Brexit and the Border

'Rust belt' to my knowledge, is not a pejorative term, its mainly used about Pennsylvania & around which were industrial powerhouses but are now in decline. The same could be said of much of the North East. It's not a taunt, its shorthand.

I don't demean their struggle, but if their vote was in protest then by all accounts they will be the ones to suffer, they were misled by Brexiteers and their blatant lies. If anyone seriously tells me the hard bexiteers give a fig about the people of the North East then I'll stand on a football terrace with no shirt on in the middle of winter....
 
RETIRED2017 said:
It is the people who are showing resentment that need to be worked on to get it through,
I think the word rustbelt speakes for itself and the people who use that term,
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Rust Belt is not offensive. It is just a term that describes an important industrialised part of the US. And there are a lot of similarities with the North of England where both regions suffered huge unemployment in the 1970's and 1980's when entire industries collapsed.
 
Betsy og / sunny
Yes I am aware when it was first used and possibly still is not offensive ,but if you look at the people who use it in most cases from time to time it is for the worst kind of reasons,

You are correct the hard bexiteers do not give a fig about these people weather they are in or out of the EU and these people no longer give a fig about them ,


They may well feel that out of the EU the UK may copy Germany and start supporting the people you live in these areas I would say the powers who are in control at present will have to start looking after these areas or there will be major unrest unless they get a bigger slice of what is left after brexit,

In fact voting for Brxit is the start of the unrest,

the Government in the country i already mentioned are afraid if you do not keep them working the will start marching. the people from these areas of the UK will become power full not power less as you suggested after brexit,
 
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Now that the UK parliament is on its summer holidays what developments can we expect on the Brexit front.

Mrs May is travelling about Europe to meet fellow heads of government to see if she can go behind Barnier's back. That does not seem to be working for her. She doesn't understand that most EU countries simply don't care.

The UK decided to leave, that's a pity, given all the difficulties that face Europe it is unfortunate that the UK is walking away, but life goes on. M Barnier has been given the job of dealing with the process.

Summer hopefully will bring a period of real negotiation out of the spotlight, at official rather that political level. There may be something looking like a proposal for a withdrawal agreement by the end of Summer. Lots of joy at the prospect of an orderly Brexit. But that may be the high point for common sense.

Then parliament resumes 5th September, with the Tory party conference at the end of Sept. Time for a savaging of whatever deal is outlined. JRM et al. in full flow. Whatever is on the table on 5th Sept will be broken by the conference if not earlier. Joy in different quarters.

If there is a proposal from the UK available for the EU summit in Oct to approve I would be surprised. The headlines in the UK papers about stockpiling food and medicine are in danger of becoming a self fulfilling prophecy. They also serve to sour the UK public mood against the EU. I cannot help thinking that they serve the needs of the Brexit extremists.

After that the boat will sail. Industry will make its choices, a December deal even if it happened would play to a departed audience.

Still, Limerick might win the McCarthy cup, that would be nice.
 

Chequers


Chuck Chequers

cremeegg said:
If there is a proposal from the UK available for the EU summit in Oct to approve I would be surprised.
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cremeegg said:
Still, Limerick might win the McCarthy cup, that would be nice.
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Good calls cremeegg. £ doing surprisingly well just lately. Something seems to be stirring. If May pulls this one off she will go down as the most wily politician since Machiavelli.
 
Duke of Marmalade said:
Good calls cremeegg. £ doing surprisingly well just lately. Something seems to be stirring. If May pulls this one off she will go down as the most wily politician since Machiavelli.
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That Sterling bounce seemed to coincide with Dominic Raab announcing a deal likely by 21-Nov. He had to backpedal within hours but the news doesn't seem to have filtered through to the market yet.
 
as the saying goes, be careful watch you wish for. I fear that this attempt to talk this up is all flannel and that the British will crash out as the brexiteers plan it. They are truly driven by ideologue and know that chaos is a ladder.
 
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ire...ackstop-deal-set-to-cover-all-of-uk-1.3686240

The current speculation is that the NI issue will be dealt with by keeping the entire UK in a type of customs union.

Interesting that neither the EU (for the Republic) nor Britain (for NI) has thrown Ireland under the bus.

The proposal can be viewed as a concession by the EU in that it allows the UK to operate within the customs union without having to implement EU legislation in full.

Or viewed as a concession by the UK in that Britain has to continue to abide by some EU legislation and pay ongoing contributions.

Whatever way it is viewed Ireland north or south has not been sacrificed. Interesting. Of course its only speculation so far.

