Brexit What Happens Next Thread ---multiple merged threads.

[pig]

2 hours ago, onlooker said:

If giving away vaccines delays reopening our UK society, getting people back to work, saving businesses and re-starting non Covid hospital operations, that must be bad surely. What do you say to the Brit facing bankruptcy, or untreated cancer?

The EU should just be told to sort their own problems out themselves. In a nice way of course.

Maybe a bit of help to Portugal, our oldest ally.

You tell everybody, they have been not reduced to rats turning on each other, and that we're all going to cooperate to find a way to save as many lives as possible and return to normality.

Or maybe you can remind them of NHS staff reduced to wearing bin bags as PPE and look back on history as to what fighting over resources eventually leads to ?

[thecrashingisles]

I have to say that the EU's behaviour in the last week does vindicate Boris Johnson's insistence that for Brexit to be worth doing, it has to mean being outside the reach of the commission.

All things being equal, Brexit was the wrong decision, but all things are never equal...

[erat_forte]

13 hours ago, dugsbody said:

Bowing out for now. Conclusion for me is after the very frank discussions and a fair amount more digging, I have come round to having more sympathy for the UK's position than the EU. The UK appears to have taken more risk than the EU, invested more and started way earlier on the vaccine front. There should be a pay-off for that.

I maintain that clause 5.4 and the list of approved sites for the EU initial doses is what is under dispute and I understand why the EU are dissatisfied that they're not being delivered doses from sites they believed would do so according to their contract. I also understand why they're irate that the UK will not allow delivery to the EU from those sites and can understand why they'd seek to ensure their citizens get doses from sites in the EU in preference, which I still see as the same as the UK policy.

Having said all that, I think the UK have the better case here overall, if not contractually then because of their initial risks and steps to secure the vaccines.

It is a real shame the EU have acted in this manner, particularly the Article 16 antics. They've damaged their reputation and set back a cause I believe in. 

Ciao for now.

@14stFlyer @Peter Hun @Drat @Bob8 @NobodyInParticular @slawek @Riedquat etc

Yes I would agree with this assessment too.

 

Questions: What is the actual back story to this article 16 "accidental" triggering and then retraction?

David ALlen Green has some background info:https://davidallengreen.com/2021/01/what-is-article-16-of-the-northern-irish-protocol-and-what-on-earth-was-the-european-commission-thinking-includes-a-copy-of-the-now-deleted-proposed-regulation/

Was this pure Bureaucratic incompetence? Was this superiority arrogance, thinking they could do whatever they liked, later slapped down by cooler heads after the row started? Or was this a sneaky calculated way to test the waters on the Article 16 process? I'm wondering if you could "accidentally" trigger it and then retract after a day, just to get a sense of the international reaction, who reacts in what way, as a "dry run" for a more serious issue later? Or as a threat for later unspecified issues? or what? Opinions?

 

[IMHAL]

Just now, erat_forte said:

Yes I would agree with this assessment too.

 

Questions: What is the actual back story to this article 16 "accidental" triggering and then retraction?

David ALlen Green has some background info:https://davidallengreen.com/2021/01/what-is-article-16-of-the-northern-irish-protocol-and-what-on-earth-was-the-european-commission-thinking-includes-a-copy-of-the-now-deleted-proposed-regulation/

Was this pure Bureaucratic incompetence? Was this superiority arrogance, thinking they could do whatever they liked, later slapped down by cooler heads after the row started? Or was this a sneaky calculated way to test the waters on the Article 16 process? I'm wondering if you could "accidentally" trigger it and then retract after a day, just to get a sense of the international reaction, who reacts in what way, as a "dry run" for a more serious issue later? Or as a threat for later unspecified issues? or what? Opinions?

 

IMO it was a hot headed over reaction, human error. They quickly realised their mistake. Is it on par with the UK breaking international law and threatening essentially the same thing? I don't know, but it's there or there about. The difference is that for some reason we expect the UK to do such things but we don't expect the EU to behave in a similar fashion.

