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6th February 2021, 05:43 AM | #241 |
Lackey
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“If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago |
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6th February 2021, 05:53 AM | #242 |
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I mean it wasn't. Politicians lie about the stuff they want to do all the time.
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Or they got cold feet in ensuring their bets against the UK would pay out massively for them.
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His resignation after the vote threw a massive spanner in the works of the pro-Brexit side of the party, since they thought they could coast through all this unscathed because everything would be Cameron's fault if it went pear shaped. May sought compromise but she was handed a poisoned chalice when she became PM. She had the unenviable task of actually determining what kind of Brexit people actually voted for, when the correct answer was "all of them". What kind of independence do you have now that you don't by being part of the EU?
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Now all that happens is that you have to work with the cards you've been dealt, and it's a rather bad hand. |
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6th February 2021, 05:57 AM | #243 |
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Once again, you're still trotting out the same failed arguments that you were trotting out before the referendum and which lost you the referendum, in the hope that things will be seen differently.
Correction, is independent again after 47 years in a customs union and political union that held sovereignty over internal laws, like our trade policy, like our agricultural policy, like our fisheries policy, like our industrial policy and our state aid policy. We had NO democratic choice in those matters because it was set externally. Obviously. And not being a producer of things such as oranges there is no reason for us to levy tariffs on them. Yet the EU imposed a tariff on things we do not make and did not need to charge for. It's far more than a trading bloc (EFTA is a trading bloc). It's a political union with an unelected policy making Commission and a Parliament. At the time of the referendum 19 of the 28 Commissioners were right wing EuroTories. Ours was Jonathan Hill, and his party lost the 2014 EU elections (coming 3rd). With an elected Commission I would have been more sympathetic and would have considered staying, in order to reform. But reform was tried and rebuffed over and over again. It may have worked for you, it did not work for me. Independence works for me, even if it does not work for you. |
6th February 2021, 06:00 AM | #244 |
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6th February 2021, 06:00 AM | #245 |
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How about the government negotiated that to begin with?
It's more important to negotiate with Norway and get the deep sea boats back in to their waters. Most of the Peterhead boats don't fish EU waters for example. In the UK we eat white fish to the almost complete exclusion of everything else. UK waters don't produce the white fish like Cod that we want, that's why we need access to the Norwegian waters. Coastal and inshore boats and those fishing out in to the North Sea and the Channel do not catch much cod. That's why the EU is such an important market for our fishermen. |
6th February 2021, 06:02 AM | #246 |
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6th February 2021, 06:07 AM | #247 |
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Agreed
Fair point. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_cod Our waters do produce cod, but it's complicated. |
6th February 2021, 06:47 AM | #248 | |||
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The first two basically boil down to "rules I don't like". I don't really get what you mean by "a seat at the WTO" since the UK was and is a member of the organisation.
Independent state aid is an interesting thing to complain about, especially when coupled with "independent agricultural policy". Or is it that subsidies are bad when it's in industries you don't care too much about, while they're good when you do?
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I don't see how pushing the EU for the same terms as Norwegian fishermen would get you access to Norway's fishing grounds. I was immediately reminded of this Spongebob clip:
I feel like that is probably one of the worst reasons to shoot yourself in the foot now, because you might shoot yourself in the foot later. |
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6th February 2021, 06:54 AM | #249 |
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Of course it wouldn’t have done - every country in the EU has made their own calls on how to support their economies. They have also made calls on how to do it at an EU level.
