The broad sunlit uplands of next March. Yeah, really. .

[Gerard C]

Bob when you say: Most people seem more concerned with how Brexit will effect them personally adding later on I may be lucky but I see no downside for myself I understand you voted with your guts as many did. But when it comes to expect the UK to thrive once free of foreign interference in our affairs let me suggest with all the respect and love I have for you that your politicians are responsible for any foreign interference and certainly more than foreigners who could do nothing without "some" help. Same situation here and probably worse I fear.

[Gerard C]

Originally Posted by Mike Bell

There may actually be a sensible reason though, as apparently all roadworks in the area are to be banned (unless emergency) between Feb and end of April to avoid any possibilty of them adding to congestion

Dont let them fool you Mike. They know you're preparing a remake of the Great Escape! No more tunnel please.

[bauble]

Originally Posted by Gerard C

Bob when you say: Most people seem more concerned with how Brexit will effect them personally adding later on I may be lucky but I see no downside for myself I understand you voted with your guts as many did. But when it comes to expect the UK to thrive once free of foreign interference in our affairs let me suggest with all the respect and love I have for you that your politicians are responsible for any foreign interference and certainly more than foreigners who could do nothing without "some" help. Same situation here and probably worse I fear.

Mon ami, Gerard, many thanks for pointing out the error of my ways. You are quite right, and I withdraw my reference to 'foreigners', I should have been more specific and said EU bureaucrats.
Your interference on this forum is most welcome, so please continue to interfere here.

Salutations,

Bob.

[bauble]

A thought;

I f we could replace Micron with Gerard, the Angular Maiden with Terence, and with Gordon sounding like an ideal PM for Spain, it needs only a suitable candidate for the UK's leader. Delta sounds pretty much a shoe-in, as he spends most of his time either abroad, cycling, watching non-existent Lunar eclipses, losing foolball teams, or struggling to post photos on ten tenths. These activities leaving him little time to attend to the concerns of government, which must be a plus point in his favour.

The positions of Tusker and Barmier would be best left to some of the remainers here. No names, no pack drill.

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by bauble

Most people seem more concerned with how Brexit will effect them personally, rather than the effect on the country as a whole.

I may be lucky but I see no downside for myself, but expect the UK to thrive once free of foreign interference in our affairs.

Being old I have faith in British pluck!

Well all the other countries that will be desperate to trade with the UK aren't exactly rushing to do so.
Of the 40 trade agreements supposedly being worked on in time for Brexit only 1 shows signs of being agreed and the UK minister says it is up to them to pull their fingers out and get them done.
Their lack of urgency might suggest they aren't that bothered.

A big problem with how Brexit will affect people personally is that it is unrelated to the issues many of them are worried about (health service, housing, lack of food & employment etc. - which are self (e.g. UK) inflicted), so it can't change those issues - which could well be a major reason that it is impossible to work out what "deal' the country would like.

[Mike Bell]

Personally I find the view that the UK will suddenly be free from interference if it leaves the Union and thrive when out of it very much wishful thinking....

Anyway, in the meantime, found a better explanation of what will be involved with trailer registration. Note that it was supposed to start in Nov 2018!

https://www.fpb.org/dvla-online-trailer-registration/

[bauble]

Originally Posted by PeterMorley

Well all the other countries that will be desperate to trade with the UK aren't exactly rushing to do so.
Of the 40 trade agreements supposedly being worked on in time for Brexit only 1 shows signs of being agreed and the UK minister says it is up to them to pull their fingers out and get them done.
Their lack of urgency might suggest they aren't that bothered.

A big problem with how Brexit will affect people personally is that it is unrelated to the issues many of them are worried about (health service, housing, lack of food & employment etc. - which are self (e.g. UK) inflicted), so it can't change those issues - which could well be a major reason that it is impossible to work out what "deal' the country would like.

No doubt that ancient occupation, Smuggling will be making a come back. Tart up your old Luggers, build your secret cellars, and prepare to avoid the Revenuers.


Oh! Ah! Me hearties.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

Well of course the systems are in pace. Arriving at many non EU countries, you can still use the E gates or they just swipe your passport at the desk. No more stamping.

The same applies to goods arriving at non EU ports. The only time there are difficties is when a customs/VAT regime is put in place and the local customs people suddenly lose a profit stream.

