Au contraire mon frere, Brexit certainly played its role. Several E.U. nations such as France and Germany initiated their own negotiations with Astra Zeneca a month or so after the U.K. finalized their deal with the company. But before they could finalize their deals the European Commission stepped in and said, “Hold up. We need to be in charge of this at an E.U. level.” That delayed negotiations by an additional two months. The U.K. was not constrained in any way.
And now the E.U. is upset with Astra Zeneca because they are honoring contracts in the order in which they were negotiated and received. Comical.
I was talking about the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, because it was the first one we authorised (on 2nd December 2020) before we'd left the EU.
The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine was approved by the UK on 30th December, two days before we left the EU. Again, nothing to do with Brexit.
Other countries could've authorised the vaccines themselves, just as the UK did, using the same legal course as the UK did.
In July 2020, the UK purchased 40m doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. In September 2020, Germany privately ordered 30 million doses, outside the collective EU purchasing scheme.
Basically, both the UK and Germany placed orders before those countries had authorised their use. There was NOTHING stopping Germany from following the same path as the UK, but they CHOSE to join the EU's collective purchasing scheme. They were not forced into it, as evidenced by the fact that the UK - whilst still a member of the EU - was not forced into it.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
Well it’ll be very good for the billionaire elite who needed Britain out of the EU to avoid stiffer business taxes.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
Well it’ll be very good for the billionaire elite who needed Britain out of the EU to avoid stiffer business taxes.
Oh, and racists.
I hate to break this to you, but there are racists on both sides of the argument. Not just the nationalist side.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
My impression has been that it’s bad for everybody, that it’s a collective delusion among older, less educated English (certainly not Scottish) nationalists mourning the long lost empire.
Brexit has been popular among all classes of British society outside of London. It wasn’t just Conservatives who supported it. Jeremy Corbyn of the Labour Party was conspicuously silent when it came to campaigning for the Remain movement.
He really wasn't, the conspicuous silence was the UK media's silence in reporting it. Corbyn went up and down the country campaigning for remain, far more than any prominent Tory.
I'm not at all a Corbyn supporter and never voted for him, but the press treated him abominably, either ignoring his message or focusing exclusively on the worst possible reading, while leaping on any inclarity or slight gaffe with glee.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
My impression has been that it’s bad for everybody, that it’s a collective delusion among older, less educated English (certainly not Scottish) nationalists mourning the long lost empire.
Russia
There's a reason Russia supported Brexit with one of their disinformation campaigns.
What reason is that? You can’t just drop that little nugget without explanation. Unless, of course, you don’t have one and are just talking shit, as usual.
We are now free from restrictions, free from opression, free from daft regulations, and free to do as we please without asking our ‘masters’ in Brussels to permit it.
I hope this vacuous rhetooric gives you comfort next time you're waiting in line in the non-EEU queue at the airport.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
My impression has been that it’s bad for everybody, that it’s a collective delusion among older, less educated English (certainly not Scottish) nationalists mourning the long lost empire.
Russia
There's a reason Russia supported Brexit with one of their disinformation campaigns.
What reason is that? You can’t just drop that little nugget without explanation. Unless, of course, you don’t have one and are just talking shit, as usual.
You don't see why it would be in Russia's interest to destabilise and weaken the EU?
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Spot the socialist, who hates his own county.
Inward investment into the U.K. has reached record levels since the Brexit referendum. Up until the pandemic the businesses have boomed in the U.K.
Brexit certainly didn't hurt its vaccination efforts, considering the disaster that the EU is on that front with its suboptimal common purchasing agreement: the UK leads all major countries of the world, with nearly 20% of its population having got at least one dose. (US is second best -- again among major countries, with ~13%). Plenty of reporting on all this for those interested, so I am not providing cites.
This was possible whilst in the EU, and actually, the deals for the vaccines were done whilst in the EU. Brexit has nothing to do with this. We merely authorised the vaccines first and earlier than the EU. From this article:
Under European law a vaccine must be authorised by the EMA, but individual countries can use an emergency procedure that allows them to distribute a vaccine for temporary use in their domestic market.
