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Move to EU to avoid Brexit costs, firms told
- Havoc 6y agoThe news here is the who, rather than what: >by advisers working for the Department for International Trade (DIT)
- kristofferR 6y agoYeah, "Move to EU to avoid Brexit costs, firms told by officials" or something would have been a much better title.
- amelius 6y agoThis one should have been easy to predict.
- johannes1234321 6y agoBut the voters were told that Britain would save money, foreigners would leave and all else would stay the same!!!!
- oblio 6y agoI'm pro EU, I'm not British, but it's too early to say. My guess is that Brexit will be somewhat bad for Britain, but not majorly so and Britain will cope just fine. The main way Britain could lose is from a geostrategical point of view and regular citizens don't really care about that (until it's too late). But who knows, maybe the "Special Relationship" will help.
- pjmlp 6y agoSwitzerland, Norway and others not in EU, do profit from the "Special Relationship", with the big difference that it was organized from the beginning and their governments actually had a plan.
- johnchristopher 6y agoA plan that was not "let's screw the EU from the inside to our advantage". Can't find that interview from a Norway official or EEA representatives that basically said "Hell no, we don't want you to screw up our relationship with the EU like you did. You are toxic.". I wonder what polls are saying about how Europeans see the UK right now. edit: found it https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=189&v=tsyudJFE8DA https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=189&v=tsyudJFE8DA edit2: just found again this interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtNr4z3YrYo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VtNr4z3YrYo in which Farage says the UK will be (I think he meant remain) a member of the EEA on Brexit day. It didn't since they were only member by virtue of being a member of the European Union.
- matthewmacleod 6y agoAnd importantly those countries' relationships with the EU are very different from what the UK has settled on.
- wila 6y agoNorway is part of the European Economic Area [1] whereas Switzerland signed the agreement without joining. Both are part of the Schengen area [2]. UK is not part of EEA nor part of the Schengen area. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Economic_Area https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Economic_Area [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Area https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Area
- pjmlp 6y agoNor did I said they were, rather Switzerland, Norway and others (too lazy to search which ones I still miss) governments, managed to negotiate their position with EU to their best interests.
- johannes1234321 6y agoIt's not neccissarily "their best interest" for one as there is no objective "best." A key difference is that in Norway and Switzerland the "political elite" is pro-European and often wants closer ties up to joining, in UK however the brexit is the culmination of a decades long "RU/Europe/Brussels is evil" campaign and the British government gives little reason for the EU to believe in good reason for their negotiations.
- me_me_me 6y agoBut this is not really a brexit that they voted on anyways. This is we are not in EU but we will keep our laws in line and pay to be part of EU economical zone. Its pretty much as if they haven't left EU but now they have no say in anything.
- tonyedgecombe 6y agoforeigners would leave Well that is happening (1.3 million last year) and it isn't a good thing.
- iso1210 6y agoIt was, it was branded "project fear" by the populist media
- iamacyborg 6y agoThe populist media on the right, let's not pretend that The Independent and similar aren't also populist media.
- krona 6y ago> British businesses that export to the continent are being encouraged by government trade advisers to set up separate companies inside the EU The DIT is not advising companies to move to the EU. I'm no expert but VAT has to be paid somewhere and now the process (especially given changes being introduced separately of brexit for e-commerce) is confusing and unexpected for small businesses. The way to deal with this is to set up a company (probably in Ireland) to make accounting easier and obviously avoid tax issues at the border. That's only part of the problem for goods but seems to be what the article is mostly referring to.
- terhechte 6y agoBut it also says: > This will mean laying off a small number of staff here and taking on people in the Netherlands. And given that the EU market is bigger, that number might increase further as time goes on.
- iso1210 6y agoI'm sure the UK staff will work for sovereignty instead of money
- throwaway45349 6y agoEU market may be big, but the UK is too valuable to just give up on entirely.
- bildung 6y agoUK represents only 18% of the post brexit EU market. The problem is that that the Uk now is a completely seperate market, so is in direct competition for attention with other non-EU markets. Why should a EU company focus on the UK when e.g. China is a much larger market and growing much faster? Or Japan? Or Brazil? https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD?locations=EU-GB-CN-JP https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD?location...
