I don't know why WTF? Maybe I misread the article, but it sounds like the Cornwall city council wants to make sure that:

a) funding already allocated to them by the EU doesn't disappear during the time in which the UK is still a member of the EU, before their exit takes effect

and

b) The UK government is prepared to take up the funding that will be lost to Cornwall once the exit from the EU takes effect


Seem like reasonable things for the city council to ask for. The people of Cornwall voted to leave. That doesn't relieve the city council from their responsibility to try to maintain funding.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

What Slowguy said . . . .

Hmmm, it would also be reasonable to simply accept an end to that funding. It would be extremely reasonable for the UK government to politely tell Cornwall "No", right?

It would be, but does it hurt to ask?

Maybe. If Brussels ends that funding now, prior to the UK actually leaving the EU, it's just a spiteful move. "Ok, you voted out, fuck you, we're taking our money back."

As for the UK government, the entire UK (including especially England and Wales) voted to leave. It's the govt of the UK's responsibility to make sure their cities and townships are taken care of under whatever the post-EU framework looks like. They might feel that Cornwall doesn't need the full funding previously provided by Brussels, in which case it might be reasonable for them to say 'no' and work with the city council to evaluate what funding is legitimately needed and/or available. It sounds like everyone will need to do some belt tightening at first, so reduced funding may be reasonable. But I don't think it would be reasonable to tell them no just because they voted to leave.

In other words, I still don't understand why "WTF?".

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

this is just the start - I'm not sure about the exact balance but you can work on the basis that the UK income generating area's have been the source of UK funds to the EU, following the deduction of running costs, funds are then distributed from the EU to area's across the EU

The UK is a net contributor - we put in 13B get 4.5 back - ish, so the claims on the redistribution of the 13 that will possibly, in theory, no longer be going to Brussels is just the first of many

However - if we remain part of the single market or wish to negotiate as a third country like CH we will still be required to fit some bills so what those finances look like no one has any idea

What sense does it make for the UK to send money to Brussels and have them distribute it back to needy jurisdictions in UK. Wouldn't it be more efficient to just keep the money in the UK? What does Brussels know about the relative needs in UK that folks in UK don't know?

Of course, we do a similar thing here in US with states and federal government.

Andrew, thank you generally for your posts on this issue here and elsewhere -- very helpful.

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It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

That's the basis for basically every form of Westernized government.

The UK isn't giving Brussels money so it can redistribute it back to the UK. The UK, along with the other member nations, are giving the EU money so it can be redistributed among the member nations. Just like in our local, State, and Federal governments, the collective group contribute so that those with less are brought up a bit, and so that the group can afford to do things none of the individuals could do on their own.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

That is not what I understood from the original article. It said Cornwall receives funds from the EU. Is that wrong?

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It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

rename it to Cornhole.

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Remember - It's important to be comfortable in your own skin... because it turns out society frowns on wearing other people's

No, that's right. My point was that the purpose for the UK to give money to the EU is not so it can get money from the EU. The purpose of giving money to the EU is so that their money can be combined with the contributions of all the member nations and then redistributed based on the common understanding of need or benefit. In that process, the UK gets some money back from the organization.

Similarly, we each pay taxes to the government, and that money is gathered with everyone else's taxes, and then redistributed to provide services to those who can't pay, to pay for things we can't or won't pay for individually, and some of it comes directly back to us. You wouldn't say that we pay taxes to the govt for the purpose of getting money from the govt, and you can't really say that about the UK and the EU either.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

The UK is a net contributor - we put in 13B get 4.5 back - ish, so the claims on the redistribution of the 13 that will possibly, in theory, no longer be going to Brussels is just the first of many //

Well the Uk will have a lot more of its own money now, but will they really since it will most likely be 10% to 15% devalued? I guess if you only buy inside the country, items make in the UK, but don't try and travel off the island!! This is going to be a big hangover for a lot that voted to leave, it is already hitting the presses how people really did not know what they were voting for. I know, they voted out of fear, a phony one. Now the real fear is setting in and buyers remorse is going to be a big topic for awhile..

There's already a petition (apparently been in place since before the referendum) to schedule a re-vote because the margin was so close. So it's conceivable that they could vote all over again. The referendum wasn't binding in the first place, the UK has not invoked Art. 50, so right now, nothing's really changed. There could also be a Parliamentary vote on the matter which would be interesting, because I understand the majority in Parliament are actually Remain oriented, and would have to either change their stance or vote against the referendum.