Obviously it has sadenned me that this has happened but no one and no thing is perfect. The EUneeds to stand back and re-evalute and make some changes. On balance, I'd still go with the deal we had with the EU.

[erat_forte]

3 minutes ago, IMHAL said:

IMO it was a hot headed over reaction, human error. They quickly realised their mistake. Is it on par with the UK breaking international law and threatening essentially the same thing? I don't know, but it's there or there about. The difference is that for some reason we expect the UK to do such things but we don't expect the EU to behave in a similar fashion.

Obviously it has sadenned me that this has happened but no one and no thing is perfect. The EUneeds to stand back and re-evalute and make some changes. On balance, I'd still go with the deal we had with the EU.

Well yes I don't see anyone suggesting any kind of change to the deal that would be better. You are probably right, events moving fast, someone thought, this will stick it to them and it went out too far before anyone said hang on, this is a bit stupid?

[onlooker]

7 hours ago, pig said:

You tell everybody, they have been not reduced to rats turning on each other, and that we're all going to cooperate to find a way to save as many lives as possible and return to normality.

Or maybe you can remind them of NHS staff reduced to wearing bin bags as PPE and look back on history as to what fighting over resources eventually leads to ?

Pathetic response in the light of what happened about PPE last year:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-idUSKBN20T166

https://www.ft.com/content/8c0a29fc-a523-4901-a190-fe5a2dcc8faa

And that we should be exporting vaccines to the Republic of Ireland - words fail me.

[yelims]

30 minutes ago, onlooker said:

Pathetic response in the light of what happened about PPE last year:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-idUSKBN20T166

https://www.ft.com/content/8c0a29fc-a523-4901-a190-fe5a2dcc8faa

And that we should be exporting vaccines to the Republic of Ireland - words fail me.

Most of UK flu vaccines and most of entries on the uk banned medicine export list I posted is made in republic. Be careful with your dimwited nationalism it could back fire 

[pig]

53 minutes ago, erat_forte said:

Yes I would agree with this assessment too.

 

Questions: What is the actual back story to this article 16 "accidental" triggering and then retraction?

David ALlen Green has some background info:https://davidallengreen.com/2021/01/what-is-article-16-of-the-northern-irish-protocol-and-what-on-earth-was-the-european-commission-thinking-includes-a-copy-of-the-now-deleted-proposed-regulation/

Was this pure Bureaucratic incompetence? Was this superiority arrogance, thinking they could do whatever they liked, later slapped down by cooler heads after the row started? Or was this a sneaky calculated way to test the waters on the Article 16 process? I'm wondering if you could "accidentally" trigger it and then retract after a day, just to get a sense of the international reaction, who reacts in what way, as a "dry run" for a more serious issue later? Or as a threat for later unspecified issues? or what? Opinions?

 

I think the fact it is a matter of life and death went to somebodies head: that may be the case but clearly there are better, less confrontational ways of dealing with the problem

[NobodyInParticular]

20 hours ago, slawek said:

How is that relevant to my point about the vaccine nationalism? The location in the EU/UK is convenient but it doesn't mean the EU owns in anyway those sites. 

It doesn't mean that the EU hasn't paid the whole amount.

The EU relied on AZ expertise here and they were confident that they will be able to fulfill the orders. If there was a risk AZ should have pushed delivery dates when it signed the contract. 

It is up to you to provide evidence supporting your claim. A failure suggests it is false.

There were part of the contract. Whether they were crucial is your personal opinion. The source of the dispute is the AZ failure to deliver contract and its unwillingness to use the UK sites to fulfill the contract.   

Sorry don't understand your point here.  

