Brexit - The UK leaves the EU

[Milouse]

So, i entered a Mark & Spencer in Paris today...

"Because of new importation rules between UK and EU, we apologize that some products are currently unavailable. We're doing everything we can to make them back quickly."

Indeed, most of the shop, which usually mostly sell food kept in fridges, was empty.

 

[UKMikey]

We are not having our cake and eating it. In fact, the cake was a lie.

https://www.politico.eu/article/a-b...ble-hurt-to-lose-single-market-boris-johnson/

 

[Tired Tyres]

We are not having our cake and eating it. In fact, the cake was a lie.

https://www.politico.eu/article/a-b...ble-hurt-to-lose-single-market-boris-johnson/

Lies. There is a cake. The EU have it and we are not allowed a piece..

We now have a few years of trade deals which ultimately won't add up to what is lost and then we'll go back to the EU and can we rejoin please? The EU will say yes - but the terms, oh the terms.

We had all better hope them trade deals deliver.

 

[UKMikey]

Lies. There is a cake. The EU have it and we are not allowed a piece..

More of a misunderstanding. The lie was when Boris told us we could take our slice back to the table and participate in a bake-off. Unfortunately there are now many obstacles in the way of those that want to eat our cakes as @Milouse highlighted above.

This wine importer predicts less choice and higher prices for all after HM Gov's ineptitude has seemingly bungled the switch to their homegrown computer system.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1350367078662987777.html

This ad on the page is a little hard to swallow...

 

[Outspacer]

We are not having our cake and eating it. In fact, the cake was a lie.

https://www.politico.eu/article/a-b...ble-hurt-to-lose-single-market-boris-johnson/

Seems to me the writer of that opinion piece is comitting very similar lies of omission that he accuses our politicians of:

"Britain insisted, however, on abandoning the intricate machinery of EU laws that allows barrier-free trade across internal EU borders (and also with Norway and Switzerland). As a result, goods entering and leaving the U.K. — from lobsters to airplane parts, cars and fresh sandwiches — suddenly faced new demands for paperwork, health checks and tariffs on components or ingredients from outside the EU."

Was that ever an option? I mean without also including free movement, labour laws, etc, etc, and having no say in those rules?

 

[TenEightyOne]

Was that ever an option? I mean without also including free movement, labour laws, etc, etc, and having no say in those rules?

Yes. It was called 'Remain'. Many of the things we "took back control of" were ours to control anyway, and we had a veto. Now all we've got is Reece-Mogg and 4,000,000 tons of rotten shellfish. I'd take the second if I were you.

 

[Outspacer]

Yes. It was called 'Remain'. Many of the things we "took back control of" were ours to control anyway, and we had a veto. Now all we've got is Reece-Mogg and 4,000,000 tons of rotten shellfish. I'd take the second if I were you.

Yes, remain would've been great, but the vote went the other way and somehow parliament voted to respect it (that still shocks me more than the result).

So with remain off the table the options were obviously going to be limited. Articles like this add nothing to any debate, just fuel your bitterness.

 

[UKMikey]

It's hard to read the Twitter thread I posted and see Brexit as anything approaching a net gain for Britain (fishing pun notwithstanding). Looks like things could have been handled a little more smoothly and saying we shouldn't talk about it isn't going to make things any better.

 

[Touring Mars]

Articles like this add nothing to any debate, just fuel your bitterness.

I don't think so.

For people who voted remain, articles like this may well be 'preaching to the converted', but they also help to document the consequences of Brexit and help to make the case for holding those responsible to account.

For ardent Brexiteers, it's just yet another 'reality bites' piece to gleefully ignore.

However, there's a new audience - the Brexit-tears, if you will - the 'this isn't what we voted for!!1!' crowd - who are waking up to the fact that 'Project Fear' was in fact entirely justified and that they've screwed themselves and many others besides over because of promises that could and/or would never be kept.

There are lessons to be learned and there are plenty of people out there who need to learn them.

 

[Liquid]

Oh, you don't want the rules to apply to you?
You assume you can go wherever you please?

Roger Daltrey then: "We toured before the EU. If you want to vote for a ******* mafia then you do it."

Roger Daltrey now: Please give us visa-free travel

how_it_started_how_it_going.txt

 

[Tired Tyres]

I don't think so.

For people who voted remain, articles like this may well be 'preaching to the converted', but they also help to document the consequences of Brexit and help to make the case for holding those responsible to account.

For ardent Brexiteers, it's just yet another 'reality bites' piece to gleefully ignore.

