1.7 Billion surcharge from Brussels...LOL

[westbrommer]

. Like I said, monies not free, it has to given back.

Have you ever heard of the term "written off"?

Why on earth should they have debts written off? Its no one else's problem they can't handle their finances.

[Steve Hunt]

. Like I said, monies not free, it has to given back.

Have you ever heard of the term "written off"?

Why on earth should they have debts written off? Its no one else's problem they can't handle their finances.

Well, you had better hope that Greece doesn't elect Syriza at the next election. It's leader, Alexis Tsipras, says he would reverse some of those policies foisted on him by the EU and demand that international lenders & the EU write off some of Greece's giant 318.6 billion euro debt. He's already miles ahead in the polls.

This additional demand is hardly going to dent his popularity, is it?

[Steve Hunt]

Monies not free, you have give it back.

In cases like Greece, they should never had been lent it in the first place.
But the introduction of the Euro & the crazy belief that Northern & Southern European economies could be converged meant that they had easy access to it.

A lot of Greece's, Spain's, Cyprus's, Portugal's problems are significantly attributable to the EU.
Perversely, their inability to recover is also due to the EU as they can no longer de-value their currency.

[westbrommer]

. Like I said, monies not free, it has to given back.

Have you ever heard of the term "written off"?

Why on earth should they have debts written off? Its no one else's problem they can't handle their finances.

Well, you had better hope that Greece doesn't elect Syriza at the next election. It's leader, Alexis Tsipras, says he would reverse some of those policies foisted on him by the EU and demand that international lenders & the EU write off some of Greece's giant 318.6 billion euro debt. He's already miles ahead in the polls.

This additional demand is hardly going to dent his popularity, is it?

He can demand all he wants, that's pie in the sky election nonsense. They took the money, partly from contributions from this country, they pay it back otherwise its theft. Just because most of their population bdoesnt pay their taxes isn't anyone's problem, thats them running a county incompetently.
Not to mention, for a country based solely on tourism, to have the EU sanction them or kick them out would be disastrous. Flight prices would skyrocket, the country would be more on its knees than it is already.
I don't see why you think they should get free money. They took the money gleefully when they were offered it, why shouldn't they give it back?

[Hillman avenger]

It's our NET payment, after money in ( especially through CAP) that we should be discussing.

Ok then, fire away.

As asked earlier, what do we receive in monetary terms for being in the club?

Setting aside all of the trade , travel and other stuff, if you want to look at the flow of money in and out, you can see what we pay because Farage bangs on about that.
The problem is the money going the other way, because it reaches us through multiple streams, and I don't know of anyone who is accounting all that. I don't see a sensible debate about the subject until somebody does.
But there is the whole income stream to our farmers for a start.
And then there are numerous EU or partly-EU funded projects in the UK.
The two places I am best familiar with-Merseyside and Ventnor, IOW- have both had big slugs of money into projects which have improved the environment and generated jobs.

[Hillman avenger]

. Like I said, monies not free, it has to given back.

Have you ever heard of the term "written off"?

Why on earth should they have debts written off? Its no one else's problem they can't handle their finances.

Well, you had better hope that Greece doesn't elect Syriza at the next election. It's leader, Alexis Tsipras, says he would reverse some of those policies foisted on him by the EU and demand that international lenders & the EU write off some of Greece's giant 318.6 billion euro debt. He's already miles ahead in the polls.

This additional demand is hardly going to dent his popularity, is it?

No doubt.
It's the same premise as Farage.
It's like the bank writes to you demanding you repay your overdraft. Over a few pints down at the pub, your mate tells you to tell them to stuff it, and at the time you go with that. When you sober up you realise what a stupid idea that actually is.

[Steve Hunt]

I don't see why you think they should get free money. They took the money gleefully when they were offered it, why shouldn't they give it back?

I agree. But the EU bears some responsibility for this. They should never had made it available.

If you owe the bank £1,000.00, you have a problem
If you owe the bank £1,000,000.00 they have a problem.

[Steve Hunt]

. Like I said, monies not free, it has to given back.

Have you ever heard of the term "written off"?

Why on earth should they have debts written off? Its no one else's problem they can't handle their finances.

Well, you had better hope that Greece doesn't elect Syriza at the next election. It's leader, Alexis Tsipras, says he would reverse some of those policies foisted on him by the EU and demand that international lenders & the EU write off some of Greece's giant 318.6 billion euro debt. He's already miles ahead in the polls.

This additional demand is hardly going to dent his popularity, is it?

No doubt.
It's the same premise as Farage.

No it's not.

The UK/EU relationship is completely different to that of Greece's.

[Hillman avenger]

The UK gets around £3bn a year back in CAP payments. Haven't got a calculator handy.
Can someone divide that by 365 please?

[Steve Hunt]

The UK gets around £3bn a year back in CAP payments. Haven't got a calculator handy.
Can someone divide that by 365 please?

£8,219,178.08 per day

Even by your rationale, it is costing us £33m per day : https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... FUZWyJmdTA

Economics of the madhouse

[Hillman avenger]

The UK gets around £3bn a year back in CAP payments. Haven't got a calculator handy.
Can someone divide that by 365 please?

