est. 2007

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The Adrian Loveridge Column – What if Brexit?

As we rapidly approach the 23rd June, when Britons will vote in a referendum on whether to stay within the European Union or not, I really wonder if our tourism sector has thought through the potential implications for Barbados. Almost all the industry pundits agree that if they do it will impact negatively in several…

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BrexitAs we rapidly approach the 23rd June, when Britons will vote in a referendum on whether to stay within the European Union or not, I really wonder if our tourism sector has thought through the potential implications for Barbados.

Almost all the industry pundits agree that if they do it will impact negatively in several ways. Increased airfares, less financial protection on package holidays, the loss of delay and cancellation compensation under an existing structured arrangement and the huge unknown of the effect it may have on the value of Sterling.

Any or all of the above will certainly affect us. We are already perceived as a high cost destination so will it drive potential visitors to areas where they think they can obtain better value-for-money?

Under rule EU261 currently agreed levels of compensation for delays and cancellations are written into law for all airlines registered and operating out of the European Union (EU). If Britain withdraws from the EU what happens to airlines like British Airways, Virgin Atlantic Airways or its new Caribbean subsidiary, Thomas Cook and Thomson? Will they be then obligated to offer similar levels of recompense?

How would it effect the current Open Skies arrangements? Almost certainly new air services agreements would have to be negotiated, competition could be reduced and fares may rise again.

Sterling when compared with the United States Dollar has already been under severe stress recently, any further effective devaluation will put further pressure on the tour operators to re-negotiate lower contract hotel rates and perhaps tempt normally returning individual visitors to other destinations which are not so pricey.

Investment bankers, Goldman Sachs has predicted ‘that Sterling slide could dip to as low as $1.15 against the Dollar’.

If this prediction is even remotely feasible, can you imagine the consequences it would have on our critical tourism industry?

In the event of a Brexit it is likely that EU-originating regulations that benefit and protect travelling consumers would need to be replaced with parallel UK-originating regulations to ensure that consumer confidence is maintained.

One compensating component may be that further additional pressure will be brought across the whole industry to eliminate or at least dramatically reduce the world’s highest departure taxes, the advanced passenger duty.

Changing the subject and a lesson learnt is my ongoing battle with one of Britain’s low cost carriers, EasyJet. It transpires that of all the world’s airlines, EasyJet has the second worst record of settling compensation claims according to a recent survey by AirHelp.

With three members of my family on one flight, EZY2019, the airline is now blaming the weather and citing ‘extraordinary’ conditions. Never mind that on the day in question Storm Katie had no significant detrimental effect on Luton Airport. I have used the incredible website database, FlightAware, to track the aircraft that should have operated our cancelled flight and it would appear to have been EZY2134 which was delayed by five hours at Paphos and arrived finally in Luton at 11.03 pm. This would confirm what one of the Easyjet staff members said originally, that the crew had exceeded their hours.

Tenacity is in my blood and I am not ashamed of that.

29 responses to “The Adrian Loveridge Column – What if Brexit?”

  1. David Avatar
    David

     

    Is Brexit a risk for the Caribbean?

    by caribbeantradelaw

    Alicia Nicholls In a few weeks’ time, June 23rd to be exact, the British people will vote in a referendum to determine the future of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland’s 40-plus year formal relationship with continental Europe. The possibility of a UK vote for an EU exit, poignantly termed “Brexit” in […]

    Read more of this post

  2. Amused Avatar
    Amused

    While I see and, to a very limited point, agree with what Adrian is saying, let us take a look from the UK’s perspective and maybe even consider the positive aspects to Bajans if Britain DOES separate from Europe.

    Why should Britain stop to think of the effect of Brexit on Barbados? After all, we have abandoned so much that our centuries of British heritage has given us, sometimes to disastrous financial effect, like replacing the Privy Council that cost us nothing with the CCJ that costs us upwards of $10 million per annum and which is creating havoc with our foreign investment. We have even talked of removing the statue of Lord Nelson, the first such in the world, as Nelson, whose history is inextricably linked with the Caribbean, in particular Antigua and Barbados is seen by some idiots as infringing on the manufactured history they intend to write largely for their own self-aggrandizement. I see from yesterday’s Daily Mail online that it has now been reported by the UK press that we will be debunking the Queen in favour of a non-executive president or another piggy to feed from the trough provided by the taxpayers. Then too, Hilary Beccles (the prime idiot of prime idiots) is spearheading the unsustainable legal action against the UK government (read, the UK taxpayers) to claim many millions of their money as reparation owing to the descendants o slaves, BUT payable, not to those descendants, but to Cave Hill and into his own personal trough. Then too, UK visitors positively relish spending their vacation savings coming to Barbados and having to report the fact that they are victims of crime to their High Commission, along with the egregious way they have been treated by the Police when they have reported it to them along with the insulting and demeaning comments of the CoP when confronted by questions from the international press….NOT! So, naturally the UK voters are going to feel it incumbent on them to consider the effect of a Brexit win on Bajans. Sure they are.

