Fox of France

In a sense, the selection of the "Prometheus Award" is almost a review of the scientific level of European countries. Although the awards have not yet been presented, and even the candidates have not yet been fully selected, the whole of Europe, including the British, has already lamented that France is the best in science.

Discussions on British young people, British students, and British education in British newspapers are not without benefits. One of the benefits is that the voices on trade issues have been successfully suppressed, which makes the British people under pressure when negotiating. Unnecessary interference can be much less. After all, when it comes to trade negotiations, Britain and France are different. In France, Napoleon said that which category needs to be wronged, they have to be wronged honestly; (of course, more often, foreigners are wronged) but in democratic Britain, don't even think about it.

Under the cover of the "Prometheus Prize", the British trade delegation and the French reached a memorandum of understanding on the previous trade dispute.

According to this memorandum, British textiles will obtain the "free trade status" in the European continent within one year, which means that British textiles can be regarded as commodities of "free trade countries". But this "free trade status" is not unconditional. British textiles are subject to an annual "free trade status" review, and if they fail the review, the status will be revoked.

As for the conditions for review, the first is the protection of intellectual property rights. In other words, the British textile industry is not allowed to produce counterfeit European brand clothing. In order to ensure that this clause can be effectively implemented, the "free trade country" headed by France will set up a joint office in London, which will have the right to conduct unprepared inspections of any British factories and their warehouses that export textiles to the European continent. unannounced random inspections to make sure they are not producing illegal products. Any manufacturer found to be infringing during this inspection will be permanently disqualified from exporting. The "Textile Industry Association" also promised to the "Free Trade Alliance" that anyone who is found to be involved in such behavior will be expelled from the association and will not be allowed to work in the textile industry for life.

Of course, agreeing to this, the agreement of "losing power and humiliating society", naturally got some compensation. First, they managed to circumvent shipping regulations for "non-free trade countries", which allowed them to continue to make money in continental Europe. On the other hand, they even keep the possibility of continuing to work in the ready-to-wear business, as long as they don't pass off French high-end ready-to-wear. In general, the French are relatively friendly to the British textile industry. The main reason for this turmoil is really because some of them are too outrageous and directly want to steal money from the Bonaparte family's plate.

After the problems in the textile industry are resolved, the negotiations on the steel industry will follow. The French, of course, objected to the British raising tariffs on steel products, and the British shamelessly suggested that the French could also raise tariffs on British steel products entering Europe.

"Hell, even if we give you zero tariffs, your steel products cannot be sold in Europe. If you insist on maintaining high tariffs on the steel industry, then we can only raise tariffs on your textiles. Of course, you We can also increase the tariffs on our textiles entering the UK and its territories in an equivalent manner. Moreover, I am more kind than you, at least there are still some markets for our textiles in the UK." Talleyrand immediately retorted.

Talleyrand's statement is also reasonable. France does export textiles like the UK. For example, the Chris series of men's clothing and the Chris series of women's clothing are bought by many people in the UK. Moreover, it is very interesting that many of the men who buy and wear Chris series men's clothing are rebellious girls; while many of the women who buy Chris women's clothes and wear them ostentatiously are men. As a result, some conservative British media have scolded "immoral" and demanded that these French things that harm young people should be quickly banned. Of course, this is just a call, including which newspapers are called. I also know that under the current circumstances, it is almost impossible to ban French products.

So the two sides quarreled in a mess over the issue of tariffs. Finally, when the French were about to announce "the end of this meaningless talk", the British still made concessions. Because if the European market is completely lost, the loss for the United Kingdom is still too great. What's more, the French also shamelessly suggested that the peace and friendship between the two countries are maintained by the trade relationship between the two countries.

The implication of these words is, of course, that if you really dare to raise the tariffs on steel, believe it or not, we will dare to let the "Free Trade Company" go out to destroy free trade!

