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[fireplace22] 19/11/2018 08:57

May is a fantasist, if I were her family I'd be concerned for her mental health now. To actually believe this agreement can go the distance in face of the opposition from all sides is delusional, that fact that her presence is preventing either modification of the agreement or the discussion of alternatives must be close to treasonable. Admittedly removing the PM will cause more upheaval but the woman is a danger to herself and the country.

[grannyboy] 19/11/2018 08:49

That letter NEEDS sending to EVERY treacherous MP in this country..And if there is some spare, to the likes of brucie and cohorts !!!

[davidosh] 19/11/2018 00:59

Here is the full two day programme schedule for MelloLondon including some excellent and highly respected keynote speakers



It is jam packed full of about 75 company presentations, lots of top quality speakers and panel sessions plus workshops to help with investment style and techniques etc.

The pre event fun starts on the Sunday evening with a dinner and investor quiz hosted by John Lee but the main conference begins on Monday 26th November at 9am through to Tuesday 27th in the evening so do come and join us as there are still 97 tickets left...



See you there.

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 23:54

Tony Abbott: How to save Brexit

Britain has nothing to fear from no deal

It’s pretty hard for Britain’s friends, here in Australia, to make sense of the mess that’s being made of Brexit. The referendum result was perhaps the biggest-ever vote of confidence in the United Kingdom, its past and its future. But the British establishment doesn’t seem to share that confidence and instead looks desperate to cut a deal, even if that means staying under the rule of Brussels. Looking at this from abroad, it’s baffling: the country that did the most to bring democracy into the modern world might yet throw away the chance to take charge of its own destiny.

Let’s get one thing straight: a negotiation that you’re not prepared to walk away from is not a negotiation — it’s surrender. It’s all give and no get. When David Cameron tried to renegotiate Britain’s EU membership, he was sent packing because Brussels judged (rightly) that he’d never actually back leaving. And since then, Brussels has made no real concessions to Theresa May because it judges (rightly, it seems) that she’s desperate for whatever deal she can get.

The EU’s palpable desire to punish Britain for leaving vindicates the Brexit project. Its position, now, is that there’s only one ‘deal’ on offer, whereby the UK retains all of the burdens of EU membership but with no say in setting the rules. The EU seems to think that Britain will go along with this because it’s terrified of no deal. Or, to put it another way, terrified of the prospect of its own independence.

But even after two years of fearmongering and vacillation, it’s not too late for robust leadership to deliver the Brexit that people voted for. It’s time for Britain to announce what it will do if the EU can’t make an acceptable offer by March 29 next year — and how it would handle no deal. Freed from EU rules, Britain would automatically revert to world trade, using rules agreed by the World Trade Organization. It works pretty well for Australia. So why on earth would it not work just as well for the world’s fifth-largest economy?

A world trade Brexit lets Britain set its own rules. It can say, right now, that it will not impose any tariff or quota on European produce and would recognise all EU product standards. That means no border controls for goods coming from Europe to Britain. You don’t need to negotiate this: just do it. If Europe knows what’s in its own best interests, it would fully reciprocate in order to maintain entirely free trade and full mutual recognition of standards right across Europe.

Next, the UK should declare that Europeans already living here should have the right to remain permanently — and, of course, become British citizens if they wish. This should be a unilateral offer. Again, you don’t need a deal. You don’t need Michel Barnier’s permission. If Europe knows what’s best for itself, it would likewise allow Britons to stay where they are.

Third, there should continue to be free movement of people from Europe into Britain — but with a few conditions. Only for work, not welfare. And with a foreign worker’s tax on the employer, to make sure anyone coming in would not be displacing British workers.

Fourth, no ‘divorce bill’ whatsoever should be paid to Brussels. The UK government would assume the EU’s property and liabilities in Britain, and the EU would assume Britain’s share of these in Europe. If Britain was getting its fair share, these would balance out; and if Britain wasn’t getting its fair share, it’s the EU that should be paying Britain.

