2011 - Another Year for British Politics

Yeah I watched the video of Sarkozy stiffing Cameron on a handshake.

They have to do what's in the best interests of their country(if it is).

I am a natural eurosceptic, so I believe this is the right path we have started to followed. Of course we need Europe as a trading partner but I think its time we left them to their own devices. We will still trade with them, they will still want our money, and they will still need access to our financial markets.


On the actual summit....
The Euro is lending itself to breakup because no solution has been, or will be brought that will solve the immediate liquidity crisis. By destroying competitiveness and enforcing strict fiscal austerity it will be a matter of time before the Eurozone countries buckle and the populations revolt. Gloomy, down right depressing but truthful.

And attacking the "anglo-saxon" financial district of London by introducing a financial transactions tax, they are directing policy towards something which is not a cause for the the euro crisis. Yes it was they that caused the credit crunch but not the sovereign debt crisis. That was the reckless Greeks and austere Germans, in fact it was the EU leaders themselves in designing a currency union which had no lender of last resort and had no proper mechanism to deal with this kind of crisis that has created the problems we see now.

Cameron sacrificing everything else to be a toady to City of London's casino economy elite even when the next elections are still 3 1/2 years away is not a big surprise in the end. He's acted for years like UKIP would really be a credible threat for the Conservatives and acted based on that pretty much baseless fear.

They might as well name UK again as The United Kingdom of Great Britain and the City of London now.

I would let Scotland and Wales stay in EU, England can go on to be the next Cayman Islands.

Can't say I disagree with any of that.

I wonder where this leaves the coalition though?

They had a large piece on the Radio here today about how angry the Scots, Welsh & North Irish supposedly are at Cameron for his veto. Anybody want to fill me in on that? It's rather interesting to see how the Scottish situation is an inverted mirror-image of our situation here (what with Seperatist/Nationalisme ... )

Or point me in the direction of relevant articles.

How do the posters here feel about those tensions, by the way?

What a very, very silly post.

Firstly Cameron didn't actually sacrifice anything.

Secondly protecting the City of London is vital. The city provides something like 44% of London's GDP. It is the crown jewels of the UK economy providing billions and billions in tax revenues. Destroy the city (which a tobin tax would) and Britain would enter a massive depression.

The coalition will be fine. Some of the more fanatically pro-EU Lib Dem members are furious but there is no way that the Lib Dems want an early election. Turkeys don't vote for XMAS.

The Scottish First Minister is unhappy, that isn't the same as the Scots being unhappy. Probably the same situation in Wales. As for Northern Ireland, all the Unionist parties and Sinn Fein are anti-EU so I doubt they are unhappy.

Well, they did specifically mention the 'people in the street' being unhappy as well, just as they mentioned the lack of support for the Tory's in Scotland overall. Northern Ireland apparently signed on to the Scottish letter to Cameron, stating their unhappiness.

On Scotland, I suspect that the vast majority of people don't actually care so the idea that the 'people in the street' are unhappy is certainly false. No doubt some 'people in the street' are unhappy but that doesn't really mean much.

As for Northern Ireland. The SDLP and the Alliance party have been critical but both Unionist parties are very happy. Sinn Fein naturally won't say anything good about Cameron but they are strongly anti-EU

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-16131701

However, the DUP's Gregory Campbell and Ulster Unionist leader Tom Elliott backed the prime minister, while TUV leader Jim Allister said it was refreshing to see Mr Cameron say no to Europe.

Meanwhile, the DUP MP Nigel Dodds is to introduce a motion in the Commons congratulating Mr Cameron and calling for the UK to claw back powers from Europe.

Nothing new under the sun - or The Sun:

Financial institutions, furthermore, have always integrated with the state apparatus to form what I call a ?state-finance nexus.?. To the degree that state power favored City of London finance over production capital in Britain after the First World War, so it contributed to the malaise of industrial production...

http://davidharvey.org/2010/08/the-enigma-of-capital-and-the-crisis-this-time/

What a very, very, very silly post. Except if one considers the xenophobic tabloids the fount of all economic wisdom, that is...

The simpleton did sacrifice the Great Britain a place in the inner core of EU, now it's on the outer rim. Well, at least the bulldog brakeman with his endless demands is now left on the station.

The minimal version of Tobin tax as proposed by EU would be barely noticed by the casino men of City. A more robust Tobin tax would hardly put a dent in the profits there. And surprisingly, the UK economy doesn't revolve around Deutsche Bank employers in London; the role of whole financial sector is less than 10 % of UK's national GDP - much of that outside London.

London is also set to lose it's position eventually. It happens to all capitals of finance, sooner or later. Antwerp or Genoa are not centres of high finance anymore for example. Today, location is also becoming far less important than it was. It will not be just a case of companies moving from London to mainland Europe or China, but overall the corporeal presence of corpotions diminishing.

The thing is, the international finance sector in UK will go the way of the mines, sooner or later.

Haven't bought a tabloid in years thank you very much and accusation of xenophobia are pitiful

We were not in the inner core of the EU anyway as fortunately we had the good sense to avoid the economic straight jacket called the Euro

Clearly you have no idea what you are talking about, hence nonsense about "casino men of the city". The vast majority of trades in the city make tiny profits in percentage terms, tiny enough that the Tobin tax would wipe it out. When Sweden introduced a Tobin tax they lost 99% of their financial transactions. Oh and if you thinking risking 10% of GDP isn't a problem you are mad.

Almost certainly true but it will diminish over time in a way that will not cause economic devastation.

Karde, did you ever think David Cameron had it in him to use the veto?

You would fit Right in as a columnist in one of them.

You haven't joined because you have lost the key to your own Thatcher-Reagan manufactured neoliberal straightjacket...

Absolute nonsense on the Swedish part and also wrong on the first too part, a minuscule tax takes a minuscule part of small profits.

No it won't, it will be a relatively rapid affair when it comes, because until then the political class believes that they must defend the City at all costs and thus fill do everything they can to avoid that ordely diminishing of financial sector.

The French are getting into a giant state re: Britain. The Hundred Years War is not dead.