
robbin
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Everything posted by robbin
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alex_b Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > > > It looks like TechUK disagree with you too > (https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/01/31/no_deal_ > brexit_smes/) and they should be pretty expert in > these matters. "Companies are not required to open > existing contracts in order to add these clauses > in ? and that the EU firms are using this as > leverage to renegotiate other elements of the > terms." and also "The legality of SCCs are also > being challenged in the Court of Justice of the > European Union, which poses a potential risk for > firms planning to switch to them." > > Both of these were points I made in my first and > follow up posts. > I'm sure you can find lots of interested groups that would express a different opinion. Check out what the Daily Mail says - I think one of their journalists disagreed with what I have said as well. But, that doesn't make them right. I was basing some of my views on the information produced by the Information Commissioner (and my knowledge of the law)- I would hope the IC has a decent handle on Brexit's effect on information flows, even if I don't. TechUK makes some interesting points but they are often skewed by political views, rather than focussing on the law and the facts. Don't overlook the fact that TechUK is basically a lobbying group for the IT industry. It is also a vocal supporter for 'remain', so although stressing all the problems the UK might have, there is precious little coverage given to the other side of the equation - that EU companies/countries will want/need data to flow just as much as we do, so will be motivated to sort things out. It is that blinkered approach to debate that frustrates me - some of my fellow remainers (i.e. most on EDF, but not those you meet in the real world) obsess over dangers/obstacles as they affect the UK, but will completely ignore the other side's similar problems. To do that is na?ve and ignores the fact that businesses on both sides are motivated to sort things out, whether there is a deal or no deal.
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alex_b Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > robbin Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > > Yet, still TM is at the helm and still she is > > using Oliver Robbins (a civil servant with no > > trade negotiation experience who must have > thought > > the WA was a good idea) in preference to > Crawford > > Falconer, in 'negotiations'. Falconer is the > head > > of UK trade negotiations at the DIT and a very > > experienced trade negotiator. > > The same Crawford Falconer was previously funded > by the Legatum Institute, an opaque 'think thank' > funded at least in part by foreign billionaires > who expect to make significant money by the damage > Brexit will do to the UK economy? At the very > least he has an apparent conflict of interest that > makes him unsuitable to be a UK negotiator. Odd that this notion of conflict hasn't been mentioned before. What is your source for alleging he was 'funded by' the Legatum Institute (also do you say he continues to be funded by them)? On the issue of conflict, are you at all troubled by Olly Robbins having been a member of the Oxford (University) Reform Club - a club that promoted a federal European Union, or is conflict only a conflict if it exists on the side you disagree with? To be clear - I don't care whether it would be Falconer or some other expert in international trade negotiation representing the UK, so long as they are experts and have proper real world experience in trade negotiations. Robbins plainly falls short on that (quite apart from his well known EU federalist leanings). After studying PPE at Oxford he graduated and went straight into the civil service. He's a career Sir Humphrey, yet he is leading this shambles. Does it not concern you that he thought the WA was acceptable (when it plainly wasn't)? Do you not question whether he is the right person to carry on with the shambolic negotiations, having already proved that's the best he could do?
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diable rouge Wrote: > > To be fair, both sides as well as the press and > commentators alike have constantly been referring > to it as 'the deal' for quite some time now. It's > a Withdrawal Agreement, a roadmap if you like for > the 'actual deal' negotiated during the agreed > transition period... Agreed, but the fact remains that it is not a 'deal' in the sense the EU keep suggesting. TM repeatedly referred to it as a 'deal' because of her attempts to blackmail Parliament into accepting it - so it suited her to try to present it as a done deal, when all it was in reality was her (incompetent) idea of what should be acceptable. The press were encouraged to use that language and ran with it. I still remain in a state of extreme frustration coupled with disbelief that anybody with half a brain (and with the benefit of legal advice) could ever have thought what they negotiated in the WA would be anything other than complete economic and political suicide. I read the WA carefully several times, but it was on the first quick scan through that it became readily apparent that it was utter nonsense. I read it more than I needed to, mostly because it was so stupid I thought I must have missed something, so had to keep double checking!