I once, with a colleague, undertook a consultancy exercise for a Dutch company that had just made a deal to buy a subsidiary (a quite large subsidiary in terms of turnover and much larger than the company buying it) of a large German company.

The German company had multiple IT systems designed an implemented to suit its internal accounting structure rather than it operational function.

Somewhat like the EU's internal structure one suspects.

The Dutch company was, as part of the deal, allowed access to the IT people in the seller's operation for 6 months to extract information related to clients, order, invoices, payments, etc. But they had to ask specifically for what they needed. Which of course they did not know since they were working with the sketchiest overview of what was where scattered amongst the system.

Plus the Dutch seemed to have little idea about what they were doing.

We started interviewing their people at around 9am on the first day and by 10am were listening to the third set of interviewees in a state of growing disbelief. By Lunchtime we were starting to winder when we would find the person that knew what was really going on and how the negotiations had included a proper option for transferring the business.

By the end of day 2 it was entirely clear that that no one had thought about the consequences at all - possibly on either side of the negotiation.

Now one might think that the seller did not care, just wanted the money. However they were a major supplier in their market and their easily identifiable and branded products would be in place throughout the lands of Europe for some years to come, under contract and reliant on continuing service. Their other interests frequently dipped in to the same pool of users. They really should have had some concern, one might have thought.

We decided that there was little likelihood that the new owner could sort out the mess - possibly even if they managed to extract the various chunks of related but unlinked data but from the existing vendor systems. The chances are they would go bust within a year.

If they were able to sort out some of the contracts they had bought that were clearly there for brand placement and local kudos and would have been losing significant amounts of cash every month (they had not spotted those in the due diligence because the data were so fragmented they could not easily be seen through central reporting) they might survive to 18 months, maybe 2 years ...

The Dutch never did get the data they needed to understand what they were dealing with in a way that would help them manage it.


The deal put them out of business about 15 months later, taking down a very successful and profitable core business as the vanity purchase engulfed them.

If the trade requirement post any form of Brexit means that, for example, customs IT systems need to be separated, a new system designed and implement for the UK and then matched with interfaces to the EU systems there may be some challenges.

Government (and, more widely, any and most government scale) projects rarely run smoothly. Many never run at all.

I doubt a paper system would enhance the ease of trade across newly re-created borders. For either party.

One could, of course, ignore such matters in some way at the point of record and let the trucks and containers flow. But that would, presumably, throw up other sorts of bureaucratic problems further down the path.

The idea that the whole system might be shown to be pointless and simply a bureaucratic cost overhead with zero benefit to anyone has some appeal but bureaucrats with vested interest in tax free salaries and large pension pots are unlikely come to a similar conclusion even if the evidence makes it entirely obvious.

There are some aspects of the EU regulation that are not entirely EU initiated. They are simply passed on, EU branded, based in higher level agreements. Typically some sort of organisation running under a UN flag.

Other aspects may be driven by large influences like the USA who may impose certain requirements that no one who may wish to interact with the USA for trade or travel is going to ignore.

But then people find ways of making the systems work because technically they may not be so central and monolithic anyway (especially in the USA).

There may be many traders operating in the EU economic area who are actively looking at ways of playing a newly fragmented system from day one. There must be many opportunities to do so. Unless, of course, the bureaucratic process is tightened up at the point of transfer between regimes.

[morninggents]

Originally Posted by bauble

A thought;

I f we could replace Micron with Gerard, the Angular Maiden with Terence, and with Gordon sounding like an ideal PM for Spain, it needs only a suitable candidate for the UK's leader. Delta sounds pretty much a shoe-in.

Presumably with you as Foreign Secretary, Bob?

[Peter Mallett]

I just found this tweeted by (among others) Laura Keunsberg.

[bauble]

Originally Posted by morninggents

Presumably with you as Foreign Secretary, Bob?

Chuckle, left to me it would not be much of a job.

[Peter Mallett]

Originally Posted by grantp

There may be many traders operating in the EU economic area who are actively looking at ways of playing a newly fragmented system from day one. There must be many opportunities to do so. Unless, of course, the bureaucratic process is tightened up at the point of transfer between regimes.

Sooo nothing arrives in the UK from non EU sources? Actually the protocols that are applied by the UK to non EU imports will simply be applied to the UK by the EU so I'm not sure there will be any problem as far as that is concerned.