It’s akin to the nonsense about how “they” couldn’t shut their borders because they were in the EU that still comes up despite it being plastered all over our media last March and April how they were closing their borders! Even had stories about some towns which in effect straddle borders not being able to visit their neighbours. |
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“If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago |
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6th February 2021, 06:58 AM | #250 |
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6th February 2021, 07:10 AM | #251 |
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Conformity to standards is good, right? When you buy electrical equipment, it's good to know it conforms to the same standards as the country you bought it from. You wouldn't want to buy a football which has been handsewn by a ten-year-old working 60 hour weeks in a sweatshop, with zero education? Bully for the UK, it can now go back to Fahrenheit and pounds and ounces, yet still carry on with left-hand drive, the wrong plugs, its own currency and all the exceptional things it thinks makes for 'independence'. I like the old pound shillings and pence, and feet and inches as being a mathematician base-60 is more elegant to my mind that dreary old decimalisation. But, you note, nobody in the EU forced the UK to use the EURO currency, nor drive on the right, nor even produce left-hand drive cars and it could have had navy blue passports any time it wanted, as several EU nations do. IOW the UK never lost its independence. Why would any worker want to go back to the days of unlimited hours of work, near zero maternity leave and Dickensian conditions? As for immigrants, it is still going to need them! |
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6th February 2021, 07:12 AM | #252 |
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6th February 2021, 07:14 AM | #253 |
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6th February 2021, 07:19 AM | #254 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 07:20 AM | #255 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 07:26 AM | #256 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 07:28 AM | #257 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 07:31 AM | #258 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 07:40 AM | #259 |
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You wanted independence. And brexit promised that
Others wanted to close the borders to scary brown people but remain in the trade deals. And brexit promised that Others wanted to keep free movement for UK citizens but close the borders to scary brown people and leave the trade agreemenst. And brexit promised that. Others wanted to keep all advantages without having to pay for them. And brexit promised that. Others wanted 350M a day for the NHS. And brexit promised that. Others wanted to burn all trade deals and replace them with ones which were better. And brexit promised that. Others wanted free range to all EU fishing grounds, while keeping the EU out of british waters. And brexit promised that. Others wanted to show they really won WW2 and thus never having to compromise with the wants of other EU countries (especially Germany). And brexit promised that. At no point did anyone involved in brexit explain HOW these many, often contradictionary and often utterly impossible promises would be kept. Nor is anyone involved in the campaigning ever going to take any form of responsibility when it turns out most promises will never occur. If you want to trade internationally you will need to give up some 'independence'. Even the US and China need to, so the UK certainly will. But now you get to negotiate from a far worse position. If you wish to keep using some EU facilities, you will have to keep paying them, but now without any input in how to calculate the costs. Etc etc. But it's ok, the ones that REALLY wanted brexit, the industrialists that would like to remove labour and standard protections will keep telling that all the negative side effects are due to the EU and remoaners, so all will be fine. |
6th February 2021, 07:42 AM | #260 |
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LOL
That's funny. Only the Commission can initiate legislation in the EU Parliament, and they aren't elected. MEPs despite being elected cannot put forwards Private Members Bills. They may only approve / amend / reject legislation, it's time consuming and messy. MPs here put forwards a manifesto, public gets to see the policies before they vote, the party with the most MPs governs in accordance with that manifesto. Democracy is more than electing politicians, it's picking policies. How could we voters pick and influence policies in the EU when we couldn't elect Commissioners ? It's hilarious to think that charade was viewed as democracy. It really really wasn't and THAT is why I voted leave and would again, inspite of the difficulties of Johnson and his mates who are currently in government. It could have been Labour, IF Labour had been willing to listen to the majority. |
6th February 2021, 07:47 AM | #261 |
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You mean the full EEA agreement, rather than the fisheries agreement (which is a separate agreement)?
I advocated the public having a vote on that before we triggered Article 50. And we voters never had influence over EU laws anyway. EU membership is off the table. There are many alternatives which are on the table. On one extreme is WTO terms, on the other, a Turkish style customs union relationship. Closer to the middle, the EEA agreement and Norway's fisheries treaty. |
6th February 2021, 07:55 AM | #262 |
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No, I mean whining, shrieking and failing to convince anyone on the other side not to be an independent self governing democracy and then sulking for years and years and years about it.
By your logic Scotland is a sovereign country, because it could in theory become independent. Temper temper. The delusion is yours. |
6th February 2021, 08:00 AM | #263 |
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6th February 2021, 08:09 AM | #264 |
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Not democratic enough.
Governments are elected to preside over domestic matters not EU. 1994 EU elections won by Labour. Commissioners (there were two at the time) were appointed by the government of John Major, who lost. 1999 EU elections won by Conservatives. Commissioners appointed by Tony Blair. 2004 EU elections won by Conservatives. Same thing. 2009 EU elections won by Conservatives. Labour's Baroness Ashton made Commissioner. 2004 EU elections won by UKIP. Conservatives Lord Jonathan Hill made Commissioner. Maybe it's time we did get to elect the PM directly. And we should definitely have a referendum on whether or not to keep or abolish the monarchy. |
6th February 2021, 08:26 AM | #265 |
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John Redwood Tweets
@johnredwood Well done Cadbury. Great to hear production of the Dairy Milk bar is coming home to the U.K. |
6th February 2021, 08:26 AM | #266 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Cadbury is owned by Mondelez International.
An American multinational. Guess how much tax they paid last year? Europeans don't eat Cadbury's chocolate because compared it tastes like sweet plastic. Their market is the UK. They only moved out for cheaper production costs in Eastern Europe which BREXIT has negated |
6th February 2021, 08:30 AM | #267 |
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Like the owners of Rowntree, they dumped the workers in the UK for Poland and now they've ditched the Polish workers.
An appalling way to treat staff of any nationality. If you want UK chocolate that actually tastes like chocolate Thorntons are the only ones left of any size. |
6th February 2021, 08:43 AM | #268 |
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Ford ceased producing cars in the UK in about 2000, and vans in 2012.
