Paphos Life

ApusApus wrote: ↑Mon Jul 23, 2018 8:22 pm If only 52% & not 48% had HiC’s intellectual foresight ................ but hey that’s democracy in action for you!


Shane

Maybe there are even more than 52% like him - but they also didn´t bother to vote?

Maybe there are but equally maybe there are not, do you know because I sure do not!


Shane

Short, to-the-point critique. It will never catch on.

UK GDP in 1973 (less than half of Germany's- when East Germany had nothing, only 70% of France's)
1 [​IMG] United States 1,369,800,050,000
2 [​IMG] Japan 412,489,646,000
3 [​IMG] Germany 385,511,883,000
4 [​IMG] France 262,579,405,000
5 [​IMG] United Kingdom 181,332,673,000

UK GDP in 1990 when the Single European Act (single market) kicked in [barely above half of Germany's GDP, only 80-% of France's]
1 [​IMG] United States 5,757,200,200,000
2 [​IMG] Japan 3,018,269,920,000
3 [​IMG] Germany 1,714,469,990,000
4 [​IMG] France 1,244,459,300,000
5 [​IMG] Italy 1,133,406,580,000
6 [​IMG] United Kingdom 991,051,120,000

UK GDP in 2014 [75% of Germany's, 103% of France's]
1 [​IMG] United States 17,419,000,100,0002941/2829
2 [​IMG] China 10,360,104,900,000
3 [​IMG] Japan 4,601,461,300,000
4 [​IMG] Germany 3,852,556,040,000
5 [​IMG] United Kingdom 2,941,885,610,000
6 [​IMG] France 2,829,192,000,000

Until 2005, Britain was paying off a huge debt to US for the cost of WW2 [$120 billion in 1945- $1,260,578,464,540 in 2005]. Having for the second time in thirty years lost millions of young men who were its future workforce. As well as rebuilding Germany at enormous cost.
And more latterly, 240 billion paid into EU over the years, [net contribution], and approximately that figure in foreign aid.
As far as I am aware, no- one was helping Britain to re-build.
Perhaps that is one reason why Britain lagged behind some other countries in GDP.

I should add to my previous post,that while importing millions of low skilled and unskilled peoples into Britain, we were [at great expense] educating millions who emigrated. [“The Brain-Drain].
For instance, my brother, who gained a B.Sc. in electronic engineering in 1970 while working for the BBC, shortly afterwards made his permanent home in the USA, where he has just retired after a successful career.

Kingfisher

I well remember The Brain-Drain, skilled people who moved to America because they were paid much more than in the UK, indeed in the early 70s I had surgery to my foot, the surgeon who performed the operation told me that he wouldn't be there for my follow up appointments, as he was going to work in America doing micro-surgery, such a shame to loose such a skilled man.

Jackie

kingfisher wrote: ↑Tue Jul 24, 2018 12:14 pm As far as I am aware, no- one was helping Britain to re-build.

From 1948 to 1952, the UK received about USD 3,300 million under the Marshall plan, this being the highest contribution to any European country. 15% of this was a loan, which has been repaid. The other 85% of this was a grant, just to help the UK to rebuild. Believe me, without that grant, the UK would have been in a BIG mess. For reference, W. Germany did not receive even half of that, but they recovered more rapidly than either the UK or France, despite more war-damage.

Well thank you Devil- I am now “aware” of those facts and figures. I never stop learning!
However, Britain was very and generous, as was the U.S., when it cancelled half of Germany’s debt for both wars, in 1953:
https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics ... -Germany-w

Just goes to show the U.S. turned up trumps, oops, pun not intended

Jackie

Lofos-5 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 22, 2018 12:55 pm It is of course fantasy-fiction and completely over the top but the fact that the government is apparently stockpiling food (and medicine) for a no deal scenario has just been confirmed as true :

Are stories about UK plans to stockpile food for a no deal scenario true? #Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab says it's an unhelpful "selective snippet that's made it into the press"

http://newsthump.com/2018/07/25/brexit- ... be-edible/

Just the sort of enterprising ingenuity which enabled Britain to win two world wars [and a world cup!!]

We need a "yawn" emoji Dominic!


