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The Positive Brexit Thread

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2 hours ago, ricardo said:

We still appear to be exporting an awful lot of electricity to the continent today and have been for several months now.

Apparently lots of French Nuclear power plants (17) are still shut down for maintenance and safety reasons.

Bit of a worry considering EDF are building our new plants.

https://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/

https://www.mypoweruk.com/news/the-uk-now-finds-itself-exporting-electricity-to-france/

I think I remember hearing that the original problem the French had with their power stations had something to do with the excessively hot summer meaning the water required to cool the reactors wasn't available. 

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39 minutes ago, horsefly said:

I think I remember hearing that the original problem the French had with their power stations had something to do with the excessively hot summer meaning the water required to cool the reactors wasn't available. 

What 32 reactors down because of the sun 🤣

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50 minutes ago, horsefly said:

I think I remember hearing that the original problem the French had with their power stations had something to do with the excessively hot summer meaning the water required to cool the reactors wasn't available. 

There are obviously still many offline if we are supplying them with electricity at the rate of 2 to 3 gw per day. In recent years its been them supplying us. Lets hope the wind keeps blowing and nobody pulls the plug out ar Dover..

Edited by ricardo

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25 minutes ago, ricardo said:

There are obviously still many offline if we are supplying them with electricity at the rate of 2 to 3 gw per day. In recent years its been them supplying us. Lets hope the wind keeps blowing and nobody pulls the plug out ar Dover..

Indeed! makes you wonder if the need to shut them down caused further problems that have delayed their restart. I hope our government are watching closely given that similar climate conditions are likely to befall us too.

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3 hours ago, ricardo said:

We still appear to be exporting an awful lot of electricity to the continent today and have been for several months now.

Apparently lots of French Nuclear power plants (17) are still shut down for maintenance and safety reasons.

Bit of a worry considering EDF are building our new plants.

https://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/

https://www.mypoweruk.com/news/the-uk-now-finds-itself-exporting-electricity-to-france/

And there I was thinking France and the U.K. swop electricity at various times of the day, so if France are f***** we are doubly f*****. 
Any news on the EU’s gas storage ? 95.8% I understand, usual winter 85% as they had the ability to fill up with free gas when certain countries had produced so much they had no storage capacity.

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1 minute ago, Well b back said:

And there I was thinking France and the U.K. swop electricity at various times of the day, so if France are f***** we are doubly f*****. 
Any news on the EU’s gas storage ? 95.8% I understand, usual winter 85% as they had the ability to fill up with free gas when certain countries had produced so much they had no storage capacity.

Er no its been one way for several months.

Even with 100 percent storage supplies are unlikely to last if its a cold winter. Let's hope its mild.

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37 minutes ago, Hook's-Walk-Canary said:

What 32 reactors down because of the sun 🤣

Oh dear, not very bright are you! If you don't have water available to cool the reactors you get rather big nuclear explosions. The exceptional hot weather dried out water supplies and made the necessary water unavailable. It really isn't that difficult to understand, do try harder.

https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20200825-drought-provokes-shutdown-nuclear-reactors-northeast-france-belgium-ardennes-chooz-meuse

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1 minute ago, ricardo said:

Er no its been one way for several months.

Even with 100 percent storage supplies are unlikely to last if its a cold winter. Let's hope its mild.

Lol Your Trumpism forgets to say 28 WERE offline that is now back to only 17, 11 now back.

France reassures UK on maintaining winter electricity flows 

Different peak times in each country should allow supplies when needed, says French grid operator
 

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https://www.ft.com/content/97dd8bf7-3c32-45b6-8d5f-9e191e6d0532

France has said it should be able to provide Britain with power at critical moments if electricity supplies come under strain this winter, despite problems with nuclear reactors that have forced it to rely on imports. Grid operators in France and Great Britain have been in discussions about energy supplies in recent months, with authorities on both sides of the Channel signalling they will need imports to avoid power cuts this winter.

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https://www.ft.com/content/97dd8bf7-3c32-45b6-8d5f-9e191e6d0532

France is Europe’s biggest power exporter. But a record number of outages and maintenance stoppages at its fleet of 56 nuclear reactors — which reached a peak in the middle of this year when more than half were offline — have for the first time turned the country into a net importer. The problems in France have compounded western Europe’s energy crisis in the wake of Russia’s decision to shut off gas exports via the Nord Stream 1 pipeline at the end of August. Fears about possible energy shortages this winter escalated last week when National Grid, the company that oversees Britain’s electricity and gas systems, warned of the potential for rolling three-hour blackouts in the worst-case scenario that it is unable to secure sufficient gas and power supplies from the continent, particularly during prolonged cold periods.

