So now it's a short sharp shock

[Suff]

Rather than a decade of misery and the column inches are so contradictory that if you subjected it to a rigorous analysis, the net sum of statements would be exactly 0.

This economist says there will be inflation driven by the low pound. That economist says that there will be less inflation driven by loss in household incomes. The first economist says there will be lower rates (in a time of higher inflation???).

Then the article goes on to witter about a slow down of shoppers in the "weeks" after the referendum and then cancels that out by saying that this was driven by people being focused on Euro 2016.

Thus adequately sitting on the fence and saying an awful lot about nothing.

I know quality journalism when I see it and this is not it.

It will take 3 months to see the true impact of the decision and whilst that is going on International businesses are going to start buying into the UK in a way they would not have done if we were still in the EU. This will skew the picture and the value of the £. At the same time we'll find more and more countries offering free trade deals with the UK. It's always useful to remember that the EU is less than 1/3 of the world economy and it's even less now that ~20% of it has walked out of the door.

Having free trade deals with the rest of the world will give areas of opportunity to UK businesses which were not available within the EU. The reason it's so difficult to agree a trade deal with the EU, from the outside, is that the EU is an inflated internal market which sells good internally at a price much higher than they could withstand on the open market. The UK, which does not agree with that, has been at a disadvantage from day1.

It is significantly easier to agree free trade. Simply by the very name. Virtually no restrictions, tariffs or barriers. How long and how many, does it take to negotiate that? Not as long as it does to negotiate additional favourable access to one of the most restricted markets in the world...

In some ways I wish the analysts would shut up and come back in 3 months and tell us how things went and where they are likely to go. This incessant self flagellation 24x7 is doing nothing to help the economy or the confidence of the British people.

[Workingman]

I was reading the BBC's take on the same EY statement.

Out came the experts. Australia's deal with China took ten years. Canada's deal with the EU to seven or nine years, depending .... The UK cannot sign bilateral trade deals until it has left the EU. It will take x years to implement Brexit and then get free trade deals, blah, blah, blah.

Some of which might be true, but irrelevant.

The UK already deals within EU rules, all that needs to be done is to make Brexit as painless as possible. However, there is nothing, nothing at all, to stop the UK holding informal yet detailed bilateral talks with prospective trade partners, in parallel with the EU negotiations. It could well be beneficial, vis-a-vis the EU, for us to do so.

We could be getting all the paperwork in order, making sure that as many i's are dotted and t's are crossed as possible so that come the day, or very shortly after, we are good to go.

[Suff]

We could be getting all the paperwork in order, making sure that as many i's are dotted and t's are crossed as possible so that come the day, or very shortly after, we are good to go.

We absolutely could.

I find the comparisons with Australia doing business with China to be Specious. Yes it would be very difficult for Australia to arrange a trade deal with China as it would for everyone else in the world. Mainly because of a lack of human rights, health and safety (melatonin anyone?), and a rang of other issues. Also any market which wants to arrange free trade with China also has to deal with immigration controls.

Almost all of what is contained in those areas are already resolved between Aus and the UK. Australia already has immigration agreements with the UK which are different from other members of the EU, operate under similar regulatory regimes and have similar taxation rules. A deal with Australia, Canada, the US or any of the Commonwealth nations would be a snap for the UK compared to almost any other nation in the world.

As for agreeing other trade agreements?? The US could agree a trade deal with the UK ten times faster than it could with the EU (still in secret meetings). Just think it over. We have one parliament with two chambers. We have one PM and one Queen who will ratify anything which has been passed by the popular assent of the people's representatives.

The EU has six institutions, four of which would have to approve this. Five of the six have titular "Presidents" and three of them are neither elected by the people nor representative of the will of the people. The Parliament is elected every 5 years and the other institutions are "appointed" by the governments in the EU every 5 years. The governments in the EU change on a regular cycle which ranges from 4-5 years and can impact the voting stance.

Any treaty must be approved by the commission and the European Council (of which any representative appointed by the member state can be replaced by a high ranking minister at any time), then be approved by the council of the European Union, which is comprised of senior ministers of the 28 member states and has a rotating presidency every _six _months_. Only then will it be put to Parliament to vote on and they have about as much power as the Lords in the UK. The can block and recommend but they can't formulate policy or control negotiations.

Confused? Think how the Chinese feel. Or even the US who can be even more confused. Which "President" do you talk to. Which one can "make the deal" for you? You create these secret deals and the second it is even shown to the senior Parliament leaders, it leaks to the press. Long before even the European Council gets it on their docket to approve.

Yet our press assumes that making a "free trade" deal between the UK and the US or the UK and the Commonwealth is going to be even more difficult, or even as difficult, as creating that trade deal with the UK.

And then there is the final point which nobody is willing to address. Currently almost every single rule and regulation that the EU is negotiating with other nations (China, US, etc), currently exists in UK parliamentary law. Exceptions being in Euro and Schengen which the EU already has to negotiate because neither are pervasive.
Because all EU directives must be implemented in every member states parliament. There are no EU laws, only directives implemented at parliamentary level in the member states. Which means that every single trade deal any country is currently negotiating with the EU could simply be duplicated, name changed to UK and agreed. Job done.

Do be brief. I wish they'd shut up and get on with trying to make these deals easier. Rather than making millions out of people's uncertainty.