EU wants us to pay 89 BILLION divorce charges.

dj losing our dominance in the financial sector is worrying indeed. WTO doesn’t cover that area, so we need to think very carefully about losing 40% of our income.

Did you see the tweet by the chief of Goldman Sachs about going to spend much more time in Frankfurt from now on?
They've leased enough office space for 800 staff.

I am interested to know where the bill of 89bn€ has come from.
I understood that the only figures talked sbout officially to date are the Florence speech figures. So Maybot has bandied about the figures that we owe up unti the end of the budget. We are signed and sealed for that.

I understood that the negotiations are about the areas that may indicate a U.K. liability and not yet any actually liability?

She has gone into Maybot mode again, hasn't she?

infacts.org/dont-cry-brexit-britain/

Brexit “The most grotesque example of John Stuart Mills “Tyranny if the majority” “

No mention of any such figure on the news- sounds a bit like a Daily Mail figure picked out of thin air

Just a few points on the finances.
For many years the EU accounts could not be approved & signed because of poor financial & budgetary management - I remember Neil Kinnock as a Commissioner strongly criticising the EU and telling them to get their house in order - in the last couple of years there's been improvement & the accounts have been signed but they are "qualified" accounts - i.e. "they're OK apart from the £8 billion of expenditure that can't be accounted for" - so given their record in financial matters what've they based their £89 billion figure on?
I seem to remember that the UK voted against the current EU budget which was increased despite the financial difficulties in the member states - but we were overruled.
I think it's reasonable to accept our liabilities - but let's offset our assets as well - we've paid for a lot of capital expenditure projects in the EU member states and we should get credit for them.
We shouldn't be tied to any current or future expenditure in which we have no say. For example - all our pensions in the UK - State, Public & Private sectors - have been reviewed and reformed in recent years - less inflation-proofing & higher age before we receive them - so I'd think it unfair if we had to keep paying for unreformed EU pensions.

It's funny how Brexiters complain about being labelled thick racists when they never say anything nasty about snowflake elites who voted remain!
I am sure all Leave voters were highly cultured , intelligent, well informed and supporters of multiculturalism . Let's leave it at that.

durhamjjen
Re Goldman Sachs. The figure you give still leaves 5,700 working in London. I would imagine they won't be fighting each other for a chance to work in Frankfurt, it's not exactly London.

petra if Goldman Sachs goes others will follow. But of course Day 6 is absolutely right let's walk away without a deal. Let's make a complete and utter mess of this instead of just a partial one. Never mind if it will plunge this country into depression and make things worse. It's the principle that counts isn't it and we won't pay that much to Johnny Foreigner. After all we are BRITISH

dbD i think that what you have talked about is forming a small part of the negotiations.

But I wouldn’t get too hung up on 89bn, that is a figure plucked out of thin air and means nothing at this stage.

Isn't it extraordinary, that 16 months after the referendum, there is not even an agreement on what our liabilities are. It should have been possible for the British Govt and the EU to agree, firstly, what items should be included and secondly how much that adds up to, but no. If you want to know how much we are honourably bound to pat (termed the divorce bill by the brexit tabloids), then take you pick from any number of numbers pulled out of a hat.

fullfact.org/europe/eu-divorce-bill/

Of course none of this was highlighted before the referendum

And in the meantime, according to the OECD, the UK has the worst economic growth not only of all EU countries, but also the G7.

Doing really well, aren't we?

Wonder how bad it has got to get before brextremists agree that Brexit isn’t such a good idea after all.

Petra exactly, regarding Goldman Sachs, there will be some who may go to Frankfurt, but London is still the place to be ( a friend’s son works for them and London is his whole world.?)
It isn’t bad at all at the moment whitewave so no point in speculating.

What's bad at the moment that particularly relates to brexit?

If you have to ask that question, then you aren’t paying attention.

Not really an answer whitewave ?

There is much speculation and talking the UK down, but as Brexit is only just underway nothing much is actually happening, good, bad or indifferent.

Exactly lemongrove nothing much is happening. It was all supposed to be so easy. How many people voted leave because they were told it would be easy?

Who thought it would be easy?
Since there is no actual policy in place for leaving ( the EU couldn't imagine anyone wanting to leave!) then it was always going to be time consuming working out all the negotiations.But it will be done.

theconversation.com/dig-for-brexit-comments-reveal-the-uk-government-digging-a-food-security-hole-for-itself-85798

Dead easy, varian, although Brexiteers are denying they said so.
Chris Grayling thinks it is, but he's an .....

Nobody, I should think, voted Leave ‘ because it would be easy’ no point to that at all, they voted that way for various reasons, but it being easy to do didn’t come into the equation.

Brexit is to the UK everything but to the millions living in the EU it is just one more subject. Many days pass by when the news doesn't mention Brexit. The EU has other more pressing subjects to worry about - Turkey eg.

If I remember rightly the UK signed all the documents which relate to the divorce bill. The main mistake concerning the referendum was that whereas in most EU countries 70 % of all possible voters must vote yes before a refendum is successful.
Cameron should have knewn that. What a fool he was.

I’ll get back on that lemon I’m off now to ask all those voting leave. I may be some time.