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I'll aim for brevity too.

 Whirlwind wrote:

I would say the same about all and any who proposed the same thing. May is especially bad because whilst she is promoting a 'fairer more balanced Britain' by undertaking the electoral reform she is doing the opposite.

But...how? It's a regular reassessment as opposed to one deliberately scheduled, run by professional people who aren't party affiliated, according to criteria determined to satisfy democratic need about balancing out the number of voters per constituency.

How is that May's fault or even an issue? I really, really cannot for the life of me see how this one is a negative point against May. I know the press has been shouting about gerrymandering, but having read plenty of such articles, all they seemed to reveal was the complete lack of knowledge possessed by the authors as to the actual process being undertaken and by whom. There's a slight predilection towards removing Labour seats, because that's because Labour has an inbuilt statistical advantage right now which is merely being corrected.

But in all likelihood the vast majority of places will go to the advantaged children because they have better education *not* because they are more intelligent.

IIRC, the figure being mooted was 50% reserved for those on benefits/school meals. So not necessarily the majority, and that's an issue of intake criteria. Easily rectified, easily played around with. Not an argument against Grammars.

Never mind the argument that trying to define a persons life options at the age of 11 is all sorts of wrong. Just like you can't predict a future premiership footballer at the age of 11, neither can you determine a persons intelligence at this age. Some may be almost about a year younger than others simply because of their date of birth and the start of the school year.

Which....is why I just pointed out that the latest proposals suggested kids could move in and out of Grammars on a yearly basis instead of taking one big test?

Nothing you're pointing out is any real argument against the concept of a grammar school. You're just arguing over what selection criteria can be used, things which can be adjusted to require the desired social; mix for mobility. You might not believe it will occur, but that does not mean it is impossible, or even improbable. I could set up a grammar school tomorrow that had 33% made up of children on benefits/school meals, another 33% with parents willing to undergo means testing (so making under £35,000 a year), and 33% open places, where an additional 5% or so worth of places were added every school year to permit the cream of the comprehensives to join.

Or rather, I could if it were permitted to set up new grammars.

She personally cancelled the scheme, that means she was well aware that it was happening (pretty much from day 1).

Does it? You've never heard of a boss walking in, spotting the underling surfing facebook, and telling them to get off it? All sorts of things can be done without personal oversight from the person three places higher up the food chain than that, who only catch wind of it once it's underway.

She was (still?) head of that department so even doing nothing meant she was giving it tacit approval (even if we don't have sight of the memo)

There's the question of money spent, contracts entered into, not wanting to interfere in a project underway, etcetc. For all you know, she thought it was bloody stupid and wrote down, 'shuffle whoever devised this into admin, and close down after the one month employment contract with the drivers has terminated' the minute she heard about it.

On the other hand, maybe she personally devised it. Or it was somewhere in the middle. Who knows? All I know is that I don't jump to conclusions without data if possible. Absence of evidence is not guilt of complicity and responsibility.

It's called Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011 (particularly that the government can 'restrain' someone without a court order, which would illegal under Article 6 of the ECHR (that you have to be brought to trial in a reasonable time)

Why hasn't it been tested in the courts out of curiosity? Because you've declared there there's a legislative clash. What was the resolution?

 obsidianaura wrote:
So looking at the french who are courting the banks, how likely is it that London will lose the banking sector to France if passporting is lost?

It's no secret that France wants the UKs banking sector, would it not be in Frances interests to veto everything that allows passporting just so the banks have to move?

I suspect if France starts trying to play negotiating games like that for personal benefit, Germany and the rest will slap it down. They won't permit all the collective interests of the other states to be harmed by French avarice.

It is unlikely we will lose 'the banking sector', we were a banking superpower long before anyone else and have always remained so. This is due to many, many factors, some tangible, some intangible. To keep my diagnosis short though, it is unlikely that 'the banking sector' will decamp en masse to a new location. What instead would possibly occur, is the fragmentation of the banking sector. Much will remain based here, but different aspects would migrate to different locations according to necessity and local advantage. I'd estimate the financial services sector here would shrink by around a third without passporting, which would be something of a blow, but it's not entirely the same thing as it all collectively moving to Paris.

Losing 1/3rd of the banking sector would be quite a hit. And once it's running successfully from Paris, who's to say we won't lose more, gradually?

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Point is, Parliament has agreed in principle to Brexit. The ball is rolling. Thay can't back down now - that would be electoral suicide.

