partly but killing off zombie companies and allowing new ones to take their place

All those zombie companies based in places like, erm, the British Virgin Islands?

@dazh business (sadly) these days is managed for the very short term – if consultants see the risk of short term disruption that will play heavily on their analysis. I work in finance and I am firmly out as you all know, we get hired by clients globally (vast majority outside EU) based on merit not whether the UK is in a political club. In fact a number of daft EU regulations make us less competitve than our US or Asian based competitors. The EU is in a mess on financial regulations with political pressure for “Tobyn Tax” yet we have such a tax already and they do not (Stamp Duty on share transactions). Its just another example of how its a poltical club and not a business orientated one.

@cody, I absolutely take what Obama has to say seriously although I personally think Clinton’s comments (pro Remain) are more relevant as Obama will be long gone. My explanation for this stance I have given here, US foreign policy interests.

Post a Leave vote we will trade with the US in exactly the same way as we do now. There has been no deal for 43 years. IMO if we Leave the EU/US TTIP negotiations will be put back significantly as France/Germany are not keen and the balance of EU interests will shift without the Uks service based economy

We should listen to Obama and form our own judgemnet on what he has to say and think about why he is saying it

Agreed, but that is different to what you and dragon were saying on the previous page when you questioned listening to Obama

In fact a number of daft EU regulations make us less competitve than our US or Asian based competitors.

😯

I personally think Clinton’s comments (pro Remain) are more relevant as Obama will be long gone.

+1 Clinton is definitely more pro UK as well.

zombie companies based in places like, erm, the British Virgin Islands?

No you are confusing shell companies with zombie companies, not the same thing.

Post a Leave vote we will trade with the US in exactly the same way as we do now.

So either Brexit boys or Obama are/is telling porkies.

The US had been removing trade barriers consistently over the period. Note the lesson to be learned there and repeated last week – the US prefers to do deals with regional trading blocks and has little appetite for deals with individual nations – an approach that is perfectly understandable.

@tmh, EU risk retention rules mean I can only access 60% of market whereas US/Asian managers don’t have to comply. The eligable deals trade 100-200bps more expensively.

Sky News covering the story about German resistance to the proposed trade deal, as I said 30,000 person anti demonstration in Germany recently – its not a free trade deal, it caters for US large corporate special interests

@tmh, TTIP is not going to be signed for years if at all and in the aftermath of a Leave nothing will change in the short term. Personally I’d trigger exit immediately and go after offshore tax evaders like Apple/Google/Facebook/Starbucks immediately and aggressively and also put a firm barrier between us and EU implosion ASAP

I am genuinely fearful of the implications of us leaving the EU

+1

If not for me, for my children.

If not for me, for my children.

Where will your children live when by 2030 there are at least 3m more people in the UK, how will the NHS and Universities cope ? How will they find a job when faced with immigrants very willing to work for low wages ?

We can all find individual anomalies – the EU has many. man flaws which we agree on. But that doesn’t mean a dash to leave is in our interests.

And there is no such thing as a free lunch trade deal, agreed. So Brexit boys need to setp back, smell the coffee, look at the evidence and re-consider what unilateral lunches trade deals with the EU and others would cost FOR EXACTLY THE REASONS YOU GIVE.

Are there any examples of unilateral trade deals with the EU which come with certain financial obligations or requirements to satisfy aspects of EU legislation? Hmm…..

@Pigface your mind was made up long ago so nothing that’s happened recently is going to make any difference to you. I’m out campaigning regularly and getting a lot of positive feedback, thats what I care about. We live in a democracy and I’m doing what I can to be part of that process.

How about Brexit boys using accurate data and facts as part of the democratic process, starting shall we suggest with the cost of membership?

A bet you a pint (on the shore or Lakes) that the next figure quoted by your boys will be the wrong one.

@tmh, of course UK businesses would have to meet EU product regulations to sell there. No problem with that. However the businesses that do nothing with the EU should not have to, speaker (small businessman) at Vote Leave event a week ago said UK small business does 6% of its trade with the EU but has to follow 100% of the regulations with all the associated costs and those are regulatuons which may or may not make sense for a UK domestic business. The growth markets of the world are all outside Europe, the expanding EU argument is akin to “never mind the quality feel the width”

Where will your children live when by 2030 there are at least 3m more people in the UK, how will the NHS and Universities cope ? How will they find a job when faced with immigrants very willing to work for low wages ?

They’ll live in their houses, the ones they live in now – although I’m confused, is this if we leave or stay? 😉

My kids are pretty much all grown-up, and it’s them that are going to be ‘paying’ the cost. That is why I’m worried for them, as I’ll be retired (early) by the time the chaos hits.

A bet you a pint (on the shore or Lakes) that the next figure quoted by your boys will be the wrong one.

They will be sticking with the £350m absolutely no doubt about it and justifiable – so the odds are not exactly even 😉 If it where me I’d use the £225m per week figure but the £350m one they’ve chosen with good reason not least as our Rebate can be challenged and its frequently threatened.