Shane

Termites Dream. A good read, thank you.
I would say it is not really an opinion piece, more factual- but not perhaps the facts some want to be bothered with. You know, those annoying little facts which challenge the basis of the “Ideals” of the EU and Euro.
In case you didn’t see this, I’ve posted an apposite comment from below the article.
"The original party was a cornucopia of cheap credit, which capital markets happily issued to the countries of Southern Europe under the protection of the euro"
The euro was created specifically to destroy national goverments ability to pursue their own independent economic policies, and to usher in the "need" for a federal europe, to be economically and politically controlled by private sector - Monet even explicitly states this end goal.
European investment loans to southern countries were taylored so that, at the end of the loan period, interest payments alone would've amounted to more than 100% of total investment, even though they represented typically 20% of said investment. So these loans were, in fact, effectively a subsidy TO central/northern european (German, French) economy BY southern european countries, not the other way around.
Also, EU heavily subsidised DIVESTMENT, not investment, by southern european industries, so that they wouldn't compete (directly or indirectly) with central/northern european ones - here's the main talked about examples in Portugal:
Subsidies towards divestment in (mostly artisanal) fisheries, to the benefit of (heavily industrialized, and mostly unaffected) Spanish fishing industry (entering the EU, Portugal had as many fishermen as the whole of EU, while Spain caught as much fish as also the whole of EU).
Subsidies towards divestment in (mostly small sized) farming, to the benefit of German, French big-agro industry (btw, the main beneficiaries of european farming subsidies, which, together with subsidies to fisheries, amount to essentially half of eu budget).
Subsidies towards divestment in (net exporter) textile industry to the benefit of Chinese exports, so that German industry could keep selling them machinery.
Incidentally, none of this is (was) news to (current) Portuguese PM, who actually had no qualms (casually, as usual) "denouncing" it publicly years ago, when he was still mayor of Lisbon.”
Jon.

Who is this Tim Sculthorpe, Deputy Political Editor For Mailonline, who has become the No.1 prophet of joy and doom? Is he any different from the 999 other prophets who know nothing?

Devil wrote: ↑Fri Aug 03, 2018 11:06 am Who is this Tim Sculthorpe, ...?

Where do you think somebody with the name Sculthorpe got their first job? ))

After study in Wales, trainee reporter on the Scunthorpe Telegraph. Where else!
How did he prepare for Westminster? Reporting on the goings on at Aberdeen City Council.
Guessing from when he did his A levels, and being too lazy to find his birth certificate, I would say he's about 34.

Why a no-deal Brexit is nothing to fear
A viable alternative to an EU trade deal is ready and waiting. By David Collins 4th August 2018. Spectator.
Warnings by Remainers about the consequences of a ‘no deal’ Brexit are beginning to resemble a game of oneupmanship worthy of Monty Python’s Yorkshiremen. Not content with claims that the M20 to Dover will be gridlocked with lorries waiting to undergo customs checks and that the North Ireland peace protest will break down, Doug Gurr, Amazon’s chief in the UK, apparently told Dominic Raab at a recent meeting that there will be ‘civil unrest’ within a fortnight of Britain leaving the EU without a deal. Next, they will have us living 150 to a shoebox.
Those who peddle this relentless doom-mongering fail to understand the protections which will remain in place for the UK under international law. Far from ‘crashing out of the EU’, failing to secure a free trade deal with the EU simply means that the UK will trade with the EU on terms set out by the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
The pundit class tends to scoff at the WTO option. They dismiss it as a recipe for chaos. But that is to ignore the huge progress that this body has made in promoting global trade over the past two decades. The government should from the beginning have presented the WTO option as a viable counterpoint to the EU’s hardline, all-or-nothing stance.
The WTO oversees a system of trade rules for its 164-member countries, which together account for no less than 98 per cent of all global trade. Under the WTO General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (the GATT), tariffs on most manufactured goods between the UK and the EU would stay quite low, averaging around 3 per cent.
While EU leaders like to threaten us with hints that our exports would be unsellable in the EU, the fact is that non-tariff barriers such as arbitrary health and safety inspections and borders would be prohibited under the WTO’s Sanitary and Phyto-sanitary (SPS) and Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) agreements. The UK intends to retain conformity with EU regulations following Brexit, at least for the time being, meaning that the existing low levels of health and safety risks to the public in UK products will not change in the days after Brexit. There would, as a result, be no grounds for the EU to exclude our goods from its markets.
The WTO’s new Trade Facilitation Agreement obliges the EU to maintain borders which are as frictionless as possible, using modern technologies such as pre–arrival processing of documents and electronic payments. Discrimination against foreign products through all sorts of internal regulations is forbidden. These rules are enforced by a well-respected international tribunal which has a high rate of compliance and cannot be overruled by the European Court of Justice.
While tariffs on some EU goods — agricultural goods and automobiles in particular — would be higher than 3 per cent, economic gains secured from an independent trade policy and a more pro-competitive environment should compensate UK consumers.
The WTO’s coverage of services is incomplete and would not grant UK firms the level of EU market access they enjoy under the single market, but the UK is well placed to take a leading role in developing the new Trade in Services Agreement, due to resume over the next few years, as well as multilateral negotiations for services at the WTO. Roberto Azevedo, the director general of the WTO, announced that he is looking forward to having the UK back as an independent champion of free trade.
Breaking free of the EU customs union will enable the UK to boost trade with other countries around the world, taking advantage of WTO rules which allow countries to offer preferential trading arrangements to nations with which they negotiate a Free Trade Agreement (FTA). In charge of its own trade policy, the UK should be able to roll over many of the EU’s 60-plus FTAs with third countries, some of which have already indicated that they intend to offer the UK terms as good as they did to the EU.
Canada has even suggested that the UK may get a better deal than that which was offered to the EU under the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) two years ago. The UK Department of International Trade has already begun discussions with several countries with which the EU has failed to do trade deals, most notably the US. Since 90 per cent of world GDP growth in the coming decades is expected to be outside the EU, it makes sense that the UK looks beyond this region, which now accounts for less than half of its overall trade. The UK will no longer be required, as it is at the moment under EU rules, to impose tariffs on products which it does not produce, such as tropical fruit — reducing prices for consumers and giving us leverage when it comes to negotiating trade deals. The country will be in a strong position to do trade deals faster than the EU has managed because it will not be encumbered by a long-winded ratification process involving 27 member states.
Why, then, has the government damaged its negotiating position by seeming to exclude the WTO option and giving the impression that it is desperate to extract a trade deal with the EU at all costs? The UK has approached the EU as a supplicant, or worse, a wounded animal. Theresa May’s Chequers deal would have us clinging to a weak version of the single market and customs union, which would deprive us of the freedom we ought to win through Brexit. Even that is not enough for Michel Barnier.
Yet it is the EU which has more to fear from these negotiations, being nervous about having a large, liberated, pro-competitive economy on its doorstep. The government should have initiated this process, proposing an FTA based on CETA but better, with deeper access for services such as finance, and lower tariffs on a broader range of products. At the same time, the government should have been making parallel arrangements for a no-deal WTO option.
Thankfully, there are signs that UK negotiators are now moving in this direction. The UK government announced recently that it has submitted its schedule of tariff commitments for certification by the WTO. The UK’s new Trade Remedies Authority — set up to regulate international trade disputes — will shortly be up and running and the ports are being built up to handle the minimal extra customs checks which will be needed.
In any negotiation, there is no strategy worse than giving the impression that you are desperate for a deal at all costs. With the WTO option as an entirely acceptable, workable alternative to a trade deal, the UK is truly in a position to walk away. And that’s a good place to be.
David Collins is a professor of International Economic Law at City, University of London.

