Few who are not deeply partisan would dispute three propositions. The first is that Brexit is not turning out as promised. The second is that it is likely to weaken the UK economically. The third is that the future unity of the UK seems imperilled by all Brexit options currently on the table because none of them solves the problems Brexit creates in Ireland, and so in turn with Scotland.
Some time ago I read of an option that could solve the Irish issue. And it could simultaneously let the UK have some more control over migration (and it already has a lot, but just declines to use those it has). Whilst it also lets us have our own trade deals, albeit on services alone, which account for 80% of all UK trade. This is the so-called 'Jersey option'. I dismissed it not because of the name, or the fact that it describes the current relationshiu0p between that Crown Dependency and the EU, but because when I first heard of it the chance that it was remotely plausible when the government's rhetoric was so robust so remote in the extreme.
Now I am not so sure. I was discussing international negotiations with a student this week. I explained that these often appear snake-like with the parties slithering closer to and then away from each other over time, but what really matters is the trajectory. Within the slithering, there is a direction of movement. It can be convergent, or not. That is much more straight line in many cases than the slithering makes things appear to be.
The reality is that the Brexit negotiations are converging. As we know, this means that the UK has conceded almost everything so far. That has surprised me. But what that means is that when at one time the Jersey option seemed very remote now it seems plausible. It has been described like this:
- The UK could take to the world and try to sign services-only trade deals.
- The UK would need to agree to follow all of the rules of the customs union, single market rules for goods and the EU's VAT regime. All industrial goods and agriculture would have to be covered. Anything less would create a situation where checks on origin and standards, among other things, would still be required at the border.
- The UK would have to agree to rules on state aid, industrial emissions and social and employment laws, to avoid the charge of environmental and social ‘dumping'.
- The agreement would need a surveillance mechanism, to check that the UK is complying with EU rules, and a court to settle disputes between the EU and the UK. Any new court would have to take account of the case law of the European Court of Justice.
- The EU would insist upon a financial contribution to the economic development of Central and Eastern Europe, among other things. The Swiss, for example, contribute around half the UK's current payments per head. They have a similar level of access to the single market as the proposal outlined here.
- The biggest question is whether the EU would insist upon free movement of EU workers as it stands, or whether it might be possible for the UK to negotiate controls on free movement, in exchange for the obvious damage that this agreement would do to the City of London.
- The customs union issue has already been pretty much agreed. So too, when it comes to it, has staying in the single market been agreed when it comes to goods: that is the only way to solve the Irish problem and May has said it will be solved. Not changing VAT means that trade remains almost frictionless: it is possible to be in the EU for VAT and not otherwise, as the Isle of Man has proved. And we have agreed to pay, come what may.
In other words, what was once impossible to imagine is now possible. And there is a precedent, albeit for a rather small island.
Is this plausible? I think it is now.
Is it desirable? No, not nearly as much as staying which is better on almost every count for this country and for the EU, which I think needs the UK at the table. But if compromise is required this may be as good as it gets now.
Ireland is solved.
We do not suffer trade issues.
We can have some freedoms that will reduce stress in this country that would otherwise arise if we stayed.
And we remain good neighbours with close relations with the EU.
Will it happen? Who knows? But I think that right now it may be the best hope there is.
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Surely the real Jersey option is all of the above but for free?
The Brexit Jersey option comes with substantial subscription charges.
It’s turning out that the Brexit dividend was one that is payable to the EU…
The cost would be less than we pay now….
That’s the best that can be said
“That’s the best that can be said” Indeed. As Khalid used to say on Down the Line, “What is point?”
“The cost would be less than we pay now….
That’s the best that can be said”
How sad is it that represents the equation in so many minds. ?
Never mind the quality feel the dthe (sic) width.
Jersey is considered as a tax haven; why would the EU accept such an option?
Because this has nothing to do with that fact
And this has already been agreed
My gast is truly flabbered. Was it something you ate?
Do you think it will help if the Duke of Normandy is re-instated?
Sorry to nitpick but this attracted my curiosity:
“services alone, which account for 80% of all UK trade”.
