For the first time in years, German sweet makers have seen a significant drop in the number of exports to Britain, Stephan Nießner said.
The UK market makes up a significant proportion of Germany’s confectionary exports, with around seven percent of sweets produced in the country bound for Great Britain.
[…]
Sixty-eight percent of the cars produced in the city are shipped to the UK.
News that the German confectionery industry is suffering in the wake of the UK’s Brexit vote comes as Angela Merkel insisted the reason her country enjoyed such a large surplus was because German-made products are in such demand.
The EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier says there has not been enough progress to move to the next stage of Brexit talks as the UK wants.
He said there was “new momentum” in the process but there was still “deadlock” over the so-called divorce bill, which he said was “disturbing”.
“Decisive progress is in our grasp within the next two months”, he added.
This week’s fifth round of talks are the final discussions before a crucial EU summit on 19 and 20 October.
What you have here is a divorce where one party, the EU, that doesn’t want to split. They aren’t going to agree to anything short of Britain staying in the abusive marriage. The only way this ends is when Britain takes her stuff, moves out, and stops returning the EU’s calls and snaps. Only then will the EU come to appreciate Britain’s value and they can reestablish a more platonic relationship on mutually-favorable terms.
I suspect we’re going to see this cycle over and over again in the next few years.
Efforts to reassure EU citizens in the UK about their future after Brexit are “a first step but not sufficient”, a top EU official has said.
Under plans announced by Theresa May, EU nationals living in the UK for five years would get “settled status”, with access to health and other benefits.
The PM said people deserved certainty but European Commission boss Jean-Claude Juncker said more was needed.
And campaigners said there were still “more questions than answers”.
Remember that EU folks are angry that Britain has decided to exit the EU in the first place, so they aren’t going to be happy with anything other than a reversal of that decision. So Britain is going to announce a Brexit policy, EU officials will say it is insufficient, rinse, repeat.
The ruling Conservative Party (nicknamed the Tories) thought it was going to increase its numbers in Parliament, but has instead lost seats – and its slim majority; it held 330 seats before the election (326 is the magic number for a majority).
Instead, the opposition Labour Party has won back many seats.
To cap it all off, Prime Minister Theresa May didn’t need to call this election – she did so because she thought she’d win a landslide. The result is being seen as a major defeat for her.
Even though she’s ahead in the polls, it’s a gutsy move.
UK Prime Minister Theresa May has called a snap general election for 8 June, taking the country by surprise.
The previous election was in 2015, so another was not due until 2020.
Ms May pledged several times after taking office last year not to call an early election, so this is something of a U-turn.
Why the U-turn?
The prime minister wants a strong mandate in parliament going into what are likely to be fraught negotiations with Europe over Britain’s exit from the EU.
Her Conservative party has a relatively slim majority in the House of Commons, won in 2015 under the previous leader David Cameron. But since that election the main opposition Labour party has collapsed in the polls, leaving her in a much stronger position and making an election win significantly more likely.
A victory in June would also hand her a very important personal mandate. Having taken over from Mr Cameron when he resigned mid-term, after losing the Brexit referendum, she has yet to win her own general election.
MPs have voted by a majority of 384 to allow Prime Minister Theresa May to get Brexit negotiations under way.
They backed the government’s European Union Bill, supported by the Labour leadership, by 498 votes to 114.
But the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats opposed the bill, while 47 Labour MPs and Tory ex-chancellor Ken Clarke rebelled.
The bill now faces further scrutiny in the Commons and the House of Lords before it can become law.
The prime minister has set a deadline of 31 March for invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, getting official talks with the EU started. The bill returns to the Commons next week.
The U.K. High Court ruled that lawmakers should vote on whether the government can begin the formal Brexit process by triggering Article 50 of the EU treaty.
Experts say parliament is unlikely to block Brexit outright. But the ruling could mean Brexit is delayed, and lawmakers may get a chance to influence what kind of deal the government negotiates with the EU.
