This kind of cycle back and forth between full-throated conservative idiocy and then demanding to be saved from the consequences of their own actions is what really makes me so depressed about the majority of voters.
I could excuse a young person maybe for being naive and inexperienced enough to think conservativism might have some kind of merit, but grown-ass adults have literally no excuse to ever believe the right-wing ever about anything.
Not just in the UK, but everywhere.
Well their voting system that overinflates the seats of the winning party does not help either.
Labour, right before the election.
Brenter
Breturn!
Brcatdoor
Sure, no problem. But this time without all the unfair special rules and exceptions that the UK had.
I fear the EU will take them right back and set a precedent for leaving and rejoining without so much problems as figuring out new contracts and agreements.
I’d demand worse terms for every time they leave and then try to rejoin (aka the cut was 50% but now the contribution has to be at least 55%)All it takes is for one member country, no matter how tiny, to say “No” and it’s no, and in some countries like Belgium even a single region (say, “mighty” Walonia) can block it.
For example, I expect that Spain will want Gibraltar back as a condition for a Yes on a UK Membership vote.
A single region within a member country can veto an entire block’s will, even if the rest of the country assents? That seems very broken as a voting system, to me.
Belgium has an unusual constitution that lets its regions have veto power over some of its decisions in the international stage and adding a member to the EU is actually a change to a major Treaty that Belgium is part of.
For most EU member countries, there is no such thing, though I believe some (Luxemburg, Malta?) are actually smaller than Walonia in terms of population.
Yeah I’m sure us Frenchies will make it veeery easy for UK to rejoin EU.
In regards of Gibraltar, the problem is it being a fiscal paradise. If one of the agreement was that Gibraltar has too have the same rules as the rest of the EU it could be enough for the Spanish government.
And if that meant enforcing the same for Ireland and Luxemburg, even better.
It’s my impression that it’s actually a lot more about national pride for Spain than about Gibraltar’s fiscal paradise status, since Gibraltar as not part of a member country can just be treated the same as any other offshore fiscal paradise, such as the Bahamas, which includes it being added to black lists. In this day and age, it’s not geographical proximity that matters when it comes to fiscal paradises.
This makes sense since Britain too doesn’t really gain much from having possession of Gibraltar so holding on to it is mainly a question of national pride for the UK - it would be strange if Spain’s motivations were wildly different.
PS: Also it’s funny how during the Leave campaign a lot of the “reason” why the EU would give Britain quasi-membership rights (without the responsabilities) after leaving the EU were a lot like this, about how those other countries or interests inside those countries would do it because they stood to gain monetarilly from it in the short term. All that turned out to be mainly wishful thinking and a serious misreading of the motivations of the leaders and people in said other countries.
Just found it funny how there are still people around thinking other countries are mainly motivated by the short term gains in sovereignty affairs, even whilst Britain itself again and again keeps doing things motivated by national pride when it comes to such affairs - one would’ve expected that “they’re a lot like us” would somehow been figured out by now.
I dont think so. Its in the EU interest for them to come back in. It will show others that leaving is not a good idea. However, they wkbt want it to be easy as it might encourage others to leave. They will join in the same terms as new entrants.
They will have to join the euro and they wont get their previous favourabke rebate for agriculture.
Its still a good deal for both sides but Britain make a mistake, as most are aware.
Yeah when they fixed their bs and gone through the entire year long joining process and without extras.
Brentrance.
Breturn
Breunion
When the EU turns around and predictably tells us to fuck off:
The EU won’t turn you down, but you won’t want to meet the necessary conditions
As the vote for new EU Members is one with veto rules, my bet is that it’s going to be an opportunity for all manner of EU members to make demands, such as Spain demanding Gibraltar back.
Crucially, although 52% of people polled think the downsides of Brexit outweigh the positives, engagement over Brexit is at the lowest it’s ever been. Most people simply don’t care about the issue any more.
Well such timescale would in any case depend on EU, not on convenience for any british parliament. There are now N. Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, [ Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo ?], Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, [Turkey ?] all in the queue to join EU. On the other hand, it might help from point of view of geographic and economic balance, otherwise the centre of ‘gravity’ will shift even further SE away from Brussels. I think to expand EU has to reform processes, to end all vetos and generalise multi-speed / opt-outs.
Meanwhile a new british government could implement obviously convenient win-win cooperation step by step, until there isn’t so much left to change. And I’d be happy to see Scotland and Northern Ireland take a lead.There are now N. Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, [ Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo ?], Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, [Turkey ?] all in the queue to join EU
it is not FIFO queue. some of these countries are more prepared to actually join than the others.
Sure, but diplomacy is not logical, and EU has a habit (mistake?) to do things in mega packages (look at 2004). Last I heard, the gossip was ‘by 2030’.
my point is, if they actually asked, i am betting my left hand they would be in in the first possible wave (contrary to… majority of countries in that queue). 2030 would actually be super fast.
Hmm, did you consult the next french president about that ?