    The London Mayor, Boris Johnson, who happens to be the front-runner to take over from David Cameron as leader of the Tory Party and, given the general dislike in the UK for the Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, as Prime Minister, has stated on many occasions in public that Britain’s natural ally is the Commonwealth and has proposed that it replace the EU as a similar cartel with similar advantages. Imagine therefore a situation where Bajans are allowed to enter the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand freely and to remain there if they so choose. A situation where Barbados is enabled to apply for and receive funding to offset its current bankruptcy, a bankruptcy orchestrated and facilitated by the crop of brass bowls we have voted into power (which started long before this current crop). A situation where we can, if we unwisely choose to keep the CCJ instead of telling them to take a hike, where the CCJ is no longer the final court of appeal, its substandard judgements subject to review by a Commonwealth court, thus providing foreign investor confidence where at the moment none such exists.

    People and especially politicians, say that they do what they do in order to create a better and more secure world for our children. That is bovine excrement. They do what they do, short-sightedly, solely for their own agendas and greed. As does Mr Loveridge who clearly is thinking of his own bottom line and not the effects and massive advantages that the right of access and residence in all and any Commonwealth country would confer on our overpopulated little country, or the effects on foreign investors of having a final Commonwealth court of appeal to which the CCJ is subordinate. YES, it will take time to establish. But if we are truly thinking of our children and the good of our country in the long term, then Boris Johnson’s idea is the one we will espouse – and if it means that temporarily there are fewer UK tourists to pay their vacation monies to Mr Loveridge, so be it.

    I never thought that the EU was a good idea for the UK. It was at best a doomed attempt to cobble together disparate cultures, courts, monetary systems and languages into one state. It conferred on the unelected and unelectable, powers that ought solely to be the right of elected representatives of the people. In short, it opened the doors to what is in essence a dictatorship with the premiere country in the EU, in this case Germany, holding sway. So Germany will have succeeded in finally doing what two world wars could not achieve for it. The domination of Europe. And how did Germany fail in those two world wars? It failed because the Commonwealth opposed it.

    I am not seeking to argue pro or con for keeping the Queen, although I will certainly vote in referendum for her to be kept. However, it has not escaped my attention, nor should it anyone reading this, that, while the Trinidad-based CCJ is now our final court of appeal, Trinidad itself retains the Privy Council. So the matter of whether we have the Queen (who costs us nothing) or a non-executive brass bowl (with his/her nose firmly imbedded in the public trough) is irrelevant and will not work against the advantages to Bajans of an EU-style Commonwealth, but with far greater autonomy and respect for individual sovereignty. It is thus future we ought to be working for and not falling for the British Adrian Loveridge’s attempts to help out the Stay campaign and its “fear” tactics. I am forcibly reminded of the late Duke and Duchess of Windsor who supported Hitler, not because they believed he would be best for Britain, but because he would put the Duke back on the throne and the Duchess could become Queen Wallis and for that alone they were prepared to become the puppets of Germany – and, although it would not happen now, in the 1930s and 1940s, we were not independent and our almost total less than Aryan heritage would have had us either reduced to being slaves again, or ended our lives in gas chambers.

    Finally, the effects on tourism. For years the UK Government has been promoting British resorts, which include those of mainland Britain, but also islands like Jersey Guernsey, Cayman, BVI and mainland British places like Gibraltar (from which day and weekend trips into Spain are readily available). That Britons will likely now choose these over Barbados if Brexit prevails is a given. But only until a Commonwealth cartel is established with free access to all countries.

    Finally, such a Commonwealth cartel which realistically means an English-speaking, common law cartel, would almost certainly see the application and acceptance of the USA to join it. So Barbados would have the chance to be an autonomous part of the largest and most financially powerful union ever seen. And let there be no doubt that our children and our children’s children would reap massive benefits rather than the narrow desires and aspirations of the bottom line of Peach and Quiet.

    I rest.

  3. GreenMonkey Avatar
    GreenMonkey

    Some interesting background info on how the EU came into being in the first place. It wasn’t quite as the politicians and the history books might have us believe (but nothing new about that).

    Origins of the EU – USA Covert Operations to Assimilate Europe Into A Federal State
    4th April 2016

    For anyone who still has doubts, the European Union was not really motivated by the twin desires of ending warfare on the continent of Europe and promoting economic growth by making it easier for European countries to trade with each other. This was the story you were spoon-fed. It was actually the creation of America. Read on.

    Post second world war, America saw the opportunity to transform a war torn continent. It wanted Europe to be complimentary to American policy, viewing American federalism an an ideal political model. It wanted to assimilate Europe and implemented various covert operations to undermine staunch resistance to federalist ideas, especially by the British Labour government. The opportunity was a puppet run super-state filled with attendant yes men for trade and the manipulation of strategic global markets and, just as importantly a defensive buffer zone against it’s new foe – the Reds from Russia and China.

