Gary's News and views
Gary writes a weekly article which appears in the Plympton Plymstock and Ivybridge News in South West Devon. The articles are published here.
Thursday 13 April 2017
IMPLEMENTING BREXIT
On 29th March 2017 the letter requesting out of the EU was despatched by the PM and on 28th March 2019 the UK will be leaving the European Union. 44 years of our membership about to come to an end. The majority voted to leave and leave we must and leave we will. There is no going back. If Parliament starts to shilly-shally on this, there would be deep and substantial constitutional fall-out. We have no choice.
The basis on which we intend to leave and the future relationship we seek was set out by the PM in January and now incorporated into a government white paper. There is now so much to discuss and resolve with our 27 partners and negotiations will begin in earnest shortly. The big issues arehow we tackle EU immigration from 2019 onwards and how our companies can sell their goods and services into EU countries.
Because the negotiations will be complex and detailed, and because the British government is not going to give a running commentary on them, we are now entering a period of confusion where there will be little clarity. Perhaps 6 to 12 months of muddle. There will be endless leaks and speculation. My advice is to ignore most of it. The framework of a deal is unlikely to start to come together until late this year or, more probably, early in 2018.
In the meantime at Westminster we have to slog round the clock putting in place a body of law that works for every sector of society and does not leave jurisprudential black holes. We will spend 12 months incorporating all EU law in minute detail an into UK law and then the following year going through it line by line deleting what we do not want.
I meet people who say that we should not bother with negotiation but just come out. Just like that. It is rather like a surgeon amputating a leg, not bothering what to do about blood vessels and ligaments, just reaching for the cleaver. There is so much to resolve about how our future dealings with the continent of Europe will work.
I am confident it will be done. A deal will be reached. But listen out for two words: transitional arrangements (orpossibly: implementation stage, but it means the same thing).We will leave in 2019 but it will take many years for the decoupling to be completed.
--
posted by Gary @ 08:45
Thursday 6 April 2017
Technology has always driven change. The wheel. Roman roads. The printing press. The train. The car. The plane. The list is endless. Now we live in an age when computer technology dominates our lives: internet access, e-mails, social media and mobile phones. We might love these things or hate them, but we can't stop them. It's called progress.
The way we live is now dominated by the internet. Not just at home, but at work. Many businesses are completely internet based. If the Russians ever bring down our communications system – we would return to the Dark Ages pdq.
It is therefore vital that we have the infrastructure in our region to make the most of this opportunity. Superfast broadband is the key to this, so that we can all access the internet for both work and leisure purposes at acceptable speed. (Remember how this started- with the old dial up system, it was always fingers crossed you would get a connection and it often seemed to take half an hour.)
92% of premises in the UK are now served by superfast broadband and in this constituency, it is 89.8% with an expectation of 91.7% by the year end. There is a plan to increase that percentage further over the next two years, despite the challenges of very rural areas. The government has recently announced an extra £440 million nationally to further this, of which we will get our share.
Accessing the internet is so important that it is to be established in a Broadband Universal Service Obligation. By 2020 everyone will have the right to request a connection speed of at least 10 Mbps (I'm not really sure what that means) that will apparently enable me to download a 30 min TV programme in 2 minutes, should the desire so take me.
For very remote areas, say a cottage in the middle of Dartmoor, it might be that airborne solutions will be necessary – it is not really feasible to lay fibre to every community. But even there technology is improving the service all the time
The roll out of superfast broadband is of immense significance to our far-flung region. We have always had a priceless set of natural assets, the water, the moors and our picturesque landscape, but traditionally much of our talent has been drawn to the bigger cities for work. Now that you can do anything from anywhere by technology, that is beginning to change.
posted by Gary @ 09:22