Corporate lawyers were previously suggested would out the EU at the back of the queue for vaccine due to being second, but echoing some of the above, it could also be argued that by August AZ should have had a better handle on production options so should have been only signing contracts it could honour. Personally, I'd say that AZ should be cut some slack as it was not previously a vaccine producer, and was picked by Hancock partly for reasons of vaccine nationalism so even by August might not have been in a position of full knowledge. But then, as I previously noted, perhaps the issue lies with AZ's legal team for the contract terms committing it to things it could not necessarily deliver. But I hope pragmatism and compromise arises. 

[NobodyInParticular]

11 hours ago, kzb said:

Yes but when you think about it, if you're not going to ask my question there's no point.

I am pointing out that I can get information but that if you want to ask specific ones get your own friends. To expect me to ask the ones you want is incredibly rude. 

[pig]

5 hours ago, thecrashingisles said:

I have to say that the EU's behaviour in the last week does vindicate Boris Johnson's insistence that for Brexit to be worth doing, it has to mean being outside the reach of the commission.

All things being equal, Brexit was the wrong decision, but all things are never equal...

That’s a bit of an overblown reaction and secondly  It shows quite clearly you’re never ‘out of the reach’ of your neighbours.

[NobodyInParticular]

11 hours ago, Byron said:

So, your pathological altruism would allow you to condemn British people to die, just to make you feel that you are a nice person?

I wonder what a British person, in hospital on a ventilator and struggling to breathe would make of you.

Morality is not beholden to national borders, IMHO. 

[dryrot]

14 hours ago, dugsbody said:

[deleted]

Ciao for now.

@14stFlyer @Peter Hun @Drat @Bob8 @NobodyInParticular @slawek @Riedquat etc

Thx for your clear and measured reply. We (I...) could learn from it!

[pig]

53 minutes ago, onlooker said:

Pathetic response in the light of what happened about PPE last year:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-idUSKBN20T166

https://www.ft.com/content/8c0a29fc-a523-4901-a190-fe5a2dcc8faa

And that we should be exporting vaccines to the Republic of Ireland - words fail me.

Wow that’s a wild accusation, the uk government acted out of justifiable fear of the hole it’s in and concern for its citizens not some pathetic belligerent revenge.

[Peter Hun]

The editor of Bild

Ursula von der Leyen’s mess has disgraced Europe

And what did the EU do? It created the biggest confidence-destroying programme in its history. On top of this, Brussels and the governments of the EU states have managed to confirm the old prejudice of a sluggish Europe. Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, denies all blame. Whistling loudly in the dark and thus damaging even further any confidence in her ability to run the EU. Music to the ears of the populists and anti-democrats.

Von der Leyen started a dispute with the vaccine supplier Astrazeneca, which was supposed to look daredevilish but was just dumb. She has disgraced Europe.

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/f3c42ae6-6408-11eb-ab68-123bacbc1c7b

[yelims]

You guys are out of EU so your point of view is different to those of us in EU

1. has some low level beuracrat put up a draft on website, Yes, bad mistake 

2. was Article 16 officially triggered, No

3. Did DUP call for article 16 be triggered publicly few weeks ago? Yes, silly buggers they are

4. Was this done by Boris? No

 

Seeing how AZ now found out of somewhere millions of extra dozes for EU as a Eu citizen I am delighted to have the commission use large carrots and threats of sticks to keep these multinational corporations to the contracts they signed. I realise it might be a foreign concept in UK but it’s great to see my representatives work to better the lives of EU citizens first.

Many Brexiteers cheer on Britain First and supported Trump’s America first slogans, the EU offered UK cooperation on multiple occasions only to be turned down, that leaves competition unfortunately, if that’s the case and UK government don’t want cooperation that’s fine so, but don’t screech when EU does what Tories been doing for 5 years.

 

you are now a third (world?) country with no say in running of EU, from our point of view, the opinions of your media and public are on same level of note as noises from other authoritarian dystopia countries such as Russia, just like Russia the truth and reality was warped to justify and distract from ongoing failure that Brexit is 

[rollover]

7 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

The editor of Bild

Ursula von der Leyen’s mess has disgraced Europe

And what did the EU do? It created the biggest confidence-destroying programme in its history. On top of this, Brussels and the governments of the EU states have managed to confirm the old prejudice of a sluggish Europe. Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, denies all blame. Whistling loudly in the dark and thus damaging even further any confidence in her ability to run the EU. Music to the ears of the populists and anti-democrats.

