Thread: Is CANZUK on the cards?

It's my belief that there has been a lot of negotiating about this behind closed doors, and I think once brexit happens it would be quickly rolled out as a way forward, with a possible referendum on it.

CANZUK: after Brexit, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Britain can unite as a pillar of Western civilisation

Of all the many splendid opportunities provided by the British people’s heroic Brexit vote, perhaps the greatest is the resuscitation of the idea of a CANZUK Union. Winston Churchill’s great dream of a Western alliance based on three separate blocs might one day live again, thanks to Brexit. The first and second blocs – the USA and a United State of Europe – are already in place. Now it is time for the last – CANZUK – to retake her place as the third pillar of Western Civilization.

The Crown countries of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom (CANZUK) need to form a new federation based upon free trade, free movement of peoples, mutual defence, and a limited but effective confederal political structure.

As one of the leaders of the nascent CANZUK project, James Bennett, points out in his new book A Time For Audacity: New Options Beyond Europe: “In the era of the internet and cheap global air travel, common language, law, history and traditions of government count far more than geographical proximity.”

Much more unites than divides the CANZUK countries, and were it to become a Union it immediately become one of the global great powers alongside America, the EU and China. It would be easily the largest country on the planet, have a combined population of 129 million, the third biggest economy and the third biggest defence budget.

A movement towards such an entity is already beginning, with 160,000 people signing a petition for free CANZUK movement of peoples on CANZUK International within a few months. CANZUK free movement brings an immediate benefit to ordinary Britons, with effective reciprocity in the form of employment, business, and retirement opportunities that ordinary Britons can enjoy, as opposed to the mostly theoretical benefits that the EU brought.

Unlike EU free movement, CANZUK would provide not only the right to take a job in a member state, but in one where there actually are real jobs available.

The proposed CANZUK Union will be more like the successful federations the English-speaking world has known, such as the Canada and Australia. Those differed from the EU in that they had the prerequisites for forming a parliament and government that could exercise control over their bureaucracies, as opposed to the uncontrollable quangos of Brussels.

Australia’s foreign minister Julie Bishop has recently said that a free-trade deal with post-Brexit Britain could lead to “improved access” and more visas for travel between Australia and Britain. There is similar support in New Zealand and Canada, which will next week welcome the Duke and Duchesss of Cambridge.

But this should be just the beginning. Now that Britain is free of the EU, she can pursue the dream of early 20th century giants such as Joseph Chamberlain – incidentally, Theresa May’s political hero – for an Anglospheric combination of free states that would project a strong and independent voice in the world.

The CANZUK Union of free trade and free movement should be the nucleus for the recreation of the dream of the English-speaking peoples that was shattered by Britain’s entry into the EU. We must pick up where we left off in 1973.

We must pick up where we left off in 1973.
Sir Roger Scruton’s famous dictum that “A nation-state is the widest span at which it is possible to be meaningfully good” can be inverted with no loss of truth, for if there are a set a peoples who effectively share an idea of what public good is, then they will probably be candidates for a state, at least a federal one.

We CANZUK countries together have far more of the potential for successful state-building than do any four member-states of the EU. A common head of state, a majority language, legal systems based on Magna Cara and the common law, Westminster parliamentary tradition, military structure, and a long history of working together including in the proudest voluntary military collaboration in human history, resisting Nazi aggression.

All we lack is geographical proximity, which is becoming less and less important in the modern world. CANZUK is an idea whose time has, thanks to Brexit, finally come again.

No link smeggles, never mind let me help you out;


CANZUK: after Brexit, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Britain can unite as a pillar of Western civilisation

^Why bother? It's fantasy.

Reality is that none of these countries want economic migrants from the U.K. That day is long past.

I would love for it to happen.

I'm terrified it won't.

NZ and UK have agreed on trade talks and NZ already has trade agreements with OZ while OS has a trade and economic agreement with Canada and Canada are in trade talks with the UK.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics...xit-trade-deal

Australia-New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement - Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Canada-Australia Trade and Economic Cooperation Arrangement (TECA)

Canada in informal trade talks with U.K. ahead of Brexit - Business - CBC News

Shouldnt be to difficult to tie it all together.

If we add in the NZ ASEAN free trade agreement which could be renegotiated for the whole CANZUK block who needs the EU.

https://www.mfat.govt.nz/en/trade/fr...w-zealand-fta/

Mustnt forget that Canada has a free trade agreement with the US.

http://international.gc.ca/trade-com....aspx?lang=eng

Back in the day when the U.K joined the EU that was the previous arrangement.
Then they dumped us like hot brick and went with their new Euro trading partners leaving us high and dry.
Fuck 'em I say.

The trade idea is fine, just leave out the free movement of people and it's a winner.

Originally Posted by Begbie

^Why bother? It's fantasy.

Reality is that none of these countries want economic migrants from the U.K. That day is long past.

According to a YouGov survey, 70 per cent of Australians, 75 per cent of Canadians, 82 per cent of New Zealanders and 58 per cent of Britons support free mobility between the four countries.

...sounds like World Whites United (Anglo sub-division)...

Sounds like a strategic merger of four of the commonwealth's most similar countries. Trust Tomcat to put a PC spin on it.

NZ was already screwed over once when the U.K. entered the common market and has since watched as it has been made progressively harder and harder to even get a visa for the place. Once bitten, twice shy maybe.

I'm with Cujo on this one, fuck 'em.

The EU was the logical move at the time when the UK was struggling.

NZ would have cut its ties with the UK at the time had it been in the national interest, much like it sought independence many years before and started the momentum you're complaining about.

I've never looked into it before but it seems that Kiwis chose to give up their British citizenship in 1948 following Canada's decision to do so.

So they were hardly "screwed over".

NZ has far more to gain from the UK under this new proposed arrangement than the UK does from NZ.