# Brexit chaos at the ports: why is this a problem now, but was not a problem before the EU? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 5, 2019, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260 "2019-01-05T19:40:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/81 "2019-01-08T10:48:24Z")
> [@Banksiaman](#): > > A question - if companies from a non-EU country broke, or attempted to break WTO regulations by say exporting stuff from the EU without the right approvals, what are the likely legal consequences? Who gets the kick up the backside - the private company or the country? Are there forward penalties imposed, such as restrictions for X years into the future? How is the non-EU company exporting stuff from the EU? 😕 I’m no lawyer, but surely there’s someone inside the EU doing the actual exporting, who would be the obvious recipient of any charges from the EU perspective if necessary paperwork wasn’t done or EU export checks were evaded. All a 3rd country can do is import, and it should be their own responsibility to enforce any rules for that, unless I’m missing something? Part of the problem as I understand it, is if the UK decides not to check EU stuff without a deal, they then have to treat all other imports the same, or they’re breaking WTO rules. Not checking not only risks a lot of the obvious illegal goods being brought in, but also plant and animal pests and diseases. There’s a lot of pests and diseases we don’t worry about in Europe- which is very hot on exclusion zones and destroying infected material and suchlike- that are a real issue in other parts of the globe. Another foot and mouth outbreak, or accidentally importing something like _Xylella fastidiosa_ could devastate UK agriculture- for those wondering why you’d check a tray of lettuce, that’s why. We’re not just checking for kicks. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/82 "2019-01-08T11:15:50Z")
> [@Banksiaman](#): > > A question - if companies from a non-EU country broke, or attempted to break WTO regulations by say exporting stuff from the EU without the right approvals, what are the likely legal consequences? This question does not make sense. If something is being exported from an EU member country 
 then the destination country of the export is the country controlling, not the EU member country. It is not the country exporting that has the obligation. The countries have the obligation for their Customs actions (the national authorities) to apply on the same basis the various rules on the import of goods to all the WTO members. If a company tries to fabricate records, that is the company’s problem relative to the importing country authorities who if they detect it, can block / send back. The importing country has the obligation of the level playing field and not discriminating in the application of the controls rules, the rules themselves, on the basis of the incoming goods outside of the basis of a proper legal framework (like the EU free trade agreements that are part of the EU membership). > [@](#): > > Who gets the kick up the backside - the private company or the country? the question does not make sense > [@](#): > > Are there forward penalties imposed, such as restrictions for X years into the future? the question does not make sense > [@Filbert](#): > > I’m no lawyer, but surely there’s someone inside the EU doing the actual exporting, who would be the obvious recipient of any charges from the EU perspective if necessary paperwork wasn’t done or EU export checks were evaded. The EU members rules apply to the domestic (relative to the EU) trade or the imports. It is not the EU obligation under the WTO to do “export checks.” The private company exporting will have to satisfy the importing country authorities (and the importing company in that country) based on the pre shipping documentation (usually required) they are in respect, and then depending on the importing country practices, they will be inspected - hard inspection, soft inspection, this depends, it just has to be on a fair basis not discriminating by origin - and if not meeting the shipment may be sent back at the senders’ cost or it may be destroyed or it may be seized and frozen (at the cost of sender or receiver depending on the contracts). > [@](#): > > All a 3rd country can do is import, and it should be their own responsibility to enforce any rules for that, unless I’m missing something? No, the third country is the entity that has it’s own rules and applies them. The third country, if it is a WTO signtory country has the obligation to apply the good imports rules fairly and evenly to all other WTO countries. It of course within the parameters of the WTO agreements can set its own rules and standards, it simply has to apply them without discrimination. That is the core of the problem of the magical thinking of the English Brexiters as exemplified in this thread. They continue to think that the EU-UK relationship is as if they are EU members still, based on the 40 years of thinking it can be supposed, but if they leave, it is no longer that relatioship (by their very own choice!), and so the WTO rules bind the EU in the case of the hard Brexit and all this flexibility they are assuming will magically happen - this > [@](#): > > Part of the problem as I understand it, is if the UK decides not to check EU stuff without a deal, they then have to treat all other imports the same, or they’re breaking WTO rules. Not checking not only risks a lot of the obvious illegal goods being brought in, but also plant and animal pests and diseases. The problem is for both sides. However the key risk is more for the EU. The UK is almost certainly in desperation enough to take the risk and facing the WTO challenges and the penalties. But for the EU countries, the balance of the risk is very different, their trade internally can more easily inter-EU rebalance and they are facing the great asymmetrical risk of the multiple WTO challenges from a huge number of the exporting countries globally that will have a very nice and fat economic motivation to claim the same benefit as any accorded to the UK. That is the problem - this huge asymmetrical risk that the EU would face on trade penalties for doing as the English Brexiters keep assuming ‘must be done.’ the incentives for countries bother to take action with a UK facing a huge trade shock is probably modest, but the same calculation does not hold for the EU zone
