If there was another EU referendum...

Jalima
It will be interesting times. Juncker put Selmayr in place without a vote. Guy Verhofstart is still spitting nails over it.
Even more interesting Michel Barnier wants the top job.

I remember that happening back in March. I wonder if he's made his mark yet?

That's OK MamaCaz I can do disagree without falling out!

Dian54, as you saw from today's statement by Barnier there is a more conciliatory tone and clearly a will to co-operate from the EU.

You are though in my view spot on with the Corbyn Labour Party, his eye is on the main chance a General Election. Although I disagree with the need for yet another vote about Brexit, I do think your take on Corbyn's motivations are correct.

Today, I put up some links to the Department for Exiting Europe you might find the website interesting:

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/620076/Biographies_of_the_Civil_Service_representatives_for_the_negotiations_with_the_EU_.pdf

You will also find the 'short guide to the Department for Exiting Europe" of interest:
www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/A-Short-Guide-to-the-Department-for-Exiting-the-European-Union.pdf

The only common goals that brought us together as far as the UK voter was concerned in 1973 was what was called "a Common Market", later to become the single market. In order to access that market with what was then 7 Country's and then 9 later to become 28, it seems by stealth and contract, regulations were introduced imposing the four freedoms into effectively business contract on trade.

Later of course the EU introduced greater controls through it's own Legal system, single currency, created citizens for it's non existent Nation, by issuing all it's member Country's citizens with and EU Passport, making us Citizens of nowhere, since the EU is not a Country these along with other 'State like" Governances, gradually absorbing the freedom's, laws and sovereign nature of Nation members. The further into membership the more the Nation state of that Country diminished. The EU is not a Country, it is not a Nation it is a trading organisation with machinations to be a super state.
Country's are held into what you call 'common goals' by trading agreements. Country's have no choice, it is blackmail, once the agreement expires you either sign up to the EU rules and regs of which there a thousands as well as the four freedoms or you have no access to the single market. Switzerland although only and EFTA Country is tied into the EU because it has foolishly become dependent to the tune of 66% of it's trade is in the single market. The Citizens want to end free movement, they can't because their bilateral agreements will not be renewed without signing up to the rest. Eggs in one basket.

You talk about more extreme members, you will have to be a lot more specific otherwise I can only guess at who you mean and what the extremes are.

As for the 'present leadership' I take it that you mean the EU leadership, since they are unelected the change can be instant if someone is dismissed, or moves on. If after attempting to renegotiate for eight years Cameron and his team got only minor adjustments on very important issues to the UK, it is highly unlikely that the EU will ever move on it's four freedoms, multiple rules and regulations, hugh membership fees. The very reason that the UK is leaving the EU is because of the intransigence of the EU. So Cameron did try, and promised that we would have a referendum in 2015 if he failed in his last series of negotiations, essentially he did fail and we are leaving.

The very reason that the UK is leaving the EU is because of the intransigence of the EU.

Yes. The fact that Cameron could get absolutely nothing from the EU in terms of concessions spoke volumes about our place in the set-up. 'Shut up and put up' was what he brought back from Brussels.

That rang real warning bells for me. We pay huge membership fees (Billions of pounds every year) for what exactly - to be ignored? Have no say? To shut up and put up?

It has also been pretty obvious from the opinions of many Leave voters interviewed on TV since the referendum that they have done no research, because their stated reasons for voting Leave have often had absolutely nothing to do with the EU!

By the same token, the same can be said of many Remain voters.

It's apparent that many prefer not to rock the boat but cannot list any advantages of staying in the EU.

(Some) younger people in particular I have found voted Remain because they felt it was the left wing thing to do. They had little background information but they wanted to appear liberal and 'right-on'.

As many of us can testify, it can be difficult to admit to being a Leaver, given the disgraceful scorn poured upon us by those who wanted to Remain. Thank goodness we had the courage of our convictions.

Given Leave voters have been betrayed as antediluvian thickos by Remain voters that was a clan many less-than-aware-Remainers preferred not to join, even if they could not explain their vote and understood little of the workings of the EU and our place in it. Not all Remainers are informed.