    Diplomatic historians have unearthed evidence of US backed covert operations designed to undermine communist influences in Europe. US officials worked on a plan in 1950 to lead to a United States of Europe. It is here we see the emergence of the Bilderberg Group and The Action Committee for a United States of Europe. Winston Churchill was one of the five presidents of the Council of Europe, a disparate organisation urging rapid European unification.”

    SNIP

    The documents show that the American Committee for a United Europe (ACUE) financed the operations of the European Movement, the most important federalist organisation in the post-war years. In 1958, it provided more than half of the movement’s funds.

    These operations were managed by the CIA but as documents show it took its orders from the US State Department. Operations included funding political groups allied to American values and/or policy, undermining trade unions and influencing cultural and intellectual trends in Europe. It went further with operations deliberately provoking dissonance in non compliant states and created ‘stay-behind’ or GLADIO networks designed to train special forces, spy networks and disruption teams to stem any potential for Soviet incursion or even business activity into western Europe.

    The leaders of the European Movement – Jozef Retinger, Robert Schuman and the former Belgian prime minister Paul-Henri Spaak – were all treated as hired hands by their American sponsors. ACUE’s covert funding came from the Ford and Rockefeller foundations as well as business groups with close ties to the US government and the CIA.

    SNIP

    A memo from the US State Department dated June 11, 1965, advised the vice-president of the European Economic Community, Robert Marjolin, to pursue monetary union by stealth. It recommended suppressing debate until the point at which “adoption of such proposals would become virtually inescapable”.

    The vision of American economic dominance is now within sight with the secretive and soon to be enforced trade deal known as TTIP.

    http://truepublica.org.uk/united-kingdom/origins-eu-usa-covert-operations-assimilate-europe-federal-state/

  4. David Avatar
    David

    Isn’t it ironic a couple blogs below we are discussing regional integration and our former ‘mother country’ wants to leave the EU.

  5. caribbeantradelaw Avatar
    caribbeantradelaw

    @David, I don’t think the UK will leave the EU. They have too much at stake. Just like the Scottish vote, this will blow over, especially considering the package Cameron was able to secure. But ultimately, it is the British people’s choice and we in the Caribbean, as I argued in my article, should bear in mind the possible implications for us if a “leave vote” wins the referendum.

  6. David Avatar
    David

    @Alicia

    Economic considerations suggest no, are there others the voters should consider?

  7. caribbeantradelaw Avatar
    caribbeantradelaw

    @David, there are also foreign policy implications. Despite its economic prowess, the bargaining power and political influence which the UK has as a part of the EU is more than it would have outside the EU. Already the EU is seeing some declining influence in global affairs relative to the BRICS but is still a formidable voice.

  8. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    David wrote: “Isn’t it ironic a couple blogs below we are discussing regional integration and our former ‘mother country’ wants to leave the EU.

    This push for regional integration in various parts of the world is only an intermediate step towards the real end goal, a one world government. The EU did not spring into existence overnight, but when it first was proposed to the people of Europe post WWII it was sold to them as only a free trade agreement between European nations. Ideally free trade would lead to increased trade and cooperation between formerly warring countries. They were sold on the idea that increasing prosperity from trade would bring them together so that everyone would realize that it was to their mutual benefit not to start wars with each other any more. It was only in stages over a large number of years that the real plan for individual European Common Market countries to give up their individual sovereignty in order to allow themselves to be rolled up into a “United States of Europe” (AKA the EU) unfolded.

    From my previous post above:
    A memo from the US State Department dated June 11, 1965, advised the vice-president of the European Economic Community, Robert Marjolin, to pursue monetary union by stealth. It recommended suppressing debate until the point at which “adoption of such proposals would become virtually inescapable”.

    I and others believe that what we have to contend with now is the planned formation of a one world government by stealth. See below:

    Forging a “New World Order” Under a One World Government
    Global Power and Global Government: Part 4

    Jacques Attali, founder and former President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and economic adviser to French President Nicholas Sarkozy, interviewed on EuroNews, said that, “either we’re heading towards a world government or we’re going to put national issues first.” The interviewer stated that the idea of world government will frighten many people, to which Attali responded, “Indeed, that’s only to be expected, because it seems like a fantasy. But there is already global authority in many areas,” and that, “even if it’s hard to think of a European government at the moment, which is there, but very weak, Europe can at least press on its experience to the world. If they’re not capable of creating an economic framework along side a political framework, then they’re never going to do it on a global scale. And then the world economic model will break up, and we’ll be back to the Great Depression.”[65]

    In December of 2008, the Financial Times published an article titled, “And Now for A World Government,” in which the author, former Bilderberg attendee, Gideon Rachman, wrote that, “for the first time in my life, I think the formation of some sort of world government is plausible,” and that, “A ‘world government’ would involve much more than co-operation between nations. It would be an entity with state-like characteristics, backed by a body of laws. The European Union has already set up a continental government for 27 countries, which could be a model. The EU has a supreme court, a currency, thousands of pages of law, a large civil service and the ability to deploy military force.”