Britain is still subject to those EU rules during the post-Brexit transition period which runs until the end of the year (2020).
And its chief executive, Dr June Raine, said on Wednesday that "we have been able to authorise the supply of this vaccine using provisions under European law, which exist until 1 January".
So, nothing to do with Brexit.
Au contraire mon frere, Brexit certainly played its role. Several E.U. nations such as France and Germany initiated their own negotiations with Astra Zeneca a month or so after the U.K. finalized their deal with the company. But before they could finalize their deals the European Commission stepped in and said, “Hold up. We need to be in charge of this at an E.U. level.” That delayed negotiations by an additional two months. The U.K. was not constrained in any way.
And now the E.U. is upset with Astra Zeneca because they are honoring contracts in the order in which they were negotiated and received. Comical.
Is that actually correct? The EU said hold up?
There was bloc negotiation for the entire EU programme and, AFAIK, freedom for member states to negotiate their own supplies too (supposedly at worse rates).
I'll admit to not following much of this as things progressed so it would be nice to know one way or another.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Spot the socialist, who hates his own county.
Inward investment into the U.K. has reached record levels since the Brexit referendum. Up until the pandemic the businesses have boomed in the U.K.
That investment "boom" was entirely focussed on financial services. Basically all other investment was down.
You don't have to be a socialist to recoognise that unbalanced growth in UK financial services serves the rich and corrupt before it serves the everyman.
Besides which, you're talking about before the referendum, but before "Brexit" and actual barriers were erected.
Inward investment into the U.K. has reached record levels since the Brexit referendum. Up until the pandemic the businesses have boomed in the U.K.
"Socialist" isn't the insult you may think it is. Socialism gives us the NHS - medical treatment free at the point of use. No one is made bankrupt in the UK because they can't afford their medical bills (because there are no medical bills).
I don't hate the UK; I just feel that the last ten years of Tory rule have absolutely diminished us, financially and morally. A footballer had to embarrass the government into giving starving kids free meals during term breaks. This government has spent £22bn on a Test & Trace system that doesn't work. The current Chancellor has excluded 2.93 million people from government support following lockdowns that closed businesses, or simply because they weren't on a specific payroll before an arbitrary date. I'm fed up of the governments of this country, not this country.
Up until the pandemic AND with us being in the EU, inward investment hit record levels. What's happening now that we're out of the EU? Well, it's more expensive to manufacture things here because we can't get the parts we need because there's now red tape at the borders. Factories making cars are shutting down until parts arrive. This isn't a good look for a potential Apple Car to be manufactured here. Also, any car made here is now more expensive in the EU thanks to tariffs that didn't exist six weeks ago.
Brexit certainly didn't hurt its vaccination efforts, considering the disaster that the EU is on that front with its suboptimal common purchasing agreement: the UK leads all major countries of the world, with nearly 20% of its population having got at least one dose. (US is second best -- again among major countries, with ~13%). Plenty of reporting on all this for those interested, so I am not providing cites.
This was possible whilst in the EU, and actually, the deals for the vaccines were done whilst in the EU. Brexit has nothing to do with this. We merely authorised the vaccines first and earlier than the EU. From this article:
Under European law a vaccine must be authorised by the EMA, but individual countries can use an emergency procedure that allows them to distribute a vaccine for temporary use in their domestic market.
Britain is still subject to those EU rules during the post-Brexit transition period which runs until the end of the year (2020).
And its chief executive, Dr June Raine, said on Wednesday that "we have been able to authorise the supply of this vaccine using provisions under European law, which exist until 1 January".
So, nothing to do with Brexit.
Rubbish. There was no hint of vaccines when the UK left the EU, which was the 31st January 2020. The deals were made back in summer 2020. The EU took 3 months longer to buy vaccines, a month longer to approve them and the rollout of the ones they have got has been glacial. Typical symptoms of a sluggish bureaucracy. The EU (mostly Germany, who then decided to buy extra vaccines when they saw the EU's terrible mess anyway) leant pretty hard on countries to use their common purchase of and authorisation of vaccines.
People seem to have forgotten about Nissan, who is quite happy with manufacturing in the UK, in fact is positive about it getting an advantage because of Brexit. How inconvenient.
Oh, and I'm <30, have a degree and voted for brexit. Also inconvenient.
Au contraire mon frere, Brexit certainly played its role. Several E.U. nations such as France and Germany initiated their own negotiations with Astra Zeneca a month or so after the U.K. finalized their deal with the company. But before they could finalize their deals the European Commission stepped in and said, “Hold up. We need to be in charge of this at an E.U. level.” That delayed negotiations by an additional two months. The U.K. was not constrained in any way.
And now the E.U. is upset with Astra Zeneca because they are honoring contracts in the order in which they were negotiated and received. Comical.
Exactly. The EU made a fool of themselves by claiming there were clauses in the contract that guaranteed their supply, then published the confidential agreement that proved there weren't. They also seemed to think they could override contract law by having a company satisfy their orders before the UK because they demanded so, claiming the notion of first come first served didn't exist. Plus they somehow seemed to think they could order vaccines made in the UK to be sent to the EU, forgetting they have no control over the UK anymore, and then caused serious issues in Northern Ireland by trying to invoke a hard border. Ursula von der Layen then tried to claim it was nothing to do with her, causing more fractions within the commission. She was a walking disaster when in the German parliament, and seems she's performing about the same as the head of the EU. Even Juncker criticised her and the commission's actions.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
My impression has been that it’s bad for everybody, that it’s a collective delusion among older, less educated English (certainly not Scottish) nationalists mourning the long lost empire.
Brexit has been popular among all classes of British society outside of London. It wasn’t just Conservatives who supported it. Jeremy Corbyn of the Labour Party was conspicuously silent when it came to campaigning for the Remain movement.
He really wasn't, the conspicuous silence was the UK media's silence in reporting it. Corbyn went up and down the country campaigning for remain, far more than any prominent Tory.
I'm not at all a Corbyn supporter and never voted for him, but the press treated him abominably, either ignoring his message or focusing exclusively on the worst possible reading, while leaping on any inclarity or slight gaffe with glee.
It's well known he was anti-EU. Always has been. No one was convinced by the sudden facade of neutrality, another reason he was so unpopular.
Why then, if he was campaigning for remain as you claim, would he refuse to be drawn in interviews on whether he voted to remain or leave, always claiming it didn't matter what he thought or did?
Brexit certainly didn't hurt its vaccination efforts, considering the disaster that the EU is on that front with its suboptimal common purchasing agreement: the UK leads all major countries of the world, with nearly 20% of its population having got at least one dose. (US is second best -- again among major countries, with ~13%). Plenty of reporting on all this for those interested, so I am not providing cites.
This was possible whilst in the EU, and actually, the deals for the vaccines were done whilst in the EU. Brexit has nothing to do with this. We merely authorised the vaccines first and earlier than the EU. From this article:
Under European law a vaccine must be authorised by the EMA, but individual countries can use an emergency procedure that allows them to distribute a vaccine for temporary use in their domestic market.
Britain is still subject to those EU rules during the post-Brexit transition period which runs until the end of the year (2020).
And its chief executive, Dr June Raine, said on Wednesday that "we have been able to authorise the supply of this vaccine using provisions under European law, which exist until 1 January".
So, nothing to do with Brexit.
Au contraire mon frere, Brexit certainly played its role. Several E.U. nations such as France and Germany initiated their own negotiations with Astra Zeneca a month or so after the U.K. finalized their deal with the company. But before they could finalize their deals the European Commission stepped in and said, “Hold up. We need to be in charge of this at an E.U. level.” That delayed negotiations by an additional two months. The U.K. was not constrained in any way.
