Wednesday 16 August 2017

No change in Ireland for Brexit - or is there?

In a week where some demented person having a breakdown is merrily providing the press with all sorts of nonsense stories, reality is slow to creep back to the table.


Just as James Chapman accuses David Davis of being a part-time layabout, he comes forward with all the proposals the EU has been asking for.


Interestingly, the UK Government has chosen the strategy that I find works really well. Admit defeat, agree to the enemy demands and then see what they do. On Ireland, the proposal is that nothing much changes with the exception of some agri-tariffs.


This meets perfectly what the EU wanted; but its a nightmare for Ireland - effectively it means in theory they could end up the "The Jungle" in Ireland, either at the NI border or in NI itself.


To me this is super idea - no immigrant is going to want to hang around forever in the hideous physical and social climate of Northern Ireland - it is like our own version of the successful, but much maligned, Australian strategy of holding immigrants in an off-shore processing centre. 


So we push most of the problems back to the EU by being broadly compliant with their demands. I like this strategy, there are many ways for it to fail - basically, the EU can always be unreasonable whatever we decide to do, given we are leaving and Article 50 is triggered, but this is nice approach.


Shame everyone is too busy slagging off the entire Government to notice or to give it any credit when it does get things right.

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

Always found that the way forward was to agree with my mum and then do it anyway rather than my brother's technique of arguing situations out - had no idea what he wanted to achieve? Anywho...

Considering immigration is so high and potentially become toxic for France then it does make sense for NI to brace itself. As with the DUP and the Good Friday accord - just pay the guys ffs, it's not fucking Palestine.

Ireland's gone a bit Canada, as well it might, but I find the EU's position on Ireland vaguely irrelevant. We can sort this shit out - may take a few careers with it but no great shakes. France has got a legitimate concern so....

Nah, be fine.

And CU, Northern Ireland's beautiful man, when it wants to be.

DtP

Anonymous said...

This has much to recommend it, although much depends on whether Eire will play the game (in their own interests) or be bribed by the EU - not impossible, and in any event the Republic has plenty of globalist types like Varadkar, Shatter and Peter Sutherland who'd put EU interests before Irish ones. Give me a Fenian any day as against that lot.

a) it would mean in practice any 'hard' border would be in the Irish Sea or at mainland ports - I doubt the EU would like that, but it wouldn't be their business once we were out. My only worry is that we don't control our mainland borders now, will we do so post-Brexit?

It would effectively bring the Six Counties and the Republic closer together, which has its plus and minus points.

b) Ireland's not in Schengen, so inshallah we can help them with stuff like number plate technology at their sea borders and whatever they need at airports. But whether the will to match the technology exists I know not - Roscoff-Cork used to be a back door to UK.

Electro-Kevin said...

I don't think the EU (nor our own Remainers) want an amicable and successful outcome.

Their nightmare is Britain succeeding outside the EU.

Anonymous said...

Oooh, I think they've got you sussed, CU!

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/16/uk-government-border-proposals-ireland-brexit-position-paper

Anonymous said...

@ Roscoff-Cork used to be a back door to UK

Yes, and there are plenty of organised crims in Ireland happy to add people-running to their other "business lines", just like in Italy etc.

DUP knows this means the Belfast ferry, BFS-LHR etc will cease to be a simple day-trip. And the bodies will be stacking up in Morecambe Bay.

CityUnslicker said...

Anon, really? So the bodies are stacking up at Dover and Harwich are they from the French gangs...

Lord Blagger said...

Step 1.
======

Go to the WTO. Ask them if post Brexit we can tax German car imports 200% or are the UK and Germany "bound" to use WTO jargon.

Bound means you can only reduce barriers and tariffs.

Note. Germany and the UK are members in our own right at the WTO. All the does is negotiate collectively for EU members.

The WTO will say we can't. That means they can't increase tariffs when the UK leaves unless the UK agrees. Why would we?

Step 2
======

Just walk away.

Then when the EU tries to impose tariffs or bar

Lord Blagger said...

It would effectively bring the Six Counties and the Republic closer together, which has its plus and minus points.
==========

Or drives them apart even more.

Anonymous said...

Some more comments about the shape of people movement (including immigration) being released now.

Seems that the monitoring will be passed down to employers and landlords under "Right to Work" and "Right to Rent" rules. So if you can't meet the restrictions, you'll be homeless and workless. But it won't actually stop people coming here.

Electro-Kevin said...

DtP - The thing with a very controlling parent is that you have to do what they say on key things sometimes, if a big fall-out is to be avoided.

Throw into that a spouse who has never had to use diplomacy and demands that you stand your ground at all times... and then deliberately throws spanners in the works.

One or the other has to go.

Lord Blagger said...

Seems that the monitoring will be passed down to employers and landlords under "Right to Work" and "Right to Rent" rules. So if you can't meet the restrictions, you'll be homeless and workless. But it won't actually stop people coming here.
=========
I've no doubt.

But throw in 3K a year charge for the NHS, 6.5K a year for schooling, no Housing benefit, relabel tax credits as welfare, and the job is done.

Anonymous said...

Likewise brexit failing is the nightmare scenario for the Tories. They won't be forgiven for decades. (Imagine the election outcome if the Labour leader wasn't an extreme left winger)

Lord Blagger said...

Wrong.

Remainers like to say that the referendum doesn't count, its parliament that's sovereign.

Parliament voted with a 384 majority for A50, even more.

100 bn Euros would have to be paid if we remained, remain didn't mention that. Why?

