Tag Archives: Brexit

geldof

The Evening Standard reports:

The two camps in the EU referendum battle met today in a bizarre clash on the Thames on board a propaganda flotilla.

Sir Bob Geldof boarded a boat on the Thames to oppose Nigel Farage’s pro-Brexit flotilla, which was making its way up the Thames towards parliament.

The flotilla, of up to 35 boats, had been organised by Scottish skippers as part of the Fishing for Leave campaign.

The Boomtown rats star blasted out songs including Chicago’s “If you leave me now”, while the Leave boats retaliated by firing water from a hose at Geldof’s vessel.

FIGHT!

Nigel Farage and Sir Bob Geldof clash on Brexit in bizarre Thames flotilla ‘battle’ (The Evening Standard)

Pic via Guardian and video via Mikey Smith and Kaya Burgess

UPDATE:

Jim Waterson tweetz:

I’m under aural attack from Bob Geldof who has the loudest soundsystem known to man and is haranguing Farage.

Jaykers.

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From top: Minister for Foreign Affairs Charlie Flanagan at a Brexit conference last month; Dr Kieran Allen

Why Britain – and then Ireland – should vote to leave the European Union.

Dr Kieran Allen writes:

If you’re Irish, you should vote Remain in the upcoming British referendum. This is the message that Enda Kenny and the political elite are pushing.

The Ryanair boss, Michael O’Leary, is spending €25,000 on persuading the British to stay. The ‘ heavy hitters’ of the ESRI, the Irish Exporters Association, the ICTU and the mainstream parties are warning about a calamity if there is a British exit.

It is all about putting on the green jersey to stop discussion on the nature of the EU itself but it rests on dubious assumptions.

There is a prediction that if Britain leaves the EU a new set of border controls will separate the North and South. However, a common travel area has existed between Ireland and Britain long before either country joined the EU.

It is also claimed that trade between Ireland and Britain would be in danger. Yet an Anglo-Irish Free Trade Agreement has been in place since 1965. And as both governments are ardent advocates of free trade, there is no reason to believe this will change.

If Britain votes to leave the EU, there should be a vote in southern Ireland to exit.

Supporters of Remain appear to have forgotten the role that the EU played in the economic crash of 2008.

Last year, the Finance Minister, Michael Noonan, told the Banking Inquiry that he was warned by the President of the European Central Bank that if he burned bondholders that a ‘bomb would go off’ in Dublin. A ‘bomb’ meant a financial explosion rather than an incendiary device.

The EU prefers to use financial methods rather than military intervention to change the policies of elected governments. When the left wing Syriza party was elected to government in Greece, the EU simply changed the rules so that its bank reserves ratios were reduced.

The result was a run on Greek banks and a turning of the financial screw until the Syriza government eventually capitulated.

The former President of the German Bundesbank Karl Otto Pöhl explained the ECB’s wider strategy:

“It was about protecting German banks, but especially the French banks, from debt write offs. On the day that the rescue package [with Greece] was agreed on, shares of French banks rose by up to 24 percent. Looking at that, you can see what this was really about – namely, rescuing the banks and the rich Greeks.”

As a result of these policies Ireland paid 42% of the total cost of the European banking crisis, at a cost of close to €9,000 per person.

The EU is a fundamentally undemocratic institution where an unelected EU Commission initiates legislation and ‘directives’. Complex, shadowy structures known as ‘trilogue committees’ then hammer out deals with members of the EU parliament.

This structure gives huge scope for the estimated 30,000 lobbyists who mainly represent corporate interests.

The secret negotiations over TTIP show exactly how it operates. Even elected members of the EU parliament are denied access to these trade negotiations.

Yet the EU Commission held 597 closed door meetings with lobbyists, with 87% coming from the corporate sector.

Budgets are no longer solely determined by national governments but are restricted by an ‘Annual Growth Survey’ that is promoted by the EU Commission.

Since the crash of 2008, the EU Commission has used its influence to increase the retirement age to 68 and to promote ‘labour activation’ policies to conscript youth into low paid schemes. It also supports increased ‘user fees’ such as water charges.

Governments are also prevented from borrowing to fund public services if their budget deficit is more than 3 percent of their GDP. Ireland is currently suffering from a huge housing crisis but EU rules prevent the state borrowing enough money to fund a major council house building programme.

National central banks have become agents for the European Central Bank and both are immune to any democratic pressure.

The Irish parliament, for example, recently passed a motion to reduce mortgage charges but were promptly told by the ’independent’ central bank that it would make no difference.

The EU Directorate General of Competition cracks down on state aid and promotes privatisation. Any public service defined as a ‘service of general economic interest’ must be opened up to market competition.

This whole undemocratic edifice provides a shelter for the political elites to tell their electorate that they have ‘no choice’ but to impose unpopular policies. Listen to Enda Kenny talk about water charges and you get the idea.