And now the E.U. is upset with Astra Zeneca because they are honoring contracts in the order in which they were negotiated and received. Comical.
Is that actually correct? The EU said hold up?
There was bloc negotiation for the entire EU programme and, AFAIK, freedom for member states to negotiate their own supplies too (supposedly at worse rates).
I'll admit to not following much of this as things progressed so it would be nice to know one way or another.
Yes, it is correct (Halfway down here), the Commission leaned on states to go with them instead. Germany also then bought more vaccines anyway when they saw the EU was making an absolute mess of it.
Rubbish. There was no hint of vaccines when the UK left the EU, which was the 31st January 2020.
Yes, we left the EU on 31st January 2020, but we were still in the transitional period to the 31st December 2020 which meant we were still following the rules etc., and that's what I was talking about (and you likely knew that, but it didn't suit your viewpoint).
It's funny how those who voted for Brexit are the same ones who are blaming the EU (that they're happily no longer a part of) for messing up their vaccine rollout, and those who voted to remain are the ones who present the facts.
Brexit certainly didn't hurt its vaccination efforts, considering the disaster that the EU is on that front with its suboptimal common purchasing agreement: the UK leads all major countries of the world, with nearly 20% of its population having got at least one dose. (US is second best -- again among major countries, with ~13%). Plenty of reporting on all this for those interested, so I am not providing cites.
This was possible whilst in the EU, and actually, the deals for the vaccines were done whilst in the EU. Brexit has nothing to do with this. We merely authorised the vaccines first and earlier than the EU. From this article:
Under European law a vaccine must be authorised by the EMA, but individual countries can use an emergency procedure that allows them to distribute a vaccine for temporary use in their domestic market.
Britain is still subject to those EU rules during the post-Brexit transition period which runs until the end of the year (2020).
And its chief executive, Dr June Raine, said on Wednesday that "we have been able to authorise the supply of this vaccine using provisions under European law, which exist until 1 January".
So, nothing to do with Brexit.
Au contraire mon frere, Brexit certainly played its role. Several E.U. nations such as France and Germany initiated their own negotiations with Astra Zeneca a month or so after the U.K. finalized their deal with the company. But before they could finalize their deals the European Commission stepped in and said, “Hold up. We need to be in charge of this at an E.U. level.” That delayed negotiations by an additional two months. The U.K. was not constrained in any way.
And now the E.U. is upset with Astra Zeneca because they are honoring contracts in the order in which they were negotiated and received. Comical.
Is that actually correct? The EU said hold up?
There was bloc negotiation for the entire EU programme and, AFAIK, freedom for member states to negotiate their own supplies too (supposedly at worse rates).
I'll admit to not following much of this as things progressed so it would be nice to know one way or another.
Yes, it is correct (Halfway down here), the Commission leaned on states to go with them instead. Germany also then bought more vaccines anyway when they saw the EU was making an absolute mess of it.
That link is a quite nice summary of the situation but nowhere does it states can't go alone. The EU pushed for a common front with member state participation for the EU plan (with all the negotiating benefits of acting as a bloc) but makes it clear that member states were free to purchase extra doses on their own terms if they saw fit. The fact that four states banded together to order more doses didn't really fall into the spirit of things but that was sorted.
At the moment I don't see this as a planning issue but more of a production issue and that's where the 'contract conflict' arose.
As stated in the article, the EU has one of the best vaccine portfolios in the world AND has more legal weight behind it if something goes wrong with one of the vaccines.
Literally, don't do it. Do not do it. The UK is a terrible place to do business. Brexit has destroyed the many to enrich the minuscule few. The Tory governments of the last ten years have ruined us. Build the Apple Car somewhere else. Please.
Serious question — who is enriched by brexit?
Well it’ll be very good for the billionaire elite who needed Britain out of the EU to avoid stiffer business taxes.
Oh, and racists.
Wrong. We know thanks to the report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission that the racists are in the Labour Party who are anti-Brexit. When we were in the EU, preferential immigration treatment was given to Europeans (ie mainly whites). Now under the new points based immigration system, the same rules apply if a person is from Europe, Africa, Asian, etc. No preferential treatment any more.