 IF you are the EU and the national (the French, the Dutch, the German, etc.) authorities, watching this, you are not just watching the complete fiasco of the British politics and their continued completely magical thinking, you are also watching the salivating non-EU exporters just waiting to jump on any waivers to take advantage - and file very easily and well justified legal challenges if they can not benefit. Just the time and expense of defending against actions will be substantial. Or maybe the English Brexiters think the rest of the world will say \*\*\*“oh poor English, they have so fucked up, but fair play old chaps, fair play we won’t take advantage while they blunder around
” \*\*\* Maybe the Americans and the Canadians will play nice Fair Play, but I do not expect the Turks, the Russians, the Chinese, the Indonesians, the Malaysians, etc etc. etc. to do so. It is not our fault on the other side of the Channel that the English have for some bizarre reason insisted on chopping off their own noses to spite their faces, and then are complaining that it hurts and they should get special medical care
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**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 11:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/83 "2019-01-08T11:27:31Z")
I think the answer to the OP can be summed up the saying that “You can’t go home again.” Things change, society changes, and the old ways become impossible. I mean, why can’t I ditch the cell phone, the internet and satellite TV? Have one hardwired phone in the kitchen, have the wife stay at home (get rid of that damned microwave too!) and have one family car, etc. ( I think you get my point). I mean, we did all of that in the 1950s, right, so why can’t we just immediately go back to that? It is not impossible, as you point out, but it puts me at a decided disadvantage when I am working with others who do not subscribe to my newsletter. I am a lawyer, so when I go into my firm and have secretaries sitting at typewriters smoking non-filtered cigarettes, I am at a disadvantage to the law firm down the street using modern technology and adapting to modern culture. Further for you (and sadly me) 1993 was in our experience, but many people have grown up with absolutely no clue how to live like it was 1993. Might as well have been 1793 for them. Do you think that you could adjust to 1793? I mean, hell, they did it and it worked out for them! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/84 "2019-01-08T11:48:46Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Because we had a hard border before we joined the EU and it wasn’t a problem. There being a hard border is not in itself a problem. Just because the US and Canada make a cock-up of it - especially given one of the nations is the US - doesn’t mean that two other nations will also cock it up. > [@Mijin](#): > > Until the late 90s there was no public internet. > So why can’t we just switch it off (for the UK only) and go back to the good old days? Beat me to it. I’m reminded of certain neo-reactionaries, who note (or at least believe) that we were all happier in small villages in feudalism, and want to return to that state. Except you can’t, because that state no longer exists and can no longer exist in any meaningful way. The world is structured around the changes that happened in the last 400 years; you cannot just suddenly say “bollocks to that” and go back to the wilderness (not least because there is very little wilderness left to go back to). The US-Canada border is not a “cock-up”. It’s just _how borders are_. It’s the way borders between countries without comprehensive free trade and movement agreements have to be. It’s not unique, or uniquely bad (compare to the US-Mexico border, for example). > [@Quartz](#): > > That remains to be seen. Anyway, the point I made is that there is no evidence that there will be chaos. There may be; there may not be. No, companies engaging in risk management is not evidence. To assert that there will be chaos is just as unfounded and ignorant as to assert that there will not. Remember the site masthead - fighting ignorance? There is no evidence so we cannot draw a conclusion. I look at the politicians and despair but I do not jump to a conclusion. Let me tell you a little story. At my old job, a while back, I was put in charge of organizing and coordinating a 12-man team to move the entire frontend hardware IT infrastructure of my company (that is, computers, monitors, and printers - someone else was handling server migration) into a new building. I was still an apprentice at that point, I had never done anything like that (closest I came was moving my own room), and as a result I did not have a clear plan on what to do or how to do it. I filled in a few details, and figured we’d just wing the rest of it, and it’d work out okay. After all, it’s just moving a bunch of computers around - what’s the big deal? My boss was not amused. In fact, let’s be clear - my boss was _fucking pissed_. When I showed him my plan two days before the move, he responded by saying