I think that’s more the media that portray the famous people as Brits when they do something good or Scottish when they fail.
I would say 80-90% of the English folk I know don’t consider themselves Brits let alone European. Pretty much every one of them has atleast one Cross of St George hanging from their window never a Union Jack and they will never announce them self as British. It’s always English unless you are talking to some of the older generation who refer to themselves by their county background.
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I’m not referring so much to the economics as to the example set for other countries thinking of leaving. In this way it suits the EU to prolong the agony. Of course, if leaving is an economic disaster that may put others off anyway.
This is a typical view from many I know well in UK. The guy who wrote this post is the Managing Director of a large industrial manufacturing company near Birmingham.
"They say the EU is so great but for how long. The smaller countries economy’s are growing at a fast rate due to the vast handouts the EU gives them, when those subside the countries will go back into recession and then bankruptcy just like Greece and the likes of the UK, Germany and France will be left supporting them once again. Thing is France are in a mess, Spain is a disaster waiting to happen the same can be said with Italy. Why would you want to be tied to an economy like this. What don’t you want to be the 5th largest economy and have full control of that economy and have every day in trade deals with every country in the world to boost that economy. The EU exports more stuff to the USA than anywhere else, the USA wants to do a trade deal directly with the UK but we cannot due to the customs unions laws we are governed by.
The EU want us to be in the Customs Union, ask yourself why. Is it because we have a growing and strong economy that can be a threat to the future of the EU "
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Did you copy and past that, BF?
Or does this bloke have a peculiar English aversion to question marks, correct apostrophe usage to go along with his contempt for foreigners?
He’s probably a Polish immigrant.
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Can’t wait for the dogfights when industry, agriculture and regional assistance subsidies and grants currently channeled through the EU budget are transferred to the UK budget - and UK exporters to the EU27 seek compensation after their comparative conditions of access to the EU market get eroded under a hard Brexit.
That will do a lot for social cohesion in the UK.
It has already been exposed as fake news that a return to the UK of its current EU budget contribution would free up funds for the health system. The Magic Pudding of the Brexiters.
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Yep, cut and paste from a post he made on his Facebook page.
He may be English, but doesn’t mean he can read or write English well.
Anyway it is a typical view from his demographic in UK.
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Is Spain still a disaster waiting to happen? Italy? The PIGS issue was 3 or 4 years ago, I’d thought.
It all hinges on the economics IMO. If the UK goes great guns, it may send a ripple.
I very much doubt it will.
People here seem to underestimate just how huge access to the EU common market is.
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It’s rrally depressing that people can be that ignorant.
If the UK is the 5th biggest economy in the world (no idea whether that’s true), that’s largely BECAUSE it’s been in the EU. Export markets build economies. With the empire gone and without the common market, the UK all of a sudden has no favourable markets any more.
They’re making noise about trade deals with the US etc, but they’re kidding themselves about the terms. Deals are things where BOTHsides make concessions. The us are going to want them to open their agriculture market and drop food standards at the minimum. And the UK will have no choice, because once they’re out of the EU, they’ll DESPERATELY need new trading partners and they’ll have zero bargaining power.
Not to mention they’ll automatically lose every business that they have who relies on access to the European market. Banks and manufacturers etc are all going to migrate to Germany & France en made. It’s altready happening.
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They too have been Murfoched.
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EFA
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The UK has The Charity for Civil Servants, funds presently stretched. Poor sods need it, all their Brexit advice would have been ignored and they will have to clean up the mess.
The government has provided counselling, and training of in house mental health enablers to get them through it.
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I’m fully expecting the EU to pull the plug on further extensions and the UK will just plain run out of time to agree on anything.
What a farce!
Merkel - who has been fairly quiet on the entire topic - wants to give them as much time as they need to leave in an orderly, structured way. She also thinks Ireland are not sufficiently prepared for a No Deal exit. She’s actually the UK’s biggest hope, because Germany has immense influence in the EU and basically props the whole thing up currently. If she argues for an extension, I think they’ll get it.
It’s the terms of the extension that are hard to guess.
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May be they should rip up the draft, start again and go back to first principles. Nothing like a drafting committee getting out of control particularly when the lawyers take charge and try to accomodate every ‘what if’. How to lose sight of mutually shared objectives.
I find it crazy that the most popular position in the UK parliament is a customs union. A Customs Union is pretty much the worst of every world:
- They get to keep no barriers on goods. Whoopee. Except that goods aren’t the big part of the UK exports, its services. AND, they’ll have to take whatever EU rules are there, with no say in them. So much for self-determination.
- It doesn’t remove barriers on services. So the biggest part of the UK economy, is farked. Brilliant.
- It does allow for control of immigration. Except most know that with the UK’s demographics, if they don’t have migrants they can’t do the cheap jobs and won’t be able to pay pensions. So they’ll have to let them in anyway! lol.
Nobody, whether they’re remainers, leavers or in the middle should be happy with a customs union. Yet it seems the most popular with the parliament. What the hell is going on???
BBC is moving some of its broadcasting licences to the Netherlands to ensure EU protection of broadcasting rights.