Brexit!

[FerrisBueller]

3 minutes ago, LiberalFox said:

Irony is we lost our status as a world power and relied on US aid to recover from WW2.

The way they bang on about it, you'd think Churchill flew a Wellington topless to Berlin, Parachuted out and killed Hitler single-handedly with a Cigar to the tune of God Save the Queen.

[The People's Hero]

1 minute ago, FerrisBueller said:

The way they bang on about it, you'd think Churchill flew a Wellington topless to Berlin, Parachuted out and killed Hitler single-handedly with a Cigar to the tune of God Save the Queen.

It was Rule Britannia. And he killed him with a cup of tea (milk in last, by the way, teapot has to be pre-heated).

 

[WigstonWanderer]

6 hours ago, BlueSi13 said:

The problem with that tweet is that it appears to make out that if we leave the Single Market we will lose £1.9 billion a week.  However for that to happen trade between the UK and EU would have to drop to 0.  Considering the EU has a significant trade surplus with us (+64 billion) such a scenario would be equally as disastrous for them.

 

However we both know that isn't going to happen.  The no-deal forecast models themselves make no such prediction, indeed they suggest that leaving the Single Market and Customs Union will cost us £1 billion a YEAR which equates to 0.055% pa reduction in growth.  Certainly not £1.6 billion a WEEK.

 

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1168964684764131328.html

 

Conclusion = a sensible and pragmatic free trade deal that suits both sides interests.

I think you misunderstood this tweet

Edited 17 September 2019 by WigstonWanderer

[Finnaldo]

2 hours ago, Strokes said:

Blair promised to hold a referendum on the EU constitution to then back track when it became the Lisbon treaty. Even though the transfer of powers was almost identical. That was outrageous.

Its difficult for me to go back much further but I’m sure there are a few on hear that could tell you more of governments gone by.

 

2 PMs, not two governments.

If the government wishes to change the course, it should either hold a binding referendum or a GE. Otherwise it’s failed to live up to its manifesto, quite deliberately.

I can’t disagree with any of that.

I can agree with most of that, although I doubt we agree on which side has been the most opportunistic.

 

Its true that perhaps certain failures of a manifesto had led to downfall of multiple governments. My frustration is more to do with how Brexit is ultimately perceived as something bigger and more irreversible than it is. If certain Leave supporters are pissed off that Brexit is cancelled, that’s understandable, but I don’t agree with the idea it’s a flagrant move against democracy. 

 

Yeah, it’s true we probably wouldn’t agree with whose been the most opportunistic. At least, whose done the most damage, but it’s not necessarily important at this point. I’m glad you agree with my second point though. Any change of governance is ultimately a new mandate and, even if Brexit hasn’t been pushed through by then, there’s no point making out it’s fulfilment is an important democratic necessity.

[Leicester_Loyal]

https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/monthly-update-concluded-investigations-11

 

Some remain campaign groups have been fined for breaking the law with regards to their spending. I imagine everyone in here is going to rightly say that remaining will now be illegal as they broke the law as well?

 

Thought not

Edited 17 September 2019 by Leicester_Loyal

[The Horse's Mouth]

5 hours ago, Alf Bentley said:

 

The Tories were voted in on a mandate to seek a Brexit deal with the closest possible relationship with the EU etc. May tried to obtain that - but her deal was rejected not only by "Remainers", but also by Soft Brexiteers & by 100 ERG/DUP types who wanted a Harder Brexit or No Deal.

 

Labour MPs were voted in on a clear mandate to oppose No Deal as the worst possible option & to seek a "Jobs First Brexit Deal" retaining the benefits of the Single Market & Customs Union. They've pretty much tried to do that.

 

The parliament is not "almost completely remain". There was a Remain majority before the referendum, but most Remain-supporting MPs have shown willing to accept a compromise Brexit deal. Parliament just has no agreement on any particular type of Brexit. Most opposition MPs voted to support Brexit options involving a Customs Union, SM 2.0 etc.....but most Tory MPs will only accept something between May's Deal and No Deal....hence the impasse.

 

May very much promoted no deal being a viable option in her early days as PM, the whole "No deal is better than a bad deal" was practically a slogan for the campaign trail. Parliament is almost completely remain let's be honest, which is why brexit will never be voted through in parliament. MPs making compromises based on the result is perfectly fine & I respect that, but it's clear that the amount of MPs in the commons do no represent the majority which voted for leave. Parliament cannot reach an agreement on this, because the majority of the vote is not adequately represented in parliament, which is why I feel brexiteers certainly have a right to be aggrieved. 

[Facecloth]

1 hour ago, Leicester_Loyal said:

https://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/monthly-update-concluded-investigations-11

 

Some remain campaign groups have been fined for breaking the law with regards to their spending. I imagine everyone in here is going to rightly say that remaining will now be illegal as they broke the law as well?

 

Thought not

Can't  be against the law if the referendum wasn't legally binding, I said as much regarding vote leave break the rules yesterday. They'll get fined, like vote leave did, but it'll go no further.

[Sly]

I’ve a friend who was hard Brexit. Even no deal. Has been for 3 years. He purchased shares in Sirius Minerals, a potash company.
 

The shares have tanked this year and he finally conceded today losing around £0.24 / share. This doesn’t seem a lost but he’s lost around £20k.

 

He phoned me today and said .... FFS, I wish I’d just have voted remain!! 😂 

 

 

[Beechey]

1 hour ago, Facecloth said:

Can't  be against the law if the referendum wasn't legally binding, I said as much regarding vote leave break the rules yesterday. They'll get fined, like vote leave did, but it'll go no further.