Not quite; they agreed in principle to Brexit, assuming criteria is met. They couldn't really reject it at this stage.

If that criteria (no matter how vague) isn't met, it gives them the perfect opportunity to reject it and blame the cabinet. That the plan criteria is vague just allows more wiggle room to claim it's not been satisfied, and the reason it wasn't satisfied is Davis' fault for (a) making a crap agreement and (b) not sticking to it.

Herzlos wrote:
Losing 1/3rd of the banking sector would be quite a hit. And once it's running successfully from Paris, who's to say we won't lose more, gradually?

Oh, certainly. But it also would possibly re-concentrate on London again given a sufficient amount of time, and indeed, would be likely to do so as whatever new financial relations between the UK and EU stabilise. Americans prefer to do business here and the Chinese Yuan is quite heavily tied into our banking sector these days, things which are unlikely to change. There are other factors in play also, but my knowledge of the banking sector/financial history is more broad than deep so I'll refrain from speculating further as I could well be wildly wrong.

Suffice to say though, that the initial idea of everyone in Canary Wharf wandering off to Paris is sufficiently unlikely as to be implausible. Not to say bad things can't happen, only that that scenario isn't going to happen.

Yeah, relying on hopes that the French won't try to mess up England, a country it seems to have been at war with on and off for the best part of 800 odd years, just because some other members of the EU don't really want them to seems optimistic.

They could float the financial district down the Thames,

A la the crimson permanent assurance.

Herzlos wrote:
Losing 1/3rd of the banking sector would be quite a hit. And once it's running successfully from Paris, who's to say we won't lose more, gradually?

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Point is, Parliament has agreed in principle to Brexit. The ball is rolling. Thay can't back down now - that would be electoral suicide.

Not quite; they agreed in principle to Brexit, assuming criteria is met. They couldn't really reject it at this stage.

If that criteria (no matter how vague) isn't met, it gives them the perfect opportunity to reject it and blame the cabinet. That the plan criteria is vague just allows more wiggle room to claim it's not been satisfied, and the reason it wasn't satisfied is Davis' fault for (a) making a crap agreement and (b) not sticking to it.

Labour are playing the Bill Clinton card on this in a desperate attempt to spin their way out of it: we smoked but never inhaled!

Granted, it is an interesting line of defence

And like I said earlier, yeah, they could brass the non-binding card once, and only once, but twice? That's P45 time.

The British public are not interested in parlour games. They seen the headlines about MPs backing the motion for Brexit. As far as the public are concerned, that is set in stone, de facto.

The legal war is over, it's all politics now.

 Compel wrote:
I'm just trying to get my head around the thought process of "I hope a bunch of people in the other team die so I can get my way."

Its a simple numbers game. Old people are significantly more likely to support Brexit, old people are close to the end of their lifespan.

Polling consistently puts the only demographic in Scotland to be in favour of the union to be the over 65s, if they were excluded from the vote Scotland would be an independent country. Given that the over 65's are significantly more likely to die than any other age group this means that unless there is a major shift in public opinion Scotland will be an independent country if a referendum is called in, for example 2025, (this is also a big reason why one hasn't been called yet).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-38248316

Downing Street has said Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson's comments on Saudi Arabia do not represent "the government's position".
Footage has emerged from an event last week at which Mr Johnson said UK ally Saudi Arabia was engaging in "proxy wars" in the Middle East.
The PM's spokeswoman said these were the foreign secretary's personal views.
She said a forthcoming visit to the region would give him a chance to set out the UK's position on Saudi Arabia.
Mr Johnson's comments were made at a conference in Rome last week but only emerged after the The Guardian newspaper published footage of the event.
In it the foreign secretary said: "There are politicians who are twisting and abusing religion and different strains of the same religion in order to further their own political objectives.
"That's one of the biggest political problems in the whole region. And the tragedy for me - and that's why you have these proxy wars being fought the whole time in that area - is that there is not strong enough leadership in the countries themselves."
'Awkward comments'
Mr Johnson told the Med 2 conference: "There are not enough big characters, big people, men or women, who are willing to reach out beyond their Sunni or Shia or whatever group to the other side and bring people together and to develop a national story again.
"That is what's lacking. And that's the tragedy," he said, adding that "visionary leadership" was needed in the region.
He went on: "That's why you've got the Saudis, Iran, everybody, moving in and puppeteering and playing proxy wars."
The BBC's diplomatic correspondent James Landale said the emergence of the comments would be "awkward if not embarrassing for the foreign secretary".
"Once again Mr Johnson's use of language is causing headlines that his diplomats will need to explain," our correspondent said.
Downing Street's comment came as Prime Minister Theresa May returned from a visit to the Gulf where she had dinner with the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman.
Her spokeswoman said that Mrs May wanted to strengthen the relationship with Saudi Arabia, saying, "we are supporting the Saudi-led coalition in support of the legitimate government in Yemen against Houthi rebels".
She said: "Those are the prime minister's views - the foreign secretary's views are not the government's position on, for example, Saudi Arabia and its role in the region."
Robert Lacey, a historian and author of the Kingdom and the House of Saud, said that while he agreed with Mr Johnson's comments, he questioned whether he should be saying them about an ally.
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that he believed it was a gaffe and that Mr Johnson was acting more like a journalist.

