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To be honest, I'd be happy to see these city spivs sent packing!

I'd quite happily get a boat and row them over to France myself.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
To be honest, I'd be happy to see these city spivs sent packing!

I'd quite happily get a boat and row them over to France myself.

Although I understand the sentiment given how much the sector exploited the uk during the financial crash (and somehow managed to persuade the government that the general populace should pay for their mistakes). However we need a sustainable reduction in the the influence of banks in the uk economy. As it stands the sector makes up about 8% of the countries gross value added (I.e. Taking into account not just taxes but also what is then spent back in the economy such as in champagne bars etc). That equates to about £130bn (info from a 2014/2015 parliamentary report). If you kicked out this amount of gva from the uk economy then you would be instantly in a very hard recession as not only the tax dried up but also the tax from their expenditure (so the champagne waiter and waitresses tax and expenditure and so on.). Taking this amount of money out of the economy would also mean that the public services we know and love would be impacted massively as well.

Like it or not the uk and it's history is built on the city of London. We built an empire on it and we still rely on it.

Much as bankers are despised it seems to me that the easiest way to keep and attract corporations to put money into our country to avoid a disaster after Brexit is to become a tax haven, make it worth their while to stay here even with the inconvenience of us being out the EU. If you attract enough you can offset the loss of them each paying in so little. Maybe that means we'd be hypocrites and annoy other countries but when you're on your own you have to look after yourself which means being hard nosed and selfish.

There are many in the EU who will deny us anything other than hard Brexit simply because their position on things like free movement is ideological and to hell with the financial costs to companies, even in their own countries who want to continue trading with us. Even if it means cutting off their own nose, they'll do it to prevent other countries thinking of leaving and bolstering the European project. If that's the way negotiations go next year, we'll have to be ruthless and selfish or we'll be screwed over.

 Whirlwind wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
To be honest, I'd be happy to see these city spivs sent packing!

I'd quite happily get a boat and row them over to France myself.

Although I understand the sentiment given how much the sector exploited the uk during the financial crash (and somehow managed to persuade the government that the general populace should pay for their mistakes). However we need a sustainable reduction in the the influence of banks in the uk economy. As it stands the sector makes up about 8% of the countries gross value added (I.e. Taking into account not just taxes but also what is then spent back in the economy such as in champagne bars etc). That equates to about £130bn (info from a 2014/2015 parliamentary report). If you kicked out this amount of gva from the uk economy then you would be instantly in a very hard recession as not only the tax dried up but also the tax from their expenditure (so the champagne waiter and waitresses tax and expenditure and so on.). Taking this amount of money out of the economy would also mean that the public services we know and love would be impacted massively as well.

I resent the fact that they ran this country into the ground, but I also resent the fact that their industry contributes a lot of tax revenues to this nation.

Catch 22? It's more like a catch 44!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Steve steveson wrote:
Like it or not the uk and it's history is built on the city of London. We built an empire on it and we still rely on it.

BREXIT gives us a unique opportunity to redress this balance. London is this blackhole as far as the rest of the nation is concerned.

Yes, it contributes a lot, but it's a vicious circle, as it needs constant money thrown at it for new projects and infastructure.

A shift is needed to the north and the midlands and a Tartan Triangle for Glasgow/Edinburgh/Newcastle, could also work.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
Much as bankers are despised it seems to me that the easiest way to keep and attract corporations to put money into our country to avoid a disaster after Brexit is to become a tax haven, make it worth their while to stay here even with the inconvenience of us being out the EU. If you attract enough you can offset the loss of them each paying in so little. Maybe that means we'd be hypocrites and annoy other countries but when you're on your own you have to look after yourself which means being hard nosed and selfish.

There are many in the EU who will deny us anything other than hard Brexit simply because their position on things like free movement is ideological and to hell with the financial costs to companies, even in their own countries who want to continue trading with us. Even if it means cutting off their own nose, they'll do it to prevent other countries thinking of leaving and bolstering the European project. If that's the way negotiations go next year, we'll have to be ruthless and selfish or we'll be screwed over.

The easiest way to sort out the bankers is to start handing out jail time when they break the law.

