicted a possible recession with rampant unemployment and inflation with companies and investors falling over each other to get out of the UK the moment a successful leave campaign was announced. Only none of this happened. In October 2017 the BoE conceded that their predictions for the UK post referendum were wrong...but only on the timing. All the terrible things they had predicted they said would happen in 2018. Oops, wrong yet again. No Somalia! Interestingly however, just three weeks or so ago Mark Carney expressed the view that, if the right decisions are made, the UK economy post Brexit could be more dynamic and robust than it would be were the country to remain in the EU. So whilst Carney never quite predicted a Somalia outcome he had nonetheless stated an outcome comparable to say an Albania. Now he is saying that the economy post Brexit could potentially turn out to be the equivalent of a tropical island paradise...or at least a nice place to live.

In your analogy you go on to say that "upon Googling it you realise you will probably be killed or taken hostage for ransom." Again, very dramatic, very emotive language. Also very silly. If Somalia is the UK post Brexit then how can you google a country's future? Economic forecasts for example are not - and never will be - nearly as reliable as weather forecasts. Plus we have already discussed why comparing the UK to Somalia is stupid in the first place.

Finally you conclude with "Then you pack your shorts anyway and hop on a flight to Mogadishu." Now as previously stated the comparison to Somalia is a nonsensical one. Furthermore, your view that those who voted leave are stupid, ignorant, right wing extremists who are easily lead smacks of extraordinary arrogance, bias and intolerance. The truth is that no one knows exactly what the UK will look like post Brexit, but it's stupid to think that Europe's second biggest economy is incapable of not only surviving, but indeed thriving, on it's own. Even Carney admits that now.

Anyway, based on the above a more accurate analogy would be as follows:

A family move to another country to live. For quite some time they are generally happy living in this new country. However, the country starts to change direction and the family start to feel a little uncomfortable. As time goes by the family grows more and more concerned as to the direction successive governments are taking the country. The family then decide to sit around a table and work out whether or not they should return home. The parents let the kids decide what they should do. In the end the majority of the kids decide that they want to leave. The kids who voted to stay however won't accept the family vote and constantly complain and try and convince the other kids who voted to return home to change their mind. This is done in the hope that they can call another family meeting and have a second vote. They call this the 'family vote'. Meanwhile, the parents find that the move home is being made difficult by endless red tape. The kids who want to stay say "look how hard this all is. It would be so much easier if we just stay". But the decision to move is based on long term factors and so the parents aren't put off by the red tape or the constant whining of the kids who didn't get their own way.

I'd read the above but frankly, I can't be arsed. From anybody else on this forum there might be something worth reading, but not you.

You're clearly spamming the thread for the sake of disrupting it. Typical Okker mentality.

Meanwhile, on the Brexit front, this very day Theresa May has announced the process by which Brexit may be delayed, and has now accepted that she may have to go back to Brussels to request an extension.

In the meantime, the leader of the opposition has now withdrawn his opposition to a second referendum. That doesn't necessarily mean there will be one, but without this happening there certainly wouldn't have been, so the effect of Corbyn's change of position is to make it more possible.

There will be a major demonstration in early March for a people's vote which is expected to gather support from MP's for second referendum. In the event that it does go to a vote in Parliament........ and that is becoming more likely by the day.

Of course I expect the Okker to pooh-pooh all this and tell me that I don't even know what's going on in my own country.... at the very moment I'm watching all these things being announced on the six o clock news.

I expect more spam on this subject from the whingeing Aussie Pom hater.

Funny how the poor pommy sheila with a huge chip on each shoulder ignores posts that call out her misinformation. No surprise there though.