How many times now has May had to slap down or apologise for this facade of a politician man ?

And he has the gall to complain people don't take him seriously.

So the foreign secretary's views are not those of government.

Capital.

I mean, he's RIGHT, but that's not helpful

 Graphite wrote:
Yeah, relying on hopes that the French won't try to mess up England, a country it seems to have been at war with on and off for the best part of 800 odd years, just because some other members of the EU don't really want them to seems optimistic.

They can try all they want, and doubtless will. But put it this way, when every second capital city wants to be the new financial capital, what makes Paris stand out? They're one of a mob. The only way they could try and induce business to move there is by offering extensive subsidies/less regulation and so forth, which immediately result in a race to the bottom as they're followed by everyone else, followed by the EU red tape around such things getting involved and discounting half of it, followed by much arguing. The logical conclusion will be the migration of different financial sectors to different regions which fit best (so for example, venture capital would want to move to where the startups are, whereas pension funds have completely different priorities).

In other words, a fragmentation. It is likely that the result would be the gradual growth of one of several locations to primacy over the next four or five decades, but that will take time, and that one location will probably be of an equivalent size to the reduced London financial sector. I am however, speculating wildly on that last aspect of the future here, given the difficulty in predicting market growth patterns and my own shallow knowledge.

Paris is also about a ~1.5 hour flight from London, and connected directly to London via the Channel Tunnel, and only 1 hour ahead of London time.

So in terms of convenience of working in Paris and keeping a base (family, friends, businesses) in London, whilst being in the EU, is hard to beat. Dublin is a similar flight time, but no trains.

It just occurred to me that next summer will see the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk film...

Right after the A50 negotiations begin.

It's highly unlikely that Nolan planned this with Brexit in mind, but with the UK pitched into negotiations, and a film about plucky Brits standing alone against dastardly Europeans...

Well, I think Mr Nolan could be on to a winner

Expect to see Farage leading another fleet down the Thames in celebration of the little ships

I mean, c'mon we all know of the British love for war films. I own 3 different versions of The Battle of Britain, and I'm a Scottish Nationalist

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It just occurred to me that next summer will see the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk film...

Right after the A50 negotiations begin.

It's highly unlikely that Nolan planned this with Brexit in mind, but with the UK pitched into negotiations, and a film about plucky Brits standing alone against dastardly Europeans...

Well, I think Mr Nolan could be on to a winner

Expect to see Farage leading another fleet done the Thames in celebration of the little ships

I mean, c'mon we all know of the British love for war films. I own 3 different versions of The Battle of Britain, and I'm a Scottish Nationalist

I think you mean a film about heroic French forces performing a rearguard action which allows the rescue of the "plucky" brits.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It just occurred to me that next summer will see the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk film...

Right after the A50 negotiations begin.

It's highly unlikely that Nolan planned this with Brexit in mind, but with the UK pitched into negotiations, and a film about plucky Brits standing alone against dastardly Europeans...

Well, I think Mr Nolan could be on to a winner

Expect to see Farage leading another fleet done the Thames in celebration of the little ships

I mean, c'mon we all know of the British love for war films. I own 3 different versions of The Battle of Britain, and I'm a Scottish Nationalist

I think you mean a film about heroic French forces performing a rearguard action which allows the rescue of the "plucky" brits.

It was a French AND British rearguard. Lots of British soldiers were left behind at Dunkirk too and ended up as POW's. And thousands of French troops were evacuated too.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It just occurred to me that next summer will see the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk film...