Try turning the tables and asking Remain voters why it's best to stay and it tends to be a 'better the Devil you know' response, unfortunately. It's almost if Remainers are the ones afraid of change and a brave new world and they refuse to see the disenchantment and chasms opening up throughout EU member states.

I remain convinced Brexit will be the beginning of the end for the EU. We were the first off a sinking ship.

Thank you Ally for your post of 13.08. Most encouraging. 80% there is pretty good and it sounds as if despite the posturing by politicians and media, the negotiators are sorting it out. It looks very positive and promising. Time to look forward.

Good post too Day6, although I think that maybe, just maybe, the jolt of us leaving may bring the acceptance of reform to the EU. Already the power Germany exerted has been lessened - although not anything to do with Brexit.

Was it on this thread or another (or it could be many threads!) that someone mentioned that 48 million UK citizens did note vote for Brexit?

Logically, that also means that 48 million people did not vote for Remain.

jalima
I think it was established that 48mil didn't vote.
Wouldn't swear to it though

petra I thought it was worth pointing out (again)

#aremainer

Could not agree with you more NfkDumpling, that the jolt of Brexit is making the EU realise that reform is necessary. It's an organisation formed to solve the problems of a different Century, trying to fit into the twenty first, it just doesn't work for the needs of the present and certainly won't provide for the needs of the future.

Great post Day6 any reform in the EU will have to be more than tweeking. The fundamental principles are out dated and instead of avoiding conflict and political extremism the rigidity of the regulations the so called 'freedoms' have strangled the member States. If the EU does reforms it will have to be so radical that it will cease to exist in it's present form. I agree with you Day6 our leaving is the "beginning of the end" for the EU as we know it, perhaps even it's decommissioning eventually.

Interesting article in the Spectator today regarding the fortunes of London and its resilience. It could prove to be bad news for the EU.

"When the UK voted to leave the EU, it was confidently predicted that the City of London would be wiped out, with the loss of tens of thousands of jobs and billions in tax revenues.

And what happened? According a report by the City of London Corporation, due to be released in September, the number of jobs lost might be as low as 5,000, and will probably be no higher than 10,000. Five thousand. It is worth pausing for a moment to consider how minuscule a number that is. An estimated 751,000 people work in the finance industry in London alone, and many more across the country. So less than one per cent of those jobs will disappear. Tops. In any industry you’d expect two or three per cent of jobs to vanish in a normal year, as technologies change, and the fortunes of different companies ebb and flow. Despite all the hysteria, leaving the EU doesn’t seem to have made any difference to the City whatsoever. It is doing just fine and will continue to do so.

And yet, the EU expected the City to be the biggest casualty of Brexit. It has long been jealous of the way London dominated the continent’s financial services industry. It expected an exodus of well-paid bankers to Frankfurt and Paris desperate to stay inside the Single Market. Hardly a day passed without a senior French or German official touring the London banks pitching their cities as the natural base for their operations, helped on by some hysterical coverage from the Financial Times and the BBC. It threw everything it had at undermining the City. And it is now clear that it has failed."

Further, from the Spectator. (Copied rather than pasted a link as it's not open to all.)

"There should never really have been any surprise about that. A few rules set in Brussels don’t actually impact anything very much. Most of them are irrelevant to how businesses actually operate anyway. In so far as they matter, banks and brokers can set up branch offices to cope with them. Like most bureaucracies, the EU is good at imposing minor, irritating costs. It is not so good at genuinely changing anything. What counts in finance is skills, technology, networks, heritage, and people. London has all of those, and most other European cities don’t. The result? The City will carry on much as before."

"That, however, poses two problems for the rest of Europe. The first is that it will be dangerously reliant on a financial centre that is not only outside the euro-zone but soon outside the EU as well. Most corporate debt, and indeed government debt (and most euro-zone countries love to borrow money) is traded through London. The rules of that business will gradually drift away from its control. The second and bigger problem for the EU is that it is going to become painfully apparent that membership doesn’t make much difference to an economy one way of another. That is clearly true of finance but will soon be true of most other industries as well."

"The EU has sold itself as indispensable to the prosperity of the continent. But the UK, with the City leading the way, is about to demonstrate that is not actually the case – and it will be interesting, to say the least, to see how the Brussels machine justifies its existence once that becomes clear."

