What it effectively boils down to is the EU accepting that the companies in the UK that are exporting to them are operating to the standards of equivalence to those in the EU. If this is recognised then the companies doing the exporting will have less administration to go through, it is not about the tariffs that is separate from this. If they accept this there will be less checks and balances required to continue selling into the EU. We havent been given any indication on how much less checks will be required though!dpedin wrote: Thu Dec 10, 2020 9:17 amLevel playing field question. The EU, if we want to have tariff and quota free access, want us to stick to the standards they set in their EU market to avoid us undercutting them in the future. I understand that and if in their shoes I would do the same. Is it not the case that the UK then has an option - either adopt the same standards as the EU or else if we dont accept we will have tariffs placed on those goods affected? This also seems a reasonable ask, if not then the EU is in effect giving the UK carte blanche to change standards in the future in order to lower costs and sell at a lower price than the EU companies. IS this actually the case, need my simple mind to understand this!Paddington Bear wrote: Thu Dec 10, 2020 9:06 amI'd much rather have a deal but don't agree that if there is no compromise on these three issues that Boris should cave. Not expecting everything but these aren't unreasonable sticking points.Longshanks wrote: Thu Dec 10, 2020 8:42 am
I get the emotive feeling about sovereignty, but a deal with conditions is better than no deal imo.
However, Britain will survive no deal, its the first 6 months that will be the hardest.
What this will ultimately do it make it far harder for the smaller companies to continue trading with the EU as they will struggle with the admin, bigger companies might need to add extra admin staff to handle it but they are probably well used to sending stuff all over the world where we dont have trade deals anyway and the extra staff for them is a rounding error, nothing to get excited about. In summary bad, possibly terminal, if you are a small company heavily focused on exporting to the EU.