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16 minutes ago, Well b back said:

Lol Your Trumpism forgets to say 28 WERE offline that is now back to only 17, 11 

I suggest you read the link provided which quite clearly explains the position of maintenance and safety issues. 17 are still closed by the French goverment due to safety fears which means that instead of being a net energy exporter it has become a net importer as the 3gw per day for the last 5 months,  UK exports clearly demonstrate.

The Netherlands has also been drawing energy from us that in normal times would have been supplied by France. Lets hope they resolve those safety issues before it gets cold.

 

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6 hours ago, horsefly said:

I think I remember hearing that the original problem the French had with their power stations had something to do with the excessively hot summer meaning the water required to cool the reactors wasn't available. 

More corrosion due to higher temperatures means more frequent maintenance, but also the laws of thermodynamics dictate that energy production is necessarily less efficient when the coolant is warmer.

 

 

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9 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

More corrosion due to higher temperatures means more frequent maintenance, but also the laws of thermodynamics dictate that energy production is necessarily less efficient when the coolant is warmer.

 

 

Exactly! Hopefully, the coastal location of virtually all our nuclear plants should mitigate against the sort of problems the French have encountered this summer.

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5 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

You are aware this was all but identical to the EU-Japan trade agreement, aren't you?

Funnily enough, it wasn't simply a roll over for once. There were tweaks to parts of it. Some heralded it as better than the EU's with an economic boost to the UK's GDP. (Some suggested it wouldn't achieve much except another photo-op for Truss, but I wouldn't have been so unkind.)

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6 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

You are aware this was all but identical to the EU-Japan trade agreement, aren't you?

That's very largely true, but only adds to the question why withdrawing from all the massive benefits of belonging to the single market would be worth it if this is the best we can negotiate. Not only that, but the few differences that we did agree were widely regarded at the time to have benefitted the Japanese more than the UK:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-japan-trade-deal-liz-truss-exports-b1619263.html 

Brexit: Liz Truss secures tariff wins with her Japan trade deal – for products UK doesn’t export

See also: https://fullfact.org/economy/japan-eu-deal-thornberry/

https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/japan-trade-deal/94178/

https://blogs.sussex.ac.uk/uktpo/2020/10/22/japan-uk-fta-what-is-missing/

It turns out that the deal was worse than many originally predicted. Now we wait to see how the pi*ss-poor deals with Australia and New Zealand prove even worse than the Japanese deal.

Every country in the world is well aware that Brexit has left the UK in an appallingly weak negotiating position and will inevitably exploit that weakness for their own benefit. That this would be a consequence Brexit before it even happened was self-evident to those with even a minimal understanding of the economics of market forces.

 

Edited by horsefly
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30 minutes ago, horsefly said:

That's very largely true, but only adds to the question why withdrawing from all the massive benefits of belonging to the single market would be worth it if this is the best we can negotiate. Not only that, but the few differences that we did agree were widely regarded at the time to have benefitted the Japanese more than the UK:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-japan-trade-deal-liz-truss-exports-b1619263.html 

Brexit: Liz Truss secures tariff wins with her Japan trade deal – for products UK doesn’t export

See also: https://fullfact.org/economy/japan-eu-deal-thornberry/

https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/japan-trade-deal/94178/

https://blogs.sussex.ac.uk/uktpo/2020/10/22/japan-uk-fta-what-is-missing/

It turns out that the deal was worse than many originally predicted. Now we wait to see how the pi*ss-poor deals with Australia and New Zealand prove even worse than the Japanese deal.

 

Point is, if it was practically identical, if not slightly better than the EU deal, then it makes absolutely no odds in an assessment of the effects of Brexit, contrary to the way the article frames it.

I think the Japan deal was a sensible approach to continuity on existing trade deals. A lot of countries with existing EU deals agreed similar terms with the UK that allowed a good degree of continuity and stability for non-EU trade.

Australia and New Zealand are a whole different kettle of fish that leads into stuff covered so many times I think everybody's bored with going over it .

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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31 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Point is, if it was practically identical, if not slightly better than the EU deal, then it makes absolutely no odds in an assessment of the effects of Brexit, contrary to the way the article frames it.

Not really though.

