UK councils to display EU flags after UK dips into Covid recovery cash | Hacker News Reader

UK councils to display EU flags after UK dips into Covid recovery cash

thelondoneconomic.com

19 pointsshifty116 comments

We are going to see more of this. UK is like a teenager who wants to leave home, but comes back every weekend to have it's laundry done by mon

Which side dragged on for months/years, asking that the UK keeps on participating to the EU budget for several years AFTER leaving ? London or Brussels ?

To improve your analogy, UK is like a teenager who was persuaded to leave home by a drug dealer, who promised them that they will be the coolest and most special kid on the block while being used to sell drugs and their body.

The great thing with the “European money”, is that you send 100 every year, it sends you 50 or 60 back( if you’re one of the top contributors like the UK, France or Germany), tells you how to use it, and you are supposed to say “thanks” and put up big signs saying “the EU paid for this”.

sounds like a scam to me

> and you are supposed to say “thanks” and put up big signs saying “the EU paid for this”.

A lot of these projects, e.g. linking up people to shared sewer systems, are things countries should have done on their own decades ago without requiring money from somewhere else. It's a reminder to the population that without the money from the EU this project would likely not have happened at all and that the EU indeed improves their very own lives!

This is especially important in countries such as Croatia that have a high amount of "EU sceptics" who claim alllll the time "all Brussels does is prescribing us to teach our children LGBT culture and we get nothing!!!" (source: am half Croat, have heard this individual line far too often).

For large infrastructure projects aka the TEN (Trans European Networks), these usually give so much benefit to the economies of the countries involved that yes indeed you are supposed to say "thanks to the EU for organizing and coordinating this over multiple governments".

"countries should have done on their own decades ago without requiring money from somewhere else."

You mean like Western European aid and investment from the US for reconstruction after the war?

Or the fact that most these countries were still under military occupation and 'should have done it' while the USSR was extracting their wealth?

Germans killed millions of Poles in living memory a few roads and bridges are owed.

> You mean like Western European aid and investment from the US for reconstruction after the war?

Yes, exactly:

"""

The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) was an American initiative passed in 1948 for foreign aid to Western Europe. The United States transferred over $13 billion (equivalent of about $114 billion[1] in 2020[2]) in economic recovery programs to Western European economies after the end of World War II. Replacing an earlier proposal for a Morgenthau Plan, it operated for four years beginning on April 3, 1948.[3] The goals of the United States were to rebuild war-torn regions, remove trade barriers, modernize industry, improve European prosperity, and prevent the spread of communism.[4] The Marshall Plan required a reduction of interstate barriers, a dropping of many regulations, and encouraged an increase in productivity, as well as the adoption of modern business procedures.[5]

"""

How is that different from what your own government does with the taxes you paid? They also take your money and spend it on infrastructure, projects or social support that you might or might not want to/need to use.

The difference is the weird branding issue. It's as though implying 'The EU did this!' when really it was local taxpayers who did, in fact, they've likely overpaid as services will disproportionately go to poor countries.

I think it's fair on some level, but should be commensurate with the activity.

Towns should not be forced to fly an EU flab 'because some fund'.

If a highway in Poland is built with EU funds, then it's very fair to have ample signage indicating that.

Or of the vaccines are paid for by the EU, then the vaccine rollout should make that very clear. That's fair.

That way at least there's legitimacy to it.

I cannot see a difference to the other examples?

„If a British town reinvigorates their high street with EU funds, …“

There's no such thing as EU funds. EU funds are British, French, and Germany's money.

The difference is that, first, you get 100% back and not 50% (a tiny detail...), and second, you elect UK government and MPs... you don't elect the "Commissioners" in Brussels, you can decide what and where to spend money on.

But if you have no problem with that then contact me by email, for your own good, i'd suggest that your spending go through me first, give me your money and I'll fund you in the "optimal" way, for your own good. ;)

As opposed to the alternative, which seems to be to have that money funneled into the pockets of Tory donors/pals through astonishingly corrupt contract awards, while the places that formerly received EU investment now get nothing and lapse into neglect and poverty because nobody in Westminster gives two shits about anything outside the M25.

Drawing on funds that you paid into and the receipts are essentially the money you put in is not hypocritical.

Forcing people who leave a club to pay 50-100 billion pounds on the way out the door for arbitrary made up claims is perhaps. While a good chunk of money is allocated towards retiring UK officials in the EU, most of it is not. Lawmakers from EU countries are literally on the public record stating 'Making them pay!' and coming up with arbitrary numbers of '10s of bilions' on the spot, out of thin air, not based on any rational reconciliation of funds, which is my view, blatant corruption.

This seems like a very onesided display as the EU claim is 40.8bn (less than your 50-100bn) and the UK recognizes around 35-39bn of those, so it doesn't seem to be as much fantasy or malicious, just regular negotiation.

Based on: https://www.bbc.com/news/51110096

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