Finally, there’s no need on Britain’s part for a hard border with Ireland. Britain wouldn’t be imposing tariffs on European goods, so there’s no money to collect. The UK has exactly the same product standards as the Republic, so let’s not pretend you need to check for problems we all know don’t exist. Some changes may be needed but technology allows for smart borders: there was never any need for a Cold War-style Checkpoint Charlie. Irish citizens, of course, have the right to live and work in the UK in an agreement that long predates EU membership.

Of course, the EU might not like this British leap for independence. It might hit out with tariffs and impose burdens on Britain as it does on the US — but WTO rules put a cap on any retaliatory action. The worst it can get? We’re talking levies of an average 4 or 5 per cent. Which would be more than offset by a post-Brexit devaluation of the pound (which would have the added bonus of making British goods more competitive everywhere).

UK officialdom assumes that a deal is vital, which is why so little thought has been put into how Britain might just walk away. Instead, officials have concocted lurid scenarios featuring runs on the pound, gridlock at ports, grounded aircraft, hoarding of medicines and flights of investment. It’s been the pre-referendum Project Fear campaign on steroids. And let’s not forget how employment, investment and economic growth ticked up after the referendum.

As a former prime minister of Australia and a lifelong friend of your country, I would say this: Britain has nothing to lose except the shackles that the EU imposes on it. After the courage shown by its citizens in the referendum, it would be a tragedy if political leaders go wobbly now. Britain’s future has always been global, rather than just with Europe. Like so many of Britain’s admirers, I want to see this great country seize this chance and make the most of it.

Tony Abbott served as Prime Minister of Australia from 2013 to 2015

[maxk] 18/11/2018 18:32

I suspect Mr Cooke of the Beckenham Conservatives has been sniffing the local air, and can smell the electoral disaster heading their way.

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 18:05

A disastrous Brexit deal has followed a disastrous General Election because Theresa May simply will not listen - she is acting like an unelected EU technocrat thinking she can do what she wants without consequences.

I am surprised that May likened herself to her 'hero' Geoffrey Boycott at her press conference.

On the fourth day of the second Test against New Zealand in 1978, Geoffrey Boycott wasn’t after the quick runs required to win but seemed more interested in improving his own Test average.

After two English wickets fell, the Captain sent in Botham with the instruction to deliberately run Boycott out. According to cricket folklore, the livid Boycott cried: “What have you done, what have you done?”

Botham’s response, apparently, was “I’ve run you out, you c---”.

“I couldn’t look at him,” Botham later added. “I cracked up and had to go for a walk around the back of the umpire.”

Is Raab a modern day Botham?


Letter to Telegraph editor from Chairman of Beckenham Conservatives

Sir – I have now have come to the reluctant conclusion that Theresa May has to go. The reason is very simple.

The farce of the last unnecessary and disastrous general election was caused by her listening almost exclusively to her now disgraced special advisers, rather than to the Cabinet, her MPs, the party or election specialists. She said she had learnt her lesson. She clearly hasn’t.

Brian Cooke
Chairman, Beckenham Conservatives
Beckenham, Kent

[alphorn] 18/11/2018 17:52

MT - why do preface everything with brilliant, magnificent etc etc. When I see that I read no further. A pity because some of your posts are worth reading.


You often talk of facts this and facts that - well, a suggestion, take out the emotions.

[taurusthebear] 18/11/2018 17:03

"No-deal Brexit could lead to loss of Mars bars within days".

LOL

[7kiwi] 18/11/2018 15:50

Martin Howe dissects the Brexit deal.

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 15:46

Serratia - 'One for the hi-fi guys.

Speaker cables. It has been shown that electrical resistivity plays a roll in sound quality. Shorter and thicker copper cables improve performance. I've recently seen a paper on coating copper wire with Graphene. In terms of ohms.m if copper is taken as 100%, silver is 95% and Graphene 60%. I woner if Graphene coated copper cables would improve the performance?'


Nerve hearing like eyesight and athletic performance deteriorates exponentially with age. Recently had hearing tests which showed i have experienced a drop off in nerve hearing consistent with most people of my age group - the deterioration however, is nowhere near the level that would normally require the use of hearing aids.

However, after discussing with a private sector ENT surgeon as to whether hearing aids might improve what i hear when listening to music, i went ahead and put an order in for two programmable digital in-ear aids.

Have a mid range B&W CM Series speaker system - the results with the aids in have been remarkable - while not cheap the £3k digital aids have proved a very good 'hi-fi' upgrade. Likewise, watching TV - have been able to materially lower the volume level because the speech clarity has significantly improved with the aids.

And yet my hearing loss is not even close to the level the wider medical profession considers likely to benefit from wearing aids!

[alphorn] 18/11/2018 15:21

I am getting fed up with these regurgitated arguments for and against and what type of Brexit, if at all, that we shall have.

I shall therefore go back to trying to profit out of it personally. Long, short or whatever it takes.

I don't like politics and rarely has there been such a time that politics could cause so much damage.

[grannyboy] 18/11/2018 15:10

Yes and there will also be 2-3 million EX Labour voters only too happy now to vote for a true Brexit party, and I say in the single plural, we don't want more than one, so dilution is avoided....And who will stay with the party..unlike the last time, voters putting their faith in the establishment pro eu parties, only to be badly let down...

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 15:01

Tories are rapidly losing electoral support following May's EU capitulation BRINO MINUS stitch up.

Worryingly for the Tories, UKIP's popularity has rocketed over the last few weeks - now back up to 9% - and that's before Farage, who said today he is seriously considering returning to front line politics via UKIP or a new party re-enters the fray.

May and her Tory remainers, none of whom have accepted Brexit, are clearly in Farage's sights - and with most of UKIP's vote and that of Farage whatever route he takes coming from hugely angry Tories - the electoral impact is likely to be devastating for the Tory Party and its MP's at the next election.

86% of Express readers in a huge poll castigated May's BRINO stitch-up.

Looking forward to meeting my Brexit voting MP next Friday for a further update!

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 14:37

Brucie - as pointed out to you at the time, the challenge for you was to do what i have done over the last 18 months - post YOUR research on a number of companies you have invested serious amounts of money in for us to consider - so that we can monitor the performance over the next 18 months and judge your stock-picking talents for ourselves.

The Board still awaits with interest your first research - hopefully it will be of a much better quality than your highly embittered posts deriding the fact, your side failed to convince the Nation of the hugely questionable merits of remaining in a totally undemocratic federal superstate in the latter stages of development that before the referendum saw the compulsive liar Nick Clegg tell the Nation that he had been told by the Head of the European Commission no less (another self confessed liar), that the idea of a EU army is a "dangerous fantasy"!

The rest as they say is game set and Brexit!


The Tories should replace May and go to the Country promising to deliver what the UK electorate voted for in the Referendum - it would likely win them a landslide victory with daylight second. Why?

The breathtakingly arrogant EU back seat driven by their German handlers and London Remainer advisors has made the fatal mistake of p*ssing off most of the UK electorate over the last two years with their total intransigence and sheer rudeness.

A General Election with a party offering what the electorate voted for in the referendum - a Clean Break from the control of an organisation run by a Commission where not a single one of them has been elected or can be got rid of would be a highly attractive proposition in today's political climate.

More and more people have become aware over the last 2 years that the EU is in fact totally undemocratic - hugely deluded remainers in the 30% of Tory constituencies and 40% of Labour Constituencies that did't vote to Leave the EU might like being run by an unelected Commission (Dictatorship) comprising mostly of ex Communists - the UK electorate after 43 years of being prevented from having a say in the matter said No Thank-you after finally being given the chance (thanks Nigel) - preferring, like the late Tony Benn, to be governed by people we can get rid of in elections.

The EU has subjugated 500 million citizens - who now have no say in who Governs them after the EU removed all traces of Democracy from its institutions as it moved relentlessly towards its end target - a Federal Superstate run by an unelected Bureaucracy of third rate multi millionaire public sector workers most of whom have never done a days work in the private sector in their lives.

[brucie5] 18/11/2018 13:51

MT, re. "The puppet masters, the Germans", it didn't take long did it..?

Showing your true colours. But in future don't accuse me of selective memory, please. Your xenophobic excuses are very clear. Personally, I find them rather distasteful, which is why I find it worthwhile challenging your more egregious lies. Are they even generational? No, I think they're just lazy.

The Eden vs. TXP side bet was really just to test that hypothesis: would you ever actually admit to being mistaken or wrong, even if the evidence was before you.

Your response is laughable. Which is why I now return you to filter, my friend. But I will endeavour to keep you updated on our little competition. Is that all right?

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 13:17

Good to hear from you again Pendragon2 - a great critique - thanks.

Hopefully you got out of Dryships long before the Class Action Lawsuits start flying in New York.

[pendragon2] 18/11/2018 13:11

Haven't posted here for a while, so just a word or two about the view from Schloss Pend.

A.
1. Referendums are a really bad idea. That Cameron should have embarked on the whole Brexit notion as a way of keeping the Conservative backbenchers in order ought to be regarded as a failure of historic proportions.
2. Second referendums only make matters worse, by discrediting the political process.
3. A three way referendum will never give a clear majority unless the issue is so clear cut that there was no point having a referendum in the first place.

If the government reneges on Brexit, it will symbolise the death of democracy in the UK.

B.
The EU has changed considerably since the UK referendum. A generation of amateurish (Macron), petty (Austria) and unpleasant (Hungary/Czecho/Poland) leaders are now running the show. Merkel is jumping ship from a completely useless government by coalition of the unable in Germany, who will be followed at some point by complete unknowns. Don't be deceived by the German Greens, they are now a party of business, bio supermarkets, landowners and windmill-makers. And who will succeed the much despised Juncker and able but thwarted Tusk?

Do you, or anyone you know, want your sons/daughters/grandchildren to be enlisted in a Euro-Army?

Be careful what you wish for.

C. The EU only has four areas of competence, however there are plenty of influential people whose careers are deeply bound up with Brussels. whether in government, local government, or business and industry, the tax evaders and the consultants, so they can all be expected to put themselves first when it comes to opinions about being in or out and I'm sure they'll turn out to march as remainers till the day their jobs disappear.

1. The Euro and ECB - UK well out of that sinking ship;
2. The Schvengen travel area - starting to decay, the UK never in;
3. Ag and Fish policy - bad news all round, UK well out of it;
4. The Single Market - a set of tariff and quotias creating a barrier to open world trade as part of a fortress europe policy. Lots of countries have trade successfully with the EU without being members.

Ask yourselves whether tariffs serve any fiscal purpose in economies with VAT type turnover taxes, apart from creating high prices for selected products - merely a barrier to imports.

Far from being a single market, the EU consists of 28 territories each with different tax arrangements, wage agreements which only serve to widen the gap between member states, while immense contrasts in social provisions (health, housing, education and pensions) make the gap an unbridgeable gulf. In 40 years there has been no progress on those questions of policy.

Can I recommend that you all start discussing what staying in the EU will really mean. Think about things industry by industry, business by business, policy by policy. I doubt if either left or right in the UK would like what is on offer.

Quite honestly, I don't think Barnier's brief was to negotiate an agreement - the EU really do not want the UK to leave because it threatens to undermine the whole project. The business about the Irish border is a red herring.

Sitting here in Berlin, I feel as frustrated with the situation as everyone else.
We really do have a dreadfully incompetent generation of politicians.

I find it difficult to believe that the left end up with a Corbin and the right have sought out someone like Mrs. May as their leader, neither of whom was ever a high flier.

enjoy the weekend,

pend.

[mount teide] 18/11/2018 13:00

Brilliant critique of the corrupt and venal EU Commission by Professor David Blake at the Cass Business School:


'Every day brings a new example of the EU’s failure to negotiate Brexit in good faith.

Refusing to agree how financial services should be conducted, despite the UK’s offer to allow EU firms based in the UK to continue trading as before. Being not prepared to grant import certificates to UK organic farmers until after Brexit, when there be a nine-month waiting period. Threatening to stop our aircraft from taking off and blocking Eurostar trains from entering the Channel tunnel.

The EU is revealing itself to be little better than an aggressive bully when it does not get its way. Then there’s the gameplaying, with Michel Barnier promising us the best ever trade deal one day and withdrawing the offer the day after. Now they want to tie us indefinitely into the Customs Union and Single Market to preserve the Good Friday agreement when the reality is that in the case of no deal, the EU would instruct the Irish Republic to impose a hard customs border with Northern Ireland.

The EU’s attitude to the Brexit negotiations more than justifies our decision to leave. But there are ten much bigger reasons.


One: The EU is fundamentally protectionist
Big business lobbies Brussels for more regulations to make it more difficult for small companies to enter the market and compete. The Customs Union, to which all EU member states belong, imposes more than 13,000 tariffs on imported goods. As a result, EU consumers are paying an average of 17 per cent above world prices on food.

The Single Market is a single protectionist zone where regulations are harmonised and all goods and services produced must satisfy these regulations whether or not they are sold in other member states. Only 6 per cent of UK companies trade with the EU – accounting for around 12 per cent of Gross Domestic Product – yet 100 per cent of UK regulations are determined in Brussels, including for the 94 per cent of UK companies that do not trade with the EU.

The UK, in particular, has seen little economic benefit from the Single Market. UK goods exports to the 11 fellow founding members of the Single Market have grown over the years 1993-2015 at just 1 per cent pa. Over the same period, UK goods exports to the 111 countries with which it trades under World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules have grown at 2.88 per cent pa, nearly three times faster.

This helps to explain why UK trade with the EU has fallen from 60 per cent to 44 per cent since the Single Market was introduced. Services account for 80% of the UK economy but only 40% of the UK’s service exports go to the EU, amounting to just 5% of GDP. The result is a £28bn services surplus but a £95bn goods deficit with the EU, leaving an overall £67bn trade deficit in 2017. Even strong supporters of the EU, like the Financial Times’ Wolfgang Münchau, concede that the Single Market is "not visible in the macro statistics…. the data are telling us a different story – that the Single Market is a giant economic non-event, for both the EU and the UK".

Two: The EU's major waste
Brussels seriously misallocates resources. Take the EU Budget: 40 per cent goes to farmers, mostly to the richest farmers with the largest farms. Yet agriculture accounts for only 1 per cent of GDP across the EU. The Common Agricultural Policy encourages overproduction.

We used to have wine lakes and butter mountains. Now we have the surplus production being dumped in overseas markets. A current example is the dumping of tinned tomatoes in Africa, in particular Ghana, which leads to a significant distortion to the local market and a reduction in the income of Ghanaian tomato farmers.

Three: The EU is fundamentally anti-democratic
A whole range of European leaders have made abundantly clear the EU's political agenda, such as Jean Monnet:

"Europe's nations should be guided towards the super-state without their people understanding what is happening. This can be accomplished by successive steps, each disguised as having an economic purpose, but which will eventually and irreversibly lead to federation"

And Jean-Claude Juncker: "There can be no democratic choice against the European Treaties".

Four: The meddling ECJ
The ‘purposiveR17; nature of EU law allows the European Court of Justice to interpret and reinterpret the wording of EU laws in line with the European Commission’s (often changing) intentions.