However, there's a new audience - the Brexit-tears, if you will - the 'this isn't what we voted for!!1!' crowd - who are waking up to the fact that 'Project Fear' was in fact entirely justified and that they've screwed themselves and many others besides over because of promises that could and/or would never be kept.

There are lessons to be learned and there are plenty of people out there who need to learn them.

A lot of disenfranchised people the Labour Party ditched when they went to the middle under Blair had a chance to kick the government in the balls and took it. As populists the world over know. Tell the people what they want to hear, and you'll get them.

 

[Daz555]

Countdown to joining the Single Market has already begun - it is just how long Britain will have to bleed before we decide enough is enough.

 

[Tired Tyres]

Countdown to joining the Single Market has already begun - it is just how long Britain will have to bleed before we decide enough is enough.

Call it two elections to remove Johnson, unless it really goes wrong, so 5 or 10 years and then a government that takes a deep breath and tells the British people "We have to rejoin the EU". That could take a couple of years, then there's the negotiation. Call it 15 to 20 years minimum.

 

[Famine]

For people who voted remain, articles like this may well be 'preaching to the converted', but they also help to document the consequences of Brexit and help to make the case for holding those responsible to account.

For ardent Brexiteers, it's just yet another 'reality bites' piece to gleefully ignore.

However, there's a new audience - the Brexit-tears, if you will - the 'this isn't what we voted for!!1!' crowd - who are waking up to the fact that 'Project Fear' was in fact entirely justified and that they've screwed themselves and many others besides over because of promises that could and/or would never be kept.

There are lessons to be learned and there are plenty of people out there who need to learn them.

The issue here is that - aside from the bus, which turned out to be a wonderful way to focus the Remain camp on the wrong argument - Brexit was never a financial thing for a lot of Leavers.

They knew (or... you know... didn't, but also didn't care or even come close to comprehending) that there would be an immediate financial penalty to leaving the EU. It has always been totally inevitable that, once any kind of free trade deal was off the table (which was itself almost inevitable; all the benefits of being in the EU with no responsibilities is an incredibly hard sell), losing free trade with our biggest trading partners would come with a cost.

No story about how much it's costing, or how much extra red tape there is at the border, will matter because that wasn't the point of Brexit for them. It was to stop Germany (because Nazis), Spain (because Gibraltar), France (because they ignore all the rules anyway), Italy (because Mafia), or whomever for whatever stereotypical reason or historic slight, telling the UK what laws it can and can't have.

Northern Ireland border and GFA? They don't care. Empty fish markets? They don't care. Mild shortage of electronic goods? They don't care. Kent is a car park? They don't care (so long as it doesn't reach Tunbridge Wells or Sevenoaks). They just don't want a bunch of people we beat in wars to dictate our laws.

Waving the fact that UK manufacturers are facing bigger expenses and delays because they may use EU-origin parts at them won't even register. If it does, it'll be petty EU bureaucracy punishing us for leaving. Anything more than that will probably be "well, we don't make anything any more anyway; now we're out of the EU we can bring back British manufacturing and ingenuity to be the best in the world again" (because, you know, that's how that works and everything).


The fact that Remain never understood how unimportant the financial argument was and kept hacking at it (and being outraged over a bus) is a good part of why it didn't win. It spent so much time on a dead-end argument on people who'd never change their minds, when all it needed to do was convince the floating voters about non-trade benefits to it all...

 

[Outspacer]

It's hard to read the Twitter thread I posted and see Brexit as anything approaching a net gain for Britain (fishing pun notwithstanding). Looks like things could have been handled a little more smoothly and saying we shouldn't talk about it isn't going to make things any better.

I'm not saying you shouldn't talk about it, but when it boils down to "remain would've been better" I'm free to point out that it adds nothing.

I don't think so.

For people who voted remain, articles like this may well be 'preaching to the converted', but they also help to document the consequences of Brexit and help to make the case for holding those responsible to account.

For ardent Brexiteers, it's just yet another 'reality bites' piece to gleefully ignore.

However, there's a new audience - the Brexit-tears, if you will - the 'this isn't what we voted for!!1!' crowd - who are waking up to the fact that 'Project Fear' was in fact entirely justified and that they've screwed themselves and many others besides over because of promises that could and/or would never be kept.

There are lessons to be learned and there are plenty of people out there who need to learn them.

Are we not capable here of at least some more reasonable discussion than repeating what is basically "we told you so" propaganda?

Just to be clear, I would've prefered to remain, so yeah, it's not telling me anything. I'm really not convinced there are a huge number of "'brexit-tears", and in any case they are already crying, apparently. In case you can't tell, I'm not a fan of that kind of reductive, 'othering', language.