A few months ago, the French had just decommissioned the first "Free Trade", and then sold it to the British Navy. After the British Navy got the ship, it immediately conducted a lot of tests around it, and finally came to the conclusion: "Britain's current industrial level is not enough to build similar ships."

But just after the French retired the old "Free Trade" on the front foot, they posted a message in the newspaper on the back foot, saying that the new "Free Trade" officially joined the French Navy.

Regarding this new "free trade number", "Scientific Pravda" only reported it in one sentence in an inconspicuous position on the first page. But everyone is also aware of a habit of "Scientific Pravda" by now: the shorter the news, the bigger the story.

In the relatively professional "French Shipping Newsletter" magazine, there are a few more descriptions of the new "Free Trade":

"The new generation of steam-powered frigates is larger, faster, and more efficient in firepower configuration. Its appearance will definitely bring revolutionary changes to the navy."

Of course, as for what the "new generation of steam-powered frigate" looks like and what its performance is, the "French Shipping Newsletter" didn't go into details, and the article above didn't even specifically introduce warships, it just borrowed new A new point of view of the author of warship sales, that is, ocean-going merchant ships should also adopt steam power.

But after carefully studying the articles in the "French Ship Newsletter", the British Navy became even more worried. Because according to the above calculations, it has become possible for a completely steam-powered ship that can directly cross the Atlantic Ocean.

If the new "Free Trade" was a ship that could cross the Atlantic on pure steam power, it would be even more capable of disrupting free trade. And because he can maintain high mobility throughout the entire process, it can autonomously decide whether to enter or withdraw from combat at almost any time. Considering that the old "Free Trade" already had the ability to threaten the connection between Britain and its colonies, especially those in the Far East, the new "Free Trade" is simply a nightmare for free trade.

Therefore, after the French made such a threat, the British can only be strategically persuaded for the time being. In the end, the British took a step back. They demanded that the relatively high tariffs on French-produced machinery be maintained to protect the British machinery manufacturing industry, but the high tariffs on steel products were dropped.

The French are not particularly satisfied with this suggestion, but considering that the construction of the navy has not been fully completed, and the construction of overseas colonies still needs a period of peace. In addition, the Olympics are about to be prepared, and peace is also needed. Therefore, this condition was reluctantly accepted. As a result, the two parties formally reached a new "France-UK-Paris Trade Agreement" in Paris, which can be regarded as a pause for the recent trade disputes.

Now that the trade issue has been temporarily resolved, the British naturally asked whether the French intervention in the strikes in the UK should stop?

However, on this issue, the French sang high-profile again, claiming that they cannot violate the spirit of France and abandon their international obligations.

The British naturally understand what the French mean. In the eyes of the French, these striking workers are a very useful tool for them to find trouble with the British when they need it. And now, because of the death of the former president of the "Textile Workers' Union", the federation has suffered a major blow. It was only because of the sudden intervention of the French that it stabilized its position and kept its own organization. Consequently, the influence of the French in the "Union of Textile Workers" rapidly increased. For the French, as long as they are kept, they will have another tool to make trouble for the British. Of course they wouldn't just throw away such a useful tool.

However, the French also said that they do not want to see a large number of orders defaulted by British textile companies because of the strike. Therefore, they suggested that the British textile merchants should try to reason with the workers. Now their trade problem with the French has also been resolved, and they no longer need to continue to lower the wages of workers to survive, so they can assure the workers that they will not reduce wages or increase the labor intensity of workers Well.

As for the question raised by the British, according to British law, the "Textile Workers' Union" is already an illegal organization, and they cannot negotiate with an illegal organization. The kind Talleyrand said that the law is of course sacred, and since it has been enacted, it should not be amended casually, however.

"As far as I know, your country's law only prohibits the unions of various factories from forming unions. But it does not prohibit the union itself." Talleyrand said, "The 'Union of Textile Workers' can be avoided by changing its name. This problem, for example, they changed the name to the 'Textile Workers United Club', in theory, it is a place where the labor unions of various factories gather together, isn't that all right?"