For the Brits: When will BREXIT referendum happen ?

[Stavros]

The everyday reality of Brexit is raising its ugly head. Sad to see UK losing her best and brightest.
Stavros, are you thinking of emigrating to Australia?

Blimey, Guv'nor, why Australia? But who knows, Remainers may yet be rounded up and expelled to the colonies, but not Gibraltar as it will be part of Spain by then. But we shall always have the Falklands, and if that isn't cold enough, Tristan da Cunha. Anywhere but the Isle of Man.

It isn't just that the 'Project Fear' the Remain argument is coming true, it is that the Conservative government is now so weak that Theresa May is dependent on both the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland to vote with them on crucial legislation (such as the Budget being debated now), and the hostile Brexiteers in her own party who could make a move to remove her from office if she 'compromises' on 'the deal'. The latest problem concerns a two-year transitional phase -May, Hammond, Green and Labour are in favour of a transitional phase of say two years to enable the UK to leave the EU in a softer and gradual manner. The Brexiteers are not only opposed because they want 'out' to be 'out' on the 19 March 2019, they now are being told that not only must the UK continue to pay its share of EU financial obligations, but that any new rules or laws in the transitional phase will be passed without the involvement of the UK.
A further complication has arisen with the riddle of the border in Ireland, and the prospect of a snap general election in the Republic of Ireland owing to a scandal there which won't go away.

Thus: negotiations on Brexit being conducted by politicians who want what is not possible, in a European environment that is unpredictable.
Once upon a time hysterical Daily Mail headlines defended British sausages from the evil men in Brussels, and campaigned for bent, rather than straight cucumbers. Sometimes boring is best.

[peejaye]

The everyday reality of Brexit is raising its ugly head. Sad to see UK losing her best and brightest.
Stavros, are you thinking of emigrating to Australia?

Who, exactly, are our best & brightest? To whom do you refer please?

[flabbybody]

Who, exactly, are our best & brightest? To whom do you refer please?

Health professionals specifically nurses
https://www.theguardian.com/society/...hs-brexit-vote

[Stavros]

The strange game that is the Brexit Negotiations continues. In a week that appeared to confirm an agreement on financial obligations, one of the three issues the EU wants confirmed before moving on to negotiations about trade, the government faces the prospect of being defeated by its own party on the agreement, while the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland is a problem that cannot go away yet also seems to represent precisely the difficulties of separating the UK from the EU that the Leave campaign claimed would not be a problem at all.

Hard Brexiteers were expected to reject the figure of 45-50 billion -pounds or euros- spread out over many years, yet many did not, the most notorious being Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson who, months ago agreeing with a back bencher that the EU could 'go whistle' with its demands for long-term financial payments, now says it is acceptable. But there are enough 'rebels' who do not think the deal is good and want a contingency added to it- the payment must be contingent on the EU agreeing to favourable trade terms or we won't pay, something the EU is certain to reject, but they could undermine the survival of their own government-

Theresa May has been put on notice by hardline Conservative Eurosceptics that they could be prepared to vote against her final Brexit deal if the UK continues to pay the £50bn divorce bill for years to come or does not get good trade terms.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics...n-divorce-bill

If the party thought it had taken one step further, it may yet be forced to take two back. If the financial obligations have been secured, the Irish Border now looms as the most difficult. In part, this is because the Good Friday Agreement on which we are told peace in Northern Ireland is based, obliges the UK and the Republican to maintain an open border with free movement of people, dual citizenship rights, and so on. Superficially, this is not a problem because free movement existed in some form before as a Common Travel Area has existed between the two countries since 1923 with subsequent amendments. In addition, when there was a power sharing executive in Northern Ireland the two main parties, Sinn Fein and the Democratic Unionist Party, did not fall out over border or trade issues.

However, the Democratic Unionist Party, on which the Tories now rely to survive in the House of Commons, has made their core issue not so much the border, as what deputy leader Nigel Dodds put it, the 'integrity' of the UK-
"Make no mistake - for us the integrity of the United Kingdom is non-negotiable. "If the EU wants to insist on border check points on the island of Ireland that is a matter for them. There will be no internal UK border in the Irish Sea."

DUP leader Arlene Foster made it clearer:
speaking to the DUP annual conference in Belfast, Ms Foster made clear that Northern Ireland would leave the customs union.

She said: “We will not support any arrangements that create barriers to trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom or any suggestion that Northern Ireland, unlike the rest of the UK, will have to mirror European regulations.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a8075576.html

Northern Ireland voted to Remain in the EU, but the DUP voted to Leave, which suggests that Northern Ireland is itself divided. Gerry Adams has argued that there should be a referendum on a United Ireland, but earlier this week on Channel 4 News an Irish Senator rejected the idea that a United Ireland would be the organic solution as it cannot happen without the approval of the Protestant communities of Northern Ireland, a position the Irish have held for years.

The problem is that most of the trade between the UK and Ireland passes through Northern Ireland, so that the question of the border is not just a geographical headache it cuts to the core of the UK leaving the Single Market and the Customs Union. Given he dependency of Ireland on trade with the UK, Brexit is threatening to damage the economy in the Republic, but they can do little to make it easier to live with.

The suggestion that there could be a 'special status' for Northern Ireland' to remain in either the Single Market or the Customs Union has not clarified the situation, in fact could make it worse as it is argued Scotland -which voted to Remain in the EU- would also want 'special status', and because the DUP has rejected it, and would almost certainly be prepared to engineer the collapse of Theresa May's government on such a hard core issue.