I had a quick look around and it seems that that services account for about 80% of GDP (or ‘economic activity’) but about 54% of all UK trade with a lot of variation in that proportion over time but a fairly constant pattern of deficits in goods and surpluses in services.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/articles/fivefactsabouttheukservicesector/2016-09-29
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/economy-business/economy-economy/uk-trade-a-deficit-in-goods-but-a-surplus-in-services/
https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/uktrade/september2017
Whoops!
There was few numbers involved in that. I wrote it all down right but cited the wrong number above so:
Services account for about 35% of all UK trade
Which was derived from figures in the two paragraphs below the first chart here:
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/economy-business/economy-economy/uk-trade-a-deficit-in-goods-but-a-surplus-in-services/
Apologies….
It occurs to me that this general topic:
“the obvious damage that this agreement would do to the City of London”
is something that receives a lot of facile attention but very little in the way of broad consideration.
If we accept these two points:
1. That the financial sector for the most part produces nothing but largely facilitates speculation in the price of existing assets within secondary markets (shares, derivatives, established real estate etc.). All in all, it represents the redistribution of existing wealth, or rent-seeking rather than production.
2. That the City of London has a comparable relationship with Europe to that which New York (Wall St) has with the rest of the USA – that it attracts a disproportionately large amount of financial activity from the region and that in both cases the broader metropolis benefits from the auxiliary business that is to be had in supplying the financial district and its employees with real goods and services.
Then it would appear that the City as leading host of Europe’s casino economy has a parasitic rent-seeking relationship with the EU. It also has parasitic relationship with the real economy of Britain but compensates for that to some extent by profiting from foreign sources as well. The City’s European customers represent a net inflow – a redistribution of wealth from the rest of Europe to the UK.
The benefits of that redistribution flow into London and the UK generally through some part of the financial sector’s employment, its auxiliary industries, the UK balance of payments and (arguably) a role in supporting the value of Sterling.
So, the indirect value that the real economy of the UK receives from the foreign component of the City’s business has to be weighed against the so-called ‘Brexit dividend’. On its own it might possibly outweigh the ‘dividend’ – or would it?
Conversely one could also say that excessive influence of the City on the UK’s politic leaves the nation increasingly burdened with an enormous drone and a Minskyan destabilising factor that will be acutely vulnerable to the next financial crisis. The European component raises the profile of the City, increases its relative size and, as such, adds to the vulnerability.
As the current era of financial capitalism draws closer to its own self-destruction a smaller, less influential City may be a dividend in its own right?
BTW for those with a keen interest in the subject this facile article is full of bankers’ perspectives but it also has lots of useful facts and figures:
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/
Not much to argue with there
How about England and Wales leaving the U.K. to form Britain instead?
Thanks but no thanks. The association of EU-miscreants wouldn’t last long. England being a Tory manufacture would finish us off in no time…they’re already well on the way of doing that.
Waggler says:
“How about England and Wales leaving the U.K. to form Britain instead?”
Very much within the spirit of the Brexit vision…. as would be doing so without considering the opinion of the Welsh populace.
The only British Conservative government Brexit red line (I do not mean a Ruth Davidson, Scottish Conservative ‘red line’: I mean a red line that actually exists), is “immigration”. Only it doesn’t.
Richard, you shrewdly observe that Britain “already has a lot [of control over immigration], but just declines to use those it has”. The point of Brexit is to win power through a reactionary appeal to an immigration ‘fortress Britain’; to use Brexit completely to rewrite British law as a neoliberal paradigm of 19th centruy ‘laissez faire’ capitalism through Henry VIII powers acquired to achieve a hard-Brexit; but actually to do nothing significantly to reduce immigration, rather than to shift the balance from EU to non-EU; there is already huge immigration from outside the EU. In short, on immigration, in real terms post-Brexit in Britain the real substance was inadvertently revealed by Theresa May when she said “nothing has changed”; in immigration quantum, nothing will change. The white vans will whizz around Britian as before, hundreds of thousands of immigrants will quickly be ‘lost’ by the system; just as now.
What will happen? How to explain the gap between reality and ‘spin’. You don’t; the spin will rathet up., and that is all. There will be lots of photographs of the white cliffs of Dover in the press. No doubt there will be three new TV series on Churchill (who was not even a Tory!). there will be enormous puff about the increase of Customs controls, and a few extra jobs will be created; ; but totally inadequate to have any real effect. There will be occasional scandals; outrage at our leaky border in the media; hand-wringing, a few arrests, a few high profile, low order ‘economic migrants’ will be sent back; but nothing substantive will change.
Neoliberal economics is no more immune to reality than any other ideology. It will not work, even sufficient to gull the gullible, without lots of low-paid immigrants to do the low-paid jobs that everybody pretends either do not need to be done; or that the British just will not do, on any account. How else do you think neoliberalism can be made to look as if it will work; even to the gullible British elderly, who live in a past that did not exist, but keep the Conservative Party tottering on in power?
As I also said, we’d be better off going nowhere near Brexit
Of all the available options few can work at all
This one might
And it provides a route back. We will need it
For the avoidance of doubt, I consider that the Brexit referendum result is the worst decision made by the British people, probably since WWII; and that really is saying something. Democracy guarantees only that the democratic process is maintained; it is no guarantee of the quality of the decision making. The British people have form in making bad political decisions; that is undeniable. It is however a reminder to us all that the British people also (and in contradiction of our self-image), have absolutely no capacity for imagination whatsoever.
Apart from the shambolic manner in which it may come about, what is so terrible about the break-up of the UK? Is Irish unity so horrible? Or Scottish independence? The UK has been a federation of unequals for a long time and the establishment has proven unwilling to reform. It’s like a building with an English landord and leasehold tenants. Jersey may be appropriate term for what happens in the short term but I doubt it will be a durable arrangement. Then again, the Irish border was intended to be temporary.
I have no problem with the splitting up of the UK
I do fear the stresses it will cause whilst it happens
Paul says:
“Apart from the shambolic manner in which it may come about, what is so terrible about the break-up of the UK?”
I suggest it depends whether your national sense of self esteem is predicated on having a parking place for some US nuclear missiles.
And what importance you attach to having blue bits on the national flag….. and probably a few other considerations not least of which seems to be concern for the colour of the passport cover.
If the EU was functioning properly it would hardly be contentious at all.
(Notice how I deftly blamed the foreigners there? Rather gives away my English origins. It’s hard wired I’m afraid. Malfunction of the EU couldn’t possibly have anything to do with consistent British refusal to ‘join in’.)
My previous comment on the damage that Brexit would cause the City of London left me with some unresolved questions so I thought I might find some real numbers that might help to put that issue into perspective.
Before doing that I will make a quick clarification as I may have unwittingly given the impression that the City would lose all or most of its EU trade due to Brexit. It won’t. It will lose a portion of that. Furthermore, as Business Insider put it: “The Brexit dividend has never existed and probably never will.”
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/brexit-dividend-myth-eu-referendum-boris-johnson-nhs-2018-1?r=UK&IR=T
Now – as to the value of the UK’s financial services to the EU, ONS stats have the SURPLUS (exports minus imports) of all the financial services industry’s international trade at about (20.8bn minus 6.4bn) = £14.4bn.
That’s for the whole world where Europe is the largest, but by no means the only, trading partner.
It should be noted the ONS services trade figures don’t include ‘travel, transport and banking’
https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/internationaltrade/bulletins/internationaltradeinservices/2016
Remarkably, the EU Parliament’s Directorate General for Internal Policies have quoted “a report prepared by the consulting company, Oliver Wyman for The City UK (Wyman 2016)” that rather interestingly estimates the UK’s financial services surplus with the EEA alone at roughly £19bn!
“Implications of Brexit on EU Financial Services: Study”, Page 41
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2017/602058/IPOL_STU(2017)602058_EN.pdf
So, considering that the ONS don’t include banking but, then again, the wildly divergent reports from Wyman and the EU Parliament have a vested interest, I would split this down the middle or thereabouts and estimate the financial services surplus with the EU at about £10bn more or less.
But then again the UK’s entire import/sector is worth about £1138bn and its GDP is around £2trillion. So I wouldn’t lose any sleep worrying about the City.
Some of your followers may not realise that Jersey, Guernsey and the IOM all have their own “immigration laws and policies” that operate under the umbrella of UK Immigration Law. The Islands all have regulations that tie work controls to housing controls. Thus at the moment in Jersey a person has to work 5 years to gain access to Social Security benefits and 10 years to be able to rent or buy proper living accommodation that is, not just as a “lodger” or in staff accommodation. Jersey also operate a job licence system and those without a “licence” (held by the employer) or 5 years status have a limited choice of employment in hospitality or agriculture. Generally the jobs that “locals” do not want.