Somehow we've got to move on - and from here, I can't see us rejoining for a long time. By all means push for that, but I don't think you'll achieve it by belittling the voters who caused us to leave.

A lot of disenfranchised people the Labour Party ditched when they went to the middle under Blair had a chance to kick the government in the balls and took it. As populists the world over know. Tell the people what they want to hear, and you'll get them.

There was also backing out of the referendum on the Maastricht treaty when it looked like going the wrong way, which no doubt sowed a good deal of resentment. Ditto the lack of referendum on the Lisbon treaty. Easy to then promote the idea that 'they' (politicians) are doing things 'we' (people) wouldn't want.

 

[UKMikey]

I'm not saying you shouldn't talk about it, but when it boils down to "remain would've been better" I'm free to point out that it adds nothing.

I think it would be hard to find an article that boiled down to "remain would've been worse" and don't see the point of staying quiet out of deference to the feelings of leavers who don't even seem to be part of this conversation. There's plenty of discussion to be had about the now-demonstrable effects of Brexit as the last two pages of this thread have showed.

 

[TenEightyOne]

An interesting argument over the EU Ambassador because Britain is not affording him the normal level of diplomatic status. The British say they don't want to set a legal precedent, the EU says we smell like, ow you say, ze rotting crabs*.

BBC.

* Probably. I mean, who knows what they're saying now we can only understand English.

 

[Outspacer]

I think it would be hard to find an article that boiled down to "remain would've been worse"

Bit of a strawman there, since that's clearly not what I'm saying!

The counter is everything that is not news - if there's anything still working fine, it isn't Brexit newsworthy after all. So it's almost impossible to have a measured view of the net effect yet.

and don't see the point of staying quiet out of deference to the feelings of leavers who don't even seem to be part of this conversation. There's plenty of discussion to be had about the now-demonstrable effects of Brexit as the last two pages of this thread have showed.

Is it a discussion or just a cataloguing of every negative bit of news that can be found? If the latter, then that's kind of my point - what's the goal of it? It seems futile so I said as much, not that anyone ought to "stay quiet". Maybe finding every "told ya so" makes you all feel better, is it somewhat cathartic? If so then carry on!

 

[UKMikey]

Bit of a strawman there, since that's clearly not what I'm saying!

"Clearly"

The counter is everything that is not news - if there's anything still working fine, it isn't Brexit newsworthy after all. So it's almost impossible to have a measured view of the net effect yet.

We can only discuss what's in the news. We can't discuss what's not reported. The alternative is not to discuss anything at all, or only to discuss what meets your standards. Whatever they are.

Is it a discussion or just a cataloguing of every negative bit of news that can be found? If the latter, then that's kind of my point - what's the goal of it? It seems futile so I said as much, not that anyone ought to "stay quiet". Maybe finding every "told ya so" makes you all feel better, is it somewhat cathartic? If so then carry on!

It's only one article. Now who's strawmanning?

And if more than one person is posting, then of course it's a discussion. Unless you say it isn't as you appear to be attempting to moderate it to exclude anything which may paint Brexit in a bad light.

Perhaps people should bring up talking points of their own rather than try to shut other people's down. That's pretty much what we've been doing all thread after all.

 

[TenEightyOne]

So it's almost impossible to have a measured view of the net effect yet.

Do you suggest that effects like doorstep delivery charges are going to go away?

 

[Liquid]

* Probably. I mean, who knows what they're saying now we can only understand English.

Ireland loving its status as the primary English speaking EU country. In terms of logistical hirings, teachers and other things like interpreters, that 'need' for a native speaker, it's boom time for Irish citizens. Much easier and far more worthwhile for EU countries to take them on now than UK citizens.

 

[UKMikey]

Do you suggest that effects like doorstep delivery charges are going to go away?

I've already had a pan I ordered on Amazon turned away at the border and the money refunded. But hey - the FTSE 100 went up 2.6% after the trade deal was announced so it's an ill wind which blows no good, eh?

 

[Daz555]

Ireland loving its status as the primary English speaking EU country. In terms of logistical hirings, teachers and other things like interpreters, that 'need' for a native speaker, it's boom time for Irish citizens. Much easier and far more worthwhile for EU countries to take them on now than UK citizens.

Yep and as soon as the pandemic is over, young Irish will be mopping up all those seasonal tourist jobs in the EU that the British used to do. And the kicker is all that seasonal work abroad was still paid in the UK, generating tax revenue at home.

 

[TenEightyOne]

all those seasonal tourist jobs in the EU that the British used to do.

