Boris's brief resumé of the 2,500 word Brexit deal was delivered as he waived it around in front of the camera. It was the best Christmas present the country could possibly receive! For once he was probably telling the truth. He really could not have done better. Another truth.
If we needed something to read over Christmas, this was it he said. A few people have been reading it.
As far as I understand it, nothing changes with fishing for five and a half years. After that the situation will be reviewed. Let's see how strong we feel in five and a half years.
Obviously, I don't understand much about finance, but I have heard that the deal has taken away unrestricted access by The City to Europe's Financial Services market. The last-minute deal has been portrayed as focussing on tangible, solid goods which have to be physically carted around in lorries, but the financial sector relies on the click of a button (and a team of mice) to shift vast quantities of fictitious cash all around the globe.
Up until now, Europe represented 80% of London's market, so this seems serious enough to have been mentioned by the P.M. in terms other than 'great opportunities', 'freedom', 'sovereignty' and all that guff fed to people who he does not credit with enough intelligence to understand anything other than the price of fish.
Rishi Sunak was a popular hero when he was dishing cash out by the billion a few months ago, but his job is just about to become next to impossible. How can he entice the red braces back to The City without making it so financially alluring that he will forfeit even more of the tax revenue which he so desperately needs after his spending-spree to mitigate (or delay) the catastrophic effects that Covid has had on every aspect of society?
Just before the plague hit our shores, the government instructed all banks to charge everyone the same fees for an ordinary overdraft, regardless of their status or situation. What did the banks do? Increase overdraft fees to almost 50% across the board. Bankers - you can't live with them and you can't live without them.
This morning Michael Gove has warned us we are in for a bumpy ride. You can say that again.
There's a short term v long term story for the markets. Europe has been chipping away at London's market position since before the Referendum so no surprises with not playing ball on the finance deal. A continuation of the shake up and diminishing of London's market share but in the long term of 5 years it will have settled down. (Lots of bargains on the UK stockmarket at the moment so I expect a market rise this week).
ReplyDeleteI suppose if there were no constant ups and downs there would be no money to make. Stability and stagnation are the last things they want.
DeleteI am watching this unfold with interest. I don't know enough about it to make comment, but it is interesting to read about it. Thanks for your look at it.
ReplyDeleteI'm looking from behind the sofa.
DeleteI have yet to hear of a single way in which I or any of my family will benefit from Brexit. I know nothing of high finance or the price of fish but I know of several ways in which we will be worse off financially and otherwise. I also know that it will be the likes of us, the medium income taxpayers, who will be squeezed even harder to pay for both disasters. The poor will be more numerous and even poorer and the rich will still get richer. It's us mugs who will be obliged to stump up the wherewithal to keep the country afloat.
ReplyDeleteAnd the crazy thing is that over half of the low income bracket were bamboozled into voting for it.
DeleteI was glad to hear about the deal. At long last, some forward progress. As Rachel says, watch the stock market. There will be some opportunity. US market has been quite good too.
ReplyDeleteIt is not forward progress. How can it be? It is more a case of the country being stopped at the last minute from going over an even higher cliff. The stock markets recovering is of little interest to people without jobs.
DeleteIn a satire (!!)here in the Welt am Sonntag one sentence concerning Brexit goes:
ReplyDelete"It is possible that it will turn out as an advantage that now nobody has the time to read the contract before it becomes law."
Honestly: we will miss the UK, and some of my British friends wept (a rare sight) when it was decided.
Nobody has been given the time or advice to think about anything since the vote to leave. The Conservatives who created this stupid mess have seen to that.
DeleteI will now have to go through the non-EU gates while, due to a quirk in my wife's ancestry, the rest of my family wave their Irish passports.
ReplyDeleteYou had better take the flight before theirs.
DeleteI don't understand much about finance either. How was I to decide how to vote in the referendum?
ReplyDeleteI voted to remain. I voted that way on the principle, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." We were the 6th largest economy in the world at the time, apparently. Presumably we maintained that position as members of the EU - which suggests to me that nothing needed fixing.
Years and years (not to mention billions) have been wasted on this that could have been spent on homelessness, the NHS, not to mention preparing the NHS for crises like this one. Instead, the government got us to indulge in this colossal waste of time.
Even if it did need fixing, the most efficient way of fixing it would have been to share the responsibility. As soon as you sow the seeds of disunity, nobody wants to be responsible for the upkeep of the system. The collapse of the EU would be a self-fulfilling prophesy, and the prophesy was made by Farage and similar scumbags.
DeleteThe UK will still have to comply with EU standards and regulations on exports and it will probably be flooded with cheap meat imports from places like south America with no traceability or testing. Ireland's losing 25 percent of it's fishing waters. At best it's soft Brexit. But it's not Brexit.
ReplyDeleteI understood that the same standards which we currently adhere to will be maintained - at least for now. This does not include worker's rights though.
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ReplyDeleteFor all those who had neither the time nor the inclinaction to do further research the fact that both Trump and Putin thought that Britain leaving the EU would be a good move should have been warning enough.
Michael gove
ReplyDeleteA pig without any merit
Piglet. God, he behaved so badly during the power struggle. His blind ambition was disgusting to witness.
DeleteI can't figure Brexit out. Is it good or bad? I can't figure out Bitcoin either.
ReplyDeleteHalf of Britain thinks it is bad, the other half thinks it is good. Bitcoin is the preferred method of payment for criminals, and is as real as the currency that The City brokers deal in.
DeleteWhen I thought about investing in Bitcoin, it was cheap and now it's over $26,000 USD. I would have cashed it out so fast. Story of my life.
DeleteBitcoin was a bubble. You would have to launder it now or keep it in the system.
DeleteIt's the best way to buy drugs, weapons and slaves.
DeleteI would be very upset about the Financial Services bit. Or lack thereof.
ReplyDeleteThey will never go away because, as Rachel says, when someone loses, someone else wins.
Delete"We are turning our back on the noblest experiment in international collaboration the world has known."
ReplyDeleteThat is the Newstateman today, quoted on Today this morning, but also that we have some fabulous trade deals as well! Watching our flag taken down from Brussels yesterday was a sad moment.
fabulous for who? The worst thing about the EU was group legislation. Human Rights got things through which no single government would have, but everyone was fighting for their own country with issues like agriculture and trade.
DeleteI wondered where the mice under my sink had gone.
ReplyDeleteYou should ask for them back Weave.
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