# Brexit and rail transport



## CHamilton (Jun 24, 2016)

‘Brexit’ will not affect Channel Tunnel, says Eurotunnel


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## railiner (Jun 26, 2016)

Interesting....I was not aware of the Schengen exception's to border control within the EU....good thing they never opted in, in retrospect....


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## Ryan (Jun 26, 2016)




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## jis (Jun 26, 2016)

Channel Tunnel passenger service really had no reason to be affected too much by this since all the relevant base agreements appear to predate EU, so there is something well known to fall back on even in operational details. Of course the French want the Brits to move their border check post to Calais and set up internment camps in Britain to handle their issues instead of leaving it to the French.

This whole thing will provide us with many months if not years of entertainment, alas at the cost of much pain, often to the very people that voted to Brexit.


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## cirdan (Jun 26, 2016)

I think a bigger concern here is if Scotland lives up to its threats and leaves the UK.

This might kill off the Scottish sleeper trains as EU rules don't allow national governments to subsidze international trains, and also the cynics claim these trains only really survive for the benefit of Scottish MPs travelling betwen their constituencies and Westminster,


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## Gemuser (Jun 26, 2016)

cirdan said:


> I think a bigger concern here is if Scotland lives up to its threats and leaves the UK.
> 
> This might kill off the Scottish sleeper trains as EU rules don't allow national governments to subsidze international trains, and also the cynics claim these trains only really survive for the benefit of Scottish MPs travelling betwen their constituencies and Westminster,


I believe this is not totally correct. EU governments can subsidise whatever they like PROVIDED they put it out to open, competitive tender that does not discriminate against any qualified provider. Some years ago there was a lot of discussion about airport subsidises, where Ryanair in particular negotiated some very cozy deals with airports. They were declared illegal and either discontinued or put out to competitive tender, most of which Ryanair won.


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## Devil's Advocate (Jun 26, 2016)

cirdan said:


> I think a bigger concern here is if Scotland lives up to its threats and leaves the UK.


Perhaps Scotland, Northern Ireland, and even London itself will attempt to leave what's left of the UK before all is said and done. Once you light the fire of patriotic tribalism there's no telling where or when it will be extinguished. In due course the people who sparked this revolution are likely to find themselves in worse shape than before.


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## jis (Jun 27, 2016)

At present a more likely scenario seems to be that the winners of the referendum will drag their feet on triggering Article 50, and at the end of it all it may just be much ado about not much. Of course the Scots and Irish are pissed off (in the American English sense), and that might have repercussions. Also the xenophobes in Europe may feel empowered to act up, consequences of which are unknown at this time. But Boris seems to be making noises about the Norwegian model which would mean that none of the goals sold to the Exiters will be met. It would be interesting to see where this goes.

Still at least in the foreseeable future, effect on rail service would seem to be minimal, at least until Scotland actually leaves the UK and rejoins the EU. Then the EU - England border will be roughly along the alignment Carlisle - Berwyck. I wonder how the English will manage customs and immigration if the Scots then decide to join Schengen.


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## Devil's Advocate (Jun 27, 2016)

It was always true that Brexit was going to be a non-binding referendum. Even if the vote was setup to trigger immediate action most of the regulations UKIP has criticized would remain in effect voluntarily due to financial considerations, geographic proximity, and cultural norms. Nonetheless, now that the referendum has passed I support giving the people what they demanded. Let them see firsthand that emotion based tribalism has real world consequences. In general I support helping those at the bottom of the food chain and many of their concerns and complaints were legitimate. Unfortunately, exiting the EU was not a logical path toward addressing such concerns and is unlikely to change much beyond dissolving past alliances and squandering future leverage.


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## jis (Jun 27, 2016)

The bookies are apparently starting a betting pool on whether Article 50 will be triggered this year or not.


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## CHamilton (Jun 27, 2016)

Brexit Leave campaign kills old website full of old promises


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## Just-Thinking-51 (Jun 27, 2016)

The Chunnel trains and ferrys might not be effect. But the free travel of the people of UK is not a given. The Brexit supporters are making promise that free travel will remain, however that is one issue that remains to be seen.

I have recently taken a safety class with a couple women from South Africa, I was very surprised that these ladies need a Visa to go into most countries. They worked super yachts, and some countries would not allow them past the ports gates.

I don't think this is what going to happen, but the EU could require a Visa for the people of the U.K. to travel anywhere in the EU. Or maybe France is going to force the issue and require a Visa, as pay back for the Calais issue. A fee for entering France with the funds ear marked for refugees care.

Since when a simple majority get to make a far reaching policy?