How many nurses get the chop to pay Eurocrat pensions?

Remains nightmare is the polls on Brexit. It's now 64% in favour of leave.

Why are so many continental EU migrants coming to the UK? The EU is supposed to be an economic heaven [with 50% youth unemployment]

Now most of that's not the EU per say, its crap government across the board. it's going to get worse.

Ask a simple set of questions.

1. Are pensions debts hidden off the state debt numbers? Yes
2. Why is that? Governments can't pay but need the cash, so they are defrauding people. [In the UK section 2, 2006 fraud act]
3. How much do they owe?
4. What's the annual rate of increase?
5. What's the state spend on debts?

In the UK, 10 trillion is owed for pensions.
Annual rate of increase 636 bn a year [2005-2010 numbers]
In the UK 205 bn a year goes on debts,

James Higham said...

the hideous physical and social climate of Northern Ireland

Y-e-e-e-s-s-s.

Ghost of BE said...

I completely agree with CU. The "virtual border" i.e. no border is perfect. In essence things carry on exactly as they are now: in Ireland people can move about as if there is no border and entering the UK from any other EU country requires passage through a passport booth. It is worth remembering that the RoI is not part of Schengen, so anyone arriving in Dublin or wherever from Latvia or Greece has to meet Ireland's requirements. This is not an accident.

The key difference will be that there will be no automatic right to work. Which means that to gain legal employment the person will need to have some kind of permit. As we are told that the main concern of the headbangers is forinners stealing are jobs (sic) then they should be satisfied. Employment permits can presumably be issued when the staff are actually needed - which again in practice will mean very little change from now.

Ghost of BE said...

My one concern is whether we are going to go back to the bad old days when there were restrictions on the liberation of cheap French booze.

Lord Blagger said...

As we are told that the main concern of the headbangers is forinners stealing are jobs (sic) then they should be satisfied.
=============

Then you are wrong.

The problem is the state selling state services and goods below cost to economic migrants.

If you think that's a good idea, sell me your house for a quid.

Ghost of BE said...

And if that is a genuine problem (the analyses I have seen suggest that health and benefit tourism are trivial in scale) it doesn't take a huge amount of imagination to fix it, does it? Sitting at my café table here on holiday I can imagine at least one way of linking a work-permit and benefit-entitlement scheme. Complex? Perhaps, but additional bureaucracy and complexity is exactly what the country voted for last June. Or did you think it was going to straightforward? In which case I have a second-hand battlebus to sell you.

Lord Blagger said...

And if that is a genuine problem (the analyses I have seen suggest that health and benefit tourism are trivial in scale)

The problem then is you do not understand the scale of the problem.

The NHS costs 3K per person per year. That's for the worker and for their dependents.

Education costs 6.5K per pupil per year.

Common goods, police defense etc cost 2.5K per person per year.

On average the cost of a person in the UK for their state services is 12K. Easy to check. Dividend state spending by population [and that ignores the buy now, pay later issue of pensions].

Health and benefit tourism is nothing to do with economic migration. It's just people turning up to get free health care and buggering off leaving the bill.

So how to implement simply and cheaply? How to call your bluff that its not a problem.

Each year a civil servant takes state spend and divides it by population. That gives you the amount of tax someone needs to generate to break even.

Then every economic migrant has to pay that tax up front [or get a bond].
Then they fill out their tax form each year. They can knock that amount off their tax bill.

Simple - uses existing mechanism the tax system to manage it.
Doesn't discriminate on basis of gender,race, sexual preference etc.

But I suspect you're going to complain that you can't afford to pay that for your nanny.

MyIrishName said...

As the token Irishman on the site it behoves me to spell things out for the Brits.
Again. ;)

The EU couldnt give a flying fuck about Northern Ireland/Ireland (henceforth N/I) or any hard/soft border options.
The only reason its an issue is because the DUP are in power, propping up the Brexiters. It follows then, that to attack the Brexit gang they must be undermined.
So the EU are trying to manoeuvre the conversation to a place where the DUP must choose between a Hard Brexit and a UI; neither of which are palatable to them.

The EU gambit is that the DUP will pull support from Brexit in order to squash a UI.

This is a real possibility.

Unfortunately waiting in the wings if the Con gov falls is a pro-UI Labour leader. So... all this will do is force the DUP to gird their loins and commit full-on to Brexit in the hope something can be achieved short of a UI.

Whats being overlooked here is the position of the Republic; they too are in a bind.

Remember now the Rep is the 2nd most indebted nation (per capita) in the history of the world (after the US which controls its own currency).
Thats worth saying again - the Republic is more-or-less the most indebted country in recorded history.
They survive only by the grace of the EU at the moment.

In addition, aside from dropping the claim to the North from the constitution, the 'dream' of a UI has lost much of its sheen.
In fact, the thoughts of taking on 1.5 million extra citizens (a good 25% antagonistic to the Republic) who are used to free health services and free schooling must have the Rep govt and populace shitting itself.
How could a UI offer these people a higher standard of living and services while simultaneously enforcing Austerity on its own citizens and being the most indebted country in history?

So a UI is out. (on these terms).

The most likely outcome then is a Hard Brexit and severe damage to the N/I economy.
Which brings us back to the start - the EU doesnt give a fuck about Ireland and is prepared to sacrifice it whether Brexit happens or not.

Lord Blagger said...

The EU gambit is that the DUP will pull support from Brexit in order to squash a UI.

==================

If the DUP pulls support then the Tories have to rely on the other parties to get a deal through.

If they don't then its clean brexit.

A good thing.