431–440 of 649 posts
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Look into the Crown estate if you're interested, that's how they make a lot of their money, with any profits going back to the treasury AFAIK.
Shouldn't this estate make the same money even without them spending money on this extravagant lifestyle?
> As Article 50 is triggered today, many European expats in Britain, as well as European-minded locals, are packing up, moving on or eyeing up their options. Brexit brain drain could spell disaster for industries like technology already facing shortages of skilled talent. Sorry, what about the brain drain when those "European expats" came from their countries into the UK? Or that doesn't matter because it was all "wi…
What about the brains who never moved now moving away? I am British and have lived here for nearly 40 years. I'm currently looking at an Irish passport (Irish wife) or maybe France. My taxes and know how will be better put to use somewhere our values (openness, tolerance, mutual respect) agree.
I'm a bit tired of reading doomsday messages by now. I am an European living and working in the UK and even though this affects me I have no reason to believe that things will go downwards now. If there's anything I've learned so far then that every analysis I've read couldn't have been more wrong. It almost seems like the more the UK economy doesn't collapse the more people shout even louder how bad the Brexit is. M…
My wages, the value of my home, are now worth 20% less. If you're ok with that, good for you. I'm not. My access to the EU faces being curtailed (not just travel inconvenience, but the permanent movement of my family). If you're ok with that, good for you. I'm not. I could go on. You say: "maybe I'm just chilled". How about, maybe you're forgetting to put yourself in other peoples shoes, or grasping why it matters to…
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The risks are most certainly not only economic. The EU influences almost every aspect of the UK in one way or another. Immigration and travel are both affected. The ability to travel and work in any country in the EU is a massive benefit which will likely be much more difficult. Visiting family in friends outside of the UK could become much more difficult. Our laws are affected - there will be nothing to stop the UK…
The human rights act, IIRC, is bound up with ECHR membership - a non-EU institution. I agree the EU was a lock on this but it's a bit more complex than just changing the legislation.
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Also note that EU bureaucracy is utterly bewildering to anyone who does not spend their whole life following it. The average British person has no idea how the EU works. They don't know what the different bodies are. They don't know who their representative(s) are. They don't know how to make their voices heard. Maybe a third of people vote in the elections, and they don't really know what they're voting for. What ki…
Sounds a bit like the British democracy to me. How many Brits know that bishops sit in the house of Lords? Some know, sure, but many? How many of us know what the Privy Council is and who the members are? What powers are purely ceremonial and which have teeth? Why can't MPs resign like normal people? How and why there is judicial independence from parliament seems to be news to the Secretary of State for Justice, if…
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Getting a visa isn't so onerous is it? Compared with the hassle of upping your roots and moving your family?
I can't speak for gambiting, but I'm also going to leave the UK as a direct consequence of Brexit. It's not that it would be impossible to get some visa if I really wanted, it's that revoking the freedom of movement sends a strong signal that they don't want us here. When I was choosing where I'd go for university, the UK wouldn't have even made the shortlist if moving here was even slightly more inconvenient than ju…
Let me ask you this, if the US or Canada offered you a job, would you refuse it as their requirement for a visa means they don't want you there?
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> That looks like a 'no', then. I gave you a specific example. From this point on, I consider you a troll, but for the record: The play of words "directives vs laws" doesn't change the fact that UK law is trumped by EU law (sorry, "directives"). The fact that the UK can "make its own laws" is insignificant if those laws have to comply with EU directives (and if new EU directives invalidate UK laws). Nobody doubts tha…
Even the current UK government doesn't try to argue that the UK has lost its sovereignty by virtue of its EU membership. Its own white paper on Brexit acknowledged that the UK was still entirely sovereign. For the record, I'm really not trolling, but my position on the sovereignty argument is that for me as a UK citizen, it just doesn't matter since I have such a minuscule say in how things are run either way. And I…
It's not something that's dependent on being acknowledged though. If your national laws have to comply with the laws (or directives if you prefer) passed by a third body, you concede your sovereignty. That's explicit in the very notion of sovereignty -- no matter how politicians might spin it.
>but my position on the sovereignty argument is that for me as a UK citizen, it just doesn't matter since I have such a minuscule say in how things are run either way.
That's a justifiable position one can legitimately hold.
But others can also legitimately feel that it very much matters. And historically and morally, the issue of sovereignty of a national state was never a light one to be set aside with "who cares, we don't very much affect our national policy anyway".
At best it's a stance that's ok for times of plenty or favorable laws, but that starts to matter more when the decisions that are taken go against a countries interests -- and there is no way to overrule them in the national level because even though e.g. 90% of the British are against, 60% of EU policy makers want them.
And despite the talk now being of right wingers being in favor of Brexit, we can very much imagine the opposite: a right wing EU (with e.g. Marie Lepen, the Netherlands guy, some German equivalent etc) that imposes right wing directives and laws upon a progressive Britain. (In fact we don't have to look that far for that: the EU has long impose right leaning labour laws upon more left leaning states).
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I absolutely see the advantages of having common standards, tariff agreements etc. to make trade across borders easier (i.e. something akin to the European Economic Area). I'm however also a proponent of federalism, because I believe that for a democracy to truly work it is necessary that the people still feel responsible for their votes and their decisions. This is something which I'm missing in centralised and unit…
What's at stake here is more fundamental than federalism: it's self determination. Throughout history, discrete groups have waged wars of independence to ensure that they can have a government that reflects their shared history, culture, and values. My family is from Bangladesh, which fought a war to separate from Pakistan over cultural/linguistic differences. In another example, Israel is engaged in an existential b…
Yet, Britain has done its best to deny the same right to self-determination to its subjects.
Self-determination seems to be an excuse trotted out to support existing power structures. "We should secede from _____ - but nobody should secede from us."
Britain and Ireland, Britain and India, Britain and Scotland... Britain had to be dragged, kicking and screaming through every single one of those conversations about self-determinism.
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> I think federalism is a good idea because, at the end of the day, I want to be ruled by a government that represents my community, not some abstract mass of people. What size do you think is the best for a democracy then? 10,000 people? 1000,000? The US is as big as the EU and certainly has a lot more centralized legislation. So many issues today (taxes, trade, environmental protection, immigration, etc.) involve v…
My thought is something roughly the size of a large city state, or small regular state. Or the size of a US state. Or whatever the people of an area decide.