thehowler

This is not the first, second or third time we have heard this from Barnier. He should liven up his rhetoric.

It's already changed. I have many friends who have made big changes to their lives because of the vote. And our involvement in EU affairs has changed substantially.

May/Davis said we'd get unhindered/zero tariff access to the SM - never said it would be free. There's already been talk of the money being listed as a cost to help maintain NI border. All the usual talking head gripers seem to be coming round to CP. It sucks in many ways, but it sucketh less than the rest.

They can't duck the HoC vote on Customs Union. If May doesn't come forward with CP or similar the rebels or Mogg will force her out.

But we will be able to decide - if you're right, we align, if not, we diverge and deal with the admin hassle.

Why, because we won't be members of the Single Market? Or do you think it's a ploy to kill time until we have to crash out? CP looks like a workable solution to me - and to moderates like Clarke - if the EU can swallow it. Once you accept that all talk of reversing Brexit and holding a 2nd referendum is a waste of breath (as I think the EU have) then CP makes a lot of sense.

Why so? It just means the UK wouldn't be an attractive conduit into the EU for admin reasons and there would be no savings (tariff the same whether you send your cobalt/toothpaste etc to Southampton or Rotterdam). But we could, for example, make a trade deal with Kenya to flood the UK with cheap fruit and flowers - any tariff exempt for goods staying within the UK. Boris and co are trying to muddy the waters by saying we couldn't keep control of our own money, couldn't trade, couldn't have different regs for different nations - it's all codswallop. We'd just have new and more complex layers of import control.

You will never be satisfied.

No, it's the one even Ken Clarke thinks is possible and acceptable...On BBC Sunday Politics yesterday: If this partnership can be devised...so it actually produces no unnecessary new barriers to trade, investment and supply lines then I personally would be prepared to settle for that... There's one of your key Tory rebels won over. Soubry and Grieve indicating similar views. The WTO-preferable leavers are running out of runway.

Who would stop her?

It gives us full and unfettered access to the SM. Where is the hard border?

Melodrama. CP is the middle way. And yes, Dave Beans, it prevents a hard border. Why is everyone refusing to accept that CP is a potential way out of this - if the EU can be persuaded to accede? Again...we'd have full access to Single Market, so no hard border. NI border would be unchanged. And we could make our own trade deals. May could put CP to the HoC and defeat Mogg and co. So get behind it.

Too many ifs and buts there though. EFTA has its own budget requirements - tiny, admittedly. And nobody in govt wants/admits they want sole WTO, they're still talking about close, frictionless trade with EU. May making the usual promises in Sunday Times today, (easy trade, NI, right to make own trade deals - "I will not let you down") raising stakes on resignation if she doesn't get them. Customs Partnership still resolves all this though, EU keeping very quiet about it since the positive remarks by Ireland last week.

If we carry on like that we'll have to call a referendum every two years.

We've already done this. You just don't like the result.

A clamour? Labour have already dismissed it haven't they? I haven't heard any politicos saying EFTA suits us, we're too big an economy. Besides, as often happens on this thread people see ornate complexity in the ideas they think are foolish and regard their own proposals as blissfully straightforward. EFTA entry requires unanimous approval from other members, do you know we've got that? They also have their own court acting as overlords and an annual budget, which won't go down that well with some. And moving with EFTA to EEA means taking the four freedoms and the same-old Brexit impossibles...

You don't really think a manufacturing revolution is going to save the UK, do you - that goose is long cooked. The drift in the UK has been clear for decades, it's cheap money, HPI, shops and services (with a sprinkling of universal income, maybe?) to try and absorb the masses that used to go into manufacturing, some high-end engineering, tech investment gaming etc, growth in higher education and finance. Tourism is growing thanks to the Brexit devaluation (could get to maybe 8-10% of GDP) and we've got the language and culture bolted on from US dominance of tv/musak. The challenge for the Brits is to see and accept what we have become, and make the best of our strengths - and that's not making washing machines. Brexit could well see us trading more... but with less wealthy people.

There was a deeper groundswell of frustration in much of the country than just Tory in-fighting. UKIP was not the catalyst, it was the result. And if Cameron hadn't moved on it the Brits would have expressed much the same euro angst through a General Election. The EU has to evolve, all the players know this, Brexit is just part of a bigger process.

Always with them negative waves.

If just one person voted for Brexit believing in something more than that, your entire argument is wrong.

I wonder how many extra votes for remain the Lib Dem overspend garnered? Glass houses here, I reckon, and the millions of taxpayer quids splurged on remain propaganda should never have been allowed by the Electoral Commission. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42411144

Electoral Commission just announced fine for Leave.EU for overspending on their campaign. A. Banks claims it was only 7K overspend on Today show and says he will appeal the findings but it's going to police so should all come out - good. More significant to my eyes is that: The investigation found no evidence that Leave.EU received donations or paid-for services from Cambridge Analytica for its referendum campaigning and found that the relationship did not extend beyond initial scoping work. So they've backed Banks over the Gruniad/Observer allegations... https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/23/cambridge-analytica-misled-mps-over-work-for-leave-eu-says-ex-director-brittany-kaiser The Commission/MPs now need to accelerate the inquiry into Vote Leave and CA so we can determine whether the Gruniad/Observer's further claims of collusion have any merit.

I don't see a lot of working people up in arms about Brexit.

Whose pocket is the 9th Duke of Wellington in?

So no chance we'll stay in SM. (Though I agree with you, individual MPs heart of hearts would probably be to stay in).