If I were to guess, I'd say the Remain camp will try to delay the Art. 50 process for as long as they can in the hopes that the citizenry will feel the economic pinch, change their minds, and call for the UK the stay in the EU.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

But the UK is giving money to Brussels so it can redistribute it back to the UK (if Brussels should decide there is need in UK).

I understand that the theory is that with a common pool of money to be redistributed by experts according to common understanding of need, more good will be done. However, the further the money is from the need, the less understanding there is of real local needs. That is why we have bridges to nowhere here in US. And, yes, I know that is also why we have interstate highways. That is the tension in a federal/state system. The Brits decided they didn't need a federal layer.

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It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

The way you're phrasing that, it sounds as if you think the purpose for giving money to Brussels is so Brussels can give money to the UK. That's not really right, as I explained.


True. The UK has decided to secede from the union, so to speak.

Well, in truth, not really. The UK has held a non-binding referendum in which the citizens of England and Wales indicated a desire to secede, and the citizens of Ireland and Scotland indicated a desire to remain.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Sure it is right. Certainly the money is given with intention and expectation of the UK that some of the money it gives to Brussels will be given back to the UK. Same thing in the United States. Of course some of the money goes to common purposes (like national defense) or is given to poorer states. But if, for instance, Texas stopped getting any federal money back, they'd secede.

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It doesn't really matter what Phil is saying, the music of his voice is the appropriate soundtrack for a bicycle race. HTupolev

That's a dangerous road to consider traveling.

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"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

We're arguing over small differences, but I still don't agree. There's a difference between having an expectation of getting something back, and giving for the purpose of getting something back.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Who are you? Mystic fucking Meg?

I voted Leave and it was out of hope of re-engaging with the world, rather than being stuck in a declining customs union that refuses to reform itself. I want to have an immigration system that decides who to let in on the basis of what they can contribute, rather than where they come from.

I've been reading this sort of whiny crap on Facebook and Twitter all day from Remain voters (I assume they bothered to vote, but probably too busy telling their friends on Facebook how stupid and racist you would have to be to vote leave). The remain side had months to put forward a positive argument for staying in the EU and instead choose to invoke a bunch of catastrophic warnings about the future if we dared to vote the wrong way.

I think you'll find that those voting out of fear were mostly remain voters who had been told there would be a recession, WW3 and the end of western political civilisation. Oh, and I'm still waiting for the 'Emergency Budget' promised by The Chancellor in the event of a Brexit vote where he would cut pensions and the health service and increase taxes.

And breath :-)

 I voted stay and obviously the results not my preferred option but it is what it is

What i will say is that its far to early to determine the economic impact one way or the other

I think its also reasonably fair to say that many people on the leave side are going to be disappointed as it becomes clear that it will be years, if ever, before border controls change

Hee, hee. As if a positive message would have mattered. As far as I can tell the Leave side was completely impervious to any arguments of any type. In the end the Leave side has created a situation where the EU and the UK now have very clear incentives to take negative economic actions in order to advance short-term parochial but ultimately self-destructive agendas. On the part of the UK, if the EU carries on, London loses it's primacy as Europe's banking center, and probably loses Scotland also. They are incentivized to cheer further dissolution (which some of them are doing in a rather unseemly fashion). For the EU's part, they are under pressure to strike hard bargains with the UK to discourage further secession. The end result will be lower economic growth (not catastrophic, but completely avoidable). Congratulations on creating that dynamic and scoring an economic own goal for Europe.

I think the economic own goal was scored by the EU when it created the Euro and then failed to follow their own rules. We are now simply leaving them to sort out their own mess. The logical conclusion of the EU is to form a political and economic union, now we have left, they are free to do so without our obstruction. I don't think this will solve the problem, but it's their choice now.

You need to ignore the hysteria from the second rate time serving Juncker and listen to what Angel Merkel has to say, she has a large democratic mandate and Germany will be paying most of the bills - he who pays the piper calls the tune.

"Meanwhile on negotiations, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: "It shouldn't take forever, that's right, but I would not fight for a short time frame."
She added that she was seeking a "objective, good" climate in talks on Britain's exit from the EU, and that there was no need to make deterrence a priority.
Mrs Merkel also said there was "no need to be particularly nasty in any way in the negotiations; they must be conducted properly".

Interesting how the voters of Britain were told to listen to the experts on the economy, but now people seem to think that the leaders of Europe are going to cause an economic crisis by invoking a trade war with the UK to punish us. With the EU economy in such a precarious position, that would be suicidal and the person paying the bills knows it.

