What is sad is that the IMF has lent more money to a bankrupt country i.e. Greece when it knows that it cannot be repaid in this or the next lifetime..And just to make sure it cannot the EU has forced Greece to adopt a corporate tax rate of 29% when its neighbours have a corporate tax rate of 10 to 15%...Just to make sure that no company opens up IN Greece or employs anyone to pay taxes.. So Greece is been forced to go belly up in 2 to 3 years time when it will more rather than less ...It is an absolute joke..Big changes are required to the IMF. Its executives past and present should come under criminal investigation. The IMF should be banned form dealing with the EU. The EU is a multi nation organisation well able to fund its own bail out programs. The Managing Director of the EU needs to be replaced. In addition all IMF financing decisions should be laid before the IMF's Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) to received their stamp of approval before loans to debtor nations are given out.  It is ridiculous that the IEO is making comment now. Their early involved would have saved Greece from disaster...Lagarde is a puppet for France. No EU citizen should ever be the Managing Director of the IMF. Self interest was obviously the plan to put Lagarde in the role. The EU is a shady organisation with manipulative intent. The EU politics continue to smell as the VW scandal demonstrates. The IMF has lost all credibility as the IEO confirms. The rest of us new it years ago as the Greece debacle continued and eventually confirmed the inept handling of the Greek situation by the IMF and the EU.  The IMF should never have had anything to do with EU member nations. ( Would the IMF ever bail out California. Of course not as it comes under the responsibility of the government of the USA). Corruption! Corruption! It is everywhere. The IMF and the EU stink of it.

 

 

The German government was the first European executive to issue a public statement regarding the Catalan elections. Berlin underscored the same message expressed by Chancellor Angela Merkel at a meeting with Rajoy earlier this month, when she talked about the importance of respecting European legislation.  “We are convinced that it is important, despite everything that is happening at the moment, to maintain the rule of law with regard to the European Union treaties and to national legislation, that is to say, the Spanish Constitution,” said the German government spokesman, Steffen Seibert, at a press conference.  Seibert nevertheless stressed that Germany considers the Catalan elections a domestic Spanish issue...The governments can claim all they like that the EU Countries and the US economies are booming; This is b*llsh*t!  Golden handshakes, handcuffs and parachutes for the few must be paid by the masses. And so must their tax cuts and other tax avoiding schemes. Who's supposed to pay for the third Heathrow runway so that WH Smith can have more shops in which it will pocket the VAT? The already taxed-to-death so called middle-class of course!
Now go see these "Moanaco" non-doms see if they're interested in buying the massive amount of gadgets our economy can no longer manage to sell!...

Switzerland has banned sales of Volkswagen diesel cars in the most severe step taken so far by a government in reaction to the emissions crisis. The country has stopped the sale of any VW cars in the Euro5 category, which contains the majority of the cars that the company has admitted have defeat devices. The move effects roughly 180,000 cars that are yet to be sold or registered, including 1.2-litre, 1.6-litre and 2.0-litre diesel engines for the VW, Audi, Seat and Skoda brands. However, the Swiss federal roads office, which announced the ban, said motorists who already own a VW diesel car will be allowed to continue driving.  Countries around the world, including Germany, US, and the UK, have launched investigations into diesel emissions since the scandal emerged and more could now ban cars from their roads.  VW has admitted that 11m vehicles, including 5m Volkswagen passenger cars, were fitted with defeat devices and set aside €6.5bn (£4.8bn) to pay for the costs of the crisis. However, it also faces the prospect of fines of up to $18bn (£11.8bn) from US regulators and one of the biggest legal claims in history from customers and shareholders around the world.

VW owners’ cars could face increases to their fuel bills of up to £100 a year if the Vehicle Certification Agency, the UK’s emissions testing watchdog, demands modification to affected pollution control systems, The Times reports.

Lies and deceit...

The EU has within it the seeds of its own destruction. It is corrupt (Accounts not passed for ? years, or ever) and undemocratic and we would do far better to get out and embrace the world again. The EU sells us much more than we sell them so they are not going to act against their own best interests The so called elite of the EU, Juncker and others are highly dubious and certainly not on the side of democracy. They have an absolute direction towards full integration and cannot understand our attitude as an island. Germany still feels guilty and France want Germany emasculated and this is the ethos which guides them. Most other countries are fundamentally irrelevant compared with these two - excepting the UK. The Euro will keep Southern Europe poor and Germany, in particular, prosperous as it provides them with a grossly undervalued currency. Trade would be far better if UK. were out of the EU, contrary to what we are being told by all those with a vested interest in remaining a member of this bloated and undemocratic monolith. It is not only the economy and trade which would improve, but the whole way of life. We would regain all those powers which our politicians have given away without so much as a whimper. We would also regain our sovereignty (with everything that entails) and control of our culture and traditions without interference from the EU. Life in general would be much better and we could spend the money we no longer have to pay to the EU in this country on things we need...The decision to leave the EU or not, is a decision about sovereignty and freedom, it is nothing to do with trade.  The fact the scaremongers namely the BBC, try to conflate exiting the EU with trade risk, rather than debating sovereignty, is simply because they can't find any counter argument to present to the voters, who demand independence and resumption of the UK's sovereignty.  The EU trade concerns, they (the BBC) and many other Europhiles, constantly flag is actually a straw man.

Useless, useless, useless - Germans have "Dachau and such" ready !!!!

Blowing hot air = UK Prime Minister David Cameron spoke of a comprehensive approach; Viktor Orban, the normally fiery Hungarian leader told me everyone had to co-operate and Angela Merkel insisted, "What we cannot say is Europe cannot deal with this. I say it again and again, we WILL do this!"

EU leaders do actually agree on a number of key issues:

 

 

• Cracking down on people smuggling rings
• Getting asylum claims processed faster, so failed claimants can be deported more rapidly
• The need to secure Europe's external borders
• Boosting aid to the sprawling, squalid refugee camps around Syria, so fewer people feel tempted to come to Europe
• Stepping up attempts to try to end the war in Syria

But common resolve is one thing. Effective, immediate action is quite another. And some of the leaders' goals are more realistic than others. At a press conference after the summit, the German chancellor spoke of the need to talk to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad as part of a new European push for peace in his country. The conflict has now reached Europe, and Germany in particular. It is the European country of choice for Syrian refugees. In the past, Germany has joined other Western leaders in calling for President Assad to step aside. So these talks would be delicate and controversial, they will not happen overnight and their chances of success are limited, to say the least. Then there's the question of building what is often dubbed Fortress Europe - or what Donald Tusk described last night as "closing Europe's doors and windows".