Well why did you bring it up?
Just how long is it going to take these cretinous government to realise that they are in no position to dictate anything other than they want sugar in their tea. I do not usually resort to rudeness but this Davis man is an absolute moron. Following on from his first meeting in Brussels when he arrived looking like a schoolboy who had just been given a lolly to demanding the sacking of an LD MEP. It just makes me so angry he is representing the country and by default me. If I was his manager I would have sacked him months ago.
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So have I got this right: the UK banged on about wanting a transitional deal, eventually to keep them happy the EU promised to discuss it internally although it couldnât go onto the table yet, and now the UK starts arguing amongst itself whether it will accept a transitional deal after all.
Honestly itâs like a kid that screams the house down because it "needs"something, and then when you give in and say OK do you want a red one or a green one, it turns its nose up and doesnât want one after all, theyâre horrible.
Yes it is all getting a bit confusing. Apparently they can discuss a future trading position but they canât start negotiations on a trade agreement with the EU 27 until the UK officially leaves. They wonât be able to negotiate a trade agreement during a transitional period because to all intents and purposes the UK will still be a member of the EU.
Iâve read article fifty and there is no mention of a transitional period only an agreed extension of the article fifty period. But I agree, asking for a transitional period and refusing to accept it if you donât start talking about trade all seems slightly strange.
What seems odd to me is creating a transitional period when it is not known what one is transitioning to.
Maybe one is transitioning towards an agreement, but who knows.
Iâd have thought the most logical thing would be to agree the trade relationship, and then have an implementation period during which all parties could transition towards implementing the agreement.
Logical yes but do you seriously think thereâs a cat in hellâs chance of having a trade agreement sorted out by this time next year? Considering how long theyâve faffed about with the âeasyâ bit and got as far as agreeing almost one out of three elements, got nowhere on the other two? Is the UK even capable of agreeing what trade agreement it wants, let along negotiating it with the EU?
Maybe the transition period is the one required for die hard anti-EU types to realise that whatever does happen (apart from remaing in the EU) they are not going to be able to have a deal that is better than what the UK has right now. No having your cake & eating it, therefore #stopbrexit #reformEUfromwithin.
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They canât agree a trade agreement while the UK is in the EU, they can talk about one, they canât start negotiations until the UK leaveâs. Members of the EU are not allowed to negotiate trade agreements with each other, its something every member signed up to, which is obviously why Tusk pointed out that trade talks proper, could not start until the UK leaves and would probably take around three years to complete. So yes, I agree, transitional period leading to what exactly? Out with no deal, over to WTO while negotiations on a new trade agreement commence? Its like trying to dig yourself out of a hole that you are continuing to fill in.
Anyway, there might not be one on offer.
Itâs all about expectations and reality. The leave voters who have considered these things believe that the U.K. will leave the EU and immediately carry on trading with no pause. This is only possible if the new trade arrangements are in place. There is a two year period between Article 50 being initiated and the UK leaving the EU. In that time the EU and Britain has to go through the process of agreeing the details of separation and then agree new trade terms. Then is the important word. So far the terms of separation have proved impossible to agree upon. This means that there is less and less of the two year period left to sort out the future trading agreements. In fact it is unlikely that two years would ever have been long enough to sort out trade, the recent agreement between Canada and the EU took nearer 10 years to complete. The British Government want a transition period between the date they leave the EU and the date wher the new terms are ready to go. They believe two years will do. Without the transition period businesses on both sides will suffer, one day they will be working under the terms that they have used for the past forty odd years and the next day they will be using a one size fits all agreement like the WTO rules. Once the EU and U.K. have sorted their new trade agreements it will be all change again. A hard Brexit will result in the WTO rules being the best there is on offer. The two year transition will protect businesses and hopefully end with a much better deal between the EU and the U.K. than the WTO rules would provide. What the leave voters do not seem to understand is that no future deal between the UK and the EU (their closest and best trading partner) will be half as favourable as those currently enjoyed. The idea that the USA or the Commonweatth countries will come to rescue the U.K. holds no water, all major countries are already tied into trading deals of their own. Britain can only start negotiating with them once they have left the EU and they will not be subject to the transition periodâs protection so once Britain is no longer covered by trade deals between those other countries and the EU the WTO rules will kick in.
Brexit might mean Brexit but it will also mean difficult, long drawn out and expensive. March 2019 is just the beginning.
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If I remember correctly EU wants Ireland border issue solved before going to discuss trade? Has it been solved? Also there is a question of EU- people in UK and UK-people in EU countries?
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I apparently still need to point out that the UK cannot negotiate a trade agreement with the remaining members of the EU while the UK is still a member. The discussions purely involve only the future relationship the UK wishes to have with the EU. Trade talks start at the earliest April 2019. You canât have a transitional period if its a transition to WTO while trade talks continue. A transitional period is what the UK are talking about whereas the EU 27 are talking about negotiating an extension to the two year article fifty period. Mrs May seems to be under the delusion that a new trade agreement can be agreed before march 2019 and everything can carry on basically as is. This is not the case, she should know what the EU rules are, and she should know that there will be no agreement in place when the UK leaves.
The answer to your question Anna is âNoâ.
Obviously the EU do not want other member states seeing that the UK can obtain a good deal by leaving, as it would set a very bad precedent as far as the EU are concerned.