That was a factor. Terry's of York ceased production in 2006, production relocated out of the UK. That was a factor. Between 1988 and 1994 the Rowntree UK workforce was cut by 2000, Smarties production was relocated to Hamburg in 2006, another 645 jobs lost. Dairy Box production was relocated to Spain, Black Magic to the Czech Republic. All to pay staff less. Membership was supposed to create a level playing field, instead it created a migration of business out of the country to places where wages are lower. The situation now, may not be great, but it wasn't great before either. There were people dependent on food banks, the first of those food banks was opened by the Trussell trust in 2000. I just want things to get better. |
6th February 2021, 09:09 AM | #269 |
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Here in Finland you'll see Lindt chocolate from Switzerland, Ritter Sports from Germany and After Eight Mints seem very popular, too, and very expensive compared to UK prices. We, of course, have our own world famous premium real chocolate by Fazer, and there is also the Panda brand. I don't recall seeing any Cadbury's brand chocolate despite Finns having a sweet tooth and at least two aisles of sweets and chocolates in every supermarket. I was sent a jumbo-sized bar of Cadbury's Dairy Milk for Christmas - I do miss my favourite, Cadbury's Whole Nut - it is 23% cocoa, Fair Trade but doesn't seem to indicate where it was made. It just says 'under licence Cadbury's Birmingham and gives Mondelez Ireland as the contact telephone number.
In the public interest of ISF I need to do a chocolate taste test. I have in front of me:
Domino is a kind of biscuit like Oreo and Lontoo Rae means London Drops: 'London drops are oblong-shaped sweets about 2 cm long and 5 mm thick. They consist of a soft liquorice-flavoured core inside a hard, sugary aniseed-flavoured coating. They are coloured in pastel colours, coming in white, pale purple and pale yellow.' These are mixed in with the chocolate to produce aforesaid chocolate bars. Experiment Aim: To test which chocolate tastes the best, British or Finnish formula. Apparatus: a small china bowl with four squares each of Cadbury's Dairy Milk, Fazer's Domino and Lontoo Rae. Method: place the broken up squares in the bowl. Dip in hand at random. Take out square without looking and place on tongue. Note taste, texture, consistency, umami factor and aftertaste. Results: Square one: Definitely had a crunch biscuit taste in there. Not a biscuit fan. Chocolate has a gummy kind of texture. The mixture of salt from the biscuit and the sugar from the chocolate and cocoa fat gives it some umami factor. Chocolate aftertaste. Square two - same as square one Square three: fat roundish, clearly Cadbury's Dairy Milk. Strangely devoid of any taste at all. Bland crumbly texture. Feint taste of chocolate. Vanilla aftertaste. Square four: Chewy, definitely the Lontoo Rae. Nice licorice aftertaste. Almond flavoured crunchy shell delicious. Squares Five - Twelve: can save for later Conclusion: Winner is Lontoo Rae, followed by Domino with Cadbury's Dairy Milk close behind. One suspects Cadbury's Dairy Milk would be defined as 'chocolate-flavoured confectionery' in the EU, rather than chocolate proper. |
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6th February 2021, 09:11 AM | #270 |
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6th February 2021, 09:42 AM | #271 |
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In 2009 after a lot of effort, Cadbury's Dairy Milk became fair trade.
Then, Kraft took over, and undid all the hard work https://www.independent.co.uk/voices...-a7451906.html Not only that, they changed the recipe. Real Dairy Milk, the stuff from my childhood and younger adult life, was rather good. The stuff since the takeover, meh. |
6th February 2021, 09:44 AM | #272 |
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6th February 2021, 09:58 AM | #273 |
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6th February 2021, 10:06 AM | #274 |
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Fair enough, life would be boring if everyone liked the same things.
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6th February 2021, 10:36 AM | #275 |
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I used to like a cream egg but they changed the filling a long time ago then they stopped using the 'dairy cream' chocolate for the outside when they were taken over as a cost saving measure.
Still like a Whisper now and again. |
6th February 2021, 10:53 AM | #276 |
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“If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago |
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6th February 2021, 02:47 PM | #277 |
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6th February 2021, 03:48 PM | #278 |
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You really have no understanding to EU-Norways relations, how they operate and how they've been developed do you?
Just the usual repetitive, pathetic, Brexiter whines about "independence". Sigh. Pathetic really. Nope. A few years and the UK will be begging to rejoin. Right.......... Oh good grief. Again, you make your ignorance of economics very obvious. |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 03:49 PM | #279 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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6th February 2021, 03:49 PM | #280 |
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As human right is always something given, it always in reality reduces to the right which men give, "concede," to each other. If the right to existence is conceded to new-born children, then they have the right; if it is not conceded to them, as was the case among the Spartans and ancient Romans, then they do not have it. For only society can give or concede it to them; they themselves cannot take it, or give it to themselves. |
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