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The EU negotiators must have laughed their heads off when TM agreed the proposed WA - I bet they could hardly believe their luck that they were set against a team of such incompetent negotiators/politicians. Anyone with an ounce of intelligence could see that the WA as drafted completely emasculated any negotiating position the UK would otherwise have, when it came to trying to agree a trade deal. Put simply, the EU could simply not agree a trade deal and the UK would be indefinitely stuck in the EU but without all of the UK's existing rights and exemptions. Hence, no motivation whatsoever for the EU to agree a trade deal and no means at the UK's disposal to force them to do so. Madness, pure madness - even the UK's own legal advice was that this was the ultimate effect of the WA (legal advice supressed until a finding of contempt forced its disclosure). Yet, still TM is at the helm and still she is using Oliver Robbins (a civil servant with no trade negotiation experience who must have thought the WA was a good idea) in preference to Crawford Falconer, in 'negotiations'. Falconer is the head of UK trade negotiations at the DIT and a very experienced trade negotiator. I can't see how it can be a good idea for the same people who previously agreed the now busted/discredited WA to be approaching the EU on a different basis. Apart from their demonstrable incompetence and lack of relevant experience, it would surely be better for different negotiators to take up any new position?
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Alan Medic Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Angelina Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > Dominating talks and negotiating are not the > same > > thing. > > > > They are not negotiating. > > What are you talking about? They agreed a deal > with the UK. What would you like them to do? Actually, Alan, they didn't agree a deal with the UK. The 'deal' you refer to (the WA) was entirely conditional on approval and ratification by UK Parliament and therefore was never a 'deal' in the sense of it being any sort of concluded agreement. It was and is, no more than a proposed deal (which has now been comprehensively rejected by Parliament). The EU continues to refer to it as a deal which is not open for renegotiation, but in truth it is not a deal, because one side has never agreed to it. It is not therefore a matter of re-opening a deal. The EU should just be honest and say they are not prepared to negotiate something new, instead of suggesting there is some sort of binding agreement which the UK is seeking to re-open. The fault may lie with the incompetence of TM and her 'negotiating' team for having signed up to the proposed deal before asking Parliament, but there is no escaping the fact that it was an entirely provisional agreement between the EU and a person who they knew did not have the power to unequivocally conclude an agreement. What I find unacceptably disingenuous on the EU side at the moment, are the sound bites that there will be no further negotiation, coupled with the repeated criticism that the UK has not put forward a concrete proposal. If the EU is truly not prepared to countenance any negotiation (presumably because they want to batter the UK as much as possible whatever the cost to themselves) then why repeatedly ask for concrete proposals from the UK (which they are elsewhere saying would never be the subject of negotiation)? Those appear to be mutually exclusive positions. The real answer lies, I suppose in not taking public statements of negotiating parties at face value and certainly not treating them as fact, as many people appear to do on the EDF.
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John - I'm not really following your point. Is it that the UK will have to keep paying into the EU in a no deal scenario? If so, the reality is set out in the article: "Officials admit they cannot force the UK to make any payments once it has left the bloc, though they hope Britain will take up the offer." Or was your point something different?
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I can see the French being the next to leave the EU. This time last year certainly it appeared that they would have voted to leave had they been given a referendum. If Macron continues to be so woefully bad at running his country as he has been, there might be an even bigger swing to the right or to a populist candidate that would ultimately lead to a referendum there. At least they might get to keep their UN veto, I suppose!
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Treaty commitment to an 'ever closer union', protectionism against non-EU states, pushing for complete membership of a single currency (Eurozone) and for an EU army... Whether you agree with it or not, isn't being a transnational state ('the United States of Europe') what the EU is all about now? The pre-EU days of the EEC single market are long gone. The irony that it will be the EU which imposes a 'hard' border between NI and Eire appears lost on Juncker, Varadkar & co. The EU doesn't care about Ireland - they are a useful pawn in their negotiating strategy. You can pretty much guarantee that if the Irish government fell out of line, the EU would turn on them in an instant in an attempt to try to maintain the backstop con that TM got suckered into.