[midgetman]

But they do take longer to come in. A single racing overall coming by plane from Pakistan takes longer than a big box from Germany. And no it's not just the distance, it's the paperwork. The Pakistan parcels physically arrive here almost overnight. The sheer volume of trade that arrives in our ports will cause problems of that I have no doubt. Especially as we haven't been able to practice for it thanks to our useless politicians who can't organise a traffic jam in a roadworks!

And please remember I only play Devils Advocate. Whether I voted "Remain" or "Leave" I take great care to hide. I'm a realist not a politician.


Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk

[Peter Mallett]

Yes they do take longer but my point is that the systems are there. The volume will increase dramatically no doubt, however just saying its difficult isn't really approaching the issue properly.

People keep using the term "crashing out" as if the world will end. It won't. I suspect that for the foreseeable future the food we eat will be home produced as opposed to foreign sourced. Will that be a bad thing? I don't know but I suspect not.

Our oil and much of our gas comes from non EU sources and even if it crosses EU soil they won't want to lose significant revenue, so again I'm not sure why people would think that our energy security is at risk.

As I said to someone today. I respect the remainers as much as the leavers since they made their choices based upon what they saw as major issues. Its not their fault that interested parties have decided to make a big issue and ignore a legitimate vote.

And as to lies? Well we didn't fall off that cliff that the remain campaign said we would. In fact we've done pretty well since the vote. Perhaps there were economies with the truth on both sides?

I presume the package holiday business is still advertising EU holidays?

[Gerard C]

People keep using the term "crashing out" as if the world will end. Of course a certain world will end, the politicians' one. Remember when the Belgian couldn't find any agreement inside their country? They've been running with almost no government during more than twelve months and they are still fine. We are kept under threaten just because they dont want people realize what is really happening behind the curtains.
As to trafic jammed by trucks queuing, may be they've better find a solution for living animals… This is not a reference to Brigitte Bardot.

[PeterMorley]

Originally Posted by Gerard C

People keep using the term "crashing out" as if the world will end. Of course a certain world will end, the politicians' one. Remember when the Belgian couldn't find any agreement inside their country? They've been running with almost no government during more than twelve months and they are still fine. We are kept under threaten just because they dont want people realize what is really happening behind the curtains.
As to trafic jammed by trucks queuing, may be they've better find a solution for living animals… This is not a reference to Brigitte Bardot.

The Belgian situation (and various other countries) shows that countries are ran by the civil service, the politicians are figureheads (possibly of the type mentioned by the Sex Pistols) that change occasionally, meanwhile the faceless servants keep the country running.

"Theresa May's deal" has basically been negotiated by civil servants with remarkably little involvement from her (or the Brexit secretaries!), which is why the EU point out that the agreement was made with the UK govt. rather than her and changing the figurehead won't make any difference.

[Peter Mallett]

I concur.

[Gerard C]

The way they dont care people who elected them in France is really shocking. They just said we are warmly welcome to express ourselves. Fair enough! And who makes the show? The president. Him and only him. Two years ago, following an affair, it was said that we have "la gauche la plus conne du monde". A large majority of people agreed upon that. Few months later, other affair and it was said that we have "la droite la plus conne du monde". A large majority of people agreed upon that. If I'm right to think that, sometimes, 1 + 1 = 2, could we agree that we have "la classe politique la plus nulle du monde"?

[grantp]

Originally Posted by Gerard C

If I'm right to think that, sometimes, 1 + 1 = 2, could we agree that we have "la classe politique la plus nulle du monde"?

No!


That's something for which you will never beat the British!


We have multiple versions of Government just to prove the point ...

[midgetman]

Can somebody please explain something to me?

Theresa May negotiates a deal and the EU says 'My way or the highway.'

That Nice Mr Corbyn turns the deal down.

Now That Nice Mr Corbyn wants to table an amendment stopping us from leaving without a deal.

But the EU repeats that "the only deal available is the one That Nice Mr Corbyn won't approve."

WTF is The Sainted Theresa supposed to do? The EU won't negotiate. But MPs won't let her sign the only deal we can get. And yet they want to make it illegal to bow out gracefully without a deal. (Or "crash out" if you prefer)

Chin up Theresa, at least if you're in the clink for breaking the "can't leave without a deal" law you can't be an MP and are well out of the madhouse.