The ruling is a defeat for the government. Prime Minister Theresa May wanted to trigger Article 50 by the end of March 2017, meaning the U.K. would most likely leave the EU two years later.
The government said it was disappointed by the judgment and would appeal.
“The country voted to leave the European Union in a referendum approved by Act of Parliament. And the Government is determined to respect the result of the referendum,” a government spokesperson said.
The BBC has a pretty good rundown on how Britain if faring over two months since the Brexit vote. Basically, despite opponents’ predictions of economic and societal collapse, things are going pretty OK. As expected, the value of the Pound dropped after the vote, but stabilized. Consumer spending is fine. Trade is fine. The British seem to be holding to their character of soldiering on.
Ryan (R-Wis.) is advocating being aggressive early in establishing deals with Britain.
“Obviously it takes time to do something like this, but I think it is something we should be working on,” Ryan told ABC affiliate WISN in Wisconsin last week, according to comments his office published on the speaker’s website Monday. “We should begin discussions with Great Britain to ease concerns so that we do have a smooth trade relationship with Great Britain because they are our indispensable ally.”
Ryan later added on Wisconsin radio station WBEL that negotiations with Britain should be done on “a parallel track” to ongoing talks with the European Union toward a trade agreement known as the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or TTIP.
Ryan, a frequent champion of free trade as a tool to improve foreign relations, isn’t the only lawmaker urging the administration to launch talks with London to ensure the U.S.-U.K. relationship won’t be harmed by British-European divorce proceedings.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) said in a statement Friday soon after the Brexit results were announced that talks should begin now.
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) announced Friday that he would introduce legislation that would require the United States and U.K. to “honor our current arrangements” until new bilateral deals are drafted. It also would direct the U.S. Trade Representative to begin negotiations “as soon as possible.”
There are many reasons that the U.S. should get a trade deal done ASAP. Britain’s relationship with the U.S. deserves respect. We are allies and friends who have supported each other vigorously for over a century. We should be holding our hands out in partnership. But it is also in the U.S.’s best interests. It is almost certain that the EU will seek to punish Britain and throttle Britain’s access to EU markets. Britain still needs a place to sell their goods. There’s no reason that the U.S. can’t benefit from their need in the form of advantageous prices on the things they export (vehicles, mechanical appliances, mineral fuels, pharmaceutical products, electrical equipment, etc.) and a place to sell American goods to replace E.U. goods. Also, by locking in an agreement with Britain right away, it bolsters the U.S.’s bargaining position in the negotiations with the E.U.
Hopefully the Obama Administration recognizes this historic opportunity to benefit both the United States and our ancient partner, Britain.
My column for the West Bend Daily News is online. Here you go:
As America prepares to celebrate the 240th anniversary of the day she declared her independence from Great Britain, the mother country has declared her own independence from the European Union. In doing so, the British people have reasserted their God-given right to self-governance.
Haunted by a century of hot and cold wars that wiped out generations and destroyed civilizations, Europeans created the European Union in 1993 with the goal of uniting Europe into a single geo-political unit with a common economy, currency, laws and regulatory structure. The EU is the latest of several economic and political confederations that have been embarked upon in Europe since World War II. The concept of a federation of states is certainly not uncommon. In fact, it is a principle upon which our own nation is founded.
Britain’s membership in the EU was always a bit at arm’s length. While every other member of the EU joined in a single currency, Britain successfully opted out of the Euro and maintained its own currency. Perhaps Sir Winston Churchill knew his people best when he wrote in the preface to the first volume of his “History of the English Speaking Peoples,” “It (Britain) is very accessible to the invader, whether he comes in peace or war, as pirate or merchant, conqueror or missionary. Those who dwell there are not insensitive to any shift of power, any change of faith, or even fashion, on the mainland, but they give to every practice, every doctrine that comes to it from abroad, its own peculiar turn and imprint.” Indeed, they do.
For centuries, British foreign policy was based upon maintaining a balance of power on the mainland of Europe so that no single power could overwhelm Britain. Suave and skilled British statesmen continually manipulated continental friendships, grudges and power with the overriding goal of protecting the independence of Britain as a free state.
