10 hours ago, sandyf said:

Not surprising when you look at the size of the brexit department. Its only going to get better as they take on the additional staff for drafting all the new paperwork, customs control etc etc. 

With all the farming, NHS and service industry vacancies that will be available shortly there should also be huge savings to be made on closing Jobcentres.

At least they could streamline that archaic system. 

Something I didn't know was that Estonia went from virtually no health service to a fully functional digital health service since joining the EU, but UK still wallows in the murky victorian administration systems -- as does France, if it makes folks feel a bit better.  :)

It's a good example of what the EU was meant to do, but it is remarkable only because it's the only one.

Britain will attempt to offset Brexit cost with €150 billion worth of European Union assets

Michel Barnier, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, is understood to be preparing a list of up to £51bn of liabilities.

An independent think tank in Brussels has already estimated that Britain's assets could be worth almost £130bn.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/02/16/britain-will-attempt-offset-brexit-cost-150-billion-worth-european/

7 minutes ago, SheungWan said:

Please don't confuse the accretion of vaporings from nonsense websites with any systematic study of history.

You'll need to be more specific before I can reply.  There are plenty of sources of history and the only variance is when they start to speculate about intentions and opinions.  Historical facts are pretty much irrefutable.

The point about history is well made.  Every politician should be made to pass a tough history exam before being allowed to stand     The thing about history is that it is a strong indicator.  Germany's history is of being rebuilt on UK and US money, not spending any substantial amount on defence, and joining all the clubs but not paying their dues.   Schauble's recent outburst is another glimpse of what is actually going on in their heads, and DT's commentary about NATO funding serves to highlight Germany very well.  Now are they waiting for the EU to have it's own army so that Germany can get away without paying more than token membership?

9 minutes ago, pitrevie said:

Not sure how I was able to display it but this in part is what is said.

 

Peugeot offered Nissan-style Brexit promises to save Vauxhall

The British government has offered the potential new owners of the Vauxhall car plants in the UK assurances similar to those given to Nissan in an effort to save thousands of jobs. The Japanese carmaker was persuaded last year to expand its operations in Sunderland after the government offered it a package of measures designed to shield it from the impact of Brexit. These included support for electric car development and incentives for suppliers to locate to the area. The measures were designed to ensure that trading conditions at the Nissan plant would not change after Britain had left the EU, the company was told.

 

Thanks ---  Sounds like business as usual for a government making attractive offers to employers.  UK jobless is well down now, isn't it?  It'd be nice to keep it that way.

5 minutes ago, pitrevie said:

https://www.ft.com/content/3137c028-f517-11e6-8758-6876151821a6

 

Paywall.... 

1 minute ago, SheungWan said:

You have to be on FT Sub Breaking News or maybe Twitter feed to pick this up as only released in last few minutes.

Ah -- ok --  I'll wait for the daily mail to carry the story....  hehe!!  :)

5 minutes ago, SheungWan said:

Peugeot offered Nissan-style Brexit promises to save Vauxhall, reports the FT in Breaking News.

Link?

20 minutes ago, hugocnx said:

May I kindly correct you. Better have left 'obviously' out. 

Not at all -- his idiocy has been highlighted many times now.... 

5 minutes ago, sanukjim said:

The US pays 70% of the cost of NATO. NATO was set up as a defense to Communist USSR or any other regime from invading Europe . In the last century it has cost The US billions of dollars and the deaths of many Americans going to defend The UK and Others after they could not defend  them self's..

NATO is/has been deployed in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, and others where the "defence of Europe" would be highly questionable.  USA gets to park it's domestic defence missiles in Europes backyard, making it the target of first strike. There's no easy answer to all this while the EU - as a non-nation - can not pass a simple trade deal with Canada in less than 3 years.  Once UK gets out of EU, and the Eu reforms to be a properly federated Germany, then NATO might well become redundant.  When was the last time anyone saw a big bureaucracy being dissassembled and it's funding clearly being used for the more immediate needs of the country?

1 minute ago, Shaksey said:

How is perpetually bankrupt Greece managing to spend 2.38% of it's GDP on defence?!?

Maybe it's a negative number?  hehe!!   

2 minutes ago, Baerboxer said:

 

Germany and some others have for very many years not met their NATO spend obligations. Now Merkel says they might. How nice of her, but of course no mention of all those missing spend amounts being paid up.

 

Germany economy - good when spending others money.