Half of the sell of it from an economic standpoint was us being free to sign our own free trade deals that would be better than what we could get in the EU. So signing something that is basically exactly the same with a country likes Japan casts reasonable doubt on that idea.

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15 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Point is, if it was practically identical, if not slightly better than the EU deal, then it makes absolutely no odds in an assessment of the effects of Brexit, contrary to the way the article frames it.

I think the Japan deal was a sensible approach to continuity on existing trade deals. A lot of countries with existing EU deals agreed similar terms with the UK that allowed a good degree of continuity and stability for non-EU trade.

Australia and New Zealand are a whole different kettle of fish that leads into stuff covered so many times I think everybody's bored with going over it .

Firstly, as the actual results show, it wasn't slightly better, it was worse (as many pointed out at the time, see links). 

Secondly, what was the point of Brexit if all it meant was that we rolled over some of the existing trade deals on the same EU terms? But so much worse than this, in the true assessment of Brexit, is the fact that we have simply rolled over some of these deals while at the same time removing ourselves from all the massive advantages we had by trading as a member within the single market. The government's own independent figures show a 16% drop in trade with the EU (By far our biggest market) and predict this will be a long-term expectation. I won't be alone in having friends who are small business owners, whose businesses have got a lot smaller since Brexit because they simply can not afford to do trade with the EU any longer.

Thirdly, you should consider it a personal luxury that you are simply "bored" with going over the many disastrous aspects of the Australian and New Zealand trade deals. I suspect many farmers would happily trade boredom for the devastation of contemplating the loss of their livelihoods.

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38 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Point is, if it was practically identical, if not slightly better than the EU deal, then it makes absolutely no odds in an assessment of the effects of Brexit, contrary to the way the article frames it.

I think the Japan deal was a sensible approach to continuity on existing trade deals. A lot of countries with existing EU deals agreed similar terms with the UK that allowed a good degree of continuity and stability for non-EU trade.

Australia and New Zealand are a whole different kettle of fish that leads into stuff covered so many times I think everybody's bored with going over it .

I'm not bored going over it and I'm very certain a lot of our farmers won't be bored of pointing out its failings.

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8 minutes ago, Herman said:

I'm not bored going over it and I'm very certain a lot of our farmers won't be bored of pointing out its failings.

Whatever floats your boat, I guess. With projected growth of meat demand over the coming decades coupled with the practicalities of growing supply constraints on meat driven by climate change over the coming decades, I suspect the concessions in those deals won't amount to much in terms of negative impact on those sectors of the UK economy, let alone the UK economy as a whole given their tiny impact on it.

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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18 minutes ago, horsefly said:

Firstly, as the actual results show, it wasn't slightly better, it was worse (as many pointed out at the time, see links). 

Secondly, what was the point of Brexit if all it meant was that we rolled over some of the existing trade deals on the same EU terms? But so much worse than this, in the true assessment of Brexit, is the fact that we have simply rolled over some of these deals while at the same time removing ourselves from all the massive advantages we had by trading as a member within the single market. The government's own independent figures show a 16% drop in trade with the EU (By far our biggest market) and predict this will be a long-term expectation. I won't be alone in having friends who are small business owners, whose businesses have got a lot smaller since Brexit because they simply can not afford to do trade with the EU any longer.

Thirdly, you should consider it a personal luxury that you are simply "bored" with going over the many disastrous aspects of the Australian and New Zealand trade deals. I suspect many farmers would happily trade boredom for the devastation of contemplating the loss of their livelihoods.

The deals are practically identical, thus our trading arrangements with Japan are barely different to how they would have been in the EU, which is why it's nonsense to flag a slump in trade with Japan as anything to do with Brexit. You're completely ignoring the fact that global economies are being turned upside down by many other factors including recovering from the pandemic, war, and the consequent impacts on so many other things, not least energy, and fuel, which will have a big impact on trade in goods with Japan. Japan's economy is shrinking at the moment, which obviously negatively impacts demand.

There's an irrational desperation in this thread to try and frame every negative as a consequence of Brexit even when it obviously isn't anything to do with Brexit.

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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7 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

The deals are practically identical, thus our trading arrangements with Japan are barely different to how they would have been in the EU, which is why it's nonsense to flag a slump in trade with Japan as anything to do with Brexit. You're completely ignoring the fact that global economies are being turned upside down by many other factors including recovering from the pandemic, war, and the consequent impacts on so many other things, not least energy, and fuel, which will have a big impact on trade in goods with Japan. Japan's economy is shrinking at the moment, which obviously negatively impacts demand.