I agree that those commiting fraud should be locked up. But most individuals don't clearly break the law, it's so complicated and full of guidelines rather than clear laws that they exploit loopholes and dodges rather than carrying out actual fraud, our laws enable this behaviour. Further, the bank bosses let staff off the leash to do what they like and if they make money they're happy, if they make losses then they blame the employee and if they do things that are illegal they wash their hands of them.

Companies that commit fraud or dubious actions are very difficult to prosecute, partly the law allows them to do what they do, and only a handful ever seem to go away for more than a few years despite laying waste to thousands of lives and destroying peoples finances. How is Philip Green receiving no consequences for 'managing' BHS and emptying the pension fund of its employees? Plain robbery you'd think but he's on his massive yacht while masses of people face a bleak retirement.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
Much as bankers are despised it seems to me that the easiest way to keep and attract corporations to put money into our country to avoid a disaster after Brexit is to become a tax haven, make it worth their while to stay here even with the inconvenience of us being out the EU. If you attract enough you can offset the loss of them each paying in so little. Maybe that means we'd be hypocrites and annoy other countries but when you're on your own you have to look after yourself which means being hard nosed and selfish.

There are many in the EU who will deny us anything other than hard Brexit simply because their position on things like free movement is ideological and to hell with the financial costs to companies, even in their own countries who want to continue trading with us. Even if it means cutting off their own nose, they'll do it to prevent other countries thinking of leaving and bolstering the European project. If that's the way negotiations go next year, we'll have to be ruthless and selfish or we'll be screwed over.

This is all very true I'm afraid.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
I agree that those commiting fraud should be locked up. But most individuals don't clearly break the law, it's so complicated and full of guidelines rather than clear laws that they exploit loopholes and dodges rather than carrying out actual fraud, our laws enable this behaviour. Further, the bank bosses let staff off the leash to do what they like and if they make money they're happy, if they make losses then they blame the employee and if they do things that are illegal they wash their hands of them.

Companies that commit fraud or dubious actions are very difficult to prosecute, partly the law allows them to do what they do, and only a handful ever seem to go away for more than a few years despite laying waste to thousands of lives and destroying peoples finances. How is Philip Green receiving no consequences for 'managing' BHS and emptying the pension fund of its employees? Plain robbery you'd think but he's on his massive yacht while masses of people face a bleak retirement.

It's the double standards as always, that gets my goat.

Take a few hundred extra quid for benifets? DWP send the Spanish Inquisition after you.

Wreck the economy and rob billions off the British people?

We can't do anything becuase it's too complicated!!

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Steve steveson wrote:
Like it or not the uk and it's history is built on the city of London. We built an empire on it and we still rely on it.

BREXIT gives us a unique opportunity to redress this balance. London is this blackhole as far as the rest of the nation is concerned.

Yes, it contributes a lot, but it's a vicious circle, as it needs constant money thrown at it for new projects and infastructure.

A shift is needed to the north and the midlands and a Tartan Triangle for Glasgow/Edinburgh/Newcastle, could also work.

So your willing to trash the UK economy to spite the banks? The building in London is not a zero sum game. It more than pays for itself. If you remove the city the money does not suddenly become avalable to spend elsewhere. There is a rebalancing of the UK economy needed away from London, but that is not just about banks, and the banking sector is so much more than the high risk investment banking that people hate.

This argument has the same failings of the whole brexit argument, and has the same basis in reality as the £350million for the NHS argument. A very small section of the banking industry was involved in the credit crunch. An even smaller section was responsible. The prime cause was down to people borroweing more than they could afford on homes and then being able to walk away in the US. The damage in the UK was caused by a complex set of issues that meant that the markets lost trust in the banks and withdrew investment. Exactly they same risk we are running with the uncertainty of leaving the EU. But this is part of a capitalist economy. The only way to avoid market crashes is to remove stock markets and move to a managed economy. You can regulate to reduce the risk or damage, but you can't get away from it completely.

What exactly is the criminal offence that the banks committed? There seems to still be a lot of calling for people to be in prison but no details on what law was broken.

 Steve steveson wrote:

What exactly is the criminal offence that the banks committed? There seems to still be a lot of calling for people to be in prison but no details on what law was broken.

I think most of those calls for prison sentences are based in Icelands response to the banking crash in which they arrested and convicted some major Icelandic financial bigwigs for a variety of crimes such as insider trading, fraud and breach of trust.

I don't know whether our banking leaders were involved in similar behaviour and just not charged but I wouldn't bet too heavily against it.