I never thought for one second that Brussels would be allowed by Germany to invoke a trade-war, but that is also not the reason that I voted to remain in - I voted in for the freedom of movement and to protect my own interests (work, capital, assets, investments)

I think that many people believe that the consequence of out will be one thing, and actually it will turn out to be both very different to what they imagined, and very disappointing for them

That said - I'm ambivalent - I'll be glad to see Brussels get its comeuppance - I'm obviously one of the "left, metropolitan elite, out of touch" remainers who will still be a citizen of both a member of the EU and the UK, and in due course a third EU country

I think the freedom to travel is a net gain, I think we have benefited from it as a nation enormously, I think those that have not seen those benefits rightly feel aggrieved but in the end, it will not help them get appointments with French Dr's working in the NHS, or their kids places in schools when there are insufficient teachers OR we continue to employ these people in which case they will continue to feel aggrieved about the endless inward flux of immigrants

I think people were lied to, misled and that as has been written about endlessly - the vote was a message about dozens of issues that have been unaddressed for decades - well now those of us (royal us) that have participated in the marginalization of those parts of society that you could safely ignore have just paid that price and we're all shocked (I'm not shocked at all, but I've friends in the PLP who are astounded but as I've told them for years - you never gave a shit about mining communities and other areas thinking they'd never vote blue, then along comes Farage and you have just been done over)

Brexit hasn't come about as a result of Leave voters not listening, it's come about as a result of their concerns being completely ignored by mainstream British politicians and by the EU. Even after 17.5m people have voted to leave, the overwhelming response from Remainers has been to slag them off as racist, stupid, ignorant, white, old, poor, etc. So tell me again who's not listening? Or for that matter, who the intolerant ones are?

This situation was easily avoidable even a couple of months ago. All the EU needed to do was give Cameron some meaningful concessions that he could take back and present as a victory to his voters. Not much to ask for when the second biggest economy and contributor to the EU has a close referendum coming up. If they'd done that if have predicted fairly comfortable Remain victory. But no, they sent him back with almost nothing, at which point the Remain campaign was doomed to be a negative one based on fear, because there was no hope of the EU changing.

I have to say, even as someone that wanted to stay in, the sense of schadenfreude seeing Schulz, Tusk and Juncker getting schooled by Merkel is giving me some pleasure

even still these clowns think that they are going to be dictating to Germany what the policy will be for dealing with the UK - they're insane

I don't think that the Brits really had any clue what they were voting for and what would be the ramifications.

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How does Danny Hart sit down with balls that big?

In a vote of this nature, the ramifications are almost impossible to predict though. The politicians leading the Leave campaign weren't actually in power, and unlike a normal election "winning" the referendum doesn't put them in power, so they can't actually make any promises about policy (or rather any promises they do make are even less credible than politicians usual election pledges). And the EU obviously isn't going to put any kind of deal on the table for what Britain would get if they left, since doing so simply makes the Leave campaign more credible.

So voting Leave was a leap of faith that firstly British politicians will actually pay attention to the concerns of the voters and make some changes, and secondly that the EU will be grown-up enough to negotiate a deal that recognises that we're all still each other's closest neighbours and trading partners, rather than cutting off their nose to spite their face. Opinions on how the EU would behave were largely predictable given the views of the person offering their opinion. At some point in the next few years we'll see who was right.

The fact that so many people were prepared to make that leap of faith is testament to how make of a divide there has become between our political and metropolitan classes and vast swathes of the country. Not all of the things that people are concerned about are necessarily directly the fault of the EU, but referendums often turn into a vote on people's satisfaction with the government generally. When a lot of people feel that their views aren't represented by any mainstream political party, and then there's a referendum where nearly all the mainstream politicians are lined up on the same side, it's always highly likely that they'll take the rare opportunity to give them a good kicking.

Of course, it can be persuasively argued that the EU was unfairly scapegoated for long-standing national policy failings. Time will certainly tell, but your sentence above certainly admits to that possibility. Here in the US, major decisions like this (treaties, ratifications, various taxes, amendments) require super-majorities. I was struck during the Scottish referendum that huge, potentially irrevocable policies didn't require some form of super-majority support.

Super majority rule is probably a good idea with hindsight. Having a decision like this made by 52% does leave the potential for a divided country. Obviously too late to change the rules now though (doesn't seem to be stopping some people from trying).