Vote Leave event a week ago said UK small business does 6% of its trade with the EU but has to follow 100% of the regulations with all the associated costs and those are regulatuons which may or may not make sense for a UK domestic business.

Which ones? And would they not be broadly similar to the rules the UK would put in place to regulate such industry?

those are regulatuons which may or may not make sense for a UK domestic business

Can we please have some examples of these regulations?

@br, understood I was assuming they where younger – if they own already good for them as prices will be going up strongly as a result of continued uncontrolled immigration. My scenario was Remain and the 3m EU immigrants was the number the Treasury/Tories used. You are also forgetting the risk of the UK funding an EU wide bailout, thats a lot of debt for your and my kids to be saddled with. I wonder when we’ll get VAT on food as they do ?

jambalaya

Where will your children live when by 2030 there are at least 3m more people in the UK, how will the NHS and Universities cope ? How will they find a job when faced with immigrants very willing to work for low wages ?
Maybe they will be living and working in another part of the EU.

I was assuming they where younger – if they own already good for them as prices will be going up strongly as a result of continued uncontrolled immigration.

Or as in previous times a complete failure of government to sort out house building. Unless all the people coming over have a 10% deposit then to they won’t be buying houses, if they do then perhaps they would be good for the economy. By 2030 migration could be heading back East as people return home to?

Can we please have some examples of these regulations?

How about the 10 year (?) argument about whether we could call chocolate chocolate, a total waste of business, civil servant and government time and money ? If an award winning local businessman tells me its so then I’m good with that btw. Many EU regulations quite naturally protect specific national interests which make little sense elsewhere.

On another note the US hs already finalised a compensation deal with Volkswagen? In Europe nothing clear yet as whether cars will be repaired and/or compensation offered. Why is that I wonder ? Transport Select Comittee chair speaking now about how its been known for years that the lab tests are nonsense but EU interests have meant nothing has been done.

jambalaya – Member

My scenario was Remain and the 3m EU immigrants was the number the Treasury/Tories used.

Aye, and I did like the response to that paper from the Exit people. “All of this paper is complete rubbish! Except for the one bit we like, it’s 100% reliable!”

but the £350m one they’ve chosen with good reason not least as our Rebate can be challenged and its frequently threatened.

No really 😀 😀

Nothing to do with the fact that it happens to be roughly 40-50% above the real figure 😉

@tmh, of course UK businesses would have to meet EU product regulations to sell there. No problem with that.

Your team mates either ignore this or have a very big problem with that. Plus it begs a pretty obvious question!

Maybe they will be living and working in another part of the EU.

Exactly, I have done that (France), my son has already done that (France) as has his girlfriend (Spain, Germany). The joy of freedom of movement – a brilliant idea!

To date, immigration has increased both the supply and demand for labour – you cant juts look at the supply side, however convenient. Hence it has not had negative impact on wages of “British workers” (whoever they are?), on the contrary it has benefitted them – individual anecdotes aside.

Those 3 million immigrants will help pay my pension.

Where will your children live when by 2030 there are at least 3m more people in the UK, how will the NHS and Universities cope ? How will they find a job when faced with immigrants very willing to work for low wages ?

So that’s the main out argument is it? Foreigners coming over here, taking our jobs, filling our schools and hospitals, and presumably taking our women? It’s pretty pathetic, not to mention arrogant.

Funny isn’t it how on the one hand you say the economic effects of brexit won’t be as bad as the stay camp say they will, but on the other you say the effects of EU immigration will definitely be as bad or worse as the leave camp say they will. How come you can be so certain on one but not the other?

How about the 10 year (?) argument about whether we could call chocolate chocolate, a total waste of business, civil servant and government time and money ?

Lol I did think you might have a top 3 list of rules that were crippling small business.

So in another scenario linked to what Obama said. If the worst happens and sanity takes a holiday and el prezidenta Trump declares a raft of protectionist trade policies that hit car manufacturers etc. How far down the list would an independent UK be on the call answering in the white house?

There are 6 million more people in the UK than there were 15 yrs ago. I live in a house.

HTH

Well Michael was on form in The Times today

Gove wrote in The Times today: “The other countries will know that until a deal which suits us is reached we still retain a veto over their plans. So that gives us all the cards.”

They need some team badges with “No really” and Pinocchio on them.

Sorry Mike but trying to blackmail Europe is not one of your finer moments – like most Brexit arguments, falls over at the first step ie, qualified majority voting.

Its sadly reminiscent of watching adolescent kids trying to outdo each other in school debates – embarrassing if ocassionally amusing

How about the 10 year (?) argument about whether we could call chocolate chocolate, a total waste of business, civil servant and government time and money ?

How much actual money? Maybe it took 10 years because no-one was really bothered except the Sun/Mirror &co?

On another note the US hs already finalised a compensation deal with Volkswagen? In Europe nothing clear yet as whether cars will be repaired and/or compensation offered. Why is that I wonder ?

