Awol Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 1 hour ago, Enda said: I presume this rhetoric, but do you actually need someone to explain why Europe wants the single market as opposed to an 1800s-style FTA? Those "1800's style FTA's" that are used in the 21st Century by most of the world? Yes, I'd like one of those between the EU and the UK covering as many areas as possible. One of the reasons the EU has singularly failed to complete FTA's with major economies like India (abandoned after 9 year of negotiations) is the disparity between the regulatory systems and standards. Thing is,on Brexit Day +1 the UK companies who wish to sell into the customs union will already be compliant, so no such impediments will exist. However you inadvertently raised an interesting and pertinent point by asking what the single market customs union was for? I agree strongly with Yanis Varoufakis analysis that it is rooted in and behaves as a cartel. This began as the European Coal & Steel Community and grew to encompass agriculture and many other industries. Its purpose is not free trade but to insulate European companies from global competition by raising (in some cases) huge tariff barriers against goods from beyond the block. The effect is to artificially drive up prices for consumers within it, particularly with regard to fresh food like fruit and veg from Africa. A more enlightened policy might assist them to trade their way out of poverty, but then that would be awful for the professional NGO industry which competes to *cough* manage our overseas aid budgets. The EU has very little to do with free trade, it's a protectionist racket. That's to say nothing of the abortion that is the Euro.. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villakram Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 (edited) 11 hours ago, Awol said: No idea, but seems a strange thing to promise when Cameron wouldn't countenance the possibility of leaving the EU? Why else would they need to make such a promise? Why not? An FTA with the UK post Brexit would represent their single largest free trade deal? It's odd to believe they wouldn't want it. Awol, there is no such thing as free trade. Free trade is an orwellian/goebbels-esque construction that seems all nice and such. How could one be against freedom? And trading is the very backbone of society ergo free trade must be super amazing. Now, I'm trying to be careful here as I suspect that you are using it as it is part of standard political discourse. Of course, politico's have an agenda... Edit: having just read your above post it appears that you are perfectly aware of the nonsense that "free trade" agreements are, though for some reason you are asserting ownership of this to the evil EU and not the benevolent UK. That's frankly bizarre! Edited October 13, 2016 by villakram Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Awol Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 13 minutes ago, villakram said: Awol, there is no such thing as free trade. Free trade is an orwellian/goebbels-esque construction that seems all nice and such. How could one be against freedom? And trading is the very backbone of society ergo free trade must be super amazing. Now, I'm trying to be careful here as I suspect that you are using it as it is part of standard political discourse. Of course, politico's have an agenda... Edit: having just read your above post it appears that you are perfectly aware of the nonsense that "free trade" agreements are, though for some reason you are asserting ownership of this to the evil EU and not the benevolent UK. That's frankly bizarre! Sorry, I've tried to identify a point or some sort of coherent argument but I just can't see it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 3 hours ago, Awol said: One of the reasons the EU has singularly failed to complete FTA's with major economies like India (abandoned after 9 year of negotiations) is the disparity between the regulatory systems and standards. I can't wait until my products are made to Indian standards! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 3 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: I can't wait until my products are made to Indian standards! Hi Phillip , how is Elizabeth today ? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Awol Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 20 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: I can't wait until my products are made to Indian standards! Another incisive rebuttal... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 Awol you're half-right. Do you want free trade of pharmaceuticals from China, or do you want pharmaceuticals imported in the UK to be generated under the same safety standards that you'd expect UK firms to produce? Cars with different colour headlights are alright by you? Happy to have free imports of hormone-laden Texan beef? No checks on food standards coming in from other countries? The point of the single market is to overcome these barriers, facilitating trade without worry about health or safety of something you import. So, speaking as an EU citizen, I do insist that the UK needs to follow the single market rules if it wants free trade and, no, I don't find such a position "odd". 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OutByEaster? Posted October 13, 2016 Moderator Share Posted October 13, 2016 Isn't part of the reason we're coming out so that our standards can be reduced to the level at which global multinationals can more easily operate? That was a huge part of TTIP and now we're not in that, we're better able to more flexibly reduce our standards in order to accommodate global markets, particularly those of the US. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Awol Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 Yep, Brexiteers want out of the EU so we can poison our children, sow the fields with salt and drive round in tuk tuks. That's why I voted to leave so it must be true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post peterms Posted October 13, 2016 Popular Post Share Posted October 13, 2016 Well they certainly want to get away from regulations which affect the ability of US firms to push hormone-added meat, GM foods, pesticides...they call it cutting red tape. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said: Isn't part of the reason we're coming out so that our standards can be reduced to the level at which global multinationals can more easily operate? That was a huge part of TTIP and now we're not in that, we're better able to more flexibly reduce our standards in order to accommodate global markets, particularly those of the US. Sure, if you'd like to lower standards but with the risk of e.g. chicken that is washed in chlorine, or beef that is pumped with hormones (two real world, US examples), or have cars with different coloured headlights (EU example), then that's not unreasonable. However it is not in any way puzzling or "odd" that the EU places restrictions on such imports. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post blandy Posted October 13, 2016 Author Moderator Popular Post Share Posted October 13, 2016 17 minutes ago, Awol said: Yep, Brexiteers want out of the EU so we can poison our children, sow the fields with salt and drive round in tuk tuks. That's why I voted to leave so it must be true. A significant number of the UKIPs and tories want to, and said so during the campaign, get rid of EU red tape, get rid of EU environmental rules and the EU telling us what to do etc. etc. The reality of that is a move towards laxer control on all kinds from food hygiene, to GM, to pesticides and air quality and water quality. Not immediately, but over time. 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 28 minutes ago, Enda said: chicken that is washed in chlorine Does that mean it's okay to swim straight after you've eaten it? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 Washington Post: Quote “Hormone-boosted beef. Chlorine-washed chicken. Genetically altered vegetables. This is what they want for us,” warned Cabaret, standing before his majestic herd of free-range cows. “In France, food is about pleasure, about taste. But in the United States, they put anything in their mouths. No, this must be stopped.” Now yer man there with his organic kale-fed chickens is too extreme for my liking, and we all know of the EU losing the run of itself with the likes of the banana regulations. But I'll say three things for the EU: 1. As stupid as the banana regulations are, when was the last time you heard of seriously dodgy imports in the EU? In terms of consumer safety, I'd rather play it safe and have the Daily Mail complaining about over-regulation than under-regulation. 2. There's a lot to be said for having one large body making these regulations instead of replicating the process twenty or thirty times. 3. It's one thing to critique the level of EU bureaucracy (I'd be in that camp on a number of issues, not least DG Competition swanning in with notions of monitoring tax enforcement), but it's another thing to pretend this bureaucracy can be simply swept away and glorious unabashed free trade can magically come flying-in in its stead. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davkaus Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 Quote in the United States, they put anything in their mouths. So, how do you apply for a US visa? 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 3 minutes ago, Enda said: As stupid as the banana regulations are, when was the last time you heard of seriously dodgy imports in the EU? In terms of consumer safety, I'd rather play it safe and have the Daily Mail complaining about over-regulation than under-regulation. What's stupid about them? They say that something that's misshapen can't be sold under the claim that it's not. It can still be sold to anyone who wants it. It's about as stupid as a rule that says you can't sell a small egg in a box that says "extra-large eggs". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 18 minutes ago, Davkaus said: So, how do you apply for a US visa? Er, only on the basis of being a giver, obviously. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 22 minutes ago, Enda said: 1. As stupid as the banana regulations are, when was the last time you heard of seriously dodgy imports in the EU? On a serious note, wasn't the horse meat scandal a european thing? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 2 minutes ago, ml1dch said: What's stupid about them? They say that something that's misshapen can't be sold under the claim that it's not. It can still be sold to anyone who wants it. It's about as stupid as a rule that says you can't sell a small egg in a box that says "extra-large eggs". Briefly: the EU has a long and sordid history with bananas. As far back as 1975 the European Commission were enforcing higher competition standards to bananas because of the importance of their soft texture to "the young, the old, and the infirm." In short, they failed to apply standard economic measures (cross-price elasticity) to define relevant products markets, and used bananas' shape (!) as a distinguishing characteristic of the product, to argue bananas were not substitutes of apples or oranges. The 1994 regulation of the marketing of bananas was (imho) a decent example of unnecessary meddling in rather trivial matters, and this is evidenced by the Commission's effective repeal of the 1994 regulation by introducing more lax standards in 2011. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enda Posted October 13, 2016 Share Posted October 13, 2016 1 minute ago, snowychap said: On a serious note, wasn't the horse meat scandal a european thing? Yep, good example of EU's health and safety regulations not being good enough. (Or an example of a fairly big hubhub over nothing, "it's only a small bit of horse meat", "we need less red tape", depending on your view.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts