Interesting development this evening Dr Liam Fox MPVerified account @LiamFox 1h1 hour ago BREAKING: Our negotiators have just initialled a trade agreement with Iceland & Norway for the European Economic Area. This is the 2nd biggest agreement we're rolling over and trade with EEA is worth nearly £30bn. This is on top of the agreement we’ve signed with Liechtenstein. https://twitter.com/LiamFox
It's quite good he's managed a deal with Iceland though, they have a smashing range of Indian food with all the sides, it's certainly going to set minds at rest
There are massive avacado farms in Spain, Channel 4 (BBC extreme) did a programme on them, for the grower a no deal Brexit would be catastophic for a whole region of fruit and veg growers. Will their governments/EU let this happen?
Which is the expected reply but, I do wonder how many were holding back till they thought it had run its course through fear of pissing off the eu. If they were holding back, then I wonder if a rush will now happen as other countries see oodles of cash waiting to be grabbed through business? A roll over deal with the eea is no small cookie and I do wonder if the deal after Bercow killing things off in parliament, is just coincidental in it's timing or timed with some knowledge?
I was looking at it like this. No one can think of planning Brexit until the people have voted for it. If they do then they are planning a theoretical outcome. The EU won't negotiate Brexit until the letter to leave has been served (which introduces the deadline). Without the letter its still all very theoretical. If you have the vote the send the letter then we don't want to vote on it again. TB
Interesting article: Meanwhile, the EU’s other showdown with a democratic European state is going badly wrong. The Swiss are holding out against the hegemony of the European Court and an attempt to gut their national sovereignty. Switzerland is facing an excruciating squeeze. Its old bilateral accords with the EU are no longer deemed acceptable. Brussels wants to shut down the idiosyncratic “Swiss model” once and for all. The country has until the end of June to submit to the EU’s new framework agreement, or see its trading and financial access progressively cut off. “They were given a six-month ultimatum in December,” said Pieter Cleppe from Open Europe in Brussels. “If the EU carries out its threat, Switzerland will see its market access revoked.” The Swiss must accept the sweeping jurisdiction of the ECJ and “dynamic alignment” of EU legislation over migration, social security rules, and other key areas of policy. But Swiss direct democracy will have its say. There will almost certainly have to be a public consultation. Voters are likely to reject the deal in its current form. A collapse of the Swiss deal would not pose a major threat to the EU in itself – though it would hurt German firms with intimate links to the Swiss engineering and machine tool sector. The greater issue is geostrategy. Brussels has to manage its near abroad with care. Relations with Vladimir Putin’s Russia broke down over Ukraine. Erdoğan’s Turkey is deeply alienated, dislikes its EU customs arrangement and is drifting into the Putin camp. Norway has been dragged kicking and screaming into the EU’s Third Energy Package. It is hard to estimate how much damage has been done to future relations with Britain by the hard-nosed negotiating tactics of the Commission, which has taken full advantage of the cliff-edge pressure points of the Article 50 process. The fateful decision to weaponise the Irish border as a way to lever the UK into the customs territory – under ECJ control – will have strategic consequences. This is risky statecraft for the Brussels. Much friendship is being sacrificed on the altar of the EU acquis.
Feckin Hell @gliddofglood you did not tell us you were joining us Forum Brexiteers: Forum Remoaners: Glids Bandwagon: Numbers depicted are correct in percentage terms for visual purposes
Indeed, but the statement was that we wouldn’t have any avocados, not that Spain would be knee deep in them.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-b...elays-eu-exit-by-a-year-the-sun-idUKKCN1QZ2OI Sack them. The ERG have caused enough grief. 2019, not the year of Brexit, the year the Tory party finally implodes. Idiots. They will end up with a Corbyn government. Brexit deal would be anybodies guess under him.
Very interesting that Norweigen media say Liam Fox is not telling the truth. "Norwegian media reports that the agreement of today only covers tariffs in the event of no deal. That is very far from a roll-over of the current EEA arrangement, which includes services, capital, non-tariff barriers etc."
any link for context on that norwegian claim? why sack the only group who wanted the deal voted for, to be applied?