£8,219,178.08 per day

Even by your rationale, it is costing us £33m per day : https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... FUZWyJmdTA

Economics of the madhouse

That's just a bit of it. That's the point.
Farage still talks about £55m a day and nobody challenges him.

[Steve Hunt]

Farage still talks about £55m a day and nobody challenges him.

That's because he's telling the truth. It is how you want to interpret it (with what we get back in return) that is open for debate.

[Hillman avenger]

Farage still talks about £55m a day and nobody challenges him.

That's because he's telling the truth. It is how you want to interpret it (with what we get back in return) that is open for debate.

Come on Steve.
You know there are different ways of telling lies.
One of them is not telling the whole truth.
Even on that first element, payments to EU less CAP returns, the figure he used overstates it by 50%.
The other flows into the UK are much harder to collate. I don't know how to do it. but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
Then you have to ask what the net effect on trade would be.
When I was in the US a couple of weeks ago, the New York times reckoned it would account for about 1 to 1.5% of our GDP.

[Steve Hunt]

The other flows into the UK are much harder to collate. I don't know how to do it.

No one does. Therein lies the problem.

We know what it costs us, but we have no idea what we get back for it.

In business, if you don't know the return on your investment, you won't be in business for long.

[birdie]

Just how does one calculate the income from the black economy?

[Steve Hunt]

This doesn't bode well for Dave's much vaunted pre-referendum negotiations should he win the next election, does it?

I wonder if this could herald an early referendum pre-May? It could be Dave's last chance of remaining in No: 10.
At least we could tell them where to go with this demand should the vote be in favour of withdrawal.

[Steve Hunt]

Just how does one calculate the income from the black economy?

I have no idea, birdie.
Though the Germans seem to have come up with a figure - partly, I suspect, because prostitution is legal.

[Steve Hunt]

Apparently the nuclear option is simply not to pay the demand.

It would mean months, if not years of wrangling. And Britain could only be fined around £240million, much less than is being demanded.

This has to be the UK's best bet, I would have thought?

[birdie]

Just how does one calculate the income from the black economy?

I have no idea, birdie.
Though the Germans seem to have come up with a figure - partly, I suspect, because prostitution is legal.

Have they taken into account the income from smoking weed in Amaterdam?

[Steve Hunt]

The other thing to consider is, given these new rules, what will next years demand be?

As our economy grows (if it does) & the Eurozone continues to stagnate (which most pundits think it will), £1.7bn could be a mere drop in the ocean compared to future demands.

[Steve Hunt]

Seems as though we've been fiddling the books

Of course, perhaps if the EU itself could publish fully audited accounts, these demands would be a tad more credible.

[Hillman avenger]

The UK gets around £3bn a year back in CAP payments. Haven't got a calculator handy.
Can someone divide that by 365 please?

£8,219,178.08 per day

Even by your rationale, it is costing us £33m per day : https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... FUZWyJmdTA

Economics of the madhouse

OK
Best I can find is a report published in The Guardian ( yes I know) which reckoned in 2012 the net moneys in and out was about £4bn, so using rusty mental arithmetic, £11-12m a day. Not £55m.
That's what it costs us for full access to EU markets, and our EU exports are over £10bn a month, or some £350m a day or so, and our fastest-growing markets in the EU are in the newly-joined countries ( who in effect spend a fair bit of their EU income with us).
So if you risk even 10% of that..
Then there's the City. Bastards to a man, but they are our bastards. Why are the US banks, and the global UK ones, HQ'd in London? Because we have access to the single market, speak English and are 1 hour nearer EST. And because EU rules would not allow the German government to fund Frankfurt competing with us. But with us gone, see what happens.
But then, we would also need to consider the cost of institutions we would have to recreate or enlarge because EU services are not there. I'd be interested to know how much extra, for example, we would have to pay for border control..
Even then, if we are in a net outlay position, there's the value argument. Ask yourself whether we would be at the top table internationally if we left- the New York Times certainly didn't think so; it thought the US would then focus virtually entirely on Germany.

[Steve Hunt]

Anyone heard a response to this from Clegg & Milliband yet?

[Steve Hunt]

Then there's the City. Bastards to a man, but they are our bastards. Why are the US banks, and the global UK ones, HQ'd in London? Because we have access to the single market, speak English and are 1 hour nearer EST. And because EU rules would not allow the German government to fund Frankfurt competing with us. But with us gone, see what happens.

If we stay, see what happens.

Part of the trade off for Germany bailing out the eurozone is that Frankfurt will become the financial hub of the EU.

[birdie]

Caught a snippet on the BBC News channel about how this was calculated and a commentator said that in the 70's Italy had, apparently, come up with a formula for calculating the black economy ( I think it was) and Margaret Thatcher is reported to have said 'Good, they can pay more into the EU budget' I think it was the time that Italy was claiming so much in subsidy for olive groves that someone calculated that if that much oil had been produced the entire country would be under 3 feet of the stuff.