Von der Leyen started a dispute with the vaccine supplier Astrazeneca, which was supposed to look daredevilish but was just dumb. She has disgraced Europe.

 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/f3c42ae6-6408-11eb-ab68-123bacbc1c7b

Boris become convinced of the EU point and agree to ship 9 million doses from UK plants to the EU and put an end to the AZ vaccines contracts dispute. The UK media are sugar coating the news and are bit shy now to say it directly.

The SKY:

Speaking to German television, Ms Von der Leyen said she had agreed with Prime Minister Boris Johnson that vaccine factories in the UK and Europe would deliver doses to each region.

Step forward on vaccines.@AstraZeneca will deliver 9 million additional doses in the first quarter (40 million in total) compared to last week’s offer.

 

 

[zugzwang]

1 minute ago, rollover said:

Boris become convinced of the EU point and agree to ship 9 million doses from UK plants to the EU and put an end to the AZ vaccines contracts dispute. The UK media are sugar coating the news and are bit shy now to say it directly.

The SKY:

Speaking to German television, Ms Von der Leyen said she had agreed with Prime Minister Boris Johnson that vaccine factories in the UK and Europe would deliver doses to each region.

Step forward on vaccines.@AstraZeneca will deliver 9 million additional doses in the first quarter (40 million in total) compared to last week’s offer.

 

 

Result!

All AZ has to do is come up with another 40 million doses before the end of March and they're off the hook.

[pig]

3 minutes ago, rollover said:

Boris become convinced of the EU point and agree to ship 9 million doses from UK plants to the EU and put an end to the AZ vaccines contracts dispute. The UK media are sugar coating the news and are bit shy now to say it directly.

The SKY:

Speaking to German television, Ms Von der Leyen said she had agreed with Prime Minister Boris Johnson that vaccine factories in the UK and Europe would deliver doses to each region.

Step forward on vaccines.@AstraZeneca will deliver 9 million additional doses in the first quarter (40 million in total) compared to last week’s offer.

 

 

Well, OK so it worked. I still think Leyen ratcheted up the situation too high, but alls well that ends well I guess.

[Peter Hun]

2 minutes ago, rollover said:

Boris become convinced of the EU point and agree to ship 9 million doses from UK plants to the EU and put an end to the AZ vaccines contracts dispute. The UK media are sugar coating the news and are bit shy now to say it directly.

The SKY:

Speaking to German television, Ms Von der Leyen said she had agreed with Prime Minister Boris Johnson that vaccine factories in the UK and Europe would deliver doses to each region.

Step forward on vaccines.@AstraZeneca will deliver 9 million additional doses in the first quarter (40 million in total) compared to last week’s offer.

 

 

Right. Meanwhile

AZN are deliver billions of doses, for free. Largely paid for by UK Gov.

 UK vaccine schedule won't be interrupted. Unlike the vaccine nationalism shown by the EU commissioner, the truer picture is that there is a massive worldwide supply chain to solve these problems. Problems that have to be solved through negotiations not threats.

 

COVAX to deliver millions of AstraZeneca doses to 36 Caribbean and Latin American states

The COVAX global vaccine sharing scheme expects to deliver 35.3 million doses of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine to 36 Caribbean and Latin American states from mid-February to the end of June, the World Health Organization's regional office said.

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said the Americas region needed to immunise about 500 million people to control the pandemic.

It said WHO would complete its review in a few days of the AstraZeneca vaccine for emergency use listing (EUL), according to a Reuters report.

"The number of doses and delivery schedule are still subject to EUL and manufacturing production capacity," PAHO said, adding that supply deals also had to be agreed with producers.