    He stated that, “it is increasingly clear that the most difficult issues facing national governments are international in nature: there is global warming, a global financial crisis and a ‘global war on terror’.” He wrote that the European model could “go global” and that a world government “could be done,” as “The financial crisis and climate change are pushing national governments towards global solutions, even in countries such as China and the US that are traditionally fierce guardians of national sovereignty.” He quoted an adviser to French President Nicolas Sarkozy as saying, “Global governance is just a euphemism for global government,” and that the “core of the international financial crisis is that we have global financial markets and no global rule of law.” However, Rachman states that any push towards a global government “will be a painful, slow process.” He then states that a key problem in this push can be explained with an example from the EU, which “has suffered a series of humiliating defeats in referendums, when plans for ‘ever closer union’ have been referred to the voters. In general, the Union has progressed fastest when far-reaching deals have been agreed by technocrats and politicians – and then pushed through without direct reference to the voters. International governance tends to be effective, only when it is anti-democratic.[Emphasis added]”[66]

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/forging-a-new-world-order-under-a-one-world-government/14712

  9. Shaft Avatar
    Shaft

    I just love reading pundits who have never lived in the UK making comments on matters they know nothing about..!

  10. de pedantic Dribbler Avatar
    de pedantic Dribbler

    @David April 18at 6:07 AM re: “Isn’t it ironic a couple blogs below we are discussing regional integration and our former ‘mother country’ wants to leave the EU.”…

    Mr Blogmaster you are always wonderfully provocative with your succinct prose. But why should that be so ironic!

    Hasn’t Britain as we know it always been a part – a leader in fact – of some union or other….count the many ways: British Isles (UK) the Commonwealth and of course Master Colonizer. And we could go further back. So the real irony is that we TALK of political unions whereas the Brits have been DOING some form of a political union for centuries.

    @Green Monkey….re: one world government. Haven’t we seen and read enough from Wikileaks and from Freedom of Info revelations in US, UK and other places to know and understand that the concept of a ‘world’ government is in many regards already a real thing. Don’t the 1% control the 90% of the world’s wealth.

    We take up a lot of words and treat this stuff in an esoteric way when in fact it is as real as the power brokers who move freely and smoothly whether in Moscow, Washington or Doha.

    Lots of smoke and mirrors!

  11. Amused Avatar
    Amused

    @caribbeantradelaw April 18, 2016 at 6:39 AM. I am not convinced that you are right. Rather, the opposite. While Cameron and the Tories won the last election in the UK, against the predictions of the polls, it would be more true to say that Labour, more particularly Miliband, and the Lib Dems lost the election. However, it was because, like us, the choice was between the devil and the deep blue. However, recent trends show a grave dissatisfaction with Cameron, the Chancellor Osbourne and the Tories for what certainly appears to be a serious imbalance in taxation rich vs poor. In our terms it would be akin to a government of which Cow Williams was leader and PM. The simple truth is that Boris Johnson, who rides his bike to work, has far more street creds than Cameron, who has just bought a private jet to ferry him on his trips – at the taxpayers’ expense.

    Then, there is the question of Cameron’s involvement with Panama and, while I hasten to say that it was all completely legal and above board, it has done him no good at all in the eyes of the UK electorate. The truth is that Cameron is known in the UK as “Dodgy Dave” and the public don’t trust him one bit, but they trust Corbyn and Labour less and, as far as a vote goes, the majority of voters are in England and Wales, Scotland having a far smaller electorate. And then, while the opinions of HM the Q may mean next to nothing in Barbados, they mean a hell of a lot in the UK where the personal popularity of the monarch herself is at an all-time high and with her 90th birthday coming up and all the media frenzy over it, her opinions are paramount in the minds of most – and we know what those are, because they were leaked by an undiscovered member of her Privy Council and they do not seem to accord with those of Cameron. Then we have the Tory icon, the late Margaret Thatcher, who left a letter making it crystal clear her disapproval of the EU which will likely sway many Tory supporters. I have friends within the hierarchy of the Tory party, some of whom support stay and some, leave and I can tell you that the stay lot are deeply worried.

    As far as the stay campaign is concerned, I think they have done it all wrong, but such things happen when people are desperate. The stay lot have lined up all kinds of business people, most of whom are perceived by the electorate to have a vested interest in the UK staying in, rather than a vested interest in the good of the country and they have all preached gloom and doom. Well, it is the same sermon that was delivered in 1939 to keep Britain out of WWII, and it failed then and history may well repeat itself now. But the single biggest mistake Cameron has made is to get his friend Obama to go to Britain, ostensibly to wish HM a happy 90th, but to also speak in favour of Britain staying. Getting a US president whose lacklustre administration is about to end to take such a public position that would appear to bind the office that he is about to leave, is ludicrous. And Boris Johnson, as those who read the international press online will know, has taken Obama to pieces, which was easy as all he had to do was to point out that the US, which in many cases even elects judges, would never stand to be dictated to by unelected bureaucrats from an external power. Johnson calls it hypocrisy and I agree. Then there are the pronoucements of gloom and doom by French ministers and we all surely know how the UK electorate will feel about that. Finally, there is the £9 million of taxpayers’ money that Cameron and the Stay lot spent on print advertising to support their cause. I see that a number of very prominent people and many not prominent at all, either dropped off or mailed the ads that went to every household in the UK, straight to 10 Downing Street to the attention of Cameron.

    Personally, I hope the UK votes to leave, but I have an agenda and no problem with declaring it. My agenda is simply that it opens the door for Barbados to become one of the autonomous parts of an English-speaking union, the largest and richest such union ever. Thus will our best interests be served, regardless of whether we have the Queen or some non-executive brass bowl/bottom feeder as head of state. Our people, if they cannot find jobs to fit their qualifications, will be able to live elsewhere without the current draconian formalities and to do that, our educational system will have to upgrade itself so that the pieces of paper they hand out actually are accepted in other countries. Our courts will be forced to compete with the standards of justice as set down 800 years ago in Magna Carta, as re-stated in our Constitution, but ignored with impunity by our judges. In other words, Brexit may well provide a chance for Barbados to truly join the international community, instead of just play-acting by brass bowls who seek to reduce everything to the level of their own incompetence.

  12. David Avatar
    David

     

    George Osborne showed the maths behind his Brexit report and we’re all confused

  13. David Avatar
    David

    UK Politics via Telegraph Politics

    13 hrs ·

    Conservative former minister Norman Tebbit gives his view on what he calls the "hair-raising" scare tactics of the Government.

    The Government is doing everything in its power to rig the EU Referendum

  14. caribbeantradelaw Avatar
    caribbeantradelaw

    @Amused, I take your point about the unpopularity of Cameron and I am familiar with late PM Thatcher’s quite fiery debates in the House of Commons re the ECU, among other EU related matters. Interesting how she once supported the EU (then EEC) and then changed her stance. But the sense I get from my British friends and family is that while the anti-EU sentiment is growing, the leave vote is unlikely to win. Sure PM Cameron didn’t get all that he wanted out of the renegotiation but he did get some important “concessions” which may be more palatable to the British people than what obtained before. I think just like the Scottish referendum, this is being overblown.

    However, my view that the Stay Vote will prevail is more based on the economic ties the UK has with the EU and the economic uncertainty that would occur in the event of a leave vote. The vote hasn’t even occurred yet and sterling has already seen sharp depreciation in value over the past few months. The EU is the market for nearly 50% of UK exports, which naturally benefit from the preferences which flow from being part of a single market. Sure one can argue that the UK has a trade deficit with Europe (mainly Germany) but that won’t immediately change just because it is no longer an EU member state.

    Either way, I have no vested interest in whether the UK stays or goes. It’s a matter for the British people to decide what they feel is in their best interest. I’m more observing from an academic point of view, particularly, from a political economy and international law perspective given the issues that would arise if the UK does leave and is thus called on to invoke Article 50 of the TEU for the first time in the EU’s history. After all, there is disagreement on whether the principle of continuity would apply to the treaties which the UK signed as part of the EU or whether it would have to renegotiate. Not sure what your thoughts are on that. Interesting times ahead for international law observers!

  15. Colonel Buggy Avatar
    Colonel Buggy

    ” The Government is doing everything in its power to rig the referendum”

    Who is to say that the referendum back in June 1975 to give support to the UK l joining the EEC was not also rigged. I was never registered as a voter in the UK, or in the Armed Forces abroad, yet still I was allowed to vote in that referendum, shortly after being posted back to the UK.

  16. Amused Avatar
    Amused

    @caribbeantradelaw April 18, 2016 at 9:42 PM. Agree re the £. However, would point out that in the 80s under Thatcher, the £ was at parity with the US$, resulting in massive employment in the manufacturing sector, massive exports from the UK specially to the USA, massive tourism boost as everyone wanted to visit the UK because it was far cheaper for them. In the latter part of the Blair and then the Browne administrations, the £ went to US$2.21 and the result was seriously falling employment especially in manufacturing, fall in exports and rise in imports and finally the bottom dropped out of the tourism market. Therefore the fall in the pound, which you may be assured was government-orchestrated (largely by use of the extremely low interest rates set by the Bank of England) has had the effect of allowing Cameron to answer all detractors, particularly in Prime Minister’s Question Time, by pointing out with monotonous regularity (almost like looped sound) that employment is steadily rising.