Right after the A50 negotiations begin.

It's highly unlikely that Nolan planned this with Brexit in mind, but with the UK pitched into negotiations, and a film about plucky Brits standing alone against dastardly Europeans...

Well, I think Mr Nolan could be on to a winner

Expect to see Farage leading another fleet done the Thames in celebration of the little ships

I mean, c'mon we all know of the British love for war films. I own 3 different versions of The Battle of Britain, and I'm a Scottish Nationalist

I think you mean a film about heroic French forces performing a rearguard action which allows the rescue of the "plucky" brits.

This is dakka and Brexit Britain - no room for facts and experts here

I don't make many predictions, but I'm willing to bet that the Daily Mail will be giving free Dunkirk tickets to every man, woman, and child in Britain




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 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It just occurred to me that next summer will see the release of Christopher Nolan's Dunkirk film...

Right after the A50 negotiations begin.

It's highly unlikely that Nolan planned this with Brexit in mind, but with the UK pitched into negotiations, and a film about plucky Brits standing alone against dastardly Europeans...

Well, I think Mr Nolan could be on to a winner

Expect to see Farage leading another fleet done the Thames in celebration of the little ships

I mean, c'mon we all know of the British love for war films. I own 3 different versions of The Battle of Britain, and I'm a Scottish Nationalist

I think you mean a film about heroic French forces performing a rearguard action which allows the rescue of the "plucky" brits.

It was a French AND British rearguard. Lots of British soldiers were left behind at Dunkirk too and ended up as POW's. And thousands of French troops were evacuated too.

True, the 51st Highland Division was sacrificed and had to be rebuilt from scratch.

 Graphite wrote:
Yeah, relying on hopes that the French won't try to mess up England, a country it seems to have been at war with on and off for the best part of 800 odd years, just because some other members of the EU don't really want them to seems optimistic.

It's not all that bad. It's hard to think of another country in Europe that is more like us than France.

We've been at war with the US too and we're pretty fond of them too, though we'd never admit it.

I just find the more I think about the ramifications for Brexit the more worried I get.. I hope Ketara is right and things will be ok, but I don't like any of this :(

I voted to stay in but, the EU is kind of pissing me of recently. It seems like the people of most EU countries (or at least the rich ones) don't want this freedom of movement rule in place. The governments of those countries know that if they offered a referendum they'd likely end up with an out vote because its an issue people are serious about, and its non negotiable.

EU aligned politicians seems like they are just ignoring it and that's why i think nationalist parties are growing because there's a perception that no one else is listening to what people are asking. I think the more the EU resists the worse this stuff is going to get and the union will break up.

Probably wouldn't hurt if people could be better educated about pro's and cons of migrants.

Herzlos wrote:
Paris is also about a ~1.5 hour flight from London, and connected directly to London via the Channel Tunnel, and only 1 hour ahead of London time.

So in terms of convenience of working in Paris and keeping a base (family, friends, businesses) in London, whilst being in the EU, is hard to beat. Dublin is a similar flight time, but no trains.

That brings into play plenty of other factors around physical passporting. There's no guarantee such a system will be in place, and that people will be able to move freely between the two. If not, then geographical proximity is irrelevant, and Vienna is as good as Paris.

 Ketara wrote:

Herzlos wrote:
Paris is also about a ~1.5 hour flight from London, and connected directly to London via the Channel Tunnel, and only 1 hour ahead of London time.

So in terms of convenience of working in Paris and keeping a base (family, friends, businesses) in London, whilst being in the EU, is hard to beat. Dublin is a similar flight time, but no trains.

That brings into play plenty of other factors around physical passporting. There's no guarantee such a system will be in place, and that people will be able to move freely between the two. If not, then geographical proximity is irrelevant, and Vienna is as good as Paris.

That's a good point, its not common even now, so it's hard to imagine things are going to get easier after we leave.

Do you think we can get away with just allowing immigration rules to stay as is and have EEC+ access?

That would be the best solution IMO. Could even use our old contributions to fund a national infrastructure project to properly cope for population rises.

 Future War Cultist wrote:
@ Whirlwind

I doubt that the EU will last another ten years. I doubt it'll last until the end of the decade.

I think there is a higher chance that the UK will not being around by the end of the decade than the EU not being around.