There's an irrational desperation in this thread to try and frame every negative as a consequence of Brexit even when it obviously isn't anything to do with Brexit.

This isn't hard to work out.

Brexit was sold as a great opportunity. We were free to do our own trade deals etc.

The UK-Japan trade deal was sold as a Brexit win, a better deal that would lead to greater prosperity.

The reality was it wasn't that much different to what we already had.

The extra reality is that it has lead to a slump in trade rather than an increase.

This is brexit in a nutshell. It was sold to people that we would be better outside out of the EU and all evidence points out that it is far worse.

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6 minutes ago, Herman said:

This isn't hard to work out.

Brexit was sold as a great opportunity. We were free to do our own trade deals etc.

The UK-Japan trade deal was sold as a Brexit win, a better deal that would lead to greater prosperity.

The reality was it wasn't that much different to what we already had.

The extra reality is that it has lead to a slump in trade rather than an increase.

This is brexit in a nutshell. It was sold to people that we would be better outside out of the EU and all evidence points out that it is far worse.

I don't care how some people sold it. What it is, is practically a cut and paste of the EU and Japan trade agreement, which is the basis of all the completely valid points I have made of how changes in trade with Japan post-Brexit have nothing to do with Brexit.

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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26 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

I don't care how some people sold it. What it is, is practically a cut and paste of the EU and Japan trade agreement, which is the basis of all the completely valid points I have made of how changes in trade with Japan post-Brexit have nothing to do with Brexit.

With the greatest of respect you seem to be missing the point.

Both the article in question and posters on here aren't saying Brexit has led to these worsening trade numbers. What is being said is that for Brexit to provide any economic boost then these new free trade deals needed to be significantly better than what we had to make up for the economic hit from leaving the single market. The fact that the first such free trade deal has failed to do this and, as you've said, isn't actually much different to what we already have, rather damages that argument. 

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The trade with Japan before Brexit was the UK acting as a hub into the EU, now that option isn't available Japan is trading directly with the EU.

It is Brexit related.

 

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17 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

I don't care how some people sold it. What it is, is practically a cut and paste of the EU and Japan trade agreement, which is the basis of all the completely valid points I have made of how changes in trade with Japan post-Brexit have nothing to do with Brexit.

LYB - I 'm afraid you're very wrong. It has everything to do with Brexit.

The issue is not that the 'rollover' deal was over-sold (it was to the idiots) but that now the UK has left EU it is in no longer the 'gateway to Europe' and hence many Japanese (on indeed any non-European) firm no longer see's the UK as a good place to be to service European markets - much more sensible to slowly relocate to the likes of Germany. You certainly don't want your 'service' or distribution centre to be in the UK for goods to Europe let alone manufacturing.

On that subject I smiled when I read BMW concentrating it's 'electric minis' in China and Europe and using Oxford for it's legacy i.c. vehicles. To use an American business phrase it's either invest, milk or close. Been there, seen that, done it. Oxford is clearly now in the 'milk' category until the cow has to go to the slaughterhouse.  

Ergo we see a reduction in our trade (and importantly as compared our EU counterparts).

I must own up here too - I've done exactly the same with my company a few years back.

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17 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

The deals are practically identical, thus our trading arrangements with Japan are barely different to how they would have been in the EU, which is why it's nonsense to flag a slump in trade with Japan as anything to do with Brexit. You're completely ignoring the fact that global economies are being turned upside down by many other factors including recovering from the pandemic, war, and the consequent impacts on so many other things, not least energy, and fuel, which will have a big impact on trade in goods with Japan. Japan's economy is shrinking at the moment, which obviously negatively impacts demand.

There's an irrational desperation in this thread to try and frame every negative as a consequence of Brexit even when it obviously isn't anything to do with Brexit.

Did you intentionally get the point completely wrong or was this a genuine mistake. Where did I say that the slump in trade with Japan was caused by Brexit? I simply pointed out that the post Brexit trade deal with Japan is actually worse than the original EU deal. Brexit was supposed to liberate us to do much better deals with non-EU countries and it has so far done nothing of the sort in ANY of the deals to date, all of which have been independently assessed significantly to benefit the other party. So, at best we have done deals that roll over former EU conditions while at the same time sacrificing the massive trading advantages that membership of the SM brings.