 Steve steveson wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Steve steveson wrote:
Like it or not the uk and it's history is built on the city of London. We built an empire on it and we still rely on it.

BREXIT gives us a unique opportunity to redress this balance. London is this blackhole as far as the rest of the nation is concerned.

Yes, it contributes a lot, but it's a vicious circle, as it needs constant money thrown at it for new projects and infastructure.

A shift is needed to the north and the midlands and a Tartan Triangle for Glasgow/Edinburgh/Newcastle, could also work.

So your willing to trash the UK economy to spite the banks? The building in London is not a zero sum game. It more than pays for itself. If you remove the city the money does not suddenly become avalable to spend elsewhere. There is a rebalancing of the UK economy needed away from London, but that is not just about banks, and the banking sector is so much more than the high risk investment banking that people hate.

This argument has the same failings of the whole brexit argument, and has the same basis in reality as the £350million for the NHS argument. A very small section of the banking industry was involved in the credit crunch. An even smaller section was responsible. The prime cause was down to people borroweing more than they could afford on homes and then being able to walk away in the US. The damage in the UK was caused by a complex set of issues that meant that the markets lost trust in the banks and withdrew investment. Exactly they same risk we are running with the uncertainty of leaving the EU. But this is part of a capitalist economy. The only way to avoid market crashes is to remove stock markets and move to a managed economy. You can regulate to reduce the risk or damage, but you can't get away from it completely.

What exactly is the criminal offence that the banks committed? There seems to still be a lot of calling for people to be in prison but no details on what law was broken.

I'm arguing for a long overdue restructuring of the UK economy, which recognizes London's contribution, but also pumps badly needed capital into the Midlands, North of England, and Scotland.

Scrapping the white elephant that is HS2 could provide the money for this.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Steve steveson wrote:

What exactly is the criminal offence that the banks committed? There seems to still be a lot of calling for people to be in prison but no details on what law was broken.

I think most of those calls for prison sentences are based in Icelands response to the banking crash in which they arrested and convicted some major Icelandic financial bigwigs for a variety of crimes such as insider trading, fraud and breach of trust.

I don't know whether our banking leaders were involved in similar behaviour and just not charged but I wouldn't bet too heavily against it.

Given that the City of London police have what is widely regarded to be the best financial crimes unit in the world I would suggest that they were not, and there is no evidence that anyone was. One of the things that makes London so successful as a financial centre is the confidence investors have in the rule of law and the ability to enforce the law of the City of London police. If there was suspicions of fraud or insider trading being ignored then investors would look elsewhere.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:


I'm arguing for a long overdue restructuring of the UK economy, which recognizes London's contribution, but also pumps badly needed capital into the Midlands, North of England, and Scotland.

Scrapping the white elephant that is HS2 could provide the money for this.

Whilst I agree that we need more investment up north, I disagree about scrapping HS2 - indeed having high speed travel between London and Glasgow/Edinburgh would only help enable investment in the north.

Imagine where you could set up your operations if you can attend a business meeting in a day trip to London?

The penalties for committing a financial offence far outweigh the rewards for the majority of those working in the FS sector.

Obviously people drawn to risk, such as in trading and other financial activity are going to dance on that edge and even go beyond.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Herzlos wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:


I'm arguing for a long overdue restructuring of the UK economy, which recognizes London's contribution, but also pumps badly needed capital into the Midlands, North of England, and Scotland.

Scrapping the white elephant that is HS2 could provide the money for this.

Whilst I agree that we need more investment up north, I disagree about scrapping HS2 - indeed having high speed travel between London and Glasgow/Edinburgh would only help enable investment in the north.

Imagine where you could set up your operations if you can attend a business meeting in a day trip to London?

HS2 was a great idea on paper. Unfortunately its benefit is being degraded day by weary day.

...... yeah. Funny that ...









why :


oh.

... so that's the tories now promising to subsidise a -- foreign owned -- company.

Strange days eh ?

Stil we'll have all that extra money sloshing about right ?







oh



still I'm sure things will calm down, people won't do anything daft










on the plus side

HS2 just isn't worth it. It's a vanity project with minimal benefits. We should spend that money on something more substantial...like a space programme!