In other news, looks like we'll all starve to death long before Brexit happens (if it happens at all):

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/dec/08/uk-food-prices-to-rise-without-eu-workers-warn-trade-groups

I was wondering though, if migrant workers make up such a large percentage of the agricultural workforce, if/when we leave Europe who's going to fill the gap they leave? I can't see many British people diving into the fields to pick cabbages when the dole pays better (and there's no manual labour involved).

Stranger83 wrote:
Feel free to buy them French Strawberries at £4 a pack thanks to EU tarriffs, I'll get the nice ones from America that come in at £2, tarriff free thanks to new trade deals.

Given that Trump will probably allow all sorts of chemicals to be used on them, I think I will take the EU strawberries with the sound environmental controls. It's likely to lead to a longer life expectancy...

I remind you the EU has been around in some form for over 40 years, meaning anyone under 58 at the time of the referendum has been in the EU (or some version of it) for most of their lives - if anything the evidence points to the fact that as people get older they tend to start reviewing the EU in more detail and decide that actually it isn't the utopia they once thought it was (exactly what happened to me and most brexiter I know about), I therefore dispute your claim that just because I believe that as the older generation die off the younger generation will start to realise that the EU is a mess, and since our young won't grow up in the shackles of the EU it's likely that we won't even get that generation in 20 years time who start liking the EU then come to their senses as they get older.

This is all supposition based on your own personal bias against the EU. I could easily counter that the education levels of the older generation is worse as a factor that you haven't fully taken into account (or that those brought up in the 70's has a much greater anti-immigration exposure). I could also counter your argument that people in three years time will change their views because of higher inflation and hence we should have another referendum in 2019. However unless you can provide current evidence to the contrary the only thing we can use without some form of potential third party bias between two data sets 40 years apart creeping in is the polls that are currently taken. Based on this and this evidence alone given current polling preferences in 10 years given death and birth rates the UK will be pro-EU. Anything else is just guesswork and almost certainly biased due to our personal views.

This is a bit of a non story - of cause they were going to look into their options, then again having worked at a bank they are always looking into their options to see what is available. It's called Due Diligence it is usually a requirement of the board as part of their obligation to shareholders.

You are missing the point. Due diligence means that they have already reviewed their options and come to a preferential decision based on some (unknown) factors, one of which probably is losing passporting rights. They are now just going through analysing the preferred option to check nothing has been missed. What it means that if these factors happen they will be in place to immediately transfer operations. That's potentially billions of £'s worth of tax lost on day 1 of Brexit.


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 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
@ Whirlwind

I haven't missed the point.

It's been obvious from day 1 that the people who brought the court case were trying their hardest to stall and delay the activation of Article 50. "

I'm assuming you have some evidence for this or had personal meeting with the people involved; otherwise isn't it just saying something 'is' because you think so and that you're right regardless (or you've been listening to IDS too much)?

When you get a few minutes have a read through these :

http://popbitch.com/home/2016/12/08/the-great-de-pressing/

Magister wrote:
In other news, looks like we'll all starve to death long before Brexit happens (if it happens at all):

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/dec/08/uk-food-prices-to-rise-without-eu-workers-warn-trade-groups

If this is true, then whats stopping our Government using fast track visas for EU citizens who've been hired by British companies? I don't have a problem with migrants coming here when they've got skills we need, or they're needed to plug a labour shortage.

I was wondering though, if migrant workers make up such a large percentage of the agricultural workforce, if/when we leave Europe who's going to fill the gap they leave? I can't see many British people diving into the fields to pick cabbages when the dole pays better (and there's no manual labour involved).

Are those jobs exempt from the Minimum Wage laws? If they are, then perhaps they shouldn't be. If such jobs pay less than the dole, then that should be addressed surely?

 Ketara wrote:
How is that May's fault or even an issue? I really, really cannot for the life of me see how this one is a negative point against May. I know the press has been shouting about gerrymandering, but having read plenty of such articles, all they seemed to reveal was the complete lack of knowledge possessed by the authors as to the actual process being undertaken and by whom. There's a slight predilection towards removing Labour seats, because that's because Labour has an inbuilt statistical advantage right now which is merely being corrected.

If she really meant it then she would introduce proportional representation, or at least attempt to ensure that the any changes do not make the number of MPs relative to votes worse in terms of voting proportion. She could easily say "This makes the situation worse, try again"

IIRC, the figure being mooted was 50% reserved for those on benefits/school meals. So not necessarily the majority, and that's an issue of intake criteria. Easily rectified, easily played around with. Not an argument against Grammars

Which....is why I just pointed out that the latest proposals suggested kids could move in and out of Grammars on a yearly basis instead of taking one big test?

