crouch

No, I don't exclude a reset here in the UK; history is replete with resets and, as I said above, is one possible definition of history itself.

I thought I had implied precisely the opposite. The ceteris paribus applies in that context to the EU but it equally applies to us; as you imply history is replete with "fundamental resets", indeed you could argue that that is precisely what history is about.

There's a slight irony here. Richard North annotated the Foreign Office paper on joining the EEC which was released in 2003 under the thirty year rule. He was quite harsh on Ted Heath for lying to the British people about what membership of the EEC would entail; there's little doubt that Heath seriously misled people. I was inclined to take a more sympathetic view of Heath as I think he saw the EEC as a way of adjusting ourselves to our proper place in the World; not as a great power but one whose history meant that we could punch above our weight and in this I think he was right. His son takes that political decline for granted and, in that respect, he appears to be at some odds to his father. Of course with all these accounts what they fail to do is take account of the way the EU is going; it's a ceteris paribus view but ceteris paribus never exists. Up to now the EU has muddled through its various crises but one day it won't be able to and there will be some sort of fundamental reset which we may find far more congenial and might well rejoin, but it will not be the EU of today.

My understanding is that it was no rumour but a statement by a senior Nissan manager about what might happen to the Sunderland plant in the absence of a UK/EU trade agreement. I'm not trying to prove anything; it's folk like you who take the slimmest of evidence and then conclude that Brexit has failed in toto. My stance is very simple: wait and see. Did I deny this (10% lower pound mean we are all 10% poorer) ? My "logic" has nothing to do with it. I am merely pointing out that as Brexit will - according to you - (not may) be a failure then the £ is certain to go down. If it does go down one of the collateral effects is that it might offset any tariffs imposed on cars by the EU and thereby nullify the cost issue alluded to by Nissan. To accuse me of appalling logic is farcical; I have never equated a trade off between a devaluation of sterling and the retenton of manufacturing at Nissan; that is quite absurd. Whether those jobs are safe whether we are in or out of the EU remains to be seen. As you note the French are nationalistic and if any rationalisation is down the road the French plants will get priority.

You mean that in 2016 Brexiteers said categorically there would be no Cvid 19 pandemic in 2020 and there is?

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

I bow to your superior knowledge.

The Nissan representative simply said that if we didn't get a trade agreement with the EU then that calls into question Nissan's long term presence in the UK. As an astronaut I will go to Mars. Which of the above is the more credible statement?

The implication of that, as with Hitler, is that they are hiding their true nature, blindside their interlocutors, and may therefore be able to get what they want at the end of the day.

I don't deny the ultimate reality of what you say. However, when a senior official implies they are considering you have to take them at their word. It might just be an opening shot for state aid.

I don't see this. People can make a perfectly reasonable assumption about what they can get out of a trade deal and, at the end of the day fail to get it. That isn't talking b0llocks. People thought for years that Hitler was a reasonable figure who could be negotiated with and look how that turned out!

The trade agreements with Canada, Korea, Japan and Singapore didn't include LPF provisions, or not to anywhere near what they are demanding from the UK. Any agreement would be subject to the ECJ which would be unacceptable. Also with regard to state aid provisions Germany has breached state aid rules 67 times in 20 years; France 29 times and the UK 4. Of course the EU wants the UK to sign up to these things and for us to be subject to the ECJ. As regards competition law, one of the examples of Anglo Saxon input to the EU France obtained key dilutions under the Lisbon Treaty. The UK is right to walk away from this lock,stock and barrell.

Where did I say 50:50? I understand what the UK is asking is a free trade agreement more like Canada or Japan but the EU want one that is more restrictive with LPF provisions that go well beyond those agreements.

The reason is quite simple. The mere fact that Renault were even considering keeping manufacturing here goes against the "we're finished" meme put out by folk like you. If Brexit is such a dumb deal then how can they even consider it; it's a no brainer. And you are right it was irony; a dig against the "we've already failed " crowd. And as for saying how could it work the answer is surely blindingly simple. If Brexit is as bad as you suggest then the pound will fall on a secular basis, perhaps more than enough to offset a possible 10% tariff.

Well the BOE are telling the banks to prepare for no deal and the odds now are substantially less than a million to one. From what I can see the EU either want an unreasonable deal or an extension into the hazy future which sees us eventually staying in the EU and I can't see the government agreeing to either.