Nope, everyone behind Ukraine is now screwed. If they want to speed things up they need to help Ukraine win it’s war. Sorry, I don’t make the rules I just pretend to know them.
Although… Moldova and Georgia might as well. We all know they’re next on Putin’s list.
They can come back with zero special privileges, as one among equals.
This is exactly why I don’t think they’re coming back just yet. If there’s one thing leavers and remainers agreed on it’s british exceptionalism. Remainers didn’t want to leave because EU in general was beneficial, remainers didn’t want to leave because UK had a good thing going in the EU and giving it up was stupid. Remainers want to join only if they get at least some of their special privileges back.
Maybe in another 10 years they’ll be more receptive towards joining without special privileges.
I’m ready now. Fuck sterling, fuck the vetos, fuck the opt-outs, etc. Yeah, the special arrangement we had was amazing and put us in a privileged position and we’ll be diminished if we rejoin without them, but that’s still a far better situation than we find ourselves in now. So yeah, warts and all; I’m in.
We should have gone full metric and adopted the Euro years ago. Then all this bollocks about pints and good old sterling would have been done with.
As usual with UK we do everything half arsed and settle for second best.Whores don’t get second chances… At least they don’t get taken back the first wife lol
Also, lol
I would love for the UK to rejoin the EU, but the survey results mentioned in the article don’t really support the claim that there is a general desire to do so. A shift from 52% against to 52% in favor of EU membership is really not that significant.
- it is more about the trend
- 52% is a lot, if the other party has 35% and the rest “do not know”…
This is not a “will the UK try to rejoin one day” trend, this is a brexit regret trend.
The people responding “rejoin” to these polls probably imagine that EU accession will be done on the previous terms. If you did the same graph but made it clear to pollees that rejoining would entail a switch to the Euro and many more legislative constraints, it would almost certainly read overwhelmingly “Stay out”.
There has been no change for 1.5 years now, what trend? The 1.5 years where it changed a little(!) prior?
The fact that in 1.5 years there was no change IS a trend.
And notice the overall change after merely 3 years.
the trend between 3 years ago and now. also, don’t forget to combine that knowledge with my point 2.
Why specifically 3 years? Any other time frame will not support your argument? There is no trend on either direction currently, has not been for 1.5 years.
Brexit happened at the end of January of 2020, so 3 years is really the only viable amount of time to consider {since this year isn’t over to be considered).
Even if that’s true (and it probably is, because it was a pretty thin majority to exit in the first place) it would be absolute political suicide to go into this election on the promise of getting us back in.
The anti EU brigade are lunatics and people who voted leave are easily lead. The last thing we need is “Look, they’re ignoring your will!” followed by Emperor Farage…
Would be kind of funny if the reverse of Brexit happened. Have some pro Europe lunatics take over the fight and make a brexiteer accept the worst deal to re-enter the union.
I assume the UK would be obligated to adopt the Euro as a currency, and i have no doubt some people would absolutely rage stroke.
Sounds fun, if unviable.
I don’t think that is essential for trade. A Norwegian/ Icelandic/ Swiss etc. approach could be adopted.
EEA does allow free movement of people though, which is most of what made us leave to start with. Mostly because of this prick pretending that hordes of dirty brown refugees were somehow the fault of that.
Yeah. If free movement of people is excluded you are down to a European Union–Turkey Customs Union type agreement.
It’s a completely moot point for another reason. The EU isn’t just going to let them back in with the same sweetheart deal they got as founding members. That alone means this would happen for decades if at all .
I mean, they could just join on the same conditions as everyone else
That will never fly with the public , especially since one of the “normal” conditions is giving up the pound, joining the Euro, and giving up direct control of their monetary policy. There is no way a majority would support that in the UK . None of these polls will even bother asking something like that. The polls are about whether they want to turn back time to before Brexit, which is somewhat interesting but isn’t possible.
How I imagine that would go:
Joining at this point would require an insane effort on the UKs side. I am pretty sure that an undemocratic institution like the house of lords would not be acceptable under current EU laws and that is not even accounting for the UKs voting system. The UK would also have to join the currency union. The last point alone makes rejoining very unlikely in my opinion. I think the only thing UK citizens can realistically hope for is, at best, something similar to the Norway model.
Norway is a rule taker that pays into the EU without any influence. They’re also tiny and they know it. This is said with love from a neighbour who would love to see Norway join the EU.
I don’t think the UKs collective ego would allow them to join on Norway terms.
If I remember it correctly, members of the EFTA such as Norway have a vote with veto, and during the Brexit Deal negotiations they weren’t at all keen on having the UK joining the EFTA because it’s far bigger than all the others and would likely dominate.
Yeah, all EFTA members have veto rights towards new members, and you’re pretty much correct but it’s even worse. The UK economy is bigger than all other EFTA countries combined. There’s no way they’d let the UK in.
Of course we do, but it ain’t gonna happen. Best you can hope for is the custom union in seven to ten years’ time.
