Tag Archives: UK and EU

Brexit: how it started, how it’s going

The European Parliament votes Tuesday on the EU’s divorce settlement with Britain, the 1,246-page Trade and Cooperation Agreement. The deal averted tariffs or quotas on almost all goods produced in the UK and EU. The new standards and attendant bureaucracy are having an impact on trade.  UK exports of live mussels, cockles, oysters and other shellfish are no longer allowed to enter the EU. Most come from Scotland, and the industry says it is staring at collapse. Britain’s government, however, says the coronavirus pandemic has been the bigger factor affecting trade since the Brexit deal took effect. >click to read< 07:32

So long and thanks for all the fish: Irish fishermen say UK Brexit position could spell ‘unmitigated disaster’

Although a debate between the UK and EU around immigration has garnered more headlines in recent years, fishing rights are perhaps the most tangible example of why the UK wanted to leave in the first place.  Over two-thirds of the EU’s fishing waters, and two-thirds of the EU’s fishing catch, belong to Ireland and the UK. Around half of Ireland’s fishing catch take place in UK waters.  Now that the UK is leaving (and, theoretically, taking its waters with it) Ireland’s fishermen and fishing industry are under threat of being locked out of waters that had been frequented by Irish trawlers long before either country joined the EU. >click to read< 23:11