But what about the EU’s ‘progressive role’ on human rights?

Many of the advocates of Brexit are racists who imagine that the National Health Service could be run with migrant workers. Their insular fanaticism makes anyone look progressive.

However, the EU’s own rhetoric about refugees has helped to legitimise fears about migrants. It has taken in only a tiny number of Syrian refugees.

The UN human rights chief, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, has been forthright in his condemnation, claiming that the EU could easily take in one million migrants, a number that would represent barely 0.2 percent of its population.

In comparison, up to 26 percent of Lebanon’s population is made up of Syrian and Palestinian refugees.

One only has to look at the number of refugees who have drowned in the Mediterranean—now dubbed ‘the world’s most lethal graveyard’—to see how hollow is the EU’s rhetoric of human rights.

Instead of a false debate about ‘Ireland’s national interest’, it is best to acknowledge that some Irish people gain from the EU’s influence over our affairs. The majority do not.

That is why I would encourage a vote to leave.

Kieran Allen is a sociology lecturer at University College Dublin. He is a member of People Before Profit.

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Above from left: Chairman of the IIEA Brendan Halligan, Minister for Foreign Affairs Charles Flanagan TD, Chair and Managing Partner with McCann Fitzgerald Barry Devereux and Director General of the IIEA Tom Arnold.

This morning.

Aviva Lansdowne Road Nua, Dublin

Minister for Foreign Affairs Charles Flanagan at a Brexit Conference hosted by the Institute of International And European Affairs (IIEA) and solicitors McCann Fitzgerald.

On June 23 the United Kingdom electorate will be asked whether they want to leave the European Union which Mr Flanagan believes has serious implications, to Irish business and security.

FIGHT!

Previously: Fexit

Sam Boal/Rollingnews

 

poll

‘sup?

Northern Ireland ‘sheet head Shayna O’Neill writes

It’s here!  My polling card arrived this morning for the much anticipated, will they/won’t they referendum on Britain remaining in the EU.  I’m not native to Belfast but live here, registered to vote and here it is – my opportunity to re-shape Europe? (Bit grandiose I know)  It’s pretty straightforward YES/NO, one tick in the box. Now, how should I vote?

Anyone?

Previously: Can You Vote In Brexit?

Meanwhile… Official Ireland has it all wrong – we could win big if UK opts for Brexit (David McWilliams, Independent.ie)

Screen Shot 2016-05-16 at 14.07.04

Darragh Ó Tuathail, of the British Irish Chamber of Commerce, writes:

The UK Brexit Referendum will take place on June 23. The latest Economist Brexit poll puts those who wish to remain in the EU at 41% and those who wish to leave at 40%, which those undecided at 14%.

British people and Irish registered to vote in the UK living abroad (including in Ireland) must register by close of business today.

There are also over 500,000 Irish people eligible to vote in the UK, phone your family, friends, colleagues and make sure they register to vote by the final closing date of June 7.

UK-based Irish readers can register here.

Graphic: The Economist

Previously: Irish May Sway Brexit Vote (Bloomberg)

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From top: Economists Liam Halligan and Dan O’Brien

This morning.

On RTÉ’s Today with Seán O’Rourke Show.

Economist and Telegraph columnist Liam Halligan joined controversial fellow economist and Irish Independent columnist Dan O’Brien to discuss the prospect of a Brexit [Britain leaving the EU}

Their discussion followed Mr Halligan – ex-political correspondent with the Financial Times and former economics editor at Channel 4 News – recently writing a column headlined, ‘Why Ireland has nothing to fear over fallout from Brexit’ in The Telegraph.

Things got a little… tense.

Liam Halligan: “We’ve done trade across the Irish Sea for millennia, the idea that Britain and Ireland couldn’t strike an overarching bi-lateral trade deal, if there was a British exit, is simply nonsense. We traded through thick and thin, through hatred, jealousy, enmity, nothing has ever stopped the constant ebb and flow of commerce between people across the Irish Sea because it makes sense for both sides, to the existence of people like me who are citizens of both countries, somebody with a lot of Irish blood, who knows Ireland well, is testament to that. The UK has a huge trade surplus with Ireland so Britain has every single incentive to strike a trade deal if there was a Brexit.”

Sean O’Rourke: “Despite the fact that a recent report prepared, and you allude to this yourself in your column on Sunday, for the Irish government,  it indicates we could see a serious drop in trade?”

Halligan: “I just don’t buy that at all. Do you honestly think that Irish and British people need the permission of the European Commission to do trade and we’ve done trade together over hundreds and even thousands of years. Of course the Irish government is massively against the Brexit. Brussels is massively against a Brexit. The whole European political establishment is massively against a Brexit. But if there was a Brexit, it’s in everyone’s interest to do a trade deal between Britain and Ireland, not least the British themselves. And it’s in Germany’s interest to do a deal with Britain, as it is in Italy and Spain’s interest to do a deal with Britain. A lot of it’s scaremongering I think, Seán.”