In one view, Britain’s involvement in the EU was an extension of this ancient policy. By participating in, and fostering the growth of, a united Europe in a confederation that respected the independence of the nation states that comprise it, Britain could further its national interests. The financial and merchant classes in Britain certainly stood to gain from an open European economy. And by maintaining its currency, Britain maintained its economic independence.
But then something went wrong. As the EU grew in membership and power, the powers in Brussels began asserting more power over the member states. Moving well beyond just promoting common trade rules and standards, the EU has taken to regulating the smallest facets of life, including things like bathroom fixtures, automobile features and farm animals. In doing so, the EU government has usurped much of the power heretofore held by each member nation’s elected government.
For the British, the issue that finally spurned their decision to leave the EU was immigration. By EU law, people are allowed to move freely to any nation in the EU once they gain entry. This means that when Greece, Germany, Spain, or any other EU nation decides to allow a flood of refugees and immigrants into their nations, Britain has no ability to stop those refugees and immigrants from settling in Britain. A nation that lacks the authority or power to control its own borders is no nation at all.
So the British have voted to leave the EU and return to being an independent sovereign nation like the United States. While many folks are panicking over the prospect of an independent Britain, they need not. The British people ruled themselves for centuries before the EU came into existence and they will have no problem remembering how to fully rule themselves again.
More than likely, the EU will punish Britain for leaving with tariffs and other economic penalties. The EU leadership has already signaled that they must punish Britain for leaving in order to threaten the remaining EU nations from following Britain’s lead. In doing so, the EU will likely plunge itself into a recession as they prioritize the preservation of power in Brussels over the economic well-being of its citizens, thus reaffirming Britain’s reason for leaving in the first place.
As far as the United States is concerned, we should stand shoulder to shoulder with our British brothers and sisters in celebration of their return to independence. The special relationship between our peoples, based upon common language, laws and traditions, has endured for generations and will continue in this new era. And now our peoples share something new: We have both cast off the oppression of a government from across the waves because we wanted to govern ourselves.
Prime Minister David Cameron is to step down by October after the UK voted to leave the European Union.
Speaking outside 10 Downing Street, he said “fresh leadership” was needed.
The PM had urged the country to vote Remain but was defeated by 52% to 48% despite London, Scotland and Northern Ireland backing staying in.
UKIP leader Nigel Farage hailed it as the UK’s “independence day”, while Boris Johnson said the result would not mean “pulling up the drawbridge”.
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said she was “absolutely determined” to keep Scotland in the EU so a second Scottish independence referendum was now “highly likely”.
It’s proving to be a fascinating political year on both sides of the pond.
He does address some other issues about the Brexit, but it is interesting how most of his arguments are dismissals of the opposition’s arguments without a counterargument or appeals to base emotions.
If the UK votes to leave, he said, “that’s it, we are walking out the door, we are quitting – we are giving up on this organisation”.
“I do not think Britain, at the end, is a quitter,” he said.
He said Winston Churchill did not “quit on Europe” during World War Two, adding: “You can’t fight if you’re not in the room”
Really? That sounds like something you say to your 5th grader who wants to quit the basketball team. For those who want to leave the EU, quitting is precisely the point. From their perspective, they want to quit the EU so that they can preserve Britain.
The leaders of Germany, France, Italy, Belgium and other core members are likely to “double down” on closer union,the Financial Times reported, amid concern that Brexit could encourage separatist sentiments in other EU states.
Officials expect a punitive approach to Britain, with an official meeting of 27 leaders – excluding David Cameron – expected shortly after a potential Brexit vote.
Senior Whitehall figures have identified EU leaders’ concerns over “contagion” of anti-EU sentiment as a key reason why, despite the reassurances of Leave campaigners, the bloc will be unlikely to offer Britain a favourable trade deal in the event of Brexit. One senior civil servant said Berlin, Paris and Brussels would see the post-Brexit landscape as an “existential battle” to save the European project.