Guernsey has already tried to introduce stricter controls so that “immigrant” workers are limited to short term employment only and must leave the Island after say 10 months to return later if they choose. This system has already had to be revised because it frightened away so many “immigrant workers” – some who had been resident for many years.
Jersey is currently proposing to limit short term employment to 10 months only and to have a further cap of 4 years on “licenced” jobs so that the employees will not gain 5 years or 10 years status.
The proposed English language requirements of the UK Law will also apply in the Islands so that those residents who fail that test will be liable to deportation.
Jersey has a resident population of about 104,000 of whom about 13,000 working adults already do not have “housing qualifications” under the 10 years rule.
Those who think that the Jersey model might work for the whole of the UK should be aware of what actually happens now in these little places which want the economic growth but without giving equal status to the inevitable influx of workers from EU or other countries.
There is no reason to suppose that the Islands will want to give up their own “immigration” controls in order to harmonize with a scheme that suits the UK and the EU.
No one said we would be adopting Jersey law
The Jersey model is simply a term for a particular set of relations with the EU
If we copied much of what Jersey does the EU would sanction the UK
As it will, no doubt be sanctioning Jersey in the near future
ironic as to the name…interesting though..
Some more figures: In 2016, financial and insurance services contributed £124.2 billion in gross value added (GVA) to the UK economy, 7.2% of the UK’s total GVA….There are over one million jobs in the financial and insurance sector (3.1% of all UK jobs). The UK had a surplus of over £60 billion on trade in the financial and insurance sectors in 2016. In 2015-16, the banking sector alone contributed £24.4 billion to UK tax receipts(http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN06193)
A report from TheCityUK today also reveals that the industry makes up 10.7 per cent of the UK economy, contributing £176bn in 2015…..employs 7.3 per cent of the UK’s working population…financial services remain the UK’s largest tax paying sector, contributing 11.5 per cent of the total….is also the UK’s largest exporter, running a trade surplus of around £72bn (http://www.cityam.com/263446/financial-and-professional-services-industry-contributes)
Can both be right?
It depends how you define finance
The broad definition includes all accountancy, for example
No, G. Hewitt,
Both are clearly wrong although I have no doubt that at least one will have devised clever technical ruses to defend their outlandish claims.
I have put a little bit of work into this question and in researching my three previous comments found a variety of conflicting sources.
I find that in these situations one needs to be discerning and know how to discern. Which isn’t always easy. The findings that I presented in my previous comments relied heavily on the ONS in preference to other sources because the ONS is relatively authoritative, compliant with its international counterparts, declares its methodology, it has no partisan interest and its findings on this and related subjects are consistent with its findings from previous years – the years before Brexit led to proliferation of exaggerated, one-off, self-serving, partisan reports on this topic.
R. Murphy’s point about definitions, inclusions and exclusions is a good one. A partisan author can make merry hell and create all sorts of distortions by adjusting definitions.
As to your first source:
(http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN06193)
Despite appearances it is riddled with problems. To begin with its first claim relies on Gross Value Added (GVA) in an article that goes on to refer to trade figures which never use GVA thereby creating a mismatch for purposes of comparison. Furthermore GVA is less frequently used in a general sense because it is useless for all but taxation purposes and revealing distortions in the economy. GDP is the more relevant, accepted measure and most used for cross comparison. Now the interesting thing there is banking is not included in GDP partly because banks don’t produce anything they mainly clip the ticket of those that do. For people like the ONS that creates a double-counting problem among other issues that they would prefer to avoid. The use of GVA in this article allows the author to include banking and thereby inflate the percieved “contribution” of the financial sector. There are more complications to be had there but I will leave it that to make my reply simpler.