But it isn't possible anyway. As the Financial Times has pointed out, if Northern Ireland were to remain in the Customs Union when the UK leaves, it would mean one segment of an ex-EU member violating WTO rules on the tariff free movement of goods into an EU member. When the UK becomes subject to WTO rules, all of it does, and the EU could not negotiate special status for Northern Ireland without violating its basic rules. But that is just the start. While both Ireland and the UK say they do not want a 'hard border' between North and South -which would violate the Good Friday Agreement- if the UK leaves the EU it has to find a way to monitor trade between the two because at some point, if regulations in the EU change on, say food standards, there would have to be some form of inspection of goods passing from North to South to ensure the regulations are being adhered to. This, then is the FT's bleak assessment:

Even if the UK promised to comply with EU product and hygiene regulations in perpetuity, border controls also function as an enforcement agency for a wide variety of laws including restricting counterfeits, ensuring environmental safety, deterring human smuggling, protecting industrial and commercial property and safeguarding national treasures. Some of these are obligations directly on the UK as a signatory to United Nations charters. Leaving the border open would thus expose the UK as an eccentric, irresponsible global citizen, not a terrific way to launch boldly into the world as an independent trading nation.
https://www.ft.com/content/1ce27838-...a-d9c0a5c8d5c9

Would it help if trade were to flow directly from Ireland to Europe by-passing the UK? The answer is no, even though it can be done. The problem is that the shortest, quickest and thus cheapest way for Irish goods to reach continental Europe is through the UK, and vice versa. 10 hours from Dublin to France via the UK, 38 hours by sea. Direct trade, though more expensive, would deal with most of the Northern Ireland problem, but still leave open the prospect of smuggling if there is an 'open border' between North and South.
https://www.politico.eu/article/carg...to-eu-markets/

Or we could sit down and think it through and come to the conclusion that the best option available to the British Government is for Parliament to vote to withdraw Article 50 and remain in the EU.

[peejaye]

Or we could sit down and think it through and come to the conclusion that the best option available to the British Government is for Parliament to vote to withdraw Article 50 and remain in the EU.

I don't think so. You & your wealthy, neo-liberal, right of centre friends need to accept you've had a big slap in the face with a dirty wet fish & learn to accept the referendum result

[Stavros]

I don't think so. You & your wealthy, neo-liberal, right of centre friends need to accept you've had a big slap in the face with a dirty wet fish & learn to accept the referendum result

That is a waste of fish, and as you know the referendum was never a 'left-right' or any other political pigeon-hole referred to above exercise.

Meanwhile, what suggestions do you have to resolve the question -should there be a 'hard border' between North and South in Ireland when -or is it if?- the UK leaves the EU?

[peejaye]

I don't subscribe to this hard/soft nonsense, I'd just have a border! I'd also like every other EU member state to have it's own referendum & see the whole lot "wound up" like it used to be! I suspect only the Germans, the French & the Scandinavian countries would vote to remain? Hopefully then billions of pounds will stop being thrown onto fires subsidising privatisation programmes such as the railways! PKP in Poland being the latest victim!

[peejaye]

Probably the "Benelux" countries too would remain?

[Stavros]

The dilemma is simple to explain: if the UK leaves the EU including the Single Market and the Customs Union, trade flowing between the UK and EU countries will have to be subject to customs inspections, but any attempt to create a border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland will violate the Good Friday Agreement.
For this reason, it has been suggested that the border could be moved to the Irish Sea and computing software used to monitor the traffic of goods by road and sea. But it would not be able to prevent the smuggling from South to North of people and goods, and would thus continue to present both governments with the problem of monitoring the land border between north and south.

It is conceivable that a revised treaty could be drawn up between Ireland and the UK that would amend the terms of the Good Friday Agreement as well as the existing version of the Common Travel Area, but Ireland as an EU member cannot negotiate a separate trade deal with the UK, so which ever way you approach this, the only solution that deals with issues of the border and trade, is a United Ireland, but that can only be realised if there is agreement among all the communities that live on the island of Ireland and it would appear that the DUP is never going to agree to it.
(Edited comment-Since writing the above it occurs to me trade talks could address the 'Irish question'.)

Could the EU fall to pieces when the UK leaves? In theory it is possible, though it may be more likely to be challenged to its limits by extremists currently in power in Poland and Hungary. But if it were to happen, most of the existing EU members would create a replacement version of the EU, for the simple reason that it works, is beneficial to its members, and represents a market of 500 million -minus the UK and any others that leave.

The Leave fantasy for some, like Liam Fox, Michael Gove, Daniel Hannan and their 'guru' Patrick Minford, is the creation of new world of free markets released from state control. Not only do they believe the EU is an obstacle to economic freedom, they believe government is too, and thus are opposed to inter-state trade deals that in reality should be deals made by companies and entrepreneurs.

The idea that half to two-thirds of governments in the world are suddenly going to hand over their lucrative national resources to individuals and companies is beyond belief. For like Trotsky and Lenin's definition of 'permanent revolution', the free market heaven on earth the libertarians yearn for, can only work if everyone participates in it. Saudi Arabia is not about to sell off all its oil to a free market, ditto the Gulf states and Iran. China is not about to relinquish control of its economy to 'the people', and so on.

The reality is that the EU represents a thriving and irreplaceable market for the UK, but it seems we are now going to spend £50 billion over the next 30 years not to be a member of it with all the benefits that has, while the national wealth declines because we lose the benefits we did have. Brexit is a colossal act of self-harm whose wounds the country will struggle to repair.

[peejaye]

All above is just your opinion, I find it so sad some of you people seem to be reduced to virtual tears over it, I accept very little of what you say above, to simply say all the countries within the EU are in it because "it works" means nothing. That's just my opinion.
If you are not a Politician, I am not convinced, then you should be. Of course, the thing with Politicians is they don't listen to others and understand virtually nothing about real life!