The GAVI alliance, the group that co-leads COVAX with WHO, said last week it aimed to deliver 2.3 billion vaccines worldwide by the end of 2021, including 1.8 billion free doses to lower-income countries.

Geneva-based GAVI was expected to publish details of its allocations by country on Monday.

[Peter Hun]

3 minutes ago, zugzwang said:

Result!

All AZ has to do is come up with another 40 million doses before the end of March and they're off the hook.

AZN offered those doses last week, before the ex-EU commissioner went Postal.

[zugzwang]

1 minute ago, Peter Hun said:

AZN offered those doses last week, before the ex-EU commissioner went Postal.

She didn't go postal. No-one got hurt.

Johnson's Brexit deal is the real cause of frustration and hardship in Northern Ireland.

 

[zugzwang]

More doses from Pfizer too.

All good. And all thanks to the grit and determination of Ursula v DL. 👍

Quote

BioNTech and Pfizer pledge 75m extra doses to EU

BioNTech and Pfizer said on Monday they will ramp up their coronavirus vaccine deliveries to the European Union, pledging to send up to 75 million extra doses to the bloc in the spring.

“Pfizer and BioNTech continue to work toward increased deliveries beginning the week of February 15, ensuring we will supply the full quantity of vaccine doses in the first quarter we contractually committed to and up to an additional 75 million doses to the European Union in the second quarter,” they said in a statement reported by AFP.

The EU has ordered a total of 600 million doses.

The statement came hours ahead of a national conference called by Chancellor Angela Merkel with vaccine manufacturers amid growing anger over the bloc’s sluggish inoculation campaign.

BioNTech and Pfizer, which will take part in the meeting, said that improvements in their production capabilities would allow them to speed up supplies.

These included the completion of modifications at Pfizer’s plant in Puurs, Belgium. “Now, we are back to the original schedule of vaccine dose deliveries,” they said.

 

[Peter Hun]

1 minute ago, zugzwang said:

She didn't go postal. No-one got hurt.

Johnson's Brexit deal is the real cause of frustration and hardship in Northern Ireland.

 

She's toast. She was useless as German defense  minister and she has failed to deliver vaccines in a timely manner to the EU. She has to go.

[pig]

2 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

Right. Meanwhile

AZN are deliver billions of doses, for free. Largely paid for by UK Gov.

 UK vaccine schedule won't be interrupted. Unlike the vaccine nationalism shown by the EU commissioner, the truer picture is that there is a massive worldwide supply chain to solve these problems. Problems that have to be solved through negotiations not threats.

 

COVAX to deliver millions of AstraZeneca doses to 36 Caribbean and Latin American states

The COVAX global vaccine sharing scheme expects to deliver 35.3 million doses of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine to 36 Caribbean and Latin American states from mid-February to the end of June, the World Health Organization's regional office said.

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said the Americas region needed to immunise about 500 million people to control the pandemic.

It said WHO would complete its review in a few days of the AstraZeneca vaccine for emergency use listing (EUL), according to a Reuters report.

"The number of doses and delivery schedule are still subject to EUL and manufacturing production capacity," PAHO said, adding that supply deals also had to be agreed with producers.

The GAVI alliance, the group that co-leads COVAX with WHO, said last week it aimed to deliver 2.3 billion vaccines worldwide by the end of 2021, including 1.8 billion free doses to lower-income countries.

Geneva-based GAVI was expected to publish details of its allocations by country on Monday.

If the UK supply won't be interrupted then WTF was going on lol ?

Yes its a global issue though that won't be solved by brexity-heads.  The graphic in the article below (posted up thread) nicely shows theres enough on order to go round the world (well pretty much, nb notable absences such as Russia China).

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/canada-and-uk-among-countries-with-most-vaccine-doses-ordered-per-person

Subject to logistics, programme, take-up, mutations  just a question of the world cooperating and sorting it out ...