Your first source, the HoC breifing paper, has other problems as well. The ludicrous claim that it makes about “a surplus of over £60 billion on trade in the financial and insurance sectors in 2016” is referenced to “Table F” in this ONS document:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/balanceofpayments/octtodecandannual2016
Further investigation reveals that there is no “Table F” in that ONS document that I can find. There are Figures 1 to 11 and Tables 1 & 2. That’s all, no “F” and nothing that is consistent with the £60bn claim. The data in that ONS document is made a bit confusing by reference to quarterly results. A clearer impression is to be found in this HoC, ONS-based article which reveals that the surplus for the entire trade in services surplus was £92bn
So, as you can imagine, its pretty hard to see how the UK’s financial and insurance sectors can have a £60bn trade surplus when the surplus for the entire service sector was just £92bn. Especially not when the leading sectors in internationally traded services trade are : ‘Professional Scientific and Technical’ and ‘Information & Communication’ followed at a distant third by ‘Financial and Insurance’ then several other categories – as revealed here:
https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/internationaltrade/bulletins/internationaltradeinservices/2016 (if this one seems to get confusing keep an eye on the numbers).
So – why was your House of Commons Briefing paper such a mess (I don’t know why exactly) and why would I trust the abovementioned HoC article instead?
Well, the first thing to notice is that the briefing paper is just a briefing paper and it includes a big fat ‘disclaimer’ on the bottom that says:
“The House of Commons or the author(s) shall not be liable for any errors or omissions, or for any loss or damage of any kind arising from its use, and may remove, vary or amend any information at any time without prior notice.”
The HoC article that I referenced is a complete work that makes judicious use of ONS data and carries no such disclaimer. It is also more or less consistent with the other ONS Data that I have seen on this subject.
As for your 2nd source:
http://www.cityam.com/263446/financial-and-professional-services-industry-contributes
It is a self-serving, deluded, far-fetched, City-loving, in-house press article that doesn’t even pretend to disclose its sources or declare its methodology. There is no need to comment any further on that.
To be fair I have made reference, in a previous comment, to one of the self-serving ‘reports’ that has come of out of the City but that was mainly because a Directorate General of the EU parliament used it unjudiciously in one of their official documents. I also mentioned it for purposes of comparison because the relevant ONS sources exclude banking and I was hoping to find something that gave a more complete indication of the transfer of wealth from the EU to the City. It looks that I am not going to find anything that serves that particular purpose because the non-ONS sources are so wildly unreliable.
This business of discerning can be hard work.
Correction: I forgot to include a link that was mentioned in the comment above.
Where the comment says:
“A clearer impression is to be found in this HoC, ONS-based article which reveals that the surplus for the entire trade in services surplus was £92bn”
This is the article: ‘UK trade: a deficit in goods but a surplus in services’
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/economy-business/economy-economy/uk-trade-a-deficit-in-goods-but-a-surplus-in-services/
Sorry.
Impressively sourced, analysed and explained comment; if I may say. You set a standard, sir!
marco,
All of which reinforces my prejudice against the use of statistics in the formulation of policy.
The precision is all illusion.
‘Pick a number’, the hucksters used to say…. ‘any number…’
I have to admit I admire your tenacity in trying to make sense of this garbage, but you get no sympathy from me if it gives you a headache.
I really love these two articles which put Britain’s dilemma into perspective:-
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2018/01/answers-from-the-mmters.html
Takeaway – inflation (and social tensions to a large degree) have been subdued in Western developed economies (The USA’s “Great Moderation”) by China’s ability to use the formula of currency rigging and Functional Finance.
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2870313
Takeaway – Global Sectoral Balances Accounting, how does the world help all countries to balance their global trading accounts where possible?
I may be straying onto delicate territory here (!), but I am reminded of a very good article by Prem Sikka in The Guardian (13th June, 2009), on ‘A nation of accountants’, from which I have excerpted the following quote:
“The UK has about 50,000 family doctors, but nearly 280,000 professionally qualified accountants (pdf), often earning exorbitant salaries. That is almost the highest number per capita in the world and more than the rest of the European Union put together………….
Accountants have colonised the state to carve out niches. There are no state-guaranteed markets for mathematicians, scientists, designers, information technology experts and other wealth generators, but accountants belonging to a select few trade associations enjoy the state-guaranteed monopoly of insolvency (they share this with law practitioners) and external audits…….
The sick are not required by law to consult doctors and the injured are not compelled to employ lawyers to seek redress, but most companies are required to have a financial audit by an accountant, even though they deliver little.”