that I was insane if I thought this was good enough, calling me incompetent, and showing me the plan he had made because I had not been forthcoming in offering him a plan. Somehow, he predicted that my lack of a plan would lead to chaos, and took the extra time to do that work for me (in addition to what was already a month of 60±hour work weeks). And, lo and behold, it did. He was _totally right_. The entire move was a shitshow from front to back, and I blame a lot of that on my own poor coordination and planning. How could he have possibly seen that coming? _How did he know_? Was there no way of knowing this? Was it impossible to tell whether or not it would have gone worse had he not stepped in and fleshed out my (quite frankly embarrassing) proposal? I mean, fuck I hadn’t even thought of the problem of “where are the bathrooms we can use”. If you think that’s unknowable, you’d be downright awful at running a business, or a department, or really doing any kind of management. Look, let’s simplify “UK Trade” for a moment and treat it as one overarching process (rather than millions of smaller processes that all share certain qualities). There are certain conditions that need to be met for this process to work. We have a pretty good idea of what those conditions are. And what everyone who understands this issue has been hollering about for the last two god-forsaken years (and much, much louder in the last 6 months) is that **the UK is in no way capable of meeting those conditions**. That’s what all this news about ferry and lorry companies not being able to meet demand is about. That’s what all this talk of shortfalls is about. That’s why the bank of england is predicting a recession that, depending on what kind of brexit we get, ranges from “bad” to “as bad as the 2008 financial crisis”. That is evidence. The fact that Brexit is in the future and that nothing like this has happened before doesn’t change that fact. This is the kind of argument brought by science denialists who want to insist that there’s no way we could possibly predict global temperatures rising in the future. It’s _nonsense_. I welcome you to rejoin us in the GD thread. By and large, my reading of it is similar to **Ramira** ’s - you made bad arguments, your arguments were consistently refuted, and eventually you left the thread. If you would like to continue to make those arguments, that thread is probably the place to do it - rather than a GQ thread where the question is both clear and easily answered, and has been easily answered by people who don’t think it’s impossible to make any predictions surrounding Brexit. > [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > **Mods** , may I respectfully submit that this thread should be moved to GD? Not to make it easier to critique other posters, but because I think the posts over the past few days show that there is not a clear factual answer to the OP’s question. I disagree. There is a pretty clear factual answer to the OP’s question, in the same way there is a clear factual answer to the question, “should I vaccinate my child” - the existence of a handful of people who do not agree does not change the clear fact-based nature of this. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/85 "2019-01-08T12:23:47Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > The EU members rules apply to the domestic (relative to the EU) trade or the imports. It is not the EU obligation under the WTO to do “export checks.” My meaning was that it’s the responsibility of the sender to ensuring exports are sent safely and legally, with any documentation required- there certainly are checks before things are sent by air freight, for example, even within one country. I was mostly thinking of the odd things like differences in gun and drug laws and legality even within the Schengen area, which don’t quite fit into the normal free trade rules- stuff that’s legal (or at least not criminal) in one country but is in another. Not sure what the right legal wording would be, but they certainly go through a lot of bags leaving Schipol airport
 At least you can view this slow-motion disaster from a distance. ---
**Author:** ![GMANCANADA](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gmancanada/32/2837_2.png) [@GMANCANADA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GMANCANADA)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/86 "2019-01-08T12:26:58Z")
As a 3rd party with no skin in this game I find this thread fascinating. Of the many Brits I know, only one voted pro-brexit and he now considers it to be a terrible mistake. He thought a pro-vote would give the UK govt. some bargaining leverage when it came to immigration (his personal hot-button issue). He never imagined it would come to this. His 35 y/o son (with dependant wife and kids) has been given notice he’s losing his job in the London financial industry with zero prospects of anything into the foreseeable future. To me, the part that seems to be missing for many Brits is the lack of comprehension that the EU will do _everything_ in their legal power to make this as painful as they possibly can for the UK. The EU wants to keep the EU together and is sending a clear message to the other member countries about what will happen to them if they go down this same path. @ Ramira - As I was reading many of the comments, all I could think of the adage “cutting off you nose to spite your face”. You beat me to it. The only other line I’d add is “be careful what you wish for
” ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/87 "2019-01-08T12:40:46Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Just put it in all the consumer storage facilities, assuming their breeding rate has exploded just as much in the UK as it has in America. Did people suddenly just have more stuff? I’m assuming rather that most of them are empty. I must confess my post wasn’t entirely serious. It was mostly because I assumed that the UK does _not_ have the same level of consumer storage facilities as the US. Otherwise it would have been a halfway serious question, as I can’t for the life of me think that all the storage facilities in America are being put to good use. On the other hand, > [@Mijin](#): > > Until the late 90s there was no public internet. > So why can’t we just switch it off (for the UK only) and go back to the good old days? I can’t tell if this is serious. If it is, shutting off the Internet would cause an immediate high single digit percentage drop in the economy, probably higher in the short term as people get used to doing things the old way. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/88 "2019-01-08T12:47:42Z")
> [@Banksiaman](#): > > A question - if companies from a non-EU country broke, or attempted to break WTO regulations by say exporting stuff from the EU without the right approvals, what are the likely legal consequences? Who gets the kick up the backside - the private company or the country? Are there forward penalties imposed, such as restrictions for X years into the future? Thanks Ramira and Filbert for your detailed answers.Not entirely sure I understand their nuance, but its not my field, which is why I asked in the first place. Agree with GMANCANADA that this is probably the most interesting GQ thread in a while. Very useful to have actual logistical type people who understand the nuance contributing. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/89 "2019-01-08T12:47:49Z")
> [@GMANCANADA](#): > > To me, the part that seems to be missing for many Brits is the lack of comprehension that the EU will do _everything_ in their legal power to make this as painful as they possibly can for the UK. The EU wants to keep the EU together and is sending a clear message to the other member countries about what will happen to them if they go down this same path. Honestly I wouldn’t go that far. The EU may have an incentive here, but we have zero reason to believe that they’re doing anything out of the ordinary here. In fact, their ability to hammer together a temporary solution at May’s behest is the unusual thing. They’re being lenient here. What even more seem to miss is that the EU doesn’t have to do anything - even things that would help them and hurt the UK - for Brexit to hurt like hell. They just have to not give the UK the kind of insane preferential treatment some leavers naively expected. ---
**Author:** ![Dead\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9fc29f/32.png) [@Dead\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Cat)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/90 "2019-01-08T12:48:36Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > You don’t seem to grasp this - there is\* no chance _of this happening because it would be_ very, very illegal\* by international trade law, and the repercussions would be _global_. > > _Only_ if May’s deal passed. Otherwise, no, the EU has been quite explicit about this. Do they strike you as joking when they say that? > [@UDS](#): > > We are talking here about a no-deal situation. > > So you’re suggesting that customs officers at French ports will simply refuse to inspoect goods imported from the UK, and collect the customs that are due? Traffic police will treat UK trucks as licensed to operate in France even though they know they are not? There will be mass mutiny by French public servants who will simply refuse to apply existing laws? > > Why would you even think that? > > The EU has already indicated which concessions and exemptions it will (unilaterally) grant to smooth (for the EU) some of the worst impact of a crash-out Brexit by the UK. For example UK truckers will still (for a limited period) be permitted to provide services between points in the UK and points in the EU (but not between points in the EU). But the import of goods from the UK won’t enjoy any exemptions from the tariffs, inspections etc that are required for goods imported into the EU, and your notion that port and customs officials will simply refuse to apply these processes to imports from the UK seems . . . odd. > [@Malden\_Capell](#): > > This is what you _want_ to be true. It will never be true. > Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Why not? How much do you think the average lorry driver or customs official knows or cares about international law, WTO agreements, etc.? “The EU” is a political organisation far removed from the front line, common sense should trump what “they” (or indeed the British government) want. Unfortunately, I may end up being proved wrong by the sort of jobsworths who think the EU is a good idea in the first place and would rather down tools at the first excuse than actually get on with their jobs, especially if they think they might still get paid. Anyway, I don’t think it will come to that as I have already stated. The idiots thinking of blocking May’s deal in our parliament have got to realise that the game is over now and we just need to get on with it. > [@Ramira](#): > > the e-mails are not in any way a good analogy to this situation. > > although I guess this underlines the English incomprehension of what they have chosen to do, not understanding the legal frameworks having forgotten about them in the EU context for the international goods and services. > > The analogy you may be able to understand that would be somewhat accurate is if one morning at your work you found that a High Court decision had come down rendering certain sales communications illegal and subject to fines and other penalties. > > Your bosses will not accept “bollocks that” as a response. I think my analogy is more accurate than yours. > [@](#): > > Why should the EU members take this risk because the English are uncomprehending idiots who insist in believing in magical solutions and unicorns? I would appreciate it if we could keep the discussion civil. > [@](#): > > If you do not, you get the WTO regime. It was you Brexit supporters who thought this was a great idea. > > May God preserve us from the pub-analysis in the economics. I support Brexit but not abandoning any trade agreements, as I have already made clear. I don’t believe I have offered any economic analysis, pub or otherwise. I wouldn’t pretend to be able to do so. I wish our politicians would see sense and admit the same. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/91 "2019-01-08T12:56:14Z")
> [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > My contention is that ordinary people don’t think and behave like politicians and lawyers. I’m trying to imagine how it would apply to my job. If I went into work this morning and was told that due to a change in the UK’s legal relationship with the EU, I was no longer permitted to send emails, my reaction would likely be along the lines of “bollocks to that - I have work to do and that involves sending emails, so I’m going to carry on regardless”. And I know which side my bosses would take on the issue. Why wouldn’t it be the same for lorry drivers, people working in ports, etc? I think there is a fair chance that trade will carry on as normal while the legal issues are sorted out in the background, retrospectively if necessary. More likely is that an official communication will happen some weeks in advance that this is in fact OK, likely in the form of something like May’s deal. It’s not “being told you can’t use email”, it’s “I try to use email and it doesn’t work unless I print it out, put the printout inside an envelope, write a physical destination address on said envelope and attach what my Post Office considers sufficient postage to it, and it will take days or weeks to arrive”. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/92 "2019-01-08T12:58:24Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Honestly I wouldn’t go that far. The EU may have an incentive here, but we have zero reason to believe that they’re doing anything out of the ordinary here. In fact, their ability to hammer together a temporary solution at May’s behest is the unusual thing. They’re being lenient here. > > What even more seem to miss is that the EU doesn’t have to do anything - even things that would help them and hurt the UK - for Brexit to hurt like hell. They just have to not give the UK the kind of insane preferential treatment some leavers naively expected. Exactly, the EU is in fact interested in having good relationships with all neighbors, including any who leave in a huff. But that doesn’t mean we need to keep going “here comes the little plaaaaaaane!” when the baby is not in the room any more. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/93 "2019-01-08T12:58:35Z")
> [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > I support Brexit but not abandoning any trade agreements, as I have already made clear. So you favour EEA membership? ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/94 "2019-01-08T13:01:21Z")
> [@Banksiaman](#): > > Thanks Ramira and Filbert for your detailed answers.Not entirely sure I understand their nuance, but its not my field, which is why I asked in the first place. > > Agree with GMANCANADA that this is probably the most interesting GQ thread in a while. Very useful to have actual logistical type people who understand the nuance contributing. I’m not a logistics person or any kind of trade expert, just an unwillingly interested local, with a lot of friends from Ireland and other European countries. I am studying in the agriculture sector though, and plant imports is a thing I do know a bit about. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/95 "2019-01-08T13:11:19Z")
> [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > Why not? How much do you think the average lorry driver or customs official knows or cares about international law, WTO agreements, etc.? Those who do not know will find out very quickly when they get stopped at the border. > [@](#): > > “The EU” is a political organisation far removed from the front line, common sense should trump what “they” (or indeed the British government) want. Unfortunately, I may end up being proved wrong by the sort of jobsworths who think the EU is a good idea in the first place and would rather down tools at the first excuse than actually get on with their jobs, especially if they think they might still get paid. What part of “this is the law” is so hard to understand? This argument is a bit like shouting, “Of course it’s okay for me to smoke weed, laws against it are terrible!” You may be right that the laws are stupid, but I would still seriously advise against lighting up in front of a bobby. I do love the hedging though - “those darn EU supporters will be too lazy to break the law and that’s why I’ll be wrong”. > [@](#): > > I support Brexit but not abandoning any trade agreements, as I have already made clear. I don’t believe I have offered any economic analysis, pub or otherwise. I wouldn’t pretend to be able to do so. I wish our politicians would see sense and admit the same. This is a bit like saying “I would like you to give me an appendectomy, but I refuse to be cut”. “Brexit is Brexit” is a phrase bandied around a lot, but the idea that you could leave the european union and still maintain all of the trade agreements, when those trade agreements only make sense on the basis of a combined legal structure and free movement union, both of which you