Ted Heath's government cancelled our fledging space program (The Black Arrow) and got us into the Common Market. We've undone the first, so why not undo the second? And we can base it in Scotland, because it's got the space for it and it'll show them we love them.

EDIT:

I say this as a committed Brexiteer; making it illegal to support or even like the EU is illiberal and unbritish.

TBF the above gent is probably bitter all us metropolitan elite made him change his name from Christmas

What a bell-end, but not surprising tbh. There are thousands of highly delusional individuals running about atm, not all of them wearing clown suits either. Unfortunately some of these people, have positions of authority or influence, and are more dangerous than killer clowns by far.
Luckily being a councillor for Guildford Borough council is not one of those positions.

I do wonder if it might be worthwhile to pursue a petition to make this sort of nonsense an equivalent of hate speech? Certainly the calls for harsh prison sentences and the sort of headlines run by the low brow tabloids like the Express and DM do bear the hallmarks treading close to hate speech. Grouping large, disparate people together under one title, making baseless and outrageous claims, and demanding punishment for perceived sleights feels like hate speech to me.
Of course that's impinging on the freedom of the press, and a childish response to childish, emotive threats, so not really a serious proposition.

Much more interesting to me is the desperation and aggression being displayed by these people. It's not enough to have won the vote, but they seem determined to attack and crush any dissent. It's starting to get tiresome listening to the endless right wing tantrum were having to face atm.
I mean, at one extreme, it's hardly going to help get the country back on its feet if you deport all migrants, and those who disagree with you by telling them constantly, if they don't like it, leave. Surely, instead of raging like a bigotted dick, those who truly believe in Leave should be trying to make the case positively, and be trying to get everyone on board.

At the moment it feels like half the crew of HMS Brittania have hacked a hole beneath the waterline, and are shouting at everyone else that they're traitors for thinking it was a bad idea.

Worst part is his constituency voted 56- 44 in favour of remain

 reds8n wrote:
Worst part is his constituency voted 56- 44 in favour of remain

A man of the people then. Maybe there's a reason he failed to make a good case for leave?

I expect the problem will be solved in the traditional British way by grumbling about this guy for a bit and then quietly forgetting him.

 Future War Cultist wrote:
HS2 just isn't worth it. It's a vanity project with minimal benefits. We should spend that money on something more substantial...like a space programme!

We seem to have made a traditional British arse of it, but I still think it's a good idea (at least by the end of HS3 or HS4). Our public transport is utterly humiliated by most of the developed world.
Plus, if we want to try and reduce fossil fuel use, we need to make alternatives viable.

The only reason we don't already have 200mph bullet trains is because we're too fething short sighted.

If anybody needs more evidence of how crooked, corrupt and farcical this nation is, then check out Craig Murray's blogspot:

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2016/10/uk-torture-secrets-will-remain-secret/

A quick 101 for anybody unaware of who Craig Murray is;

Murray was the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan. During the war on terror, terror suspects were taken to Uzbekistan, that beacon of human rights, and tortured for information. Bush and Blair knew of this. Murray wasn't happy with this, blew the whistle, and then got the boot.

Now they're holding an 'inquiry' into it, and this is where it gets farcical. Despite being present at 'secret' meetings about this, and despite writing some of these 'secret' memorandums, Craig Murray was initially denied access to these notes before attending the inquiry. He wanted to refresh his memory as some of this stuff was written years ago. Eventually, they relented, but its been pretty shambolic.

The full story is on his blogspot, but in all honesty, the inquiry looks as though it will be the usual whitewash....

When you read what went on, it makes you ashamed to be British at times...

PS I know I support Scottish independence, but still...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Herzlos wrote:

 Future War Cultist wrote:
HS2 just isn't worth it. It's a vanity project with minimal benefits. We should spend that money on something more substantial...like a space programme!

We seem to have made a traditional British arse of it, but I still think it's a good idea (at least by the end of HS3 or HS4). Our public transport is utterly humiliated by most of the developed world.
Plus, if we want to try and reduce fossil fuel use, we need to make alternatives viable.

The only reason we don't already have 200mph bullet trains is because we're too fething short sighted.

It will decades to build HS2 and by that time, the tech will be old hat, and everybody will probably have jetpacks by then, anyway...

High time this dead horse stopped getting flogged and instead was sent to the glue factory...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I expect the problem will be solved in the traditional British way by grumbling about this guy for a bit and then quietly forgetting him.