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## Bob Dylan (Jun 27, 2016)

Looks like buyers remorse setting in on the Island! Millions are signing petitions to hold another election and the world financial markets are in free fall.

Hopefully the morons,er voters that support the know nothings now in charge of the GOWMTP will realize that immigrate bashing and ".sending the Government a message" aren't in their interest!

But it CAN happen here! Vote early Vote often and vote Democrat as they say in Chicago!


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## jis (Jun 27, 2016)

Please note that the referendum has set no policy. It is non binding and advisory. Policy can only be set by the Parliament.The Parliament now has to decide how to address the advise it has received. There are many ways of slicing and dicing this. Let's wait and see what come out before we get ahead of ourselves. There is also a lively side discussion going on about to what extent the Scottish parliament can ignore the British parliament on devolved matters.

But whether you like it or not the British Parliament does get to set policy using a simple majority in almost all cases. There are some corner cases where things may get delayed a year and may need passing twice. In the UK any constitutional change is a bit hazy since they do not have a written constitution, so it is not clear what that phrase means. OTOH, since the the Constitution is essentially the collection of all bills passed by the Parliament, in effect any bill passed by the Parliament essentially changes the Constitution, weirdly enough. And that just requires (may be several) simple majority vote.

The French are not going to do anything that highlights xenophobia and causes travel to become difficult for anyone. They have significant worries about their own xenophobes and they will not be giving them any comfort even if on the surface it might be just to express displeasure with the British referendum (no it was not an election, it was a referendum on a single issue). UK was not part of Schengen, and one can almost rest assured that the Europeans will not impose Visas on the British for the purposes of tourism. For the purposes of conducting business or working is a different matter. That is where the quid pro quo comes in if the British restrict similar travel by EU citizens. However, if the UK wishes to continue to be a member of the EEA, like Norway is, they will have to essentially agree to the same free flow of people as is required by EU membership as both Norway and Greenland have learned.

And finally, while the results are disconcerting, it is also true that there is significant deficiency of democracy in the way the EU is set up. The European Parliament is essentially a coffee clutch with little powers. The European Commission can and does run rough shod over all sorts of things and is in dire need of reform. They could take this shock to start fixing some of those problems instead of ignoring them.

it is another matter that what was sold as the goals of the Exit side may be very difficult to achieve in reality, since the cost of achieving the goal will possibly be found to be much higher than the cost of living with the immigration issue and the subsidy issue. But it is also true that Humpty Dumpty is off the wall lying shattered at the bottom and there is no way to put it together again and get back to as things were before. Interesting times lie ahead.


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## Bob Dylan (Jun 27, 2016)

Humpty Dumpty is a great analogy jis!

Hopefully it won't happen here and we have Trumpty Dumpty!


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## caravanman (Jun 27, 2016)

Well, despite my best efforts, we seem to be getting divorced from the E.U.

My gut feeling is that nothing will change... Boris and Farage lied about many things, so "although the people have spoken", they were misled about what they would be buying. (I guess that is "politics").

So far, all we are hearing is how terrible things will now come from Brexit, no good news at all.

I am concerned by fascist murmurings in Europe and the UK, and see calling this referendum as pandering to the extreme right wing... We did not have to have it in the first place, but Cameron was trying to woo votes away from Ukip.

Anyway, pricewise, now is a good time to cash in on our plummeting £, and visit these shores!

Ed.


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## jis (Jun 27, 2016)

Maybe I will show up there this year again during the long Thanksgiving weekend after all. Originally I had decided to skip it this year due to the cost. Unfortunately I have all my vacation days allocated for other activities this year already.

I see that now the lying about the lying has begun... http://boingboing.net/2016/06/27/brexit-leave-campaign-kills-ol.html

I just checked. They need a little more time to adjust the dollar prices for things. Or else I will just have to masquerade around as if I am in Scotland at my cousins place and purchase things in GBP or Scottish pounds as the case may be. Got my airline reservation in place. Unfortunately that is in Dollars, but not too bad if I go to Scotland.


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## tp49 (Jun 27, 2016)

jis said:


> And finally, while the results are disconcerting, it is also true that there is significant deficiency of democracy in the way the EU is set up. The European Parliament is essentially a coffee clutch with little powers. The European Commission can and does run rough shod over all sorts of things and is in dire need of reform. They could take this shock to start fixing some of those problems instead of ignoring them.


Thank you. I've been saying this for years. I'd love to think that Junker and his lot in Brussels would take this shock and start fixing a number of their issues but the EC marches to the beat of their own drummer who sadly also happens to be tone deaf.



caravanman said:


> Anyway, pricewise, now is a good time to cash in on our plummeting £, and visit these shores!