want to leave, is just bizarre. You want all of the advantages of the EU with none of the compromises. That’s not on the table - no country would ever agree to that. That’s simply not how free trade agreements work. There’s an excellent essay by Ivan Rogers you’d do well to read, “[9 Lessons of Brexit](https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/2018/12/13/full-speech-sir-ivan-rogers-on-brexit/)”. It may clean up some misconceptions. Here’s a useful quote: Then leave the club. But you cannot, in the act of leaving it, expect the club fundamentally to redesign its founding principles to suit you and to share its sovereignty with you when it still suits you, and to dilute their agency in so doing. It simply is not going to. And both HMG and Brexit advocates outside it seem constantly to find this frustrating, vexatious and some kind of indication of EU ill will. We have seen this in both former Brexit Secretaries’ conceptions of how deep mutual recognition agreements should be offered to the U.K., alone of all “third countries” with which the EU deals, and in the initial propositions on both financial services, other services and data. We saw it with the bizarre – and total non-starter – Schroedinger’s Customs Union FCA proposal of the PM whereby we got all the benefits of staying in a CU whilst leaving it to have a fully sovereign trade policy. We see it in the constant have your cake and eat it demands which run through every document the European Research Group produce or endorse, and we even see it in the railing against the “subordination to inflexible pooled law of the EU” which Richard Dearlove and others view as intolerable on national security grounds in what the Prime Minister is prepared to sign up to in her proposed deal. But if by sovereignty we must mean more than purely nominal decision-making power and we mean something about the genuine projection of the UK’s power in a world where autarky mercifully, is not an option, then, as we get into the deeper trade, economic and security negotiations ahead, we are going to need a far more serious national debate about trade-offs. You demand to abandon all the responsibilities of being part of the EU and maintain all of the benefits. And you’re not going to get that. That’s not how any of this works. And the longer pro-brexit folks insist that that’s the way they want it without thinking about the tradeoffs for even a second, the more their refusal to understand reality will end up hurting them and the rest of the UK. > [@](#): > > I would appreciate it if we could keep the discussion civil. I would appreciate it if we could keep the discussion _grounded in reality_. If anything I’ve said sounds uncivil, it’s because it’s very difficult to tell someone, “your position is so fundamentally wrong that I have no idea how you reached it” without sounding harsh. But that’s where we are with many pro-brexit folks. Their position is madness. You are literally advocating for people to break international trade laws because “the EU should come second to common sense”, for crying out loud! That’s just
 wow. _Wow_. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/96 "2019-01-08T13:22:10Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Exactly, the EU is in fact interested in having good relationships with all neighbors, including any who leave in a huff. But that doesn’t mean we need to keep going “here comes the little plaaaaaaane!” when the baby is not in the room any more. And of course, “good relationships with all neighbors” is important, but “good relationships with all members” is far more important, and when those two goals clash, the latter is going to take precedent every time. To take from Sir Roger’s speech again: Well, just wait till the trade negotiations. The solidarity of the remaining Member States will be with the major fishing Member States, not with the U.K. The solidarity will be with Spain, not the U.K., when Madrid makes Gibraltar-related demands in the trade negotiation endgame. The solidarity will be with Cyprus when it says it wants to avoid precedents which might be applied to Turkey. [
] But the EU is negotiating with us, not as a member, but as a prospective soon-to-be third country. Those glorious, sweaty, fudge-filled Brussels denouements are gone. The Prime Minister is not in a room negotiating with the 27. That’s not how the exit game or the trade negotiation works, or was ever going to. We need, urgently, on all sides of the spectrum, to start understanding how being a “third country” is different. And the most naïve of all on this remain the Brexiteers who fantasise about a style of negotiation which is only open to members of the club. So when Britain wants something out of the trade negotiations, but Spain really doesn’t, Spain absolutely holds more sway, because Spain is part of the EU. As said, no matter how this goes down, it’s going to suck for the UK. Not because the EU is being evil or cruel or forcing the UK to suffer, but because there’s no way for it not to suck for the UK that doesn’t involve the EU utterly selling out both its principles and its own members - of which the UK will no longer be one. ---
