
IBM is preparing for a UK exit from the EU - jboynyc
https://www.ibm.com/brexit
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TicklishTiger
Except for the sticky header, this is a surprisingly useable page.

It's funny, how in 2019, it feels strangely unfamiliar to be able to simply
read a page without having to fight it and be annoyed by a million dark
patterns.

~~~
npunt
It's not terrible, but it has several unnecessary stylistic decisions that
make legibility harder, including

\- sticky header as you mention

\- an unnecessary 3 column layout

\- switch between light / dark background

\- FAQ accordion where you have to click to view each answer, which collapses
the others. This means to read the entire thing, you have to click >20 times.

Content-wise, there's no TL;DR / summary at top which impacts understanding. I
still can't find the part of the text that says IBM is preparing for a UK exit
from the EU as the title suggests. It's a lot of 'well we believe these things
and there's complexity in this'.

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sytelus
Genuine question: most countries in the world are not part of EU. The US,
Japan, China etc are all doing fine and have good trade agreements in place
with EU. No company is leaving from these countries because they don't happen
to be in EU. What am I missing?

~~~
19870213
CGP Grey had a good video about this recently: [0].

Basically, the UK is required by treaty with RoI to not impose a border
between the RoI (not part of the UK) and Northern Ireland (part of the UK).
And the UK wants to erect a border between the UK and the EU. So, do they
break the treaty with RoI potentially causing The Troubles [1] to come back?
Or does Northern Ireland effectively leave the UK? Or does the UK allow the EU
to require that Northern Ireland and the UK by extension to conform to the
trade rules the EU made and will make?

They can only pick one, and they don't want to pick any of them.

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1Yv24cM2os)
[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles)

~~~
SamReidHughes
The UK doesn't need a wall -- it could have an open border if it wants to
(right?). It's Ireland that would have to enforce a border. Unless there is
some other binding agreement at play.

~~~
jpat1
It absolutely could... but a major promise of the Brexit campaign was to
"secure their borders" so that's a no-go. Plus it'd result in a hell of a lot
of smuggling into the UK, and they'd be sanctioned under WTO rules since
they'd be "favouring" Irish products and discriminating against others. For
example US apples that came into a British port would have to pay tariffs
while Irish apples driven across the border wouldn't, which is a big no-no
under WTO rules where the first and foremost rule is that you must treat
countries the same using WTO rules. So they'd be forced to either drop checks
everywhere, or to erect them at the Irish border, or to do this legally they'd
need a separate Trade Deal with Ireland, that is with the EU... which puts
them right back at square one.

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excalibur
Well, at least somebody has a plan.

~~~
Animats
Yes. It looks like the UK is headed for a "hard Brexit", having been unable to
agree on anything else. Parliament just voted down May's latest proposal. 17
days to go.

An extension requires unanimous consent of the 27 EU countries. The EU
leadership has taken the position that they would only consider an extension
if the UK got its act together and had a concrete plan that just needed time
to implement. Not happening.

~~~
benj111
The UK can unilaterally retract Article 50.

There is a vote to block a no deal Brexit tomorrow, which is expected to pass.

~~~
msclrhd
Because the ERG ("European Research Group", including MPs like Jacob Rees-
Mogg) pushed a UK ammendment to include the March 29th leaving date into UK
law, MPs will need to revoke that to make it possible to retract Article 50.
It is unclear whether the current pariament breakdown would support removing
that ammendment.

The key question is how blocking a no deal Brexit will be implemented, given
the rejection of the withdrawal agreement (not a deal!) and the reluctance of
the EU to extend the Article 50 period without something different such as a
general election or people's vote. There is also the upcoming European
Parliament elections in 3 months which -- if the UK stays past that point --
the UK would need to participate in if Article 50 was extended past that
point.

A general election is also problematic as it will likely result in another
hung parlaiment or slim majority and we will be back where we are. This is
especially the case given that Scotland is overwhelmingly SNP, and may gain
seats over the Conservatives/Tories.

While a people's vote may be a potential way out of the deadlock, the
government (and maybe the majority of parliament) are against it. Even if
there is a majority for it, there isn't a majority for what to ask in the new
vote. There are MPs that don't want remain on the vote, and there are others
that don't want no deal on the vote.

~~~
benj111
Agreed.

I would guess that if a majority of MPs voted against a hard Brexit, that
would imply their for an extension. If that were taken off the table it would
be logical (ha!) to conclude that they would support an article 50 reset. Of
course the rest of the EU also know all this, so they don't really gain much
from pushing the UK to that option.

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elefanten
Makes sense they have this page and it shows thoughtfulness in identifying
specific potential risks. But I think I only counted one plan that was
actually disclosed: using EU Standard Clauses in client contracts to ensure
data portability. Everything else pretty much says "we have comprehensive
plans in place for this possibility".

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pjc50
As they point out, they're not going to be affected by customs issues. Anyone
depending on physical imports or exports is faced with preparing for unknown
but undoubtedly large delays.

Given today's events of voting down the only deal on offer, the only realistic
remaining outcomes are chaotic No Deal or No Brexit.