Maybe because the rules are different and the cars are also different.. just a hunch 🙄

Worst debater ever, Jam.

How will they find a job when faced with immigrants very willing to work for low wages ?

Did it occur to you that his children might actually BE the immigrants…..?

Re the costs to business, Brexit boys again love to quote selectively (the polite way of saying inaccurately/decetifully) from the Open Europe study (source of the claim that regulation costs us £600m a week.

Conveniently ignoring

If the UK were to leave the EU, the costs described above would not disappear overnight – much would depend on what path Britain took outside the EU. If the UK were to leave the EU and instead ‘become like Norway’ by joining the European Economic Area (EEA), 93 out of these 100 costliest EU-derived regulations would remain in place at a cost of £31.4bn (94.3% of the total cost). This is because under EEA, many EU policy areas would continue to apply to the UK including financial services, social and employments laws, energy and climate change policies, and this is where the bulk of the regulatory cost stems from. [my point]

Given that EEA membership comes without any formal voting powers in the EU institutions, the UK would lose its ability to both amend these regulations and shape new EU laws. [a trifling point 😉 ]

While the ‘Norway option’ does mean greater independence in certain areas – chiefly the repatriation of agricultural policy, regional policy, trade policy and justice and home affairs – overall, it would make little sense to leave one club only to join another with many of the same costly rules.

I do care what he says…

And he actually has done quite a lot given the Congressional opposition he has endured…, or at least some of it has happened on his watch.

Health Care, Cuba, moves towards Marriage quality, Drug legalisation, Financial policy. Gitmo is the major negative,

So – our both our major trading partners think we should stay. We’d have to wait 10 years to get a trade agreement with the US, and a Norway style agreement with the EU would lead to us having to pay as much as we do now and have open borders to EU citizens… And as we are still a manafacturing and trading nation…

And Boris is an opportunist untrustworthy but charismatic muppet.

I can only think of one pro-Brexit person I know personally who isn’t one or more of Old, Xenophobic or a bit thick.

I can only think of one pro-Brexit person I know personally who isn’t one or more of Old, Xenophobic or a bit thick.

I don’t know of anyone personally who is pro-Brexit, apart from one bloke I’m ‘friends’ with on FB – and tbh that is only for amusement at his daily ‘rants’, and he is definitely two of your three 🙂

I can only think of one pro-Brexit person I know personally who isn’t one or more of Old, Xenophobic or a bit thick.

+1. Sadly they have been given the chance to f*ck up my kids lives (along with their own younger family members but are too thick/blinkered to realise that).

And Boris is an opportunist untrustworthy but charismatic muppet.

To think I liked him before this and have said hello to him when I have seen him cycling around the city. I wouldn’t cross the street to p*ss on him if he was on fire now.

Describing people who want to vote for Brexit as thick and xenophobic is counterprouctive, there are prefectly valid arguments for Brexit as there were for independence for Scotland. However, where both movements have had difficulties is presenting what the world would look like afterwards – and this is because in both cases the relevant economies have become so intertwined with the other party that it is difficult to have a compelling forecast of what would happen. This gap in their prospectus will prove the undoing of the Brexiteers as it was for the Nats.

Anyone who write an article this good about Shakespeare is hardly stupid.

Back of the queue 😀 😀 😀

The US is only negotiating one trade agreement at present. The ‘queue’ is not very long.

The US is currently negotiating one trade agreement. According to the Office of the United States Trade Representative, ‘The United States has completed negotiations of a regional, Asia-Pacific trade agreement, known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement and is in negotiations of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) with the European Union, with the objective of shaping a high-standard, broad-based regional pact’ (Office of the United States Trade Representative, 2016, link).

The US has agreed many trade agreements (20) with countries much smaller and certainly less wealthy than the UK and typically in around 2 years (1 year for Morocco, 2 for Australia and Chilie). The UK is a major export partner for rhe US with $120bn of goods and services representing 5.4% of US exports.

In all this time the US has not concluded an agreement with the EU ? Why is that ?

In all this time the US has not concluded an agreement with the EU ? Why is that ?

Because the EU is big enough and powerful enough that it doesn’t have to roll over and agree to whatever the US wants?

Not sure if already posted but this makes interesting reading, trying to get some balance to the claim and counterclaim

https://fullfact.org/media/uploads/leave_remain_the_facts_behind_the_claims.pdf

Those above deliberately steriotyping Brexiters are making a very dangerous mistake if I may say so. At the Brexit meetings I have attended there have been significant numbers of young (late teens, eariy 20) volunteers. My local co-ordinator is a mid 30’s tradesman. By steriotyping and underestimating your opponents in any election (or indeed any situation) is often a fatal error.

I would also add again that senior Labour figures such as Corbyn and McDonald have spent their political careers opposed to the EU – old maybe 😉 but not thick or xenophobic

@jimw thnaks for that, along with some other stw-ers I put a few quid their way to fund their Referendum work