“If you voted for Brexit, please realise this is 90% because of your decision”: UK cycle distributor FLi ceases trading

So you can't tell me anything in life that is better for Brexit? So all that remains is spite. 

You asked for a benefit.

I gave you a benefit.

If you want to actually have a discussion we can, if you just want to repeat yourself incessantly I'll leave you to it.

So are those "benefits" worth all that we are losing? 

HANNAN is going to argue "not Brexitey enough" presumably, somewhere behind the paywall?

Believe more, sacrifice more. 

You're now arguing that the contents of an article that you haven't actually read somehow back you up?

Quote from the article:
"It is true, too, that the EU, which has made similar mistakes to ours, is also on the slide, so that we do well enough when we measure ourselves against France, Germany or Spain."

So the Brexit "benefits" you mentioned - Worth it? 

All I'm seeing is a value-less deal to import sub-standard Australian meat; what happened to the deal with the USA? How long is all this going to take? 

In my opinion, yes.

Rich_cb wrote:

We are now negotiating independent trade deals.

Using up many people's time and money that could be used for something more productive if we had stayed in the EU. UK is negotiating from a position of relative weakness, regardless of the size of the economy.

And this stuff about the UK economy benefitting from services rather than goods is bullshit - the state of supermarket shelves and food prices demonstrate some of the difficulties faced in importing and distributing food. Food is a good, not a 'service'. As are clothes, cars and everything else being transported into/out of and around the country.

You have continually refused to acknowledge the massive ongoing headache for everybody in the food supply chain due to Brexit. And it is acknowledged that these supposedly wonderful trade deals you so admire are shafting UK producers and undermining UK food security, among other things. But I'm sure that hard facts like thise will not change your mind.

Has food price inflation been any better for EU countries? It would seem that for a lot of countries in the EU food price inflation was far worse last year. How on earth can that be true if it's all because of Brexit?

79% of the UK economy is services. You might not believe it but it's a "hard fact".

And in exactly the same article on the BBC (which appropriately enough addresses a government minister cherrypicking the figures to make the same claims as you), directly above the chart you have chosen to share is a chart which demonstrates that over the course of the year the UK had the highest food inflation in Europe. 

Criticises cherry picking. Cherry picks.

Roll the dates back by 2 months and it would look entirely different.

The fact is that over most of last year food price inflation was far higher in many EU countries than in the UK. I didn't hear many people saying it was because of Brexit then. A couple of months when the reverse is true and all of a sudden...

Rich_cb wrote:

Criticises cherry picking. Cherry picks. Roll the dates back by 2 months and it would look entirely different. The fact is that over most of last year food price inflation was far higher in many EU countries than in the UK. I didn't hear many people saying it was because of Brexit then. A couple of months when the reverse is true and all of a sudden...

Are you actually attempting to deny that on average for the year April 2022 to April 2023, the UK had the highest food price inflation in Europe? No obfuscation or yes buts, is that a fact or not?

That is a fact. It's also a fact that the average Feb to Feb would have been very different.

UK food price inflation was below EU averages for most (all?) of 2022.

UK food price inflation has been above EU averages for the last few months.

If the recent differences are down to Brexit then why were price rises lower in 2022?

Rich_cb wrote:

That is a fact. It's also a fact that the average Feb to Feb would have been very different. UK food price inflation was below EU averages for most (all?) of 2022. UK food price inflation has been above EU averages for the last few months. If the recent differences are down to Brexit then why were price rises lower in 2022?

Actually no it wouldn't be "very different" February to February, if you look at the chart which you chose the UK's inflation curves largely mirrors the other countries, just from a lower starting point, until theirs starts to drop and ours goes on rising. Oh and just for your enlightentment, the Feb 22-Feb 23 food inflation rate for the UK was 18%, 1% lower than April-April, so that's a strange definition of "very different."

https://foodfoundation.org.uk/news/food-prices-tracker-april-2023

If the UK rate is consistently lower then the EU rate for 2022 then the average will also be lower.

That was my point.

Brexit replaced inflation, which has completely disappeared from their minds. Kind of like how Putin invading Ukraine got rid of Covid. 

Rich_cb wrote:

We are now negotiating independent trade deals. There hasn't been a 'blockbuster' deal yet but the India negotiations have massive potential. Personally I think we should be going much further with cutting tariffs independently but things are getting better from a free trade perspective. I'm sure that nothing I say will change your mind however. We've lost the ability to easily import Taiwanese made bicycles from, um, France which is obviously a disaster. I can't think where we could possibly import them from instead.

First the big potential of the USA trade deal then India, sigh.

We're a service based economy, tariffs (which are generally low anyway) are not the major issue, NTB's are.

So Cube, Canyon, Ridely, Commencal, Giant etc etc are going to set up Warehousing in the U.K. and import directly are they? And we haven't even put in full import controls from the EU yet so it ain't gonna get any easier. 

Why wouldn't they set up separate warehousing here?

The market is easily big enough to support it for most of those brands. The first one to do so will instantly get a 10%+ price advantage against their competitors.

If the Freeports ever get up and running they could set up the whole European warehouses here and ship to both areas without worrying about double tariffs.

India negotiations are ongoing and the recent TATA deal must surely help get it closer to the finish line.

Agree re NTB, hence digital trade deal with Singapore.

