So Liz Truss now says that the UK - US trade deal is dead and 'not on the agenda'

www.ft.com/content/1b0e6267-d46e-4eb8-9071-d12532a9abb9

Even though this trade deal was vaunted as an example of one the most important post-Brexit benefits ....


And the Chancellor has refused to publish economic forecast figures

www.bbc.com/news/business-62970803

And the only good news is that many major investments are being made in our big infrastrcuture companies - because they prices are so low, the pound is so weak - which means that all the buyers are foreign - in fact, the big ones this week have all been French



"French buyers snapped up a slew of British assets on Wednesday, from a slice of the UKs biggest telecoms group to a buyout of one of the countrys oldest technology companies, underlining how overseas acquirers are taking advantage of depressed valuations.

Entrepreneur Xavier Niel bought a 2.5 per cent stake in Vodafone; Schneider Electric agreed to buy Aveva for £9.5bn; and Suez moved to buy back its British waste-treatment business for around $2.3bn.

The UK is experiencing relatively high inflation, low investment confidence and a weaker currency, making it an attractive moment for European suitors to pounce on struggling British assets.

A top-25 shareholder in Aveva described the Schneider bid as yet another example of a world-leading UK-listed company whose share price has been smashed to pieces being taken over. Avevas shares have fallen 23 per cent in the past 12 months.....

.... Wednesdays flurry of inbound French interest comes two months after Frances state-backed satellite group Eutelsat announced it was buying OneWeb, the space-based British internet company rescued from bankruptcy by Boris Johnsons government. OneWeb had struggled to raise capital to come to market with its satellite constellation and become a viable standalone business.

In a parallel to Niels investment, French telecoms billionaire Patrick Drahi last year built an 18 per cent stake in former British telecoms monopoly BT, sparking speculation that the veteran dealmaker would ultimately try to wrest full control of the company."


www.ft.com/content/8df0f111-51c8-407e-bea0-0a4f826605b6

Sorry for the doom-and-gloom but:

The Office for Budget Responsibility, the official independent British forecaster, has reaffirmed its prediction from that Brexit will reduce productivity and UK GDP by 4% compared with what it would have been if we'd remained in the EU.

That means about £100bn p.a in lost output and that the Treasury loses revenues of approx £40bn a year.

According to Reuter's citing of reports, British manufacturing output fell for a third month in a row in September and orders declined for a fourth consecutive month, hurt by falling foreign demand.

"September saw new export business contract at the quickest pace since May 2020, with reports of lower demand from the U.S., the EU and China," S&P Global said.

Trade is about 25% down

The Centre for Economic Policy Research says the currency sharp drop did not bring a corresponding increase in exports and left only imports being dearer, and so pushed up inflation

Red tape has caused international buyer-seller relations to drop by 33% overall

Foreign investment is about 10% lower than back in 2016 (some due to covid but a long way behind other European countries which are now in positive territory)

Several high-level scientists I know have moved to the EU, as worries about their funding (and lack of it) fail to be addressed.

.......

Coup Droit wrote:

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I note that, in his interview, the ex-Governor of the Bank of England refuses to give an opinion about the benefits, or not, of Brexit.

But says that, as a neutral factual statement:

"In 2016, Britains economy was 90 per cent the size of Germanys. Now it is less than 70 per cent."

---

Just a copy and paste below but the point I am making is that both sides continue to quote facts, and offer proof as to why they are true, and yet their "facts" differ.  One issue I would take Coup, if you were referring to Mark Carney, staunch remainer, how do you claim this factual statement to be "neutral"?

 

On this Mark Carney quote - has anyone found a data point which allows it to be remotely true, even if only from a certain point of view?

UK 2016 - $2.72tn UK 2021 - $3.19tn DE 2016 - $3.47tn DE 2021 - $4.22tn UK/DE 2016 - 78.4% UK/DE 2021 - 75.6% World Bank says it isn't.

The FTs take on Brexit

www.ft.com/video/91b8a350-5817-4b40-a5ea-c62ec832aa9c

30 min video.

Brexit in a nutshell - or a tea bag in this case

https://twitter.com/BestForBritain/status/1589638864066727940

Not sure whether to laugh or cry at this one.

At the weekend, GB News ran their own Brexit poll on Twitter. They thought they were winning but once the 'catchment audience' stretched beyond their own viewers, they were beaten. Here is the result.

https://twitter.com/GBNEWS/status/1594205004227047424

When they were about to announce the result of their poll, they didn't realise until the last second, that they had actually lost the vote.

https://twitter.com/MattLCapon/status/1594369207612891137

The reaction of Martin Daubney is priceless.

And now, to cap everything off, they have decided to RE-RUN the poll today to ensure that there was no interference. To quote them:

Referencing GBNews Poll on BREXIT. For the avoidance of doubt, and bots, could we do a quick retake on this one?

https://twitter.com/CarolineCoramUK/status/1594698887285047299

So apparently you ARE allowed to keep re-running a vote until you get the result you want, despite what they have been telling us for the last 6 years.

Hysterical

In 2022, a total of 45,728 asylum seekers crossed the Channel in 1,104 boats

According to the Home Office's own website:

"There were 28,526 people detected arriving on small boats in 2021. This compares with 8,466 in 2020, 1,843 in 2019 and 299 in 2018."

www.gov.uk/government/statistics/irregular-migration-to-the-uk-year-ending-december-2021/irregular-migration-to-the-uk-year-ending-december-2021

So, since Brexit, the numbers have risen by about by a multiple of about 150 times

Just shows what happens when the UK is no longer part of the EU's Dublin III Agreement

And moreover, as with the customs union etc, Britain could still have remained part of the Dubin Agreement even after leaving the EU. We could have been like Norway or Switzerland.

But the Tory government deliberately chose not to. Because it would be seen as being too cooperative, too in the EU's pocket.

And so we now have 45,000 extra immigrants that we wouldn't have had otherwise.

Which, if your whole soapbox was that we needed to withdraw from the EU to control your borders, is just too ironic for words....