- brigandish 6y ago
- wdb 6y agoDoesn't sound like being back in control
- jlokier 6y agoIt kinda is the "UK government" back in control. But you have to recognise that UK government is generally harsher to smaller businesses and to people than EU institutions. In general, EU directives and regulations are more oriented towards easier and fairer trading, and better support of human rights than UK government attitudes towards those things. It's not true of every little directive of course, but the general trend is that way. For cross-border trading, the problem is that UK business and UK government aren't aligned at all. So the UK government being in control means screwing a lot of UK business, and government appears to be fine with that, as long as they get re-elected. The current prime minister literally said "fuck business" when anticipated issues around Brexit were discussed some years ago. His position does not appear to have changed. You can see this misalignment on LinkedIn posted from HM Government that advise on actions businesses "need to take" now. On each post you might see 99-100% of the comments expressing disappointment, annoyance and contempt at the government. Considering the popular vote split on Brexit, it's striking how the comments on HMG LinkedIn posts are almost universally negative. I think the government's real priority was made clear by the previous prime minister: Many speeches about Brexit negotiations to UK audiences started with words like "on XXX date, freedom of movement will end". It was strikingly consistent. Preventing people in the UK from freely moving to the EU, and vice versa, looks to me to have been the primary agenda item of those leading the Brexit movement throughout. That's what being "in control" is. Control of people. Some parts of the resulting trade agreement reflect this, for example the EU offering to allow touring musicians so long as it was mutual, and the UK declining, and the UK's decision to decline the EU offer to continue the Erasmus student exchange program.
- wdb 6y agoYes, that's true. The UK government had always had some level of control at the beginning when the borders opened for so countries but the UK didn't make of this ability. Personally, I am biased as EU citizen in the UK but I think the EU has been flexible to the zero-sum approach of the UK during the negotiations.
- libertine 6y agoWho could have guessed that having a company in EU helps doing business in the EU... it's like there's a deal in place that helps businesses in the EU move goods inside the EU.
- fenk85 6y agoYou are missing the point, Brexit was sold as a "Britania would rule the waves, Singapore on Thames selling into Europe, rah rah" to the public. However that's not what happened as it was never realistic or possible, and now the 46% of UK goods exports that go to EU27 are in a very tough spot, thousands of businesses and jobs at risk, direct and indirect. Not to say anything of services which are of course not included in tarrif free trade deal UK now has. anyways purpose of Brexit was not "sovereignity" or whatever other lies were told, the purpose was to distract from decades of mismanagement by political elites in what is a fundamentally undemoratic system (Monarchy with hereditary head of state, vs presidential republic, upper house made of lords vs elected senators, lower house composed of Etonian elites, no constitution, centralisation of power at expense of Scotland, Wales, N. England, well basically everywhere outside the M25)
- LatteLazy 6y agoBrexit was sold to different people as different things. You're right for some people but you're missing a much bigger voter block: the lazy and jealous. A shit tonne of brits haven't done much with their lives. They've just sat and grumbled that their job doesn't pay enough (while refusing to work harder or change employer or get a qualification). At the same time, for the last 30 years anyone who worked hard, invested, got skills, started businesses etc has been rewarded. The first group are really upset they're being left out. That's why you get all this talk about mysterious "elites". The first group voted for brexit to fuck with people just trying to get on. They're actually very pleased that those companies are struggling and their workers are suffering. The first group would never have started a small business exporting to the EU. They'd have stayed in the pub moaning over stale lager. This is result (and many more to come) is exactly what many brexiteers wanted and voted for: a fuck you for trying hard.
- matthewmacleod 6y agoA rather large number of companies have discovered suddenly that the overhead of exporting to the EU from a third-country position makes it far less effective to make direct sales to EU countries. This seems pretty obvious if you're familiar with the structure of international trade – but many businesses don't have expertise in this area. One of the major goals of the EU is the reduction of this red tape, but the UK government spent a lot of time making a political argument about how everything would still be fine. Businesses obviously had to work with that advice. Now that the barriers are there and real, it's been a bit of a shock. This is particularly true for sectors like food products, which now require health and biosecurity checks (which are expensive!). One of approaches to compensate for this to some extent is to ship products in bulk to distribution centres or similar facilities within the EU – this reduces the per-shipment overhead. But obviously this means you move staff and investment to the EU, and the UK loses out on employment and tax revenue. The whole thing means it just becomes much less attractive to import from, and export to, the EU. That translates in the long term to a dark on the UK economy. Baffling as an economic decision, but politics seems to defy practicality in the UK these days.
