UK's Brexit deal agreed by EU leaders

Only if you are absolutely certain that you will not entertain FoM so EEA/EFTA membership is out.

Just about the only thing the deal delivers on is stopping migration from the EU - funnily enough wasn’t it Theresa May that wanted a “hostile environment” for immigration when she was at the Home Office.

Coincidence?

Otherwise, if we enter the agreed back-stop we become tied to the EU in a customs union which means we will have to abide by quite a lot of EU regulation without having any say in the matter and not even being able to easily withdraw from the situation.

And entering the back-stop is inevitable because 2 years of “transition period” is not enough to negotiate a trade deal, and the basic unsolveability of the Irish Border issue has not gone away.

Someone really needs to point out that not leaving would be a much better plan.

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I don’t know what to say anymore…particularly when French folks ask me what on earth is going on…
Does anyone know ?

Actually, forget I said that…I’ll keep a low profile & pretend not to speak english from now on, if anyone asks

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Bien sûr :slight_smile:

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Ha ha…the hot topic in the bar this morning… was the Manifestations… not Brexit thank heavens… :wink::thinking:

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I feel distinctly uneasy about the Brexit situation now the EU leaders have said no further negotiation will be entertained. End of the road, folks, nowhere to go except westward-ho! Come back Sailor Bill (Morgan) - all is forgiven.

Made-in-China swimming-wings tied on, blow up that Li-Lo, buckets and spades at the ready to paddle and bail out the bilge, set your course by the stars and set out across the pond for Trumpland with your asylum-application in a screw-top coke-bottle. Don’t take the kiddies if you ever want to see them again if/when you arrive in the Land of the Free. :cry:

Well, except that the trade deal still has to be negotiated so this is more a case of it being the end of the beginning.

As for the withdrawal agreement - there just isn’t time to do much more.

Other than scrap this whole messy business.

She was hostile to the extent she wanted to include overseas students in immigration figures.
Now the Universities are desperate for more funding and they need foreign students to keep going.
Is TM going to let our universities go to the wall because of her totally fixed views?

Oh look, Macron is already pointing out that we’ll be stuck in the backstop if we fail to accede to EU demands over fisheries.

Basically we will just be backed into a corner over stuff like this, or Gibraltar, because the backstop is so awful. We’ll end up agreeing to anything to get a deal done which is ever so marginally less awful than the backstop.

I think I’d actually rather leave without a deal.

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And then, with no deal and no backstop, how would you solve the Irish border? (WTO requires a border between trading blocks)
Either you have a solution or you don’t. If you have a solution and a deal, you wouldn’t need the backstop any more.
If you don’t have a solution and you don’t have a deal and a backstop, and consequently the troubles start up again, the backstop might in retrospect seem not such a bad idea but by then it will be too late.

Calm down :slight_smile: - I am fully aware of the chaos that a no deal exit would bring.

You will know from my previous posts that my preferred option in the short term would be to halt Brexit entirely which would, of course, solve the problem of the Irish border.

That said, given the acrimony that the referendum has brought we cannot just return to the status quo ante so it comes down to whether you want a lingering death of the British economy, with no real prospect of gaining a competent political class and being utterly in thrall to Europe or a complete reset, albeit at huge cost but which a) would utterly crush the lies and misdirection of the Brexiteers and b) pretty much require the re-emergence of competent government.

Some fine choice to which we have brought ourselves.

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Brilliant rant by Mike Harding.

The only slight issue I have is that I still think it is all Cameron’s fault, May had a big hand but she’s not the ultimate architect of this fiasco.

No Paul, it was not you and me.
I saw people interviewed in Leeds Kirkgate Market, almost all of them belonged to either the non thinking Brexiteer or fed up with Brexit camps.
Only two people had real thoughtful comments to make.
It is really worrying that TM might get her deal through on a second Referendum through boredom.

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