Unless he pops up on Big Brother or some other low budget Channel 5 reality show


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 r_squared wrote:

 reds8n wrote:
Worst part is his constituency voted 56- 44 in favour of remain

A man of the people then. Maybe there's a reason he failed to make a good case for leave?

The guy will probably end up with a Daily Mail column or something

There's a lot of speculation, doommongering, and inaccurate guff going through the press right now. To summarise the key economic sectors on Brexit impact right now:-

The construction industry (as notprop as pointed out) is quietly content regardless. We've been underbuilding for so long that it's unlikely any cut is going to be made to housebuilding, and the government has several large infrastructure projects in the pipeline to keep investment and training high.

The pharmaceutical sector considers itself immune to most macroeconomic shifts, medicines are valuable anywhere in the world (assuming standard patenting laws apply), giving them a steady (indeed, the majority of their) income in foreign currencies from existing drugs. There are some concerns over retaining membership of the EMA, which approves how drugs are approved within the EU, because forced withdrawal from that will hit them in the pocket slightly. It is likely that a deal can be struck over this area without much difficulty however, so they're not too worried.

Like pharmaceuticals, the aerospace industry makes a large proportion of its sales abroad whilst manufacturing internally, rendering a weak pound a positive advantage. They've seen a minor uptick in investment, collect in most of their profits in foreign currencies, manufacture locally, and their research base is mostly domestic and US centred, so losing access to EU institutions/researchers won't affect them. They're slightly worried about losing Horizon 2020 funding, but there are sufficient other factors working in their favour that Brexit is unlikely to impede them much.

The automotive manufacturing industry is a bit more worried. Whilst the weak pound has initially boosted sales, there's genuine fear that lengthy negotiations combined with higher overheads will result in European tariffs killing their sales. They are one of the most likely sectors to need support if things go tits up. There's a reasonable hope that common standards/no tariffs will be maintained with the Continent due to German concerns in this sector, but the uncertainty is causing a lot of worry.

Oil is dead. Nothing will happen there for a while, and there are a lot of companies in Scotland going/gone broke already on that basis.

Tourism is on the up. A weak pound combined with the fact that people from outside the EU already needed a separate set of paperwork to come here means that this sector is likely to continue to grow regardless of Brexit, and the weaker the pound gets, the more foreigners will be attracted to visit.

The financial services sector is very jittery and don't know which way is up. They stand the most to lose from Brexit if things go south, and the speculators trying to make money off of guessing how the market will develop is only exacerbating volatility. Britain will remain a major banking hub regardless of what happens, but uncertainty and finance make extremely uneasy bedfellows.

The creative industries are quite vulnerable to Brexit. The sorts of people they employ are the most easily replaced abroad (be it in Europe or America), and often operate on shoe string profits for the smaller businesses. They're probably going to get hammered regardless of what happens, be it soft or hard Brexit, if they don't get some sort of substantial tax breaks/financial incentive to remain UK based.

The higher education sector, despite most of the (excessive) whinging from it, will likely weather Brexit reasonably well. EU student fees contribution remains minimal to their income, academics tend to go where the work is regardless of visas (we'll still remain a highly attractive place for research with so many top unis), and our appeal in asia has never been higher. A weaker pound also works to their direct advantage here. A few weaker unis are likely to go bust in the next few years, but that will be unrelated to Brexit and more to do with other things going on. EU research funding only compromises about 10% of the total research funding in the UK (and thus 2.4% of total income), so again, despite all the complaints, impact is likely to be minimal.


In short, many of our economic sectors are remarkably resilient to the impact of Brexit. But there are key areas that will likely need to be supported in the event of hard Brexit, and it is good the government is identifying and reassuring them sooner rather than later.

Oil is dead. Nothing will happen there for a while, and there are a lot of companies in Scotland going/gone broke already on that basis.

As I've said before, Westminster's handling of North Sea Oil has to be one of the greatest acts of criminality ever inflicted upon the British people.

No oil fund, an industry squeezed until the pips squeaked, chronic lack of investment, and so on and so on...Compare and contrast to Norway. It would break your heart...

What a waste...

 Ketara wrote:


Oil is dead. Nothing will happen there for a while, and there are a lot of companies in Scotland going/gone broke already on that basis.