That's okay, Brexit is opening up new seasonal work opportunities right here in good old Blighty. And I had no idea that publication was even a thing, but I'm bookmarking it.

 

[Outspacer]

"Clearly"

Yes, clearly. Where do I say anything remotely like "remain would be worse"? Kind of the opposite - when I said that saying "remain would've been better" adds nothing, did I really need to add "because we know that already"?

We can only discuss what's in the news. We can't discuss what's not reported. The alternative is not to discuss anything at all, or only to discuss what meets your standards. Whatever they are.

We can discuss things that aren't in the news, why not? Sometimes we can dig for facts and figures, as I did over the imports VAT thing. (Not a standard , just an example of something that wasn't directly from the news).

It's only one article. Now who's strawmanning?

Not me. You mentioned the last couple of pages of posts so I browsed them again, I wasn't still referring to that one article.

And if more than one person is posting, then of course it's a discussion. Unless you say it isn't as you appear to be trying to moderate it to exclude anything whichmay paint Brexit in a bad light.

Perhaps people can bring up talking points of their own rather than shut other people's down. That's pretty much what we've been doing all thread after all.

Ack, whatever... I don't know how this escalated to the point of snideness and false accusations of me trying to shut down "anything which may paint Brexit in a bad light". I wanted remain so.............

Do you suggest that effects like doorstep delivery charges are going to go away?

Are you suggesting that is a good way to measure the overall effect on the economy? Or simply trying to paint my words a certain way? Nice way to discuss things.

I'd just read about that before coming back here to see if anyone understands those figures - not why they exist (that's obvious, brexit, bad) but how they come to be the amounts they are. What is the situation with duty on goods to consumers from an area we have a tariff-free trade deal with? The cases reported in that article don't break it down enough to say, but certainly seem to have some duty charge as well as VAT and handling.

Let's have a look at the £300 boots that had a charge of £147. To get the biggest charge with the lowest item cost, and assuming postage was about £15, then 20% of £315 is £63. Express delivery might attract a courier's handling charge of say £20. Still leaves another £64 which could mean that duty of 16% was applied (by e.g. code 6404, and then 20% VAT on top, so almost 20% effectively). That's one way to account for it all, probably not exactly right but close enough.

With a process so convoluted, I've no idea if that's the correct amount or not. It may be that the duty would have been waived with an appropriate certificate of origin, but the supplier didn't know to provide one. I think the .gov info is up to date for business rules, but it certainly isn't for consumers.

The VAT charge is otherwise a straight swap for being charged VAT at point of sale. It's not a new excess charge.

So in answer to your snarky question, no, it isn't going to go away, but it may be that once things have settled down the actual excess charge on those boots might only be the courier's handling charge.

 

[MatskiMonk]

Let's have a look at the £300 boots that had a charge of £147. To get the biggest charge with the lowest item cost, and assuming postage was about £15, then 20% of £315 is £63. Express delivery might attract a courier's handling charge of say £20. Still leaves another £64 which could mean that duty of 16% was applied (by e.g. code 6404, and then 20% VAT on top, so almost 20% effectively). That's one way to account for it all, probably not exactly right but close enough.

With a process so convoluted, I've no idea if that's the correct amount or not. It may be that the duty would have been waived with an appropriate certificate of origin, but the supplier didn't know to provide one. I think the .gov info is up to date for business rules, but it certainly isn't for consumers.

The VAT charge is otherwise a straight swap for being charged VAT at point of sale. It's not a new excess charge.

I'd pretty much agree with your workings out here, I'd break it down as follows;

Goods value + Duty (e.g. 16%) = Net Goods value + VAT = Gross goods value
Carriage cost + VAT = Gross carriage charge
Importers fee for customs declarations*

*the customs fee's might be for example; £35.00 per shipment for 3 commodity codes, further commodity codes at £1.50 + 1.5% of VAT & Duty value. This is set by the freight company.

So, the total amount is Gross goods value + Gross carriage charge + Importers fee

The question of duty based on origin is certainly not a clear one. An example may be... an American company shipping goods to the UK from an EU based distribution centre that receives goods from China paid for by the American company. Your average Amazon buyer might think that because goods are shipped from a warehouse in Germany, that the tariff rates between us and ze Germans are the one that applies, but that might well not be the case.

Personally, I don't buy much stuff online, and I try to support local retailers, so I'm not that bothered by doorstep charges... as someone who has to consider all this for a business that relies heavily on imports, it's an absolute ball-ache that is going to massively hamper cashflow for the short-term, and at very best will never offer a benefit.

