Forum Topic

What a mess!

UK draws up plans to quit European science, satellite and nuclear programmeshttps://www.independent.ie/world-news/europe/britain/uk-draws-up-plans-to-quit-european-science-satellite-and-nuclear-programmes-41026148.html?fbclid=IwAR2SGu0oJI4W5vS8T5bbFAoDSoi8S5xsCGmLhl2sseMSTkr_XXfa0O6DjHUIn addition to threatening to trigger Article 16.  This is not even a year since the government signed the trade deal, including the NI Protocol.  I find this unacceptable as I do withdrawing from European science, satellite and nuclear programmes.

Ivonne Holliday ● 1548d11 Comments

With regards to the NI protocol the EU just want it implemented as agreed. It must be a bad deal from the UK's point of view, but then why did Frost and Johnson agree to it? Please explain, Paul. It will be interesting if the DUP lose their majority in the next NI election :-|True, the EU are hesitating on completing the Horizon agreement but that's apparently because of the UK threatening to invoke section 16 of the NI protocol.Its undeniably a mess and wouldn't have happened without Brexit.The EU isn't perfect but Johnson et al have backed themselves into a f***ing big hole. Just as he did with the prorogation, the current Paterson scandal and his subsequent U-turn. Too scared to attend parliament today. It's just serial arrogance and incompetence.

Michael Ixer ● 1547d

You lot just pick up the latest difficulty we have to leave the EU. It's the EU that's holding up the UK's membership of the Horizon project. It's the EU that is making the Northern Ireland protocal unworkable. It was the UK that set up their precious single market that they are now using as an excuse.The euro has been a disaster which has bankrupted half of their members. Their economic growth is rubbish. They are economically illiterate & still you yearn for our return to it. It aint going to happen & you are just sore losers.

Paul Rolink ● 1548d

"Please remember that some 55% of the country did not vote"Only 43.6% voted for the Conservatives according to wiki.It doesn't look like the current Labour leadership will consider anything but first past the post.Even replacing the House of Lords with an elected chamber has been shelved by the opposition - which will no doubt further inflate corruption.A SNP MP apparently commented that peerages used to cost £1M under New Labour and now they cost £3M under the Conservatives.

Ed Robinson ● 1548d

The statistics were not the rude bit, what followed was.....And I agree, the matter of ECHR was quite baffling - and embarrassing!

Ivonne Holliday ● 1548d

Quoting statistics from Google doesn't seem rude to me. I remember running up to the referendum having to point out that the ECHR wouldn't disappear if we left the EU as that was a separate treaty relating to the Council of Europe. (Although signing the ECHR treaty is normally a requirement to joining the EU.)

Michael Ixer ● 1548d

I hope I am not going to be too rude.... I agree that every country has the government it deserves.  Please remember that some 55% of the country did not vote for the current government.Also, some characters in the current government, as well as others, fed misinformation to the electorate at a time when immigration into Europe was very high.  Remember the famous poster?  And here comes my rudeness.  I found in 2016 that so many people were totally ignorant on the workings of the EU (the highest volume of queries in Google on 24 June 2019 related to the EU, what they do, etc).What is more, none of them realized that the successive UK governments since the EEC, have had a say - and veto - on decisions taken by all the members of the EEC/EU. Today, some media and people are blaming the EU for being intransigent and the French for being unfair.  I would say that breaking the NI protocol signed by this government is an affront.  The problems with fisheries started with the UK government (which included UK fishing and exporting companies having to close down) and the government not issuing the certificates to the French fishers which it had promised to do.All in all, this is a true Machiavellian government.

Ivonne Holliday ● 1548d

Ivonne, as much as I agree with you the country is getting what it voted for - the electorate is always credited by politicians as having good sense so who is to blame?

Clifford Cowell ● 1548d

Just hope I live long enough to get the full benefit, Matt :-)

Michael Ixer ● 1548d

It is heart breaking (gut-wrenching?) and soul destroying!Horrible!

Ivonne Holliday ● 1548d

You need to be more upbeat and start thinking about where you will spend your £3-£7 brexit dividend! (over 15 years)"All of Boris Johnson’s new post-Brexit trade deals put together will have an economic benefit of just £3 to £7 per person over the next 15 years, *****according to the government’s own figures*****"https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-trade-deals-australia-new-zealand-b1952442.html

Matt Palmer ● 1548d

It's a shambles. Johnson and Frost negotiated and agreed the NI protocol which is the core of the problems we're experiencing; it's all down to their incompetence, they obviously didn't understand what they were signing. Or they dishonestly and cynically agreeing to something they weren't going to honour? They're just proving that Remainers weren't talking about project fear, we understood what the implications and costs of Brexit would be, particularly a hard one negotiated by a government that doesn't appear understand business and science, and lives in the 19th century :-(  Johnson said "f*** business", obviously the one to time he wasn't lying, although perhaps he really meant "business and science science"?Of course, it may all just be a negotiating ploy but when science is being used as a pawn in arguments society has gone horribly wrong, if not failed. To solve the climate emergency more cooperation is needed not stupid, petty arguments.

Michael Ixer ● 1548d