    Meanwhile, there is a massive exodus of wealthy citizens from Greece, France, Spain, Portugal and, most of all, Italy and their purchase of expensive properties and the transfer of their funds from those countries into the UK. As Brexit seems a possibility (note that I do not say “probability”) these people are moving for many reasons, of which the main ones seem to be the clamp down on immigration if Brexit prevails that will lessen the threat of terrorist activities to the UK and also the possibility to be a part of an English-speaking union through the Commonwealth that will allow them a far greater degree of financial security than is offered by the Euro single currency.

    I’m afraid that my own friends in the UK are unable to predict how the vote will go and they discount the polls that are being taken as likely inaccurate, especially as far as Scotland is concerned. But remember that the population of the UK as a whole is just over 65 million of which the population of Scotland is a mere 5.3 million, less than the population of London, which is 8.6 million.

    As I have said, my hope is that Brexit will prevail, because of the enormous potential advantages to Barbados as a part of the Commonwealth and likely one of the founder members of the replacement English-speaking cartel. Let there be no mistake, we are in a world war, but it is no longer military, but financial. It may be that once again, as happened twice in the last Century, the UK and the Commonwealth lead the way and the US eventually joins to assure victory. Like in the last Century, it will not be easy and some sacrifices will have to be made. However, I would like to think that the UK’s people are still unwilling to simply accept a status quo. I could be wrong, but I hope not.

    And if Brexit wins and Barbados and the Commonwealth do opt to join in the formation of an English-speaking union, we will have to think very carefully about our own elections and officials. We will need a leader who can be respected internationally and who is a very tough negotiator. The choice we have now is Stuart or Mottley. I know which one I would choose.

  17. David Avatar
    David

    What is interesting if you follow the UK media and discuss with players over there is the high and informed level of engagement for and against In or Out. Then one juxtaposes same to Barbados regarding the change to a Republic for example. It pales by comparison.

  18. caribbeantradelaw Avatar
    caribbeantradelaw

    @David, my sentiments exactly. It would be nice if we had that level of discussion of issues here in Barbados but we prefer to discuss personalities and motives instead.

  19. Sargeant Avatar
    Sargeant

    @Amused

    Imagine therefore a situation where Bajans are allowed to enter the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand freely and to remain there if they so choose. A situation where Barbados is enabled to apply for and receive funding to offset its current bankruptcy,
    &
    Personally, I hope the UK votes to leave, but I have an agenda and no problem with declaring it. My agenda is simply that it opens the door for Barbados to become one of the autonomous parts of an English-speaking union, the largest and richest such union ever
    +++++++++++
    After reading your submissions (which included those two statements among others), can you divulge if your name is Joseph? He of many dreams?

    It is one thing to have an opinion on the merits of Britain’s exit from, or continued membership of the EU, it is another thing to bolster those opinions with pie in the sky expectations on what that exit would mean to Barbados and how Barbados could benefit from that action. Are those hopes in your submission manifestations of “irrational exuberance”? (thanks Greenspan), yuh know Hollywood is always on the lookout for script writers and those thoughts could be part of a farce titled “The Fall and Fall of the British Empire” sub titled “How Barbados and the colonies help Britain get back on its feet after turning its back on Europe”, starring Mad Dogs and Englishmen.

    April is indeed the cruelest month…….

  20. de pedantic Dribbler Avatar
    de pedantic Dribbler

    @David, you and too @Caribbeantradelaw’s remark may be quite accurate re “What is interesting … there is the high and informed level of engagement for and against In or Out. Then one juxtaposes same to Barbados regarding the change to a Republic for example. It pales by comparison.”——————-

    But there is a MASSIVE difference on the issue of Republic status in Bim : Bajans know that it is meaningless in the grand scheme of their lives…

    Not so in UK… My limited knowledge of the EU-UK issues suggest that the implications are quite serious and the immediate and mid-term impact significant.

    There was (to me anyhow) an interesting comment from the previous posts of @Amused. He spoke of the UK and other high net worth folks being skittish (my word) of investing in Barbados sans a UK Privy Council as final arbiter. To his eye as a long-time practitioner and based too I presume on his business operations Barbados lost much when they went to the CCJ.

    So if we extrapolate that single example to a broader perspective, what more of real significance do we project would befall us from the world community with a move to a Republic ???

    @Amused, what really are these opinions and opinion polls worth? Often not even the ‘paper’ or screen pixels which they use. You stated : “But the single biggest mistake Cameron has made is to get his friend Obama to go to Britain, … Getting a US president whose lacklustre administration is about to end to take such a public position that would appear to bind the office that he is about to leave, is ludicrous. ”

    Amusingly, I read a few articles recently which said just the OPPOSITE. One lambasted Obama as not having many ‘friends’ in Europe and certainly did not link him and Cameron as pals.

    (In fact @David, it provides excellent additional fodder to support your view of Obama’s lack of success after inauguration. ‘ Washington Post: A cold-eyed view of allies has left Obama with few overseas friends’)

    So to continue it said … And here is the strange kicker:

    “In Europe, where Obama remains popular with the public, his tough-love approach has been less of a handicap. A Pew Pew Research Center Research Center survey last year showed that about three-quarters or more of voters across France, Germany and Britain trusted Obama to do the right thing — a lofty status that is down only slightly from his first year in office. ”

    So what is any opinion worth, eh?? Some of the lead-ins to that statement are quoted below.