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jimbo1964 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Oh I see. Being a Ryedale resident with a son of a > mugable age I'm hoping the miscreant is > apprehended or at least takes a long hard look at > himself and decides on another life path. Sadly, if he is happy to physically attack a stranger in the street with the intention of robbing him, the assailant is most unlikely to have a road to Damascus moment unless and until he is caught. OP - I hope your son is ok. What sort of age was the mugger and did your son think he may have had a school uniform under his green coat??
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TE44 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Thanks robbin, I can't see how EMA could continue > without preparing for the changes and uncertainty > of a no deal. The case above Sidhue has mentioned > Seems similiar to what is happening with Peckham > Rye business at this moment. It was mentioned it > was down to the renter to insure themselves. > Wouldn't an organisation like EMA be insured? > The thing about law is it often loses connection > with everyday people in huge cases like this. > There seems to be no room to individually look at > circumstances, where the outcome seems to be > dettered by who is representing you. Not sure I understand what you are saying in your last two sentences. As for insurance, I don't see that it is particularly relevant to whether or not a contract or a lease is frustrated. EMA are taking a punt, given their silly decision to enter into a long and expensive lease with no break clause. They will most likely end up being told they have to perform the contract they freely entered into (which no doubt was entered into with the benefit of legal advice). Then again, I do not know all the relevant facts so can't say for sure. I know what the law is though and EMA's starting point (on the authorities) is not a good one.
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I've seen it argued in relation to leases (but never successfully).
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Sorry, but that's just not right. Frustration is a contractual law concept which is argued quite often but applied sparingly, because of the limitations on its scope. It is certainly not correct to say it has not been applied in a case since 1903! Edited: If you meant to refer only to its applicability to leases, as the article correctly says, the HL in the Panalpina case decided (in 1981) that frustration could apply to leases (albeit rarely) rather than just to covenants. EMA are obviously prepared to take a punt though - or maybe the person (if any) who suggested they sign a long and expensive lease with no break clause is insisting they do!
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JohnL Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > robbin Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > I keep asking myself when it became ok in a > > negotiation, (i) to tell the other side you are > > really scared of certain possible outcomes in > > advance of a deal or (ii) to hand over > concessions > > with nothing in return. Does anyone in the real > > world ever conduct commercial negotiations like > > that? Not in my experience they don't. Quite > why > > all these commercially inexperienced civil > > servants/politicians seem to think that those > are > > competent approaches to a negotiation fails me. > > They are a tank we're a mini that thinks we're a > tank. > > to clarify my comment - we are one country > bargaining with a conglomerate of countries acting > in concert and our plan seemed to be to split them > and they rumbled it. I don't think there was a plan at all (at least not a properly thought out commercially sound one).
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?...The High Court is being asked to decide whether Brexit triggers the rarely used legal doctrine of ?frustration? in the case of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and its ?13m-a-year lease of premises at Canary Wharf, which runs until 2039, with no break clause...? Ha ha - good luck with that, EMA! No break clause - how careless!