**Author:** ![Grim\_Render](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a87d85/32.png) [@Grim\_Render](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grim_Render)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/97 "2019-01-08T13:25:04Z")
I believe it was one of our Norwegian EU-negotiators, people whose full time job it is to talk and negotiate with the EU who made this observation: The UK is a nation with an unwritten constitution. Almost everything is based on established custom and precedence. Not hard rules. There is always a fudge, a compromise or a flexible approach possible. The EU is basically a set of hard rules and laws. Nations interact through the framework of rules, and the EU is fundamentally that framework. Its pretty much the opposite of how the UK government is run. British EU negotiators do not seem to get that difference. They keep trying to find the fudge or the work-around. When that doesn’t work, they feel as though the EU is being hostile, while the EU experience the UK as making impossible demands. This leads to a situation where watching the UK try to negotiate Brexit is like what someone else likened to watching someone spend all day trying to haggle down prices with the Tesco automated till. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/98 "2019-01-08T13:44:08Z")
> [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > Why not? How much do you think the average lorry driver or customs official knows or cares about international law, WTO agreements, etc.? I’m going to bet that the customs official knows a whole hell of a lot about what can legally enter the country and what can’t. The lorry driver, if he has any brains in his head at all, is going to know before he starts his truck whether or not he has the right paperwork to get where he needs to go at the end of the day. I work in a port, if Customs says a box doesn’t go anywhere, it doesn’t leave the property, period. If a trucker’s paperwork isn’t in order, he doesn’t get his box, period. ---
**Author:** ![Dead\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9fc29f/32.png) [@Dead\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Cat)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/99 "2019-01-08T14:29:19Z")
> [@Baron\_Greenback](#): > > So you favour EEA membership? I probably wouldn’t be against that, at least initially, if it means trade can continue much as before. But to be honest I probably won’t look into it in any detail unless there is a vote on the subject (which there shouldn’t be). > [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Those who do not know will find out very quickly when they get stopped at the border. I still think there is doubt as to whether they will actually get stopped. In whose interests is it to do so? Only a small cadre of people in Brussels. Literally everyone else wants to get on with life as normal. > [@](#): > > What part of “this is the law” is so hard to understand? This argument is a bit like shouting, “Of course it’s okay for me to smoke weed, laws against it are terrible!” You may be right that the laws are stupid, but I would still seriously advise against lighting up in front of a bobby. I do love the hedging though - “those darn EU supporters will be too lazy to break the law and that’s why I’ll be wrong”. It’s not a good analogy though, is it? It would be more like watching a video from an illegal streaming site in the same railway carriage as a policeman. How many people have ever been arrested for that? > [@](#): > > This is a bit like saying “I would like you to give me an appendectomy, but I refuse to be cut”. “Brexit is Brexit” is a phrase bandied around a lot, but the idea that you could leave the european union and still maintain all of the trade agreements, when those trade agreements only make sense on the basis of a combined legal structure and free movement union, both of which you want to leave, is just bizarre. You want all of the advantages of the EU with none of the compromises. That’s not on the table - no country would ever agree to that. That’s simply not how free trade agreements work. If the “you” here is directed at me, it is misdirected. I am not deluded like some of our politicians appear to be. However, it is a good argument for why the EU has the wrong structure. There is no inherent need for trading agreements to be tied into movement of people of legal structures, it just suits the current system to do so. > [@](#): > > There’s an excellent essay by Ivan Rogers you’d do well to read, “[9 Lessons of Brexit](https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/2018/12/13/full-speech-sir-ivan-rogers-on-brexit/)”. It may clean up some misconceptions. Here’s a useful quote: > > [snipped] > > You demand to abandon all the responsibilities of being part of the EU and maintain all of the benefits. And you’re not going to get that. That’s not how any of this works. And the longer pro-brexit folks insist that that’s the way they want it without thinking about the tradeoffs for even a second, the more their refusal to understand reality will end up hurting them and the rest of the UK. Thank you, I don’t disagree with that quote and I am not demanding anything. I reiterate that the idiots in our parliament (of all stripes) who want to block May’s deal need to back down, in my view. > [@](#): > > I would appreciate it if we could keep the discussion _grounded in reality_. If anything I’ve said sounds uncivil, it’s because it’s very difficult to tell someone, “your position is so fundamentally wrong that I have no idea how you reached it” without sounding harsh. But that’s where we are with many pro-brexit folks. Their position is madness. You are literally advocating for people to break international trade laws because “the EU should come second to common sense”, for crying out loud! That’s just