Rich_cb wrote:

Why wouldn't they set up separate warehousing here? The market is easily big enough to support it for most of those brands. The first one to do so will instantly get a 10%+ price advantage against their competitors. If the Freeports ever get up and running they could set up the whole European warehouses here and ship to both areas without worrying about double tariffs. India negotiations are ongoing and the recent TATA deal must surely help get it closer to the finish line. Agree re NTB, hence digital trade deal with Singapore.

It won't be as high as 10% as the majority of bikes are likely to be bought in in such a way as to be less than that. Because of that they then need to be built up, not just stored. Having 2 units doing that is more costly and Iess efficient.

 Also we have a zero tarrif zero quota deal with the EU so it's a moot point in relation to Freeport's. Cube are not going to bring in their 200,000 (?) bikes to the U.K. to ship to the EU, those pesky NTB's again! U.K. specific hub warehousing , maybe. 
And compared to the EU our bike market is small (and if the recent distributor and retailer struggles are anything to go by not growing). 

Matthew Lynn is just speculating about the India trade deal. 

We only have a zero tariff agreement for items actually manufactured in the UK/EU.

If a bike is manufactured outside those areas, as most bikes are, then importing it to the EU then re-exporting it to the UK can lead to paying tariffs twice. Hence the 10% cost saving for a UK based warehouse.

The UK market is smaller than the EU but you'd assume a lot bigger than countries like Australia which, presumably, have dedicated warehouses.

A Freeport also solves the 'double tariff' issue as no tariff is paid until the item leaves the Freeport for its final destination.

It's public knowledge that another round of UK-India trade talks took place recently, whilst it is speculation to say the TATA deal will help it's quite a reasonable assumption.

Rich_cb wrote:

We only have a zero tariff agreement for items actually manufactured in the UK/EU. If a bike is manufactured outside those areas, as most bikes are, then importing it to the EU then re-exporting it to the UK can lead to paying tariffs twice. Hence the 10% cost saving for a UK based warehouse. The UK market is smaller than the EU but you'd assume a lot bigger than countries like Australia which, presumably, have dedicated warehouses. A Freeport also solves the 'double tariff' issue as no tariff is paid until the item leaves the Freeport for its final destination. It's public knowledge that another round of UK-India trade talks took place recently, whilst it is speculation to say the TATA deal will help it's quite a reasonable assumption.

Okay so let's assume a U.K. freeport based assembly/warehouse will pay tariffs into the EU when they export the 100,000's of bikes every year. In that case with a freeport set up that only makes sense if bikes can use tariff inversion which in my limited experience is not the case. My understanding is you will also have to pay a U.K. tariff if you sell to a U.K. retailer as it has now crossed the freeport border into the U.K.  Again unless you have tariff inversion why bother? 

Of course Australia, US have separate warehousing, they're geographically further enough away to make that a sensible thing to do. 
 

India FTA and TATA? I don't believe it is a reasonable assumption at all. 

Ah Freeports - the entities that make real life out of the hitherto dark fantasies of Gotham City and Sin City. 

At present you pay tariffs when you import the product to the EU. If you then want to export the product to the UK you pay the tariff again. The same occurs the other way around too.

If you import to a freeport, where it is warehoused, you pay no tariff. When you export the product to either the UK or EU you pay the tariff.

With a Freeport there is only one tariff paid whereas with a UK or EU warehouse there is the potential for some products to incur tariffs twice.

Personally I think we should just scrap import tariffs completely on products we don't actually manufacture, like most bikes, and then the problem disappears.

We'll have to agree to disagree on the TATA thing, no way to prove it either way.

Tariff inversion is a thing with bikes, they just have to use a certain proportion of UK/EU made components to benefit. Many manufacturers now offer bikes specifically built to benefit from this.

So like Rail privatisation, Brexit only works when we don't do it. 

I'm sure that made sense in your head.

I am curious that you defend it.  What do you get from Brexit? 

I'm a believer in free trade and the removal of protectionism.

Brexit gives us the opportunity make progress in both of those areas.

So to facilitate frictionless trade with our near neighbours, by any logic you'd be in favour of the CU and SM? Or does it not work that way?  Still not sure what problem we had that Brexit is meant to have solved. 

The EU is a highly protectionist organisation.

High external tariffs on many products mean that consumers pay higher prices.

We should take the opportunity to remove many tariffs and benefit from the lower prices and increased standard of living.

Rich_cb wrote:

We should take the opportunity to remove many tariffs and benefit from the lower prices and increased standard of living.

Any idea when we're going to reap that tangible benefit of Brexit?

hawkinspeter wrote:

Rich_cb wrote:

We should take the opportunity to remove many tariffs and benefit from the lower prices and increased standard of living.

Any idea when we're going to reap that tangible benefit of Brexit?

Presumably if (I haven't checked overall numbers) more people are migrating to the UK that means it's more "free" (we can get all the workers we want - cheaper labour, the consumer wins!) so that's a benefit?

I'm unqualified to opine on this one though (perhaps we need an accountant) as I think "free trade" is the imaginary Platonic ideal / economist's fiction at the end of a series of "more / less limits or taxes" continuums - including those relating to movement of people / labour.  AFAIK even in places with "few restrictions / taxes" there are always a collection of both, just different ones.  (Perhaps zero "taxes" but you have to make donations to a middleman and/or  enable the Prince's sons' university aspirations.)