- dgellow 6y agoSounds like a great advertising campaign for the EU. In the future we may be able to point to the Brexit disaster as a reason to join and not leave.
- benhurmarcel 6y agoBrexit has already gotten an effect on Eurosceptic movements within the rest of the union. They're not as strong, and the parties associated with it aren't as vocal about it anymore.
- arcturus17 6y agoWell, many people already warned about this, but Brexiters retorted with two arguments: (1) The lack of EU regulation would allow the UK to negotiate its own trade deals with non-EU countries, potentially making up the loss of trade with the EU (2) The lack of red tape would also allow the UK to become find new efficiencies in the production of goods and services The UK is a resourceful country so in the long run they will make up for some of the loss, but I doubt they will ever reach the same trade potential as if they had stayed in the EU. What's clear is that the short term looks dire for a lot of businesses.
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- OJFord 6y agoThis doesn't sound good, but I wish shadow ministers (whoever's in government) wouldn't bother with such shitty content-less anti-government quips like: > Rachel Reeves, shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and shadow minister for the Cabinet Office, said: “Once again we see this government’s sheer incompetence and lack of planning holding British businesses back and slowing our economic recovery. “They’ve got to get a grip on this now and stop leaving our businesses out in the cold.” Brilliant, if only they'd thought of 'planning' and 'not leaving businesses out in the cold', thank god for that contribution. Sir Keir Starmer (opposition leader) actually seems pretty good on this front, especially in re coronavirus which is what I've mostly seen him speak on. Not afraid to say (the situation's diabolical but) the government's doing the right thing etc. His predecessor Jeremy Corbyn was by far the worst offender I've seen.
- desas 6y agoI don't think that the point is that HMG haven't thought of "planning" and "not leaving business out in the cold". I think the point is that HMG's execution hasn't been very good.
- OJFord 6y agoBut that's useless and boring. If they haven't got a solution to offer that they believe is better, why bother saying anything?
- desas 6y agoIt pushes HMG towards executing better or changing priorities. That and it raises the their personal and party profile while highlighting the opposition doing poorly. I'd argue that UK politics don't tend to be won on ideas but mainly on perception of competency.
- JeanMarcS 6y agoLet's not forget artists that are also hit roughtly by Brexit. A good text by Fish "How Brexit Has Destroyed UK Artists’ Ability To Tour In The EU" [0] [0] https://www.facebook.com/derek.dick/posts/10157827728953587 https://www.facebook.com/derek.dick/posts/10157827728953587
- gkwelding 6y agoWow, who could have possibly foreseen that saying a big "fuck you" to our largest trading partners could have possibly resulted in unfavourable trading conditions for the smaller party... Not me that's for sure... But at least we all get blue passports.
- iamacyborg 6y agoBlue passports, made by the French.
- gkwelding 6y agoBut... But... But... They're blue...
- iamacyborg 6y agoI think I saw a photo of one on twitter that was more black than blue. Oops.
- jen20 6y agoMy parents have British passports issued in the early ‘80s (expired, obviously, with the corner cut), and those passports are black, quite plainly and obviously. The new blue colour sometimes being issued is completely unrelated to passports issued before the standard red EU ones (and is indeed closer to the currently-issued EU Croatian blue passports).
- jlokier 6y agoIt's sillier than that: 1. We could have had blue passports without Brexit. 2. Many of these unfavourable conditions on UK firms and UK citizens are imposed by the UK government itself. It's not a simple case of the larger trading partner giving the smaller one unfavourable terms. In this case, the smaller partner chose to impose hardships on its own firms and people, while the larger partner was willing to offer more benefits so long as they were mutual. For example, those UK musicians who can't tour the EU any more. That's a UK decision. The EU was willing to allow that touring as long as EU musicians could tour in the UK on similar terms. But the UK declined. That's why there are petitions about it, because if the UK changed position on that, the EU would probably accept.