What happens if it is 80% in one year or 30% in the next? What happens when you meet the 'allocation' and one group or another are different in development than the other simply because of a line drawn in the sand. You may as well just keep state schools and fund them better.
Moving children in and out doesn't work. This happened to my mother in the 70's. She didn't get into a grammar but then found to be 'worthy' of a grammar school place so moved 'up'. Problem was that the grammar lessons were already more advanced hence she went from top of the class to
the bottom of the class. She was then moved back down and the cycle repeated ending up with a relatively poor education. She wasn't at fault it was the system - no one recognised that trying to catch up on a six month shortfall on education standards was the issue.

Grammar schools are selective and will damn a generation of children to being underachieving (but hey we need lots people picking vegetables in fields, making jam and biscuits right?) whilst a few lucky ones get an unfair advantage

Does it? You've never heard of a boss walking in, spotting the underling surfing facebook, and telling them to get off it? All sorts of things can be done without personal oversight from the person three places higher up the food chain than that, who only catch wind of it once it's underway.

There's the question of money spent, contracts entered into, not wanting to interfere in a project underway, etcetc. For all you know, she thought it was bloody stupid and wrote down, 'shuffle whoever devised this into admin, and close down after the one month employment contract with the drivers has terminated' the minute she heard about it.

Given how much of a stink the other parties made over it and the length of time until she said it wasn't working then even if she did not know about it on day 1, she was well aware of it on day 2. You can always pay off a contract, there's no actual additional cost in doing this (and if it saves staff time on people wasting the Home Offices time then you gain)

It's no secret that France wants the UKs banking sector, would it not be in Frances interests to veto everything that allows passporting just so the banks have to move?

I suspect if France starts trying to play negotiating games like that for personal benefit, Germany and the rest will slap it down. They won't permit all the collective interests of the other states to be harmed by French avarice.

They could quite easily not agree to the terms for long enough to force a WTO agreement (especially if they felt it strengthened their own position). Despite the claims the EU is 'undemocratic' every one of the 27 countries will have a vote on whether to accept the agreement (and in some cases might include local regions as well, for example Belgium).

If this is true, then whats stopping our Government using fast track visas for EU citizens who've been hired by British companies? I don't have a problem with migrants coming here when they've got skills we need, or they're needed to plug a labour shortage.

All those groups screaming about economic migrants taking British workers jobs I'd imagine.


As for agricultural jobs being minimum wage, this: https://www.gov.uk/agricultural-workers-rights/pay-and-overtime suggests that they must be paid at least the minimum wage according their age and hours worked.

I currently work for a food retailer (hint: rhymes with Laitrose) and we struggle massively to recruit delivery drivers and shop floor staff in a lot of areas, purely because no wants to do a job that is hard work and not ridiculously well paid.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

If this is true, then whats stopping our Government using fast track visas for EU citizens who've been hired by British companies? I don't have a problem with migrants coming here when they've got skills we need, or they're needed to plug a labour shortage.

Just to clarify you did read the article, yes? It is stating there is *already* this year a shortage of workers because of the impact of Brexit. You can issue as many visa's as you want but if people aren't coming to the country to do the job then it doesn't help unless you just go and grab them from somewhere (so back to slavery!). Hence to attract more workers and offset the impact of poor £ they need to pay more (either to UK or EU citizens). This results in higher costs and higher food prices. It shouldn't come as any surprise, it was predicted as an impact of the Brexit vote including by people on this forum

I was wondering though, if migrant workers make up such a large percentage of the agricultural workforce, if/when we leave Europe who's going to fill the gap they leave? I can't see many British people diving into the fields to pick cabbages when the dole pays better (and there's no manual labour involved).

Are those jobs exempt from the Minimum Wage laws? If they are, then perhaps they shouldn't be. If such jobs pay less than the dole, then that should be addressed surely?

It's a bit more complicated than this. They are migrant workers because many follow the work. Fruit/vegetable picking is seasonal work. If you are farmer specialising in pumpkins then they only get farmed in the September/October months, so you hire temporary staff for that period of time. For a migrant they come, work, get paid then go home. Over the year they would be paid much less than a minimum wage annual salary, but as an hourly rate it is fine (and probably more so). However this is not particularly viable for a UK family where to maintain any sort of standard of living they need year long work (strictly speaking we could all move the east European countries though).

