Back to Business as usual for Brussels

[Suff]

Voting to take sanctions against Portugal and Spain for exceeding budget deficit targets. Rather than congratulating them for having dragged the deficits down by more than 50% since 2009.

All of this, of course, was put on hold for the UK referendum and is now on the "urgent" list. Expect much more business like this to pop up out of the woodwork over the next month or two as they clear the backlog.

Of course Brexit now means that Portugal and Spain may not be fined in order to keep anti EU sentiment down. Or maybe not. Maybe they want to make an example to keep anti EU sentiment down in the richer Northern EU states???

I never did understand this. It was like this in the Army. If someone bounced cheques then the were reduced in ranks and pay. They then had no option but to bounce more cheques to cover the commitments that did not vanish as fast as their pay did. The Army treated this by chucking them in Jail. Which is unpaid. Exacerbating the situation even more. Until the Army, eventually had to step in and organise a loan to dig out the soldier who's career, finances and, often, marriage, they had trashed....

I shall be watching as all the "business as usual" rolls in. I was phoned about a job in Belgium today, better pay than when I left last year. Thanks but no thanks, things are not going to be good in Euro Land in a year or two.

[Workingman]

Foot. Aim. FIRE!

Do these idiots never learn? Do they really want a Greece on the Atlantic seaboard, the whole Iberian peninsula? Isn't one enough?

[Suff]

Wrong question. Of course they never learn because they never ask the relevant questions. They have all convinced themselves, over a number of decades, that the UK is the "difficult child" of the EU. They have been so busy trying to "quell" the difficult child that they have never looked around and seen that the UK was one of the few reasonable voices in a house full of difficult children. The main problem with the more reasonable child is that it did not deign to get into the mess of intrigue and politico which is the EU. Much to it's detriment and also to the detriment of the EU.


The Spanish shouting at the top of their lungs that "nobody" can re-open the CAP and that they have a "right" to fish in British waters because of their "culture" of seafood in their diet. Never mind the fact that they land the majority of their catch in the UK because it pays more. The French demanding that their banking rules which cover a measly 3%-4% of the Euro denominated financial transactions will apply to the UK "no matter what", forcing the UK to use it's Veto or threaten to use it's veto.

The whole Euro Zone creating rules which work for Germany and the Northern states but only marginally for France and not at all for the southern states, then demanding that everyone conform or else it will all fall apart...

The Danes and the Swede's standing behind the UK and supporting us every time we negotiate an opt out to charters or treaties, but never standing up front threatening to veto, yes, having referendums which they eventually fudge, but never being up front and taking the flack.

All of them have a huge salient lesson to learn. The more reasonable child is leaving the house and taking it's cheque book with it. Britain paid 12.57% of the EU budget in 2015, the third largest contributor (net), for which the other countries will now have to make up. Come 2018 there is going to be a hell of a lot of gnashing of teeth and a hell of a lot of countries understanding that nearly 5bn Euro in contributions (net), is not easily found. Especially by countries rapidly running out of GDP to borrow the money they give to the EU, yes France I'm talking about you. When Spain demands, yet again, that the CAP is not open for negotiation, it's going to find itself outvoted by the others who have no intention of paying for it now the UK is gone. In fact the whole subsidies budget is going to have to go on a very radical diet in the next 2 years. It's going to be highly amusing to watch.

What the EU are going to have to do to their members to fill the gap is going to make a pork chop in a synagogue look like a new husband kissing his bride. The countries of the EU have absolutely no clue what is going to happen over the next 2 years and the EU themselves are clueless as to how rapidly they can become powerless to drive events.

Pretty soon they are going to run out of feet and have to start shooting higher. Eventually they'll get to the head if saner minds don't take over.. I'm hoping they don't.