    “Even the United Kingdom, a U.S. “special” partner, has received criticism. Obama seemed to blame the postwar chaos in Libya on British Prime Minister David Cameron… ”

    “One big challenge for Obama will be squaring the careful diplomatic rhetoric that’s a standard, and frequently stultifying, part of all presidential visits with his tougher, more honest language from interviews back home…”

    “Leaders are going to have to deal with that dichotomy,” said Heather Conley, a former State Department official … “and I don’t believe it’s going to be very easy.”

    And then….

    “I’ve never heard that Obama has a personal relationship with any of them,” said Xenia Wickett, head of the Americas program at the London-based think tank Chatham House. “It is neither hot nor cold. There is no personal relationship.”

    Incidentally @Sargent I agree with you. I cannot square @Amused previous sentiments re Privy Council with his conviction that any exit would redound so significantly to places like little Bim.

    The man is in the business so one has to ask whether that opinion is more a strong desire than solid analysis – academic or otherwise!

  21. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @ Amused April 19, 2016 at 3:23 AM
    “As I have said, my hope is that Brexit will prevail, because of the enormous potential advantages to Barbados as a part of the Commonwealth and likely one of the founder members of the replacement English-speaking cartel. Let there be no mistake, we are in a world war, but it is no longer military, but financial. It may be that once again, as happened twice in the last Century, the UK and the Commonwealth lead the way and the US eventually joins to assure victory. Like in the last Century, it will not be easy and some sacrifices will have to be made. However, I would like to think that the UK’s people are still unwilling to simply accept a status quo. I could be wrong, but I hope not.”

    Dear, dear, a case for the Brexit so well argued, Mr. Amused! Mr. Michael Grove the leading Eurosceptic can certainly use your PR services here in the UK. But the reality on the ground in the form of local knowledge tells a different story to what your enthusiasm is portraying.

    It appears that the English, just like their northern neighbours in the Breakaway Union Referendum, are at this stage NOT prepared to divorce the EU.

    Most ‘younger’ Brits (some of whom are being engaged in discussion on the topic) see themselves as “Europeans” and not as members of some amorphously foreign Commonwealth of English-speaking nations. Even the black British are keen on maintaining the existing marriage of convenience.

    The integration is too well established for the younger generation to just walk away, barring a war. A recent visit to Amsterdam certainly indicated how much the Brits ‘freely’ enjoy a rather open-minded city, devoid of their native hypocrisy.

    So keep wishing and hoping for your Brexit. But it does not appear your dream would come true.
    Even in the cosmological ‘rare’ event Britain does leave the EU there is an even ‘rarer’ chance Bim- who is now a grown-up looking to take on it republican responsibilities-
    would not be welcomed back into the fold of British Overseas dependent territories.

    King Sugar is dead, tax havens are to be scaled back and the Brits are spoilt for choice when it comes to tropical tourist destinations in the Caribbean.
    Barbados has made up its bed now is the time to sleep in it. Barbados is no longer an attractively profitable market for British goods or services.

    The most can be expected is that young educated and skilled Barbadians would do like their fore-parents and leave the economically ossified ‘Rock’ for “greener” pastures, including those same British Overseas dependent territories to which they once endeavoured in their numbers.

  22. Enuff Avatar
    Enuff

    @Amused
    Who are these unelected you refer to?

  23. Victor Avatar
    Victor

    Surprisingly, Brexit is gaining ground amongst those recently polled. Thank goodness, I never thought it would.
    Germany rules in the EU world and Mrs Merkel’s great idea of inviting unlimited numbers of Muslims to Germany has resulted in catastrophe.

    Not content with battering the world into the 2 worst wars on the planet ever, TWICE in the 20th century in which many, many millions died and Dictatorships flourished as a result, Germany still has to scratch its itch for domination of Europe by using it’s economic dominance in the EU to throw open the borders of those countries within the Schengen Agreement to this influx of mainly Muslim migrants with a mindset totally opposed to the hard-won liberal laws of Europe and the current mindset of those who live within it, thereby unleashing yet another German-inspired war on Europe for the 21st Century, the impact of which will be seen for years to come.

    Luckily Britain never subscribed to the Schengen Agreement so in principle is not obliged to allow free ingress to the several million “refugees” (only one fifth coming from embattled Syria) arriving upon Europe’s shores daily from mainly Pakistan.

    When Britain leaves the EU the pound will suffer, as it is already doing. It will become much more expensive for Brits to travel to Barbados as the value of the pound declines.

    I do not believe that Brexit will cause Britain to be poorer, as new trade links will be established quickly by this historic trading nation, and London will continue as the centre of world Finance and Banking.