You are completely ignoring the fact that EVERY other country in the world is also dealing with precisely the same global conditions as the UK, yet it is the UK that is failing miserably compared to all the other industrialised countries of the world (Take a look at the US growth figures etc, etc). We are also predicted to be bottom for growth out of all those industrialised countries next year. So, when you factor out all the global issues shared by every other country affecting growth, I wonder what economic variable it is that explains the UK's pi*ss -poor performance.

I'm afraid you have to be displaying wilful ignorance to claim that Brexit has nothing to with the current appalling performance of the UK economy. Or do you know something that the IMF, the Bank of England, the OBR, and every other reputable economist doesn't? The facts are incontrovertible; export trade with the EU is down 16%, and that specific failure has nothing to do with the pandemic nor the Ukrainian war. Every business in the country blames the appalling Brexit deal for that reduction, only hard-line Brexiteers like yourself can look at those figures and continue to spout utter nonsense that it has nothing to do with the dreadful conditions imposed by becoming a "third country" outside of the SM. We even have incontrovertible evidence from within the UK: remind me which part of the UK is still trading within SM rules and explain why that part of the UK has the strongest economic performance of all the others.

Rationality demands you pay heed to the evidence. Even the government has accepted that Brexit will cause at least a 4% reduction in GDP for the foreseeable future.  There is only one person in this debate who is behaving "desperately" and "irrationally" in ignoring the evidence.

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4 minutes ago, horsefly said:

Did you intentionally get the point completely wrong or was this a genuine mistake. Where did I say that the slump in trade with Japan was caused by Brexit? I simply pointed out that the post Brexit trade deal with Japan is actually worse than the original EU deal. Brexit was supposed to liberate us to do much better deals with non-EU countries and it has so far done nothing of the sort in ANY of the deals to date, all of which have been independently assessed significantly to benefit the other party. So, at best we have done deals that roll over former EU conditions while at the same time sacrificing the massive trading advantages that membership of the SM brings.

You are completely ignoring the fact that EVERY other country in the world is also dealing with precisely the same global conditions as the UK, yet it is the UK that is failing miserably compared to all the other industrialised countries of the world (Take a look at the US growth figures etc, etc). We are also predicted to be bottom for growth out of all those industrialised countries next year. So, when you factor out all the global issues shared by every other country affecting growth, I wonder what economic variable it is that explains the UK's pi*ss -poor performance.

I'm afraid you have to be displaying wilful ignorance to claim that Brexit has nothing to with the current appalling performance of the UK economy. Or do you know something that the IMF, the Bank of England, the OBR, and every other reputable economist doesn't? The facts are incontrovertible; export trade with the EU is down 16%, and that specific failure has nothing to do with the pandemic nor the Ukrainian war. Every business in the country blames the appalling Brexit deal for that reduction, only hard-line Brexiteers like yourself can look at those figures and continue to spout utter nonsense that it has nothing to do with the dreadful conditions imposed by becoming a "third country" outside of the SM. We even have incontrovertible evidence from within the UK: remind me which part of the UK is still trading within SM rules and explain why that part of the UK has the strongest economic performance of all the others.

Rationality demands you pay heed to the evidence. Even the government has accepted that Brexit will cause at least a 4% reduction in GDP for the foreseeable future.  There is only one person in this debate who is behaving "desperately" and "irrationally" in ignoring the evidence.

It's you not getting my point I think you'll find. If this slump in trade isn't caused by Brexit, the subject of a slump in trade with Japan isn't relevant to a thread on Brexit.

Honestly, I can't be bothered. There's no point trying to be rational with you lot on this subject. Carry on.

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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6 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

It's you not getting my point I think you'll find.

I think I won't. I look forward to your explanation, or is one not required because you're just "too bored"?  I think enough people have already pointed out the glaring non-sequiturs in your claims, but feel free to add to them if you wish.

Edited by horsefly

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5 minutes ago, horsefly said:

I think I won't. I look forward to your explanation, or is one not required because your just "too bored"?  I think enough people have already pointed out the glaring non-sequiturs in your claims, but feel free to add to them if you wish.

I edited, to lay it out, but I'll say it again: If this slump in trade isn't caused by Brexit, the subject of a slump in trade with Japan isn't relevant to a thread on Brexit.

Herman's original post implied a connection between the Japan continuity agreement and the recent slump in trade with Japan, which everyone seems to agree aren't connected as was my original point, so we can move on.

Edited by littleyellowbirdie

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