"Unless and until" remains to be agreed. If it is accepted that is a win for Leo, if it is rejected a win for Theresa (or Boris).
 
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The more I see and hear Mrs. Foster the more I think she's happily go back to the "good old days" of bombs if it restored Ulster as a Protestant country for a Protestant people. I hope I'm wrong.
 
Purple said:
The more I see and hear Mrs. Foster the more I think she's happily go back to the "good old days" of bombs if it restored Ulster as a Protestant country for a Protestant people. I hope I'm wrong.
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I don't agree with you there, Purple. It is the pan-nationalist front from Simon Varadkar to Mary Lou McNugget to Howling Brendan that have their undergarments in a right twist over this backstop thing. Jayz if they are so concerned about the visibility of the border why did they needlessly split the currency in 1979 and then even more needlessly and wastefully in 2004 introduce possibly the most visible aspect of the border - the different speed and distance measures?
 

I don't think it was Leo that did those things.

If we are listing historical reasons why we find ourselves dealing with this issue we'll be here a long time.
We broke with Sterling to join the EMS because of the economic and political decision that our economic future lay with Europe and not with the UK.
Given that we have reduced our relative reliance on the UK as an export market since then it has been shown to be a generally good decision.

We moved to Km because that's what the rest of Europe used.
The question is why didn't the UK move, not why did we.

Leo and Mary Lou aren't exactly buddies and it's hard to see the moderation in the DUP tail wagging the Tory/ Little Englander dog.
 
Purple said:
I don't think it was Leo that did those things.
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The Pan Nationalist front did those things. There wasn't the slightest whimper that the examples I cite would introduce very visible aspects to crossing the border. The prospect of distancing themselves more from the Brits easily overrode any squeamishness about aggravating partition.
Purple said:
We broke with Sterling to join the EMS because of the economic and political decision that our economic future lay with Europe and not with the UK.
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And who gave a fig about the North and the border. Talk about having cake and gobbling it. The UK sees its future outside the EU and we elevate the cause borderi to the apogee of human rights. When we saw our future with Europe and not with the UK the implications for the border and the North were totally irrelevant.
Purple said:
We moved to Km because that's what the rest of Europe used.
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Now I could debate the economic pros and cons of the break with sterling with you on a separate thread but really I can see absolutely no reason for the move to kilometres leaving aside the wasted cost of the exercise and the danger to road safety brought about by the confusion on speed limits. Tourists from the US and the UK (including NI) vastly outnumber those from kilometre speaking countries. No, this was another dash to cut the umbilical cord with Britain and again good riddance to NI. To heck we have partition, let's wallow in it seemed to be the Pan Nationalist mindset.
Purple said:
Leo and Mary Lou aren't exactly buddies.
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Exactly and that's why I call it a Pan Nationalist front.
 
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Duke of Marmalade said:
I can see absolutely no reason for the move to kilometres
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The move to km was initiated in Europe alongside the move to metric weights system in an attempt to align all members to the same standards. The UK just refused to cooperate.

Maybe suggesting Ireland changed just to spite the UK/NI is more of the Brexiteer mindset where some believe the UK has a larger influence over the world than is the case in reality.
 
Leo said:
The move to km was initiated in Europe alongside the move to metric weights system in an attempt to align all members to the same standards. The UK just refused to cooperate.
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Okay Leo, it might be argued that Ireland were just behaving like good EU citizens and the Brits were the bad guys. All the same we would not be best in class when it comes to our approach to corporation tax, for example. The point I am making is that the visibility of the border seems to now be a "die in the ditch" issue. I don't remember it even being discussed either here or up North when we went the extra kilometre for Brussels.

As for the DUP it is a bit of a case of "cried wolf". They are so often (always?) unreasonable that sensible folk like Purple seem to think "ah there they go again". Yeah sure there is an element of Paisleyism to their stance but they are right to point out that the East/West economic relationship is much more important than the North/South one and it is at least understandable that they are deeply suspicious of the Pan Nationalist front.

Anyway, leave aside the DUP, reasonable unionists (they do exist) like Nobel Peace prize winner DT agree with the DUP on this.

Leo V saying that this time round the South would not desert northern nationalists was an unbelievable error.
 
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The East/West trade relationship is far more important here as well. Nobody really gives a damn about the North, least of all the British Government. Conor Cruise O'Brien was right when he said that the only way Unionism will be able to protect its identity in the future will be within a united Ireland. Personally I hope it's a long way off.
 
There seems to be some language drift going on. Leo seems to be using 'hard border' and 'border' as synonymous. Is there a nuance escaping me?
 
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