This is not the issue with oil though; it's that it is all valued in dollars. With an ever devaluing £ that means that that oil prices are steadily rising which will affect a host of different sectors from farming to petrochemicals to hauliers to fuel for oil power plants. It's not likely to increase to the $100 a barrel prices again anytime soon when it started causing unrest. But then it no longer has to get this high to result an equivalent cost per barrel. Take for example the current exchange rate, a $75 barrel would now be the equivalent of $100 dollar barrel we saw a few years ago. If the £ dropped as a badcase scenario to a 1:1 £:$ rate then it would only be $65 a barrel to result in the same cost as when we had a $100 per barrel. The worst case would be a poor exchange rate and high price per barrel that would really hurt (though less likely at the moment).

 Ketara wrote:
Tourism is on the up. A weak pound combined with the fact that people from outside the EU already needed a separate set of paperwork to come here means that this sector is likely to continue to grow regardless of Brexit, and the weaker the pound gets, the more foreigners will be attracted to visit.

Except it's not, there has actually been a reduction in the increase in foreigners since Wrexit. In the 12 months up to July 2016 visitors were up 4%, whereas the direct July 2015 to July 2016 comparison was only an increase of 2%. Hence there was a greater increase in tourism pre-Wrexit with a higher exchange rate than there was post Wrexit and a lower exchange rate. So the argument that foreign visitors are up because of a lower pound is evidentially false given the current data (because the increase was greater previously). However I would again stress that I think that these increases are all likely to be within normal statistical variation (and only minimally affected by Wrexit issues). http://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/leisureandtourism/bulletins/overseastravelandtourism/provisionalresultsforjuly2016

 Ketara wrote:
The higher education sector, despite most of the (excessive) whinging from it, will likely weather Brexit reasonably well. EU student fees contribution remains minimal to their income, academics tend to go where the work is regardless of visas (we'll still remain a highly attractive place for research with so many top unis), and our appeal in asia has never been higher. A weaker pound also works to their direct advantage here. A few weaker unis are likely to go bust in the next few years, but that will be unrelated to Brexit and more to do with other things going on. EU research funding only compromises about 10% of the total research funding in the UK (and thus 2.4% of total income), so again, despite all the complaints, impact is likely to be minimal. .

Maybe for those universities that have minimal science courses. But for science areas (except maybe medicine due to the large number of other external sources) it is likely to be a disaster. For a student on a science or engineering courses it costs about £14,000 whereas actual fees received are only around £9000. This is because the coursework based courses with a handful of lectures a week are cheap relatively because of the lack of formal labs etc. Hence the loss of foreign students will really hurt and put a big dent into the finances because they effectively allow the university to subsidise the domestic students. Some will probably be OK on name alone (Oxbridge and UCL) but the rest will. Ironically this is likely to hit the 'higher' tier universities more than the 'lower' if they provide more science and engineering courses (which could lead to a reduction in places and courses, not likely helpful to the economy). The loss of EU funding is also not likely to help, excepting medicine, approx. 50% of the science funding comes from the EU. the UK has only committed to matching this until 2020 (which is rather pointless as that is about the time Wrexit would actually happen). As such there are already researchers preparing the packing of bags because they believe they will no longer be able to obtain the funding if they stay in the UK (and note a lot of funding is awarded on proposals so if they leave they take the money with them, it's not where the work is in this case) and aren't really willing to wait to find out. Hence Wrexit is likely to have serious implications on science and engineering in the upper to middle universities (and even some of the top ones may be affected). If you are in a university that focusses on mainly non-science, coursework based (e.g. law, history, arts etc) then I can see the impacts are likely to be less. But I'm not sure we need less science and engineering graduates?

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Oil is dead. Nothing will happen there for a while, and there are a lot of companies in Scotland going/gone broke already on that basis.

As I've said before, Westminster's handling of North Sea Oil has to be one of the greatest acts of criminality ever inflicted upon the British people.

No oil fund, an industry squeezed until the pips squeaked, chronic lack of investment, and so on and so on...Compare and contrast to Norway. It would break your heart...

What a waste...

I'll be honest, I don't think it's been mismanaged any more or less than any other industry in Britain. You could say that the revenue should have been put aside to generate interest or somesuch, but you could literally say that about any revenue stream; oil isn't so special it has to be treated differently for some reason. The money it made just went to pay for the pensions and health services of today; you could have put the money to one side, but the need would still have been there to find the money to pay for those things.