Of course London will be less affected than the rest of the U.K. but it will still be worse off . Not sure if that’s much consolation to those left behind areas where most jobs will be lost.
The results of a study by Cambridge Econometrics suggested that the softer the Brexit deal between the UK and the EU, the better for Britain and for London, but the capital’s economy performs more strongly than other areas of the country.
The report’s overall findings of the effect of Brexit on jobs and living standards in the UK are on the conservative end, with 500,000 jobs lost across the UK in a hard Brexit scenario by 2030 compared with remaining in the EU single market and customs union.
The study for London’s Labour mayor said that if the UK embarks on a hard Brexit — leaving the EU single market and customs union, with immigration limited to the tens of thousands each year — Britain’s national income would be roughly 3 per cent less than if it had stayed within both trading arrangements by 2030.
In the hard Brexit scenario, the hit to London’s output was estimated at 2.1 per cent by 2030, with this lower impact compared with the UK overall reflecting the capital’s dynamic industries.
The report concluded that London’s economy would fare better than the rest of the UK under all Brexit options.
It said London performed better than other regions because it has a larger concentration of higher-value industries, which are more resilient, and are able to recover from economic shocks relatively quickly.
“London is not expected to be affected as much as the UK in terms of [gross value added] and productivity,” added the report. Strange that London was a strong Remain area.

London voted Remain as the people believed they would be worse off. The media,etc told them so. The rest of the country (well, around here anyway) felt they have nothing much to lose. In Norfolk only Norwich (with a high naive student population) voted to remain.

Day6
Exactly what leavers have been saying since day1.
One teeny weeny reason why Frankfurt couldn't cope in the financial big league is because Germany's broadband is not good enough. Businesses are complaining, saying that it is holding them back.
From the German website Deutsche Welle.

Petra, wired broadband speeds are becoming ever less important to all industries in general.

With the mobile network suppliers now widely offering 4g LTE connectivity, many offices are finding that an excellent alternative to conventional broadband

Network Three has this week announced that 5G LTE connectivity is to be trialled in selected areas of Britain and Europe commencing in the next few weeks.

Many in offices use their mobile devices on LTE connection for much of their work these days with the traditional workstations becoming less important. That would probably not apply to the city as yet, but it will eventually become more prevalent I have no doubt.

Therefore if anyone believes the City can "hang on" to its business into the future purely on the basis of the London broadband speeds I believe should think again.

That isn’t the real reason though .....London will continue to be a hub for finance and City ‘dealings’ not only because they are world renowned but that everything is interconnected and all in a small area, which is very convenient.

lemongrove, industries which run on large IT systems are one of the easiest workplaces to move if needs be.

London will maintain its world prevalence if frictionless trading with other centres is maintained. However, should tariffs, taxes or other costs make trading in London more difficult or expensive than elsewhere in Europe, then I believe those banks and traders will soon be gone.

I doubt that very much.
Still, we all have our own opinions.
Waiting to see ( a much maligned thing on GN) is probably the best.

Grandad1943
The UK is a gobal trading centre with most transactions being done in USD. The Euro is a bit player in this scenario. I wonder why the rest of the world has no issue trading through London yet the EU will?
With regard to IT, The UK is a centre of excellence for cybersecurity and provide security surveillance to sensitive users throughout the world.
Whether 4 and 5G can offer the bandwidth or security for large scale secure transactions is debateable.

So less than one per cent of those jobs will disappear. Tops. In any industry you’d expect two or three per cent of jobs to vanish in a normal year, as technologies change, and the fortunes of different companies ebb and flow. Despite all the hysteria, leaving the EU doesn’t seem to have made any difference to the City whatsoever. It is doing just fine and will continue to do so.

Clutching at straws about secure transactions does not take away from the fact that all the hysteria about financiers packing up and leaving - a certainty according to most Remainers - just hasn't happened.

Nor have all those firms/celebrities vanished from our country, as Remainers/Project Fear predicted.

As Lemon suggested, the 'wait and see' approach to Brexit can and has been the only way. The Project Fear crystal balls have proved to be duds even though most sensible people have reiterated time and time again that the future is not ours to see.