Comments
The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine was approved by the UK on 30th December, two days before we left the EU. Again, nothing to do with Brexit.
Other countries could've authorised the vaccines themselves, just as the UK did, using the same legal course as the UK did.
In July 2020, the UK purchased 40m doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.
In September 2020, Germany privately ordered 30 million doses, outside the collective EU purchasing scheme.
Basically, both the UK and Germany placed orders before those countries had authorised their use. There was NOTHING stopping Germany from following the same path as the UK, but they CHOSE to join the EU's collective purchasing scheme. They were not forced into it, as evidenced by the fact that the UK - whilst still a member of the EU - was not forced into it.
Well it’ll be very good for the billionaire elite who needed Britain out of the EU to avoid stiffer business taxes.
I'm not at all a Corbyn supporter and never voted for him, but the press treated him abominably, either ignoring his message or focusing exclusively on the worst possible reading, while leaping on any inclarity or slight gaffe with glee.
Inward investment into the U.K. has reached record levels since the Brexit referendum. Up until the pandemic the businesses have boomed in the U.K.
There was bloc negotiation for the entire EU programme and, AFAIK, freedom for member states to negotiate their own supplies too (supposedly at worse rates).
I'll admit to not following much of this as things progressed so it would be nice to know one way or another.
You don't have to be a socialist to recoognise that unbalanced growth in UK financial services serves the rich and corrupt before it serves the everyman.
Besides which, you're talking about before the referendum, but before "Brexit" and actual barriers were erected.
I don't hate the UK; I just feel that the last ten years of Tory rule have absolutely diminished us, financially and morally. A footballer had to embarrass the government into giving starving kids free meals during term breaks. This government has spent £22bn on a Test & Trace system that doesn't work. The current Chancellor has excluded 2.93 million people from government support following lockdowns that closed businesses, or simply because they weren't on a specific payroll before an arbitrary date. I'm fed up of the governments of this country, not this country.
Up until the pandemic AND with us being in the EU, inward investment hit record levels. What's happening now that we're out of the EU? Well, it's more expensive to manufacture things here because we can't get the parts we need because there's now red tape at the borders. Factories making cars are shutting down until parts arrive. This isn't a good look for a potential Apple Car to be manufactured here. Also, any car made here is now more expensive in the EU thanks to tariffs that didn't exist six weeks ago.
People seem to have forgotten about Nissan, who is quite happy with manufacturing in the UK, in fact is positive about it getting an advantage because of Brexit. How inconvenient.
Oh, and I'm <30, have a degree and voted for brexit. Also inconvenient.
Exactly. The EU made a fool of themselves by claiming there were clauses in the contract that guaranteed their supply, then published the confidential agreement that proved there weren't. They also seemed to think they could override contract law by having a company satisfy their orders before the UK because they demanded so, claiming the notion of first come first served didn't exist. Plus they somehow seemed to think they could order vaccines made in the UK to be sent to the EU, forgetting they have no control over the UK anymore, and then caused serious issues in Northern Ireland by trying to invoke a hard border. Ursula von der Layen then tried to claim it was nothing to do with her, causing more fractions within the commission. She was a walking disaster when in the German parliament, and seems she's performing about the same as the head of the EU. Even Juncker criticised her and the commission's actions.
Why then, if he was campaigning for remain as you claim, would he refuse to be drawn in interviews on whether he voted to remain or leave, always claiming it didn't matter what he thought or did?
At the moment I don't see this as a planning issue but more of a production issue and that's where the 'contract conflict' arose.
As stated in the article, the EU has one of the best vaccine portfolios in the world AND has more legal weight behind it if something goes wrong with one of the vaccines.
When we were in the EU, preferential immigration treatment was given to Europeans (ie mainly whites). Now under the new points based immigration system, the same rules apply if a person is from Europe, Africa, Asian, etc. No preferential treatment any more.