‘Accountancy Daily’ (1st Novermber, 2001) suggested that the UK, with <1% of the world's population, has 13% of its accountants. Germany has few; and the journal suggests this:
"the equity market is still relatively small and listed companies relatively few. The main suppliers of credit have been the banks, and the needs of creditors have been rated more highly than those of shareholders. The numbers of professional accountants have been diminished both by the relative lack of organisations for which audits are required by law or expected by custom and the perception that the role of the professional accountant is limited to audit. Where by law and/or custom the role of accountants is so limited, the membership of accountancy bodies is small. Taxation, insolvency and management services are provided in these economies, but by lawyers, engineers or specialist tax advisers rather than by persons called accountants."
Of course we can discount German experience because their economy is so small, intenationally irrelevant and poorly managed. Well, maybe not. Surely there cannot be a relationship between 'the way we do things' (the nexus of institutions, guilds and professional cartels) in the UK, and our current predicament?
Personally I think there is a very important role for UK accountants; teaching economists double-entry book-keeping, to improve the economists' understanding of banking…………
Prem and I work closely together with a few others to draw attention to our profession’s failings
“Prem and I work closely together with a few others to draw attention to our profession’s failings”
i wouldn’t beat yourself up about your profession’s failings in this regard.
If there is a root to this disproportionate number of accountancy specialists, it stems from a pathological fear of numbers which somehow infected the British Psyche.
It goes back a long way. I decline to venture for how many years….because I have a pathological fear of numbers 🙂
John,
I have no doubt that you and Prem are generally right and some of those figures are amazing (“13% of the world’s accountants”) but I also wonder if some of this ismerely due a difference in job titles.
For example:
“Taxation, insolvency and management services are provided in these economies, but by lawyers, engineers or specialist tax advisers rather than by persons called accountants.”
It could be that these people are doing a lot of the same things but aren’t required to have the same professional title. If so the cultural difference may not be as big as it initially seems.
But we actually qualify them and endow them with title, as I know
And it is a good question as to whether the effort expended provides a good return for society, not least because the training seems to neuter the capacity to think critically in many cases
Typically the “cultural differences” are actually more important than the formal processes and rituals; sometimes more important than the qualification (as Richard, I think, may be implying).
Let me take a currently fashionable issue – the sexual harassment that has affected womens’ lives or careers. In spite of the legislation, the votes, the rhetoric, the rise of women in professions – all the paraphernalia of progress and success; what we renctly had demonstrated in public that it all meant a lost less than was claimed: informal structures, assumptions, prejudices (let us gather the sorry list under the tem ‘cultural differences’), had no effect on the difficulties, barriers and offensiveness many women had to tolerate; until the Weinstein affair ‘broke the spell’.
I doubt if that is the best example i could have given; but it briefly, if rather obviously emphasises the point.
It does
Correction to hasty, butter-fingered typing; it should read:
“what we recently had demonstrated in public, is that it all meant a lot less than was claimed: …. “
Belated Happy Easter!
I’ve just been reading Anand Menon’s article in the Guardian: “Don’t expect much Leave regret when Brexit hurts prosperity”, and found these comments from a reader who says he ‘consults at the Cabinet Office’ – https://profile.theguardian.com/user/id/17730600?page=1.
His comment @ 11.30h is of particular interest. If there’s any truth in what he says, it seems as though the Gvt. has already thrown in the towel and is preparing for a post-Brexit Armageddon. Can this possibly be so? So much uncertainty and so little time …..
Has anyone tested his claims re WTO?
That could be worthy of an investigation and maybe a blog post at least.
I will try to look into the WTO stuff fairly soon when time allows an opportunity.
My brief review suggests he may well be right
As it’s not an area of my limited expertise, hopefully there’s someone out there in cyberspace who has the ability / facility to do so. On the face of it, his assessment seems exaggeratedly draconian – but what do I know? It would be good to have a 2nd and 3rd opinion from an accredited professional. If he’s even close to the truth it’s not going to be pretty, is it?
It’s not only not going to be pretty – it’s good reason for screaming ‘stop’
“It’s not only not going to be pretty — it’s good reason for screaming ‘stop’”
But whoever dared to use the communication cord ?
It would be so fwightfully un-Bwittish.
And besides there is that notice there that threatens a fine for improper use.
Douglas Adams ‘Don’t Panic’ button better suits the British temperament.