So true.  Germany doesn't contribute it's weight in anything external.  Nato. UN, EUPol, etc etc all have a hole where the german contribution should be.  UK picks up the EU slack, US picks up NATO's slack, etc, etc  But Germany's economy is booming, excellent roads and rails-links, good social services, etc. 

2 minutes ago, anotheruser said:

 

Looking at the article the USA is paying 3.61% of it's GDP. The recommended amount it seems to be 2%. So the USA over pays by 273,700,000,000 (1.61% of 17 trillion) every year. That is no small amount. The USA could effectively pay off it's the national debt in a decade with that kind of money. 

 

Even if everybody paid the recommended percentage the USA would still have the highest burden because it has by far the highest GDP. These numbers are disgraceful and I just can't imagine how anybody can justify this. If Trump could do one worthwhile thing correcting this immediately would be the one I would like to see. 

 

I hope my math was right as I am not used to dealing in billions and trillions. 

 USA now pays 650Billion and that represents 3.61%.  If they only paid their 2%, that would be

650 / 3.61 x 2 = 360 This gives the USA 290 billion to play with.

US national debt is quickly heading towards 20 trillion -  so it'd take 69 years to clear the current national debt......

57 minutes ago, hawker9000 said:

It's all meaningless if all the members fail to see the value of contributing their fair share. The same is true of the UN. Everyone else constantly belly-aching about "US leadership", but when the hat's getting passed they're all of a sudden afflicted with chronic followeritis... Putin's dreams of a resurrected Russian empire aren't going to be overcome by the US paying everyone else's bills. If Europe is determined to play the deadbeat, the US is going to have to cut the cord. Better sooner than later.

Don't forget that USA relies on friendly European countries to park their first-line missiles pointing straight into the heart of Russia, with about 25% of the flight time of US based missiles.

10 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

Canada? Strategically it's worth 1% GDP just having that huge landmass between the US and Russia in securing the Northwest Passage.

I agree with Junker that other security factors should count towards contribution of security and especially America's global security needs. But in the final analysis, NATO is about collective security (aka block) and not about individual security. It's more than about money. It's about the "synergy of the whole that is greater than the sum of its parts."

http://www.tewealth.com/the-whole-is-greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts/

 

Putin understands the value of security synergies as a KGB agent in the former USSR and now as PM as he seeks to rebuild the USSR. He knows the value of a security bloc and the security challenge Russia faces with a strong and united NATO. America should not help Putin weaken NATO.

 

 

 

There's a huge difference.  Russia has not gone "abroad" to get new members of it's block.  They have traditionally relied on a solid landmass of russian interest.  NATO, otoh, is a disparate and sometimes argumentative group of independent countries only held together in NATO because of their mutual dislike of the russian block -- thought even that is fragile, given Turkey cosying up to Putin now....

5 minutes ago, Orac said:

Looks like there is finally something being done to get everyone to pull together to get brexit sorted by having someone slightly less popular than Garry Glitter spearhead a pro-EU stance.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-38996179

Good grief !  Not him again!!  Fortunately he'll only be talking to the remain disciples, and being paid handsomely for his evenings "work".  Certainly a good chance for TM to drag out some skeletons......

14 minutes ago, nontabury said:

 You mean to the Antonine Wall. If so would that mean returning Edinburgh to the Kingdom of Northumbria? Leaving where as the capital of Scotland.

No -- down to the Fosse way -- the original demarcation between north and south....

11 minutes ago, USPatriot said:

More reasons the UN should be disbanded.

 

The western countries support it with money and the others do not. Yet they are given a voice

This is about NATO -- do try to keep up

http://money.cnn.com/2016/07/08/news/nato-summit-spending-countries/

31 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Please no! The EU leadership has stuffed up the EU countries and if they start interfering with other countries they are just going to stuff them up too.

They'll probably try to get other western nations to take lots of those illegal immigrants trying to get into Europe because of Merkel, despite it being apparent ( to all that can see ) that their policy is causing chaos in the EU.

So true - given the way EU is governed.  Matters relating to member countries foreign policy are not under the jurisdiction of the EU, so Schauble is advocating a massive step towards a federalised europe ( with Germany in charge, of course...)

Nice to hear that Junckers is getting a taste of his own medicine.  He was the guy who wanted to dictate the terms of Brexit to the UK.  Fortunately he's leaving his EU job and will not be a part of any negotiations with NATO, Brexit, etc, etc.