I'll be transiting through for a couple days on stopovers in September to partake in a number of pints and avoid the football hooligans.


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## Devil's Advocate (Jun 27, 2016)

caravanman said:


> Well, despite my best efforts, we seem to be getting divorced from the E.U. My gut feeling is that nothing will change... Boris and Farage lied about many things, so "although the people have spoken", they were misled about what they would be buying. (I guess that is "politics"). So far, all we are hearing is how terrible things will now come from Brexit, no good news at all.


The way it was explained to me was that the UK was leaving because they were tired of being pushed around by the EU. Fair enough, but do average Brits believe the UK is large and powerful enough to survive without doing business with the rest of the EU? If it's not then how exactly do you remain part of the EU market without following EU rules? Presumably you'd end up like Norway, who aren't technically bound by EU rules, but who end up having to follow them anyway at the risk of being denied access to their primary market.

At which point you're nothing but a bystander. Watching the rules being debated and implemented and then having to follow them without any input whatsoever. And this makes Britain stronger how, exactly? Not to mention the risk of losing Scotland and Ireland was in the cards from the beginning. Without them the fall in the pound and the deteriorating credit ratings would likely be even more severe and the day may come when they leave the UK only to rejoin the EU. From what I saw these pitfalls were explained over and over again but a majority of Brits either didn't believe it or simply didn't care.



caravanman said:


> I am concerned by fascist murmurings in Europe and the UK, and see calling this referendum as pandering to the extreme right wing... We did not have to have it in the first place, but Cameron was trying to woo votes away from Ukip.


Cameron is no idiot. Seems quite possible to me that he played the role of willing patsy and self-sabateur.



caravanman said:


> Anyway, pricewise, now is a good time to cash in on our plummeting £, and visit these shores!


I see nothing on the horizon that indicates any sustained upward momentum for the GBP. The best you can hope for is that things get bogged down in committee for a few months/years. I'd probably wait and see how much more it drops. If immediate travel is on the horizon why not visit Scotland instead? You can reward wisdom and punish ignorance in one fell swoop. :lol:


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## Ryan (Jun 27, 2016)

Yep. Feeling pretty good about my already-booked trip to Edinburgh in October.


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## jis (Jun 27, 2016)

I just booked one to Edinburgh in November. One of my favorite cities.


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## caravanman (Jun 28, 2016)

Sadly, most of the votes to leave came from those who have been affected most by the E.U. "freedom of movement" policy.

Many folk from the continent have taken up much of the lower paid agricultural and factory work, and seem to do better work for less money, from an employers viewpoint. On my recent trips to Scotland, almost all the hotel staff were from Europe, not Scotland. Mass immigration can lead to resentment by diluting the make up smaller communities too.

Some politicians dressed it up as a vote to take back control, but we had a voice in Europe, maybe similar to your individual states sending folk to the Senate?

Trump is trumpeting similar "populist" issues over there, stirring up resentment over immigrants and loss of jobs overseas.

How you can have free markets, which is the American dream, and also protect US jobs is beyond me, but Trump pretends, in the same way that our politicians pretend, 'till after the elections.

I don't feel that the workings of the E.U. are against common sense, and the fragmentation of the E.U. is not going to be of benefit to us this side of the pond, although multi-national big business outside Europe would like that...

No comment on football, we are out of the game there too!

Ed.


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## cirdan (Jun 28, 2016)

caravanman said:


> I am concerned by fascist murmurings in Europe and the UK, and see calling this referendum as pandering to the extreme right wing... We did not have to have it in the first place, but Cameron was trying to woo votes away from Ukip.


UKIP was a single issue party, and if they have now achieved that goal, there goes there justification and they will fizzle away into oblivion.

And even if there is an eleventh hour reprieve (which I believe there will be in some form or other), the UKIP will have suffered so much loss in credibility that they won't be back in a generation.

In the bigger picture here, Boris has finished off Farage and finished of Cameron, all in one move.

Now that's why I call a strategist.


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## caravanman (Jun 28, 2016)

It is the stirring up of differences, as in 1930's Germany, to achieve a hidden (sometimes not that hidden) objective that I fear.

Maybe someone, Boris, Farage, Gove, or uncle tom cobleigh is in charge of how events will play out, but to me it seems not.

Cursed are those who live in interesting times, as the Chinese say...

Ed.


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## jis (Jun 28, 2016)

At present it looks like Boris, Farage and Gove are standing around like deer in headlight, and the Labor folks are as usual confused running around lik a chicken with its head cut off. I don't think the Exiters expected Cameron to drop the entire mess in their laps and depart. I think they expected Cameron to invoke Article 50 on Friday and then be able to blame the entire mess on him. Cameron basically caught them flat footed since it is all their baby now, effectively. Surprisingly neither the Exit supporters nor the government had done any contingency planning covering this contingency.