 Whirlwind wrote:

 Future War Cultist wrote:
@ Whirlwind

I doubt that the EU will last another ten years. I doubt it'll last until the end of the decade.

I think there is a higher chance that the UK will not being around by the end of the decade than the EU not being around.

Care to wager?

 Future War Cultist wrote:

Care to wager?

Yes.

Stranger83 wrote:
Edit - moved on, pointless to bring back up


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 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Silent Puffin? wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Labour, as always, were a shambles!

Really? Given that Labour managed to make an amendment that has now effectively forced the government to be transparent about its EU negotiating position it seems as though Labour got as good a deal as it was possible to get.

The Lib Dems have a bigger rebellion on their hands with half(ish) their MPs supporting and half(ish) opposing this bill.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

And as a side note, the Supreme Court case has been rendered void - it's not worth a bucket of horsegak now, the rug has been pulled from underneath it.

Not entirely, there is still the Scotland question.

Labour think they've won because they got David Davis to promise to present a 'plan.'

Davis could scribble something on the back of a beer mat, and technically, that's a plan, because that's how vague the promise was.

When the Tories present a dozen pages of waffle, not worth the trees sacrificed for the paper, Labour as always will be up gak creek without a paddle.

That's how stupid Labour were these last 48hrs, but they're too busy celebrating this 'victory' too notice.

It's even worse - Davis agreed to provide 'enough of an outline of a plan'. No clarification of what 'enough' is.


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 Whirlwind wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:


Point is, Parliament has agreed in principle to Brexit. The ball is rolling. Thay can't back down now - that would be electoral suicide.

You don't think that will be the end of it do you? Even if we do leave there are going to be plenty of people wanting to get back in like myself even if it just for the sake of my niece and nephew. Give it ten years and as I pointed out previously enough old f**ts will have pegged it and enough young people will have got to 18 that we will be back to a majority supporting the EU. In the mean time I can refuse to buy from any companies that supported Brexit like Dyson and Tate & Lyle; buy my strawberries from French farmers and so on and encourage others to do the same. So an EUK party with slogans like

'Britain in the EU, making both great'
'Give back our civil liberties, UK to join the EU today'
'Parliamentary sovereignty is ruining the country. Help us EU're our only hope'

And as a side note, the Supreme Court case has been rendered void

Give it ten years and most people will have forgotten that the UK was ever in the EU, once we start trading with the rest of the world again and our economy is the fastest growing in Europe people will wonder why we were ever in the EU in the first place.

Feel free to buy them French Strawberries at £4 a pack thanks to EU tarriffs, I'll get the nice ones from America that come in at £2, tarriff free thanks to new trade deals.

I remind you the EU has been around in some form for over 40 years, meaning anyone under 58 at the time of the referendum has been in the EU (or some version of it) for most of their lives - if anything the evidence points to the fact that as people get older they tend to start reviewing the EU in more detail and decide that actually it isn't the utopia they once thought it was (exactly what happened to me and most brexiter I know about), I therefore dispute your claim that just because I believe that as the older generation die off the younger generation will start to realise that the EU is a mess, and since our young won't grow up in the shackles of the EU it's likely that we won't even get that generation in 20 years time who start liking the EU then come to their senses as they get older.




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 Kilkrazy wrote:
Paris negotiates with major UK based banks.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38245646

Due to uncertainties over Brexit, various major banks are exploring their options for setting up operations in EU countries.

This is a bit of a non story - of cause they were going to look into their options, then again having worked at a bank they are always looking into their options to see what is available. It's called Due Diligence it is usually a requirement of the board as part of their obligation to shareholders.

In other words, UK Banks are doing what they are supposed to do, shock horror!!!

You don't seem to have understood the point.

The banks are doing due diligence for moving key operations out of the UK and into the EU, because it is a very important part of the market and it looks like the UK will not get passporting access post-Brexit.

In other words, the banks are preparing to move divisions along with their jobs, tax revenue and spin-off spending on premises, cleaning, IT support, etc, out of the UK and into the EU.