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[Tourer]

Originally Posted by PeterMorley

Well all the other countries that will be desperate to trade with the UK aren't exactly rushing to do so.
Of the 40 trade agreements supposedly being worked on in time for Brexit only 1 shows signs of being agreed and the UK minister says it is up to them to pull their fingers out and get them done.
Their lack of urgency might suggest they aren't that bothered.

Or it could be that they're holding off to see where the whole Brexit situation ends up?

Might make a material difference to the core items in those trade agreements - to put it into a motorsport context, it would be like buying a racecar to go and compete when different governing bodies were arguing about who would be running the series and under what rules. As a keen purchaser who wants to buy the car, you'd probably still hold off until there was some clarity I expect.

From here down under, I feel for you all in the UK, I really do. Not so much about where Brexit should happen or not but for the complete mess that the bureaucrats and politicians seem to have made of the negotiations and arrangements.

As someone who lived and worked in the UK quite some time ago, I have to say that IF going racing in Europe needs to go back to the days of ATA Carnets, it's not the end of the world - that was how we did it back then. Needs focus and being completely organised within each team for it to work though. Big change from what you've been used to in recent years no doubt but it can be done.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by midgetman

Can somebody please explain something to me?

Probably not Max.

The thing about politics is that they actually thrive on volatility since without it there would be nothing to battle about.

We have become quite used to a 'nothing to battle about' situation in recent times since most politicians seem to have been 'fighting' each other with the same policies - though of course they would deny it.

Brother Corbyn would be different but only in so much as he doesn't really seem to have any clearly stated policies of substance. If elected with a large enough majority he could, in theory, then do whatever he wanted to do since no one could claim he was not delivering on the policies for which he was elected.

The principle that underpins politics in the modern age seems to be similar to the concepts that underpin activities in the 'City'. It is possible to appear to turn a 'profit' even when the 'investment' relates to falling values of failing companies. In the case of politics that would be failing policies.

Politicians, having somehow created a reputation for themselves, no matter what that reputation is, seem very able to survive and prosper personally with roles outside politics. Usually lucrative roles. Often somewhat connected with organisations that have in some way already benefited from the politician's previous interests or, in some cases, direct actions and awards of contracts for the new employer's services.

In effect that is the same sort of benefit that a hedge find might see from shorting a company stock or an asset stripping 'activist' investor might exploit having invested in a cash and asset rich business.

In all cases the current and future electors are picking up the bills and living with whatever mess is created with no chance of compensation.

Nearly all 'negotiations' will end up being last minute compromises, if not failures. It is the nature of the game especially when the rules are not designed to cater properly for the part of the game being played. In the case of Brexit we are currently observing play in a part of the game that was never meant to be played. No one knows where the boundary markers really are nor who is managing them.

Or perhaps the rules are just very loosely defined - something like Dwile Flonking

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBamCWdx6gI

although many may think that flonking a dwile probably has greater purpose and a claim to a longer history than most political institutions.

[Mike Bell]

Originally Posted by Tourer

From here down under, I feel for you all in the UK, I really do. Not so much about where Brexit should happen or not but for the complete mess that the bureaucrats and politicians seem to have made of the negotiations and arrangements.

As someone who lived and worked in the UK quite some time ago, I have to say that IF going racing in Europe needs to go back to the days of ATA Carnets, it's not the end of the world - that was how we did it back then. Needs focus and being completely organised within each team for it to work though.

Always interesting to see how those outside of Europe view the proceedings! You’re quite right on both points, but the big problem is that nobody knows what they need to be prepared for, so organising for it very difficult....

It really has got to the stage for a lot of people where the actual result- whether we leave or don’t leave, whether it’s with concessions or not- is far less important than having a decision!

[Peter Mallett]

Working with Italians, Australians, French, Albanian and Swiss people out here, I'm always being asked what I think. Apart from "embarrassed" I can't think of any other answer.

One thing is for sure, any MP who did not respect the referendum is unlikely to be re elected in the next GE.

[midgetman]

But what happens there Peter? Will we see a turnout of <48% because you can be sure the usual suspects will stand for re-election. Will we get a government by default? Because there isn't time to get a new national party up and running.

The political types are relying on inertia and they may just be rewarded.

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