This contrasts with the clarity and precision of English laws. A further issue relates to the EU legal convention that everything is prohibited unless it is permitted, which requires constant appeals to the ECJ to grant permission. This contrasts with the English common law tradition where everything is permitted unless it is prohibited.


Five: The folly of the euro
Introducing the euro across a group of countries whose economies were so disparate that the operation of a single monetary policy with a single Eurozone interest rate was inevitably going to lead to a pattern of booms and busts in the peripheral states when the interest rate is set to meet the needs of core economies, such as Germany.

In addition, the way in which exchange rates were fixed at the start of monetary union resulted in Germany joining at too low an exchange rate, while the peripheral countries joined at too high an exchange rate. This inevitably led to the mainly northern members of the Eurozone, especially Germany, building up large trade surpluses and the southern members, such as Italy and Spain, building up corresponding deficits.

This, in turn, has encouraged capital flight from Italy and Spain to Germany by savers fearful of the solvency of their banks. The deficits building up in Target2, the Eurozone payments system, by Italy and Spain are so serious that it is very likely that the Eurozone will implode – and do so sooner rather than later. In the meantime, the southern member states are stuck in a permanent Japanese-style deflation trap.

Six: Being shackled to the EU corpse
The EU's population is ageing, resulting from a combination of rising life expectancy and declining fertility.

Europe’s share of the world’s population will fall from 7 per cent today to 4 per cent by 2100 and 90 per cent of global economic growth over this period will occur outside the EU. Douglas Carswell, the former MP for Clacton, likened the UK’s membership of the EU to being "shackled to a corpse".

Seven: EU's numerous separatist movements
The EU has inadvertently encouraged regional separatist movements to develop in a number of member states in the mistaken belief that these regions can become ‘independent’ members of the EU ‘with a seat at the top table’. Current examples are Scotland, Catalonia and Corsica.

Eight: Increasing Euroscepticism
Rising Euroscepticism in the EU – dismissed as ‘populism̵7; by europhiles – demonstrated by the East/West split over the immigration and internal security crises. The Visegrád Group, comprising the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia, is challenging the authority of Brussels by refusing to accept migrant quotas imposed by Brussels. Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, has said: ‘All the institutions of the EU have utterly failed. Neither the European Commission, nor the European Council, nor the European Parliament protected the Schengen Treaty’.

Nine: Russian rift
The EU has been blamed for the tension between Russia and the Ukraine as a result of its 2014 ‘Association Agreement’ with the Ukraine, which Russia interpreted as an encroachment on its sphere of influence. The Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko described the agreement as Ukraine's ‘first but most decisive step’ towards EU membership’.

Ten: Massive corruption
This is well illustrated by the fact that the EU’s accounts have not been approved for the last 20 years by the EU’s chief auditor in respect of around €100bn of expenditures. Governed as it is from a centre run by unelected bureaucrats and judges rather than politicians, it is readily apparent that the EU is incapable of reforming itself.

As an institution driven by process rather than outcomes, it is drowning in its own rules and this is stifling innovation. It should be clear from the above that remaining in the EU is the high-risk strategy – not leaving it. '


Armed with the above knowledge who in their right mind - other than the Mafia or brain dead, die hard remainers would want to join such an organisation?

[serratia] 18/11/2018 12:32

Some time back we talked about hydroponics. Here's an update -

Lettuce yields by traditional methods are around 4 t/acre, with this system it's 320 t/acre - 80* higher.

hxxps://www.ge.com/reports/lettuce-see-future-pink-leds-whizzy-forklifts-will-power-cutting-edge-indoor-farm/

[7kiwi] 18/11/2018 12:25

ERG Analysis of May's deal is pretty devastating.

What was she thinking? Or wasn't she thinking at all, and just leaving it to Olly Robbins?

[maxk] 18/11/2018 11:08

Cheers 7K

I've nicked it, many thanks.