The EU have decided that they will not start trade negotiations until after the UK leaves, but letâs face it, the remaining 27 member states could decide to change that particular rule any time they wish. What the EU is doing is illogical, as you simply donât treat a friend in that way. They are behaving like a petulant child, and simply decline to understand that such is precisely the type of behaviour that encouraged many people in the UK to vote âleaveâ in the first place. Had the EU given some ground when Cameron went to renegotiate a few things, then the referendum result would probably have been different. The EU needs to wake up to the fact that it was in part their own intrasigence that has resulted in Brexit in the first place.
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I thought it was implementing a trade agreement that was prohibited, I wasnât aware that you canât even discuss it. Iâm also not sure why you say âa trade agreement with the remaining members of the EUâ, surely the agreement will be negotiated with the EU itself, not with individual members.
It was always the plan for Phase 2 of the negotiations to be the future relationship, ie talking about trade, and originally the expectation was that weâd have got onto this by now.
Well you can put it that way, you can also say it would be unfair to other members. The golf club analogy is as good as any - members pay fees to keep the club going, and they would be miffed if the club let the public come and use the club facilities free of charge. Would you say thatâs unreasonable?
What the EU is doing is expecting the UK to stick to its initial agreement to phased talks. If the UK didnât want to do it like that, why did they agree to it? The EU decided on phased talks for reasons - because they felt that the UK would be slippery to pin down on those three specific questions, and because they wanted to ensure the UK couldnât turn citizens rights into bargaining chips. And look how theyâve been proved right, the UK is refusing to address the Irish question or the money question. The only way the EU has of trying to get them to focus on the difficult questions that they donât want to face up to, is refusing to discuss the things they do want to discuss until they have. If trade talks were started now, what hope would there be of ever making the UK take an interest in the Irish border problem or sitting down and going through the finances? So yes the EU could change the rules and let the UK off the hook, but I donât think theyâre likely to, because the reasons they decided on those rules, apply more than ever. The UK is proving even harder to pin down than they anticipated and they canât let it off the hook no matter how much it squirms because - it has to come up with answers. The UK may not care what happens in Ireland as long as they get their precious trade deal, but fortunately the EU does.
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All 28 members signed up to an agreement that states no member state can negotiate trade agreements with other member states while they are a member of the EU. Why would they change this rule to suit the UK? Its totally illogical, members would be agreeing stuff willy nilly with each other, completely undermines the idea behind the EU. I see some of us still blame the EU which the UK is a major player in as the cause of all the UKâs woes. This is not the case. The UK immigration department could have implemented all the EUâs agreed rules on freedom of movement from day one, chose not to do so because of cost. Immigration was the only reason the UK voted out of the EU, immigration that the UK government chose to allow to continue unhindered. Just as many people were coming into the UK from outside the EU as were coming into the UK from within the EU. No one knew who remained in the country and who had left. No one knows how many mainland European citizens work full time in the UK then go home every two or three weeks. All the figures have been inflated because the UK immigration department have absolutely no idea whatâs going on.
Cameron had all the tools he needed to control immigration, May ran the immigration department, the immigration department failed, and now May leads the country.
Why should the EU 27 alter the rules to suit a country that was stupid enough to vote leave, a country that had several ukip Mepâs who hardly ever turned up and did absolutely nothing on the UKâs behalf. The UK has had loads of influence over the direction the EU was taking and to say they were always outvoted or overruled is a total lie. We are where we are, and the idea now is to minimise the overall disruption to the EU, not the overall disruption to the UK. A totally united Europe going forward into the future is far far more important to me that the economic future of the UK.
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I donât follow the logic. Why would they waste time talking and dreaming about the relationship they could have if neither of them was in the EU, when in fact they all intend staying in the EU and will therefore never be in a position to implement any of it? Whereas the UK will/might soon be in a position where it can implement a new agreement with the EU - but NOT with individual EU states.
The UK can indeed have a chit chat about what they would like, but they canât negotiate. The other 27 members of the EU have to agree any agreement that the EUâs trade team negotiate with the UK.
With the willy nilly bit, its to do with members agreeing little deals with each other while members of the EU, which is why the UK cannot negotiate until it is a third country, as in out completely.
Article fifty was the naffest piece of paperwork ever written up, anything can be read into it depending on your point of view.
It doesnât state that the remaining members of the EU dictate the terms of the negotiations, but it also doesnât state that all parties negotiate the terms under which the negotiations take place.
The whole plan was to deter potential leavers by making the state leave, revert to third country status, WTO, then negotiate a future trade agreement with the remaining members. This is obviously something the UK doesnât want because it would cause major economic problems. Its obviously something that no member state would want. At least with a Rubikâs cube you can watch a video on YouTube to show you how to solve it, there arenât any on YouTube yet on how to solve brexit.
Fair enough so can you explain why Phase 2 of the negotiations, which if the UK had got on with the job we would now be starting, was always scheduled to be discussions of the future relationship - what in your view were they going to talk about for 12 months?
EDIT - itâs explained here:
http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2017/04/29-euco-brexit-guidelines/
âWhile an agreement on a future relationship between the Union and the United Kingdom as such can only be finalised and concluded once the United Kingdom has become a third country, Article 50 TEU requires to take account of the framework for its future relationship with the Union in the arrangements for withdrawal. To this end, an overall understanding on the framework for the future relationship should be identified during a second phase of the negotiations under Article 50 TEU. We stand ready to engage in preliminary and preparatory discussions to this end in the context of negotiations under Article 50 TEU, as soon as the European Council decides that sufficient progress has been made in the first phase towards reaching a satisfactory agreement on the arrangements for an orderly withdrawalâ etc, it then goes on to mention transitional arrangements.