 wow. _Wow_. I don’t think you have been uncivil but in my view you have a greater respect for the institution of the EU than it merits. > [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > So when Britain wants something out of the trade negotiations, but Spain really doesn’t, Spain absolutely holds more sway, because Spain is part of the EU. As said, no matter how this goes down, it’s going to suck for the UK. Not because the EU is being evil or cruel or forcing the UK to suffer, but because there’s no way for it not to suck for the UK that doesn’t involve the EU utterly selling out both its principles and its own members - of which the UK will no longer be one. Another excellent argument for why the structure of the EU is not always helpful. > [@Grim\_Render](#): > > I believe it was one of our Norwegian EU-negotiators, people whose full time job it is to talk and negotiate with the EU who made this observation: > > The UK is a nation with an unwritten constitution. Almost everything is based on established custom and precedence. Not hard rules. There is always a fudge, a compromise or a flexible approach possible. The EU is basically a set of hard rules and laws. Nations interact through the framework of rules, and the EU is fundamentally that framework. Its pretty much the opposite of how the UK government is run. British EU negotiators do not seem to get that difference. They keep trying to find the fudge or the work-around. When that doesn’t work, they feel as though the EU is being hostile, while the EU experience the UK as making impossible demands. > > This leads to a situation where watching the UK try to negotiate Brexit is like what someone else likened to watching someone spend all day trying to haggle down prices with the Tesco automated till. This is an excellent point, certainly a culture clash is apparent. > [@Cheesesteak](#): > > I’m going to bet that the customs official knows a whole hell of a lot about what can legally enter the country and what can’t. The lorry driver, if he has any brains in his head at all, is going to know before he starts his truck whether or not he has the right paperwork to get where he needs to go at the end of the day. > > I work in a port, if Customs says a box doesn’t go anywhere, it doesn’t leave the property, period. If a trucker’s paperwork isn’t in order, he doesn’t get his box, period. And if your boss tells you the paperwork is in order, then it’s fine. Look, I must admit that part of my argument is perhaps fanciful. But I think the extremes imagined by some of the more hysterical comments on this issue (not just in this thread) are equally so. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2019, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260/100 "2019-01-08T14:37:41Z")
> [@Dead\_Cat](#): > > Why not? Becuase 200 years of law and rules and Customs authority. > [@](#): > > How much do you think the average lorry driver or customs official knows or cares about international law, WTO agreements, etc.? The average lorry driver may not care anything, but the company doing the shipping cares a great deal (except maybe the SME who tries the exporting sans knowing anything and fucks up badly, and sees their shipment sent back or destroyed and the complains and whines about the horrid mean complexity
). The customs officials, know and they they care a great deal because it is the law imposes via the domestic law the fines, the penalties
 that cost you. And the shipping officials in the logistics, they know these rules because they know from the hard experience that contra the wisdom of the Pub, in fact when you are not in respect to the customs regulations of the destination country, your shipment is destroyed or sent back or it is frozen and this costs you (the sender usually) very serious money. This is not the meanie EU, it is in fact the things that the EU membership has exempted the English from for the trade with the EU, now you’re going back to the WTO, but I can expect that soon the WTO rules will become the next great Meanie Scapegoat
 Of course one of the investments I am in management of and tracking, it is a logistics company operating across the NAFTA, the EU, the Latin America etc. - they do well because they do not operate on the Pub Wisdom but master the customs rules sets and their Transitaires including the people managing the lorry driver care and know very well the goods trade rule sets. > [@](#): > > “The EU” is a political organisation far removed from the front line, common sense should trump what “they” (or indeed the British government) want. Ah the wisdom of the Pub. The EU is a treaty organization, the rules of the international trade are not something the EU invented. The ‘front line’ is the logistics handling and this is a global rule set, not something new. You in supporting the Brexit have decided to subject yourselves to this complexity. That is how the international goods trade works outside of the Customs Union like the EU. Of course if one is in the international logistics or investing in this area, one hears again and again the whining of the SMEs who complain about this and when one looks it is very often the case of the non respect of the basics
 > [@](#): > > I think my analogy is more accurate than yours. Of course you do, because you do not understand at all the subject. > [@](#): > > I support Brexit but not abandoning any trade agreements, as I have already made clear. I don’t believe I have offered any economic analysis, pub or otherwise. I wouldn’t pretend to be able to do so. I wish our politicians would see sense and admit the same. this is incoherent
 you are abandoning the free trade agreement that is the EU - that is the Brexit. Now you have to find something different. > [@Baron\_Greenback](#): > > So you favour EEA membership? who can know? > [@](#): > > I work in a port, if Customs says a box doesn’t go anywhere, it doesn’t leave the property, period. If a trucker’s paperwork isn’t in order, he doesn’t get his box, period. Exactly, which is why the successful exporters have the special services inside the company or they use the transitaire services. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/brexit-chaos-at-the-ports-why-is-this-a-problem-now-but-was-not-a-problem-before-the-eu/827260.md?page=6)