'Charter cities'

wild greens

Well-known member
It doesn't strike you as at all worrying that the architects of this project, in their documentation, consider "labour laws, the regulatory process and access to infrastructure" to be undesirable "disincentives to trade and development"?

I mean, sure, maybe this is all nothing to worry about and these special deregulated zones set up by billionaires will turn out just fine. But it does seem to be an odd thing to want to give the benefit of the doubt over.

I dont think you or the the Baker Street Herald have a clear understanding of what the freeport project is actually doing or how it is directly affecting these areas. The freeports will act effectively as a deregulation area and allows areas in the UK to become Singapore on the Thames (or the Mersey, in the case of Peel Holdings/Wirral Waters).

There is actually a link replying to your initial post detailing the current scenario


*

The Wirral one is being ran by Urban Splash with dozens of known contractors, it's basically an incarnation of Salford Quays with a tax dodging port at one end of it. But you see Baker St popping up in threads talking about it on twitter, piping in with the same sort of stuff that's in here. Its a charter city! It isn't

There are a lot of mad things happening in this country at the moment - and a lot of opportunities tbh - but i don't believe in this one I'm afraid.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
If we've got Tea embedding weirdo conspiracy tweets, does that mean Biscuits should be the one posting the Byline Times debunking?

I mean, fine, but:

There are two main kinds of persistent criticism of Freeports, including those in the EU.

One is that they aren’t economically effective, being more likely to relocate activity from adjacent parts of the country with little or no net benefit. The other is that they may have disbenefits, especially in facilitating tax evasion and money laundering or in leading to lower environmental and labour rights standards.

The Government claims that its new Freeports will be economically beneficial while having rules to prevent all of these disbenefits, and any reduction of environmental and employment standards is explicitly ruled-out.

"The government claims..."? So that's OK then?
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I dont think you or the the Baker Street Herald have a clear understanding of what the freeport project is actually doing or how it is directly affecting these areas. The freeports will act effectively as a deregulation area and allows areas in the UK to become Singapore on the Thames (or the Mersey, in the case of Peel Holdings/Wirral Waters).

There is actually a link replying to your initial post detailing the current scenario


*

The Wirral one is being ran by Urban Splash with dozens of known contractors, it's basically an incarnation of Salford Quays with a tax dodging port at one end of it. But you see Baker St popping up in threads talking about it on twitter, piping in with the same sort of stuff that's in here. Its a charter city! It isn't

There are a lot of mad things happening in this country at the moment - and a lot of opportunities tbh - but i don't believe in this one I'm afraid.
OK, I accept that there are important legal distinctions between these two classes of entity. But the assertion that the establishment of one kind of SEZ in the UK definitely won't lead the establishment of another kind of SEZ here because, well, it just won't, doesn't strike me as entirely convincing.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Maybe that's a slippery slope fallacy, but maybe not.

Even the piece Slothrop posted admits that some of the people involved in these think tanks and lobby groups that orchestrated Brexit would love to set up charter cities (sensu stricto) if they could.
 

woops

is not like other people
OK, I accept that there are important legal distinctions between these two classes of entity. But the assertion that the establishment of one kind of SEZ in the UK definitely won't lead the establishment of another kind of SEZ here because, well, it just won't, doesn't strike me as entirely convincing.
SEZ2TAZ
 

Slothrop

Tight but Polite
OK, I accept that there are important legal distinctions between these two classes of entity. But the assertion that the establishment of one kind of SEZ in the UK definitely won't lead the establishment of another kind of SEZ here because, well, it just won't, doesn't strike me as entirely convincing.
Sure, and you should oppose the legalization of weed because you can't assert that it definitively won't lead to crystal meth being made mandatory for preschoolers.

It's just a different thing. It's arguably a step in the same direction but it's a very small step (some tax breaks and maybe weakened planning restrictions) compared to instigating some sort of corporate city-states with unlimited and unaccountable law-making power.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Sure, and you should oppose the legalization of weed because you can't assert that it definitively won't lead to crystal meth being made mandatory for preschoolers.

It's just a different thing. It's arguably a step in the same direction but it's a very small step (some tax breaks and maybe weakened planning restrictions) compared to instigating some sort of corporate city-states with unlimited and unaccountable law-making power.
Might be different if the present UK government were heavily influenced by think tanks and policy units whose members included several big-time crystal meth dealers.
 
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