As for Whirlwind, I'm afraid I'm not really interested in engaging with you anymore. At least, not in the OT.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
Much as bankers are despised it seems to me that the easiest way to keep and attract corporations to put money into our country to avoid a disaster after Brexit is to become a tax haven, make it worth their while to stay here even with the inconvenience of us being out the EU. If you attract enough you can offset the loss of them each paying in so little. Maybe that means we'd be hypocrites and annoy other countries but when you're on your own you have to look after yourself which means being hard nosed and selfish.

There are many in the EU who will deny us anything other than hard Brexit simply because their position on things like free movement is ideological and to hell with the financial costs to companies, even in their own countries who want to continue trading with us. Even if it means cutting off their own nose, they'll do it to prevent other countries thinking of leaving and bolstering the European project. If that's the way negotiations go next year, we'll have to be ruthless and selfish or we'll be screwed over.

While I agree I think its important remember that trade wise we still have China, America and the commonwealth countries. I believe Australia and Canada have been talking about freedom of movement and free trade. We also need to wait and see what happens with other countries that may end up having referendums (such as France, Germany and I believe Norway has been mentioned). While you see a lot of hard Brexit talk, with the state of the Deutsche Bank, I imagine it's more project fear to try and force the UK to continue paying into the EU and retaining the freedom of movement the globalists want.

 Ketara wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Oil is dead. Nothing will happen there for a while, and there are a lot of companies in Scotland going/gone broke already on that basis.

As I've said before, Westminster's handling of North Sea Oil has to be one of the greatest acts of criminality ever inflicted upon the British people.

No oil fund, an industry squeezed until the pips squeaked, chronic lack of investment, and so on and so on...Compare and contrast to Norway. It would break your heart...

What a waste...

I'll be honest, I don't think it's been mismanaged any more or less than any other industry in Britain. You could say that the revenue should have been put aside to generate interest or somesuch, but you could literally say that about any revenue stream; oil isn't so special it has to be treated differently for some reason. The money it made just went to pay for the pensions and health services of today; you could have put the money to one side, but the need would still have been there to find the money to pay for those things.



As for Whirlwind, I'm afraid I'm not really interested in engaging with you anymore. At least, not in the OT.

We know from interviews from the main actors, books, and documents released under the 30 year rule, that North Sea Oil was used as a political football from day one.

In the 1970s, Labour used it to stiff the SNP and curb the Scottish independence movement.

In the 1980s, Thatcher used the oil revenue for tax breaks ahead of General Elections.

Party politics was allowed to waste this precious resource that belonged to the nation.

Even the civil service was in on it, when it came to manipulating data and documents.

The only person to come out of this with some credit was Tony Benn, who wanted an oil fund, or a mega infastructure project like high speed rail or super motorways...

Instead, as always, political parties came before the nation...

 Ketara wrote:


As for Whirlwind, I'm afraid I'm not really interested in engaging with you anymore. At least, not in the OT.

That's fine, I'll still be commenting though when I think your facts are wrong!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Party politics was allowed to waste this precious resource that belonged to the nation.

Even the civil service was in on it, when it came to manipulating data and documents.

The only person to come out of this with some credit was Tony Benn, who wanted an oil fund, or a mega infastructure project like high speed rail or super motorways...

Instead, as always, political parties came before the nation...

Is there that much difference though between spending the tax say on election promises or just putting it into one fund and then spending it on individual capital projects though; the first is just less apparent but may being funnelled into supporting the NHS, road, or other infrastructure/service projects. If the money had been stored in a capital fund then where the tax would have been spent would have had to come from somewhere else instead (or you have to cut services). The public are also notoriously fickle and regardless of the merits of a capital fund will get less support if NHS or other public services are not perceived to be as good as they can be. The North Sea oil is now getting significant tax breaks (effectively making tax on it negligible) to allow them to keep pumping the harder to reach oil but that does continue to support part of the Scottish economy (especially around the Aberdeen area). What I find more galling is that they don't provide the same tax breaks to renewables so that we can steadily transfer from oil/gas to renewables over time. I'm not also aware of the civil service manipulating data and documents on North sea oil, have you a reference on this?