But at the end of the day the effect on trains service is minimal to non-existent except that a vacation in Europe for the Brits is going to cost a tenth or so more, which might reduce traffic towards Europe a little. OTOH conversely for folks on the continent to visit Europe will be cheaper, but then who wants to go to England for a vacation anyway?


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## caravanman (Jun 28, 2016)

It has been reported that Boris, etc, were taken by surprise at having to do the deed themselves, by Cameron's resignation, hence all the sudden "no rush" speeches...

Anyway, back to trains...

Ed.


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## MARC Rider (Jun 28, 2016)

jis said:


> At present it looks like Boris, Farage and Gove are standing around like deer in headlight, and the Labor folks are as usual confused running around lik a chicken with its head cut off. I don't think the Exiters expected Cameron to drop the entire mess in their laps and depart. I think they expected Cameron to invoke Article 50 on Friday and then be able to blame the entire mess on him. Cameron basically caught them flat footed since it is all their baby now, effectively. Surprisingly neither the Exit supporters nor the government had done any contingency planning covering this contingency.
> 
> But at the end of the day the effect on trains service is minimal to non-existent except that a vacation in Europe for the Brits is going to cost a tenth or so more, which might reduce traffic towards Europe a little. OTOH conversely for folks on the continent to visit Europe will be cheaper, but then who wants to go to England for a vacation anyway?


Hey, in 1985 I took a vacation to Britain. I'd be open to doing it again. For a Yank, its kind of like visiting an alternate reality version of home - sort of familiar and they speak English, but the English is a wee bit different, the cops are dressed differently, and traffic is in the wrong side of the road.

Even back then, though, it seemed like immigrants were taking over the service jobs, though they were mostly South Asians and West Indians. It seemed all of the folks examining tickets at the train stations were south Asians. I suppose it's all automated gates now.

Well, you set up an empire, what else do you expect? We Yanks conquered half of Mexico in the 1840s, and all of a sudden we wonder why so many Mexicans live here? It's funny, though this was starting to happen during the Thatcher era, and I didn't read too many complaints about it then.


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## caravanman (Jun 30, 2016)

Well, Boris has said he no longer wants to be a Leader, wonder if he will pop up again in 2020 for those elections...

The U.K. welcomed immigration in the years after WW2, folk were invited to come, as mentioned, from the West Indies and India, etc.

Sadly, people are treated as commodities, and once the job vacancies dry up, immigrants are suddenly seen as problematic, "surplus to requirements".

Whether it is ok for us fortunate folk to just say "no entry" to the less fortunate is a matter of opinion, I would say it is not.

As the son of a poor Irish immigrant myself, I don't feel too responsible for "the British Empire" 

Ed.


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## Bob Dylan (Jun 30, 2016)

We're all Immigrants! Even the so called Native Americans ( used to be Indians cause Columbus thought he discovered India! ) came here from somewhere else!

Our country has a long history of Immigrant bashing going back to the Alien and Sedition Act that our Founding Fathers shamefuly put into Law!


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## jis (Jun 30, 2016)

MARC Rider said:


> jis said:
> 
> 
> > But at the end of the day the effect on trains service is minimal to non-existent except that a vacation in Europe for the Brits is going to cost a tenth or so more, which might reduce traffic towards Europe a little. OTOH conversely for folks on the continent to visit Europe will be cheaper, but then who wants to go to England for a vacation anyway?
> ...


Don't get me wrong. I go on short vacation to Scotland and Milton Keynes almost every year. But that is primarily driven by family and the desire to ride an amazingly good rail service.


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## jis (Jun 30, 2016)

BTW all this is becoming truly stranger than fiction and kind of funny maybe ....

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/so-much-for-taking-back-control-its-clear-now-there-was-no-plan-and-boris-johnson-has-unleashed-a7111416.html


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## Chaz (Jul 3, 2016)

The Guardian has an editorial today about UK (& EU) politicians after Brexit.

It compares a key 'leave' leader Michael Gove to someone " loitering at the end of a rainy railway platform, spotting trains' lol.

". Gove is the sort of nerdish, know-it-all clever dick one once might have expected to see loitering at the end of a rainy railway platform, spotting trains. He has Britain’s number, or so he says. But what use is knowledge without wisdom, judgment and fidelity? Gove claims to stand for change. What he actually stands for is bad old political opportunism. Like Johnson, he is not the leader Britain needs."

http://discuss.amtraktrains.com/index.php?/topic/68340-brexit-and-rail-transport/?hl=brexit


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