It’s pretty shameless that Obama would link dead American soldiers to the EU, which was created almost 50 years after the last European war in which those American died.
London (AFP) – US President Barack Obama plunged into Britain’s increasingly poisonous EU debate on Friday at the start of a visit, warning strongly against Brexit and pointing out that US soldiers had died for Europe.
Obama’s intervention ahead of the EU referendum in June drew a furious response from eurosceptics like London Mayor Boris Johnson and UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, who said he should “butt out”.
Writing in the Daily Telegraph, a traditional bastion of euroscepticism, Obama argued that Britain’s place in the EU magnified its global influence and was a matter of “deep interest” to the United States.
“I realise that there’s been considerable speculation — and some controversy — about the timing of my visit,” Obama wrote.
Stressing that the choice was purely for the British people, he wrote: “I will say, with the candour of a friend, that the outcome of your decision is a matter of deep interest to the United States.
“Tens of thousands of Americans who rest in Europe’s cemeteries are a silent testament to just how intertwined our prosperity and security truly are.
“And the path you choose now will echo in the prospects of today’s generation of Americans.”
In a blow to David Cameron and the pro-EU camp, the online survey by Opinium puts the Leave side on 43%, four points ahead of Remain, on 39%. Some 18% of voters said they were undecided, while 1% refused to say.
While most of the “don’t knows” said, when pushed, that they were leaning towards Remain, offering hope to the pro-EU side, the survey will serve as a wake-up call to leaders of all four main Westminster parties, who are urging people to back their calls for continued membership.
Above all, it will be deeply worrying for Cameron, who will almost certainly have to resign as prime minister in the event of a vote to leave. But it also adds to pressure on Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. Only 47% of those asked said they identified him as being in favour of remaining in the EU, while 40% said they did not know his view and 12% believed he wanted to leave. Some 78% knew that Cameron wanted to remain in.
Government strategists and pollsters privately admit that the central problem for the Remain side is that its support for staying in the EU is strongest among young people, the group least likely to vote. Opinium found that in the 18-34 age group, 53% said they backed staying in, against 29% who wanted to leave. But only just over half (52%) in this age group said they were certain to actually go out and vote.
Boris Johnson has transformed the terms of the EU referendum debate by announcing that “after a huge amount of heartache” he is to throw his weight behind the campaign to take Britain out of the EU.
The London mayor announced on Sunday that he will campaign for a leave vote after concluding that David Cameron’s deal will not deliver the reformed EU he promised.
Speaking outside his home in north London, the mayor said his decision had been “agonisingly difficult”. But he added: “I would like to see a new relationship based more on trade, on cooperation, with much less of this supranational element. So that is where I’m coming from and that is why I have decided, after a huge amount of heartache, because the last thing I wanted was to go againstDavid Cameron or the government, I don’t think there is anything else I can do.
“I will be advocating Vote Leave – or whatever the team is called, I understand there are a lot of them – because I want a better deal for the people of this country, to save them money and to take control. That is really what this is all about.”
Downing Street issued a low-key response. A No 10 spokesman said: “Our message to everyone is we want Britain to have the best of both worlds: all the advantages of the jobs and investment that come with being in the EU, without the downsides of being in the euro and open borders.”
Essentially, many in Britain think that their nation’s membership in the European Union costs more than it’s worth. The increasing regulatory regime of the EU is threatening the British economy. What’s aggravating the issue is the migrant crisis in mainland Europe where their lenient migrant policies are creating huge costs and problems for which the EU wants nations like Britain to pay.
Remember that it was only in 2014 that there was a huge national debate in Britain about Scotland cleaving from Britain and becoming an independent nation again. A big part of that debate centered around Scots’ desire to join the EU as an independent nation and reap the perceived benefits that smaller, poorer nations enjoy with their EU membership. In that vote, the Scots agreed to stay part of Britain, but it wasn’t a landslide (55% to 45%). Now all of those same Scots will vote on EU membership.
Britain won’t vote until June 23rd. It’s going to be a long, passionate debate.
