Cliff Edge anyone?

Primrose, why is your information so out of date?

Didn't the mini used to be a British car till we sold it to the Germans?

Problem is this country is nowhere near self-sufficient in food, and is dependent on importing food using other countries land and low wage labour. The UK gets 30% of food from EU rising to 40% for horticultural produce. According to Prof Tim Lang (Centre for Food Policy) our food system depends on complicated cross continental supply chains and heavily tied into Europe, and to sever this web will be an awesome and unprecedented task. We are used to cheap food, which no doubt the US will readily supply, and which as dj states we may have to compromise on in order to secure bilateral trade. Of course the well-off will always be able to eat healthy and well sourced food, which will be at a premium.

Why can't we secure bilateral trade with every EU country, as we know their standards are similar to ours?

Not allowed is it?

I don't think it would be allowed as they negotiate as a bloc - but presumably they are allowed between two EU states because UK has the Le Touquet agreement with France about the border posts but that would have nothing to do with any other country anyway.

This report about the Brexit talks etc popped up in my feed to day - could not do a link so had to copy it all - Verhofstadt.

Press Releases OTHERS 5 hours ago


The Brexit Steering group met Michel Barnier, EU negotiator for Brexit on Tuesday 25 July and issued this common statement after the 2nd round of negotiations between the EU and the UK.
“Last week was the first real round of Brexit negotiations between the European Union and the United Kingdom. It was an opportunity for the two parties to review the main issues and map out where further explanations are necessary,” said the Members of the EP Brexit Steering group.
“However, if we want negotiations to succeed within the limited time we have, progress on more detailed content will have to be made sooner rather than later. We can only start talking about a new EU-UK relationship if sufficient progress has been achieved in the three main withdrawal areas: citizens’ rights, the financial settlement and the border issue on the island of Ireland.”
“The European Parliament cannot be clear enough that sufficient progress means progress across the board, and not just in one or two areas. The European Parliament will formally and in due time indicate when the point of ‘sufficient progress’ has been reached”
“To be precise, the European Parliament will remain vigilant regarding citizens’ rights and will continue to push for full rights for EU citizens in the UK as well as UK citizens in the EU. It is a core mission of the European project to protect, not to diminish, the fundamental rights of all citizens."
“The European Parliament specifically seeks to fully safeguard the rights concerning family reunion, comprehensive healthcare, voting rights in local elections, the transferability of (social) rights, and the rules governing permanent residence (including the right to leave the UK without losing this status). Simultaneously, we seek to avoid an administrative burden for citizens and want proposals which are intrusive to people’s privacy off the table, e.g. proposed systematic criminal checks.”
“Last but not least, the European Parliament wants the Withdrawal Agreement to be directly enforceable and to include a mechanism in which the European Court of Justice can play its full role.”
Note to editors
Members of the Brexit Steering group:
Guy Verhofstadt
Elmar Brok
Roberto Gualtieri
Philippe Lamberts
Gabriele Zimmer
Danuta Hübner

Fraser Nelson editor of the Spectator, has tweeted that he is a Brexiter, but if Brexit looks like an economic disaster then it would be ridiculous to go ahead

It's called being a member of the EU, isn't it?

Why is he still a brexiter if he thinks leaving the EU is potentially an economic disaster?

But he's saying IF Brexit looks like an economic disaster...THEN he'll change his mind. Not yet. Hedging his bets, like a lot of Brexiteers.

Fox dismissed the need to lower U.K. Food standards in order to accept USA garbage for the poor as a minor detail of trade negotiations.

The EU described Fox's claims as "ignorant and indigestible" " it is a further gift from the Tories and their Brexit"

I think it is yet another Brexit lie to add to all the rest.

"This news reinforces why the EU will need to have stringent checks and controls at the borders to ensure that the food is of sufficient standard to meet the EU consumers high standards. We cannot acccept a race to the bottom on standards"

This lowering of standards by the U.K. Will significantly hinder trade.
The British poultry industry is concerned about the UK market being flooded with cheap chlorinated washed hormone and drug filled chickens.

The only way for the poultry industry to compete would raise the chickens in the same poor way, ensuring that the UK chickens would be subject to the same chlorine wash and drugs.

Fox the former disgraced defence minister, doesn't see anything wrong with any of of it.

Another EU official said that he had been surprised at the lack of knowledge amongst the U.K. Politicians and their approach to negotiations.r

Good news!! Gove has categorically stated that we will not accept USA rubbish meat. We will under no circumstances lower our food standards!!

Puts him direct conflict with a fellow minister. But I don't care.

Well that's OK then! Will it come back later to bite (peck) him............

Not remotely a Gove supporter so was surprised that, in the course of the Today interview, he actually gave two direct answers to questions!
It isn't often that we hear a simple 'yes' or 'no' in reply to any question!

Do you think he is silently praying to be sacked in the reshuffle that is going to happen after the recess.

Did he mention this in the interview?

www.theguardian.com/education/2017/jul/25/more-than-600000-pupils-in-england-taught-by-unqualified-teachers

Aren't quaified teachers (or at least some of them) experts in education.? Gove says the British people have had enough of experts. Sadliy, I think this attitude might also have a lot to do with the appalling attacks on GOSH staff over poor little Charlie Gard.

Independent report yesterday.

"As a British negotiator, I can tell you that Brexit is going to be far worse than anyone realised"

The government said "it didn't realise about the problems" but they have the experts in Westminster, which they appear to have ignored.

We are now facing a breakdown in airline safety, animal welfare, medicine, security, international aid and so much more.

Tories are calling on the government to avert a disastrous port gridlock, by investing in customs check points, widening roads building huge lorry parks and getting started immediately on a further Thames crossing.

How much is that going to cost?

Article in The Times where a Tory reports that if Brexit is cancelled then the Tories will be destroyed but if we continue with Brexit, then the country is destroyed.

Ah, just a Tory who wanted to stay in the EU, doesn't make it Gospel.

WW, I saw that report too. Sounded like the most honest bit of reporting on that issue for a long time.

Link to the Independent article ww mentioned:

www.independent.co.uk/voices/brexit-eu-negotiator-europe-euratom-airline-safety-negotiations-theresa-may-worse-anyone-guessed-a7858586.html

How will the UK remain in the EU’s internal energy market post-Brexit as it looks to import more energy from the EU, and what are the implications if it doesn’t? What about the Emissions Trading System? Patents and intellectual property rights? Food standards? Medicine approvals? Europol? The list goes on and on.

What is most frustrating, and deeply worrying, about these continuous “we didn’t realise that” moments is that the Government has plenty of excellent sector-specific experts in Whitehall, and the United Kingdom Representation to the European Union (UKRep), which represents the UK in negotiations that take place in the EU. I simply don’t believe that they are not doing their job and reporting these issues to ministers and their offices.

The amount of vituperative and anti-expert comments on twitter about this article was quite startling .

Thanks maize me and links = hopeless

Getting back to the former disgraced foreign minister and his attempt to foist dirty chlorine washed, hormone and drug laden meat on us under the guise of " good trading relationships"

I have been reading an article by George Mombiot.

In it he reminds us (well me anyway because I had forgotten) that some of the antibiotics used in the US meat production is listed as "critically important" in human medicine, and bad a result there is a high risk that a super bug will emerge.
Hormones used in beef production are also implicated in breast cancer.

This is all because the US has much lower standards than the EU and by our membership the UK.
Trump is hell bent on removing as much of the regulation in the US as soon as is possible. So standards will almost fall even further.