 Whirlwind wrote:

If she really meant it then she would introduce proportional representation, or at least attempt to ensure that the any changes do not make the number of MPs relative to votes worse in terms of voting proportion. She could easily say "This makes the situation worse, try again"

If you want to change how our system works, that's an entirely different kettle of fish to the one under discussion! Holding a black mark against May because she's not changing the makeup of the British electoral system is completely unrelated to the work of the Boundaries Commission.

The Boundaries Commission are carrying on their work that (I believe) started back in 2011, following on from their earlier work in the 1990's, following on from earlier work before that. She hasn't formed the Boundaries commission, she's not controlling it, and she's not dictating the principles/guidelines under which it's operating. Their job is to make sure MP's represent roughly the same number of people each, and that there aren't too many of them. Nothing to do with May, and it's why Tory MP's are getting cut as well as Labour ones. Literally the only thing the Tories have to do with it is submitting the recommendation to Parliament for it to take effect.

Seriously mate, I accepted the black mark on the whole immigrant education thing because it was a genuine point. You need to accept that this one really, really, is demonstrably nothing to do with May and shouldn't be a reason to think badly of her.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_commissions_(United_Kingdom)

What happens if it is 80% in one year or 30% in the next?

For there to be such statistical leap, I would assume some drastic evidence had necessitated it, and congratulate the government on their clearly rapid action.

What happens when you meet the 'allocation' and one group or another are different in development than the other simply because of a line drawn in the sand. You may as well just keep state schools and fund them better.

Or get grammars since there's no difference...?

Moving children in and out doesn't work. This happened to my mother in the 70's. She didn't get into a grammar but then found to be 'worthy' of a grammar school place so moved 'up'. Problem was that the grammar lessons were already more advanced hence she went from top of the class to
the bottom of the class. She was then moved back down and the cycle repeated ending up with a relatively poor education. She wasn't at fault it was the system - no one recognised that trying to catch up on a six month shortfall on education standards was the issue.

That's an interesting perspective, but one anecdotal tale does not a macro trend create.

whilst a few lucky ones get an unfair advantage

Life is unfair advantage. Some kids get born smart and attractive, others don't. Some get genetic diseases, others don't. I accept that there's a goal to try and make sure everyone has a decent start, but there's that and then insisting that the nail that sticks out the most should be hammered down because it's unfair to the other nails.

To pull in my own anecdotal story to match your own, I went to a school out in Zimbabwe for five years before transitioning into the British comprehensive education system. When that occurred, I was approximately three years in advance of the other children here in terms of education. I'm not exaggerating even slightly, when I left we were performing simultaneous equations there, something that didn't crop up until three years later in the British system. And that wasn't the only thing by a long shot.

I scored straight A*'s for those 3 years because what the other children here were trying to learn was literally child's play to me intellectually at that stage. And I don't believe for a minute that that was down to any sort of genius on my part, because we were streamed out there, and I'd bounced between upper and mid tier streams for a good few years previously. There were kids there far smarter than me.

Now under the comprehensive system? I spent three years picking my nose and wasting my time sitting in a room listening to teachers trying to explain basic mathematics, history, and science that I already knew. The comprehensive system utterly failed me. The concept of streaming, and permitting those who are more in advance to progress more quickly, was utterly frowned upon. Surely the job of the education system is to push for the utmost development of the students within it?

I don't claim that the grammar system is perfect here, and done poorly, it can have some very bad effects, like those you described for your mother. But it should also be acknowledged that the comprehensive system is equally flawed, and this strange pseudo-egalitarian pretence that all children should receive exactly the same one size fits all fare from the education system is equally as damaging in its own way. And this vague line that 'Well, we just make the comprehensives better, and then every student can be equally amazing' is just an unrealistic fantasy that distracts from the fact that it is impossible, and always will be.

So the logical thing to do is to try and come up with something in the middle that allows talent to flourish and be rewarded without disadvantaging the poor or less intellectually fortunate. If those who spend their time obsessing over 'grammar' and 'comprehensive' labels, which are nothing more than ideological whinging points, spent half as much effort trying to develop a solution and keeping an open mind, we might actually get somewhere.

They could quite easily not agree to the terms for long enough to force a WTO agreement (especially if they felt it strengthened their own position). Despite the claims the EU is 'undemocratic' every one of the 27 countries will have a vote on whether to accept the agreement (and in some cases might include local regions as well, for example Belgium).

That doesn't make financial services automatically migrate to Paris instead of elsewhere in Europe though. Trying to push a disadvantage on Britain may disadvantage France as well in some regards.