O’Rourke: “Ok, Dan, you’re shaking your head.”

Dan O’Brien: “Look Liam I’ve never met you and I don’t mean to sound controversial or, or aggressive towards you but you don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m afraid to say. When you join the European Union, you give up the right to trade deals with other countries, that’s how it’s been since 1950s. The notion that Ireland can do a bilateral deal, a country-to-country deal with Britian, if it leaves, is simply factually incorrect, OK? Further than that, the Lisbon Treaty, that’s also the same with foreign direct investment. That’s exactly why Britain doesn’t have a trade deal with the United States, what’s being negotiated now the TTIP, is something that’s negotiated between Brussels and Washington. London does not have a trade deal with America, Ireland does not have a trade deal with America, you cannot have a trade deal with a third country when you’re in the EU. So, you simply don’t seem to understand that fact. So for you to come out and say it’s nonsense and scaremongering, when you don’t understand the very basics of trade diplomacy, is quite shocking.”

Later

Liam Halligan: “I just don’t buy it. People get very hot under the collar about this. A lot of people’s livings depend on the European project. A lot of people have devoted their lives to the European project. They don’t like to be proved wrong or even entertain the fact that somebody could have a different point of view from them. If they’re, you know, we were told that the Euro was forever, remember? Oh you can never leave the Euro.

Now it’s completely clear that countries can leave the Euro. We were told the Stability and Growth Pact and Schengen would always hold. Then the facts on the ground change and the rules change. It strikes me that Canada’s just struck an incredible deal with the European Union, the European Union will be under extreme pressure if there is a Brexit. There will be a loss of credibility, it will have to scramble in order to stop other countries form leaving the European Union. And, in that political vacuum, a country like the UK, the world’s fifth biggest economy, will be able to do trade deals with countries where it has very, very strong commercial links. Not least the Republic of Ireland.”

Sean O’Rourke: “And what about, Liam, what about Dan’s point – whatever about the Irish and we would be very well disposed to continuing the relationship that’s there – other countries might not be so well disposed for example, France.”

Halligan: “Of course, in the immediate aftermath of a Brexit, if there was one, or a Brexit vote and the polls are suggesting that that’s a very real possibility now, then of course there will be an uncomfortable period. The political establishments of France, Germany are very, very closely wedded to the European project. But, you know, across the European Union, look out of the window, look at what’s happening in the opinion polls. There’s a lot of Euroskepticism out there. Some of it is pretty ugly and takes the form of discomfort towards immigration. Some of it is based on the fact that countries feel they’re losing their sovereignty. Look at what we saw in Greece, for instance. So it strikes me that we should stop insulting each other and actually have a conversation about what could happen if there is a Brexit because that could easily be the stated will, the democratic will of the British people.”

Dan O’Brien: “And Liam, we fully respect that. And this is not a thing about insulting. We’re entitled to…”

Halligan: “You came out pretty aggressively there, Dan, I have to say. [Inaudible] judges conducted themselves more politely than you…”

O’Brien: “You have written something that is completely, we’re all entitled to our opinions, we’re not entitled to our own facts.”

Halligan: “And I’m saying is that the political facts on the ground are saying the rules will change. We have had a series of massive rule changes within Europe where previously, almost semi-religious ideas have been blown up by political reality.”

O’Rourke: “OK, Liam, just…”

Halligan: “The Stability and Growth Pact, Schengen, look out of the window.”

O’Brien: “And many things could change. The European Union is weak, the Eurozone is weak, many things could change. Britain…”

Halligan: “I don’t know what I’m talking about even though I’m suggesting something..”

O’Brien: “Just like another third country, you mentioned Canada, exactly. That’s exactly what will happen. London doesn’t negotiate with Canada, Dublin doesn’t negotiate with Canada, the trade bureaucrats in Brussels negotiated that deal with Canada and it covers us all. They’re just the basic facts…”

Halligan: “The Republic of Ireland does 19% of its trade with the United States, the US wasn’t a member of the European Union last time I looked.”

O’Brien: “Sorry?”

Halligan: “The Republic of Ireland does 19% of its trade with the United States, the US wasn’t a member of the European Union last time I checked.”

O’Brien: “All of that happens within EU trade laws. There’s a bilateral trade deal between the EU and the US. It’s not a bilateral deal between Dublin and Washington, it’s between Brussels and Washington and that’s just the basic fact.”

Listen back here

Schulz: EU Parliament’s approval of UK deal not guaranteed (RTE)

Previously: Rule Number 1: No Touching Of The Hair Or Face