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alex_b Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > My understanding is that as an EU member state we > are automatically deemed compliant. When we become > a third country we will need to be assessed by the > European Commission as compliant, but crucially > this cannot take place until we are a third > country. I believe in the current draft withdrawal > agreement has clauses to cover this, but clearly > in the case of no-deal there would be a gap from > the 29th March until such time as the Commission > has made it's assessment. > > Just because we've maintained our standards > doesn't mean that either the Commission will > declare conformance on the 30th March without the > proper review they would do with other third > countries (that would probably be unlawful under > EU and WTO rules) or that they'd necessarily find > conformance (e.g. our domestic surveillance > legislation may be an issue without EUCJ > supervision). > > Of course this may be able to be resolved in the > majority of cases by rewriting every contract with > new GDPR compliant clauses, but this isn't > necessarily possible in the next two months and in > any case may not be agreed by counterparts in > other EU states (who would bear a lot of the risk > if the clauses weren't sufficient). > > As with most of these no-deal problems it isn't > that other countries haven't found ways of > resolving these issues without being part of the > EU, but that those solutions have been built over > time, on lower volumes of trade, with less tightly > linked systems and their alternatives are more > cumbersome and more expensive than the current > relationship we enjoy. It would over time be > possible to minimise the pain of this divergence, > but in a no-deal scenario we would lose many of > the legal agreements we depend on and would need > to replace them with different agreements as a > Third Country. In the interim there is no legal > basis for a lot of cross border activities. Then your understanding is in certain respects wrong. The EU does not need to have completed an adequacy assessment of the UK's (obviously) GDPR compliant position before any personal data can flow - individual users of the data in question will need to show they are GDPR compliant - which as you will have seen over the last year or more has been something of a national obsession and now businesses are compliant (or should be by now). They should be able to satisfy the GDPR issues by amending their contracts, but that is a small issue and can be very quickly taken care of. There are EU compliant (accepted by the EU as compliant) model contractual clauses which can be used for that purpose (or so I understand). There's a handy 'myth-busting' article on the ICO's website should you be a nerd like me. Also, yet again, I note that the concentration on 'problems' arising from this issue is all one way (on EDF -not everywhere). Do you not think the EU as a responsible body looking out for their members' businesses would not want to ensure two way movement of data? I appreciate that (in keeping with the UK's amateurish negotiating stance) the UK has said we are going to accept data flows from the EU to the UK come what may, but things could change on that if the EU is intent upon some sort of a weird scorched earth policy. I can't see any reason why we should just surrender reciprocity and unilaterally agree something without a similar sort of level of grown up cooperation on the same issue from the other side to the negotiation (but then the UK has adopted a shambolic approach to the whole Brexit event, so I suppose we shouldn't be surprised). I keep asking myself when it became ok in a negotiation, (i) to tell the other side you are really scared of certain possible outcomes in advance of a deal or (ii) to hand over concessions with nothing in return. Does anyone in the real world ever conduct commercial negotiations like that? Not in my experience they don't. Quite why all these commercially inexperienced civil servants/politicians seem to think that those are competent approaches to a negotiation fails me.
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Isn't Prince Charles into homeopathy? 'nuff said!
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If a certain brand of cotton wool buds was a few days delayed hitting the Waitrose shelves, you could go out and shout "down with this sort of thing" just to prove you were right! Oh, hang on a minute, with martial law and snipers around every sandbagged corner, you might be best just to post something on tweeter.
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Alex_b wrote: "This is leaving aside no-deal where the loss of GDPR equivalence will make working with European customers essentially impossible overnight." Just interested - why do you think we will lose GDPR equivalence? What about the Data Protection Act 2018 and the EU Withdrawal Act? Also, what would be so difficult for an organisation to incorporate some standard EU approved GDPR compliant clauses (regarding the handling of confidential data)into their contracts? It's not rocket science, particularly for a financial services company with access to lawyers.
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Oh, the suspense!
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TreacleRabbit Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > If you know who he is, you could get legal advice > to pursue him for civil damages (especially if the > police aren?t interested). Or, you could challenge > the police decision not to progress it (as saying > they are unreasonable). There are possibly several civil causes of action you could rely upon to claim damages (vets bills etc.) but they would only be worth considering if the defendant has any assets which you could enforce against.
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Indeed, but they are morons from goodness knows where - JC is the leader of the opposition and a sitting MP, so if he uses inappropriate language he should be held more to account. The morons are not asking people to vote for them - Corbyn is. That said, based on his recent performance (or lack thereof) it almost seems like he doesn't fancy being in power!
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Charter school East Dulwich opening date
robbin replied to pecksniff's topic in General ED Issues / Gossip
Coach Beth Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Also Deptford Green is becoming more > popular and is co-ed but a bit further away of > course. And has lousy OFSTED assessments (again). -
Why would you not bung your (poorly paid) hairdresser a few quid? I don't understand!
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Was she trying to effect her 'plan B' of sneaking into an empty Parliament (with her Chief Whip) and holding a quick vote on her Brexit deal while nobody was looking? Calling off the vote planned for tonight was merely a ruse to empty out the main chamber.
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