    However, as a result of a poor exchange rate against the US dollar for the next few years whilst Britain re-establishes its new position in the world outside the EU, the impact of devaluation will affect tourism to Barbados, as the generally middle and lower middle class Brits who form most of the tourists to Barbados won’t be able to afford Barbados’ expensive prices. The all-inclusives may survive, offering a Costa Brava style holiday, but those who choose to holiday in them won’t be going out spending in town. They will save up all year for their 2 week family holiday and spend most of it on hotel premises.

    Meanwhile those retirees who dreamed of retiring to Barbados will find their pound not matching up to the buck so hello a cheaper destination in the Caribbean such as St Lucia or Antigua, cheaper and MUCH nicer and more welcoming. Barbados immigration is developing amongst British expats, a reputation of being hostile and negative; many are leaving anyway.

    So who will be the new customers for Tourism Barbados?

    Cuba will claim US customers as a new, cheap, exciting and historic destination. Canadians will continue to come to Barbados but let’s welcome more Chinese and Russians!

    Don’t think that leaving the EU will open the way for more immigrants from the Commonwealth! Dream on. Although people from the Caribbean, Canada, Australia may be welcome, the last thing the UK needs is more immigrants from Pakistan or Bangladesh or Islamic African countries.

    There are between 4-5 million Muslims living in the UK, at least 37% of whom would like to overthrow democracy in favour of Islamic Sharia law. So cut down on that source of migrants, thank you.

    Sadly that affects other Commonwealth states.

  24. balance Avatar
    balance

    Excellent thought provoking piece at 3.23 Amused – I am fully supportive of your views and will not be ditching the Crown which does not cost me a cent for a fatted calf feeding from the trough mentality.
    “In plenty and in time of need when this fair land was young
    our brave forefathers sowed the seed from which our pride is sprung’

    utter nonsense

  25. balance Avatar
    balance

    Amused my reference was specifically to your 4.22 comments not that disagree with your comments at 3.23

  26. balance Avatar
    balance

    “Personally, I hope the UK votes to leave, but I have an agenda and no problem with declaring it. My agenda is simply that it opens the door for Barbados to become one of the autonomous parts of an English-speaking union, the largest and richest such union ever. Thus will our best interests be served, regardless of whether we have the Queen or some non-executive brass bowl/bottom feeder as head of state. Our people, if they cannot find jobs to fit their qualifications, will be able to live elsewhere without the current draconian formalities and to do that, our educational system will have to upgrade itself so that the pieces of paper they hand out actually are accepted in other countries. Our courts will be forced to compete with the standards of justice as set down 800 years ago in Magna Carta, as re-stated in our Constitution, but ignored with impunity by our judges. In other words, Brexit may well provide a chance for Barbados to truly join the international community, instead of just play-acting by brass bowls who seek to reduce everything to the level of their own incompetence.”

    well said.

  27. balance Avatar
    balance

    “The choice we have now is Stuart or Mottley. I know which one I would choose.”

    then based on your profound assertions in your above comments ; your choice would have to be one in sync with the current norms and behaviours of the international community. Legalisation of abnormal behaviours, same sex unions and the like.
    Over to you.

  28. balance Avatar
    balance

    “Forging a “New World Order” Under a One World Government
    Global Power and Global Government: Part 4″

    Green Monkey- your observations are all part ofthe doctrine adopted by the policy committee of the Bilderburg group during its first known meeting in 1954. A copy found in 1969 was in possession of naval intelligence. The document” Silent weapons for a quiet war”was found on july 7, 1986.

  29. pieceuhderockyeahright Avatar
    pieceuhderockyeahright

    @ Victor

    Don’t really contribute to Loveridge’s rhetoric because I feel that he writes from the perspective of a hotelier whose interest are solely driven by bed nights

    You sir have hit the nail on the head which is the fact that Britain is hemorrhaging internally supporting the EU and, in keeping with their “Rule Britannia, Britannia Rules the Waves” patriotic song, the last line, which I adapt here in support of the tacit facts? “Britons never sahll be party to the importation of slaves and camel lovers and goat herders”

    Ooops, I simply did not observe the metre of “3,3,6, 9”, my bad.

    In 2015 the UK government paid £13 billion to the EU budget.

    The UK government spent £66.5 billion in its Defense budget.

    Russia is flexing the muscles of its military might and while President Obama’s ostensible mission is one to bolster this EU presence, they too realise the winds that are a-blowing around us that myopic Loveridge and amazingly my man Amused CANNOT SEE.

    We are in the preliminary stages of a war where allegiances are being shored up.

    The UK has no interest in goat herders, and like Churchill would assembled and then committed his limited RAF fighters at the Battle of Britain, Cameron is now clearly assembling his forces, AT HOME IN THE UK.

    The UK has no desire to strafe its forces across the EU, to fight, and die in unknown lands, for ungrateful EU comrades particularly those that are sucking the life blood out of the UK at a rate of 16 BILLION GBP a year.

    We are moving slowiy towards Revelation 6

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