 

[DG_Silva]

I had a look into this a couple of days ago. VAT is charged on the item, delivery charge, and import duty, which is charged at 2.5% of the total amount if £135 or more.

https://www.gov.uk/goods-sent-from-abroad/tax-and-duty

 

[Outspacer]

I'd pretty much agree with your workings out here, I'd break it down as follows;

Goods value + Duty (e.g. 16%) = Net Goods value + VAT = Gross goods value
Carriage cost + VAT = Gross carriage charge
Importers fee for customs declarations*

*the customs fee's might be for example; £35.00 per shipment for 3 commodity codes, further commodity codes at £1.50 + 1.5% of VAT & Duty value. This is set by the freight company.

So, the total amount is Gross goods value + Gross carriage charge + Importers fee

The question of duty based on origin is certainly not a clear one. An example may be... an American company shipping goods to the UK from an EU based distribution centre that receives goods from China paid for by the American company. Your average Amazon buyer might think that because goods are shipped from a warehouse in Germany, that the tariff rates between us and ze Germans are the one that applies, but that might well not be the case.

Personally, I don't buy much stuff online, and I try to support local retailers, so I'm not that bothered by doorstep charges... as someone who has to consider all this for a business that relies heavily on imports, it's an absolute ball-ache that is going to massively hamper cashflow for the short-term, and at very best will never offer a benefit.

Thanks for the breakdown, glad I got it about right. I broke it down differently to make it easier to note before/after differences:

Goods value -- as before
VAT on Goods + carriage -- essentially as before (disregarding the minor variance in EU vs UK VAT rates)
Duty + VAT on duty -- new addition
Courier / Freight company Fees -- new addition​

Total being the sum of all of those rows.

The 'origin' aspect is going to be a big part of debate even after things have smoothed out a bit. Somehow businesses will likely manage to settle into it, at least where shipments are repetetive. But for consumers (and sales to consumers) it's a minefield. Presumably an item shipped from Germany has had German (or EU) duty paid on it, but I've no idea if there is a mechanism to reclaim that on export, and if there is it's doubtless nowhere near as straightforward as dealing with VAT can be. At least for small companies... Amazon is kinda different...

Quick test on amazon.de... plopped 2 items in cart for a subtotal of €802.98. Logged in and prices changed to GBP equivalents totalling £712.05. At checkout, their breakdown looks like this:

Items: EUR 674,78
Postage & Packing: EUR 4,31
Import Fees Deposit: EUR 135,82
Order Total: EUR 814,91​

Probably a bad example, low duty on SSDs and phones?

Some boots for €351.15...

Items: EUR 295,08
Postage & Packing: EUR 7,46
Import Fees Deposit: EUR 118,60
Order Total: EUR 421,14​

Yep, clearly a big chunk there of about €57 that must be 'duty + VAT on duty'. So it really depends on what you're buying. Duty is only 2% on wooden shoes I believe :/

Those cowboy boots are going to haunt me as 'suggested' for years now

Only looking at that because if anyone can find a way to workaround paying duty twice it would be Amazon, and it doesn't look like they have.

Of course it's never going to be a benefit, but it's quite far from being a near 50% surcharge on consumers generally.

I had a look into this a couple of days ago. VAT is charged on the item, delivery charge, and import duty, which is charged at 2.5% of the total amount if £135 or more.

https://www.gov.uk/goods-sent-from-abroad/tax-and-duty

2.5% on gifts up to £630... might work for stuff ordered from China, but not from most EU or US companies. Otherwise click through...

The Brexit transition period has ended and new rules on tax and duty now apply. This page is currently out of date. Check the rules for VAT and overseas goods sold directly to customers in Great Britain from 1 January 2021.

 

[UKMikey]

'Festival of Brexit' can play 'powerful role' in healing UK, organiser says

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-54069456

According to the article the event is now known as Festival UK 2022. Perhaps the "Festival" part can be shortened still further or even initialised for convenience.

 

[Touring Mars]

Somehow we've got to move on - and from here, I can't see us rejoining for a long time. By all means push for that, but I don't think you'll achieve it by belittling the voters who caused us to leave.

While I think a certain amount of 'We told you so' is justified, and even necessary, this is definitely a fair point... indeed, one cannot expect to bridge a large divide by more divisiveness. That said, it does need to be a two way street, and I think the thing I would like to see is more people who voted Leave but now regret it not only making their voices heard, but doing something about it.

But I agree, things are not going to change in a hurry, so the opposite to what I want to see also needs to happen in the immediate future, which is that we just have to make the most of it and not waste too much time or energy on protesting a result that cannot be overturned.