Ha ha ha ha ha.

Collins is about as "independent" on writing about Brexit as Rees-Mogg!

He wrote a very similar article four months ago in Briefings for Brexit -
https://briefingsforbrexit.com/a-new-uk ... d-collins/

For this blog they write -
if you are an academic who wishes to contribute well-argued pieces in support of Brexit, or are outside a university but able to contribute at an equivalent standard, please contact us via the contact page.

Incidentally, why is he pushing trade with Canada so much??? (particularly in the article I quote) Guess where he was born. ))

When you read both carefully, they are filled with "if's" and "but's" - speculation. Just propaganda. In a word, rubbish.
One line I agree with -
... it is unquestionably true that departure from the EU will mean that the UK’s economic relationship with the EU will be diminished,...

kingfisher wrote: ↑Sat Aug 04, 2018 11:29 pm Why a no-deal Brexit is nothing to fear

Please! Do you have to quote long pieces in full when a link will do the same job?

OhSusana wrote: ↑Sun Aug 05, 2018 12:52 am Ha ha ha ha ha.

Collins is about as "independent" on writing about Brexit as Rees-Mogg!

He wrote a very similar article four months ago in Briefings for Brexit -
https://briefingsforbrexit.com/a-new-uk ... d-collins/

For this blog they write -
if you are an academic who wishes to contribute well-argued pieces in support of Brexit, or are outside a university but able to contribute at an equivalent standard, please contact us via the contact page.

Incidentally, why is he pushing trade with Canada so much??? (particularly in the article I quote) Guess where he was born. ))

When you read both carefully, they are filled with "if's" and "but's" - speculation. Just propaganda. In a word, rubbish.
One line I agree with -
... it is unquestionably true that departure from the EU will mean that the UK’s economic relationship with the EU will be diminished,...

You really do take the biscuit don't you? Every single pee taking post you and your best mate Happy in Cyprus have written since the majority of voters decided to leave your beloved EU , have contained...ifs, buts, possibilities, and on and on. Speculation. Just propoganda. In a word, rubbish. I've read all your funny little Brexit jokes, not a one of which is funnier than the sight of Herr Druncker stumbling around rat-a***d, and feel dismay that the EU negotiators are refusing to accept anything we offer. Do you seriously, under all your vitriolic pee take think that the businesses in the EU and this includes Cyprus's agriculture exports, will just roll over and accept the huge loss of profit and trade they have with the UK? There are something like 206 sovereign nations in the world, which is 206 nations the UK can do deals with under those WTO rules you are poo pooing, something we are not allowed to do at present. That figure includes the member nations of your beloved EU assuming your beloved EU doesn't prevent those nation's businesses from trading with the UK , (as if the EU would do that, tsk tsk, the EU may be a bully but it is not silly....is it?). And if your beloved EU doesn't allow trade with the UK, well I can't think of a single thing that I won't be able to get from somewhere in the world except possibly halloumi.

I just scrolled to the bottom without reading it... And my guess is that many others did, and will do, just the same