Legally binding does not mean what you seemingly think it means.

The police have been running a number of investigations regarding the EU referendum because of funding breaches.

Edited 17 September 2019 by Beechey

[Facecloth]

8 minutes ago, Beechey said:

Legally binding does not mean what you seemingly think it means.

The police have been running a number of investigations regarding the EU referendum because of funding breaches.

They fined vote leave, but it went no further. This is the same offensive, I imagine it'll be the same punishment.

[Beechey]

10 minutes ago, Facecloth said:

They fined vote leave, but it went no further. This is the same offensive, I imagine it'll be the same punishment.

It only went no further due to lack of evidence pointing to criminal acts.

[Beechey]

5 hours ago, LiberalFox said:

Irony is we lost our status as a world power and relied on US aid to recover from WW2.

The UK still is a world power. There's no argument to be had on this point.

However, it's no longer a superpower. Most consider the Suez Crisis the end of that.

[HappyHamza]

1 hour ago, Sly said:

I’ve a friend who was hard Brexit. Even no deal. Has been for 3 years. He purchased shares in Sirius Minerals, a potash company.
 

The shares have tanked this year and he finally conceded today losing around £0.24 / share. This doesn’t seem a lost but he’s lost around £20k.

 

He phoned me today and said .... FFS, I wish I’d just have voted remain!! 😂 

 

 

I'm struggling to sympathise. 

[HappyHamza]

2 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

May very much promoted no deal being a viable option in her early days as PM, the whole "No deal is better than a bad deal" was practically a slogan for the campaign trail. Parliament is almost completely remain let's be honest, which is why brexit will never be voted through in parliament. MPs making compromises based on the result is perfectly fine & I respect that, but it's clear that the amount of MPs in the commons do no represent the majority which voted for leave. Parliament cannot reach an agreement on this, because the majority of the vote is not adequately represented in parliament, which is why I feel brexiteers certainly have a right to be aggrieved. 

 In the referendum 51.9% voted leave.

48.1% voted remain. 

 

As Michael Gove has stated, the vote leave campaign was based on achieving a deal. Farage spent the whole time talking about being like Norway. 

 

But I digress....in the run up to the referendum polls showed what was originally clear support for remain gradually dwindle away and become a leave victory. 

 

This suggests that there is a significant hard-core vote for both remain and leave of 35-40% each. Then a sizeable percentage of floating voters that opted to leave.  I would argue that those voters are unlikely to have suddenly opted for the most extreme form of brexit and the likelihood is that they would have listened to the soft brexit being suggested and gone for that. 

 

This view is supported by the 2017 general election where 54% voted for parties that were explicitly ruling out no deal (some even ruling out brexit altogether). On that basis, it is clearly democratic that the majority of the House is against no deal. As there has never, ever been support for no deal.  

 

The biggest problem is that parliament doesn't really have a majority for anything. I tend to think that one of the liklier outcomes - and probably the best outcome now - is for a deal to be put together and then all options put back to the people.

[Sly]

Why the country remains as devised by this issue, we’ll never move forwards. 
 

It does need another vote and I’m yet to be given a justifiable reason, as to why you wouldn’t want to do that and potentially draw a line under it?
 

Evidence suggest more of a swing to remain, now that more us known. Is it enough of. Swing to justify that swing. Who knows.

 

Ultimately, the next general election will largely be won / lost on Brexit stance as the main manifesto point. Lesser issues will become mute to a degree.
 

 

[Alf Bentley]

5 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

May very much promoted no deal being a viable option in her early days as PM, the whole "No deal is better than a bad deal" was practically a slogan for the campaign trail.

 

"No deal is better than a bad deal" was one May slogan. Another was "a deep and special partnership with the EU".....and "the best Brexit deal"......and "strong and stable government".

She was forever trying to keep every part of the divided Tory Party onside - that priority of party unity was part of the problem with her.....and she even failed to achieve that!

 

She always saw No Deal a fallback option to a Brexit Deal, though. Look at the 2017 Tory manifesto: https://www.conservatives.com/manifesto

- Stuff about "best possible deal", "deep & special partnership", "smooth & orderly Brexit" in Intro & on pp. 6, 30, 31, 35, 36. The stuff about "no deal is better than bad deal" is limited to a sentence on p.36, as far as I can see.

 

5 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

Parliament is almost completely remain let's be honest, which is why brexit will never be voted through in parliament.

Parliament had a Remain majority before the referendum, but it's not honest at all to say that is the case now. There might be a majority who still think Remain would be better, but the vast majority of MPs have voted for one or other sort of Brexit.....they just cannot agree on what SORT of Brexit is acceptable between Soft Brexit options, Hard Brexit deal / May's Deal, No Deal etc.

 

Here are the results of the "indicative votes": https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47779783

- 273 MPs (mainly Labour) voted for a Brexit Customs Union proposal from Ken Clarke;

- 261 MPs (mainly Labour & SNP) voted for a Brexit Common Market proposal from Nick Boles;

- 280 MPs (mainly Labour, SNP & Lib Dem) voted to accept the Withdrawal Agreement if it was put to a second referendum

.....That's on top of the 286 MPs (mainly Tories - different MPs from above) who voted to accept May's Deal at the 3rd time of asking.

So, in fact, the vast majority of MPs have voted for an actual or hypothetical Brexit deal......but for different ones.

 

Almost the only MPs who have NEVER voted for a Brexit deal are.....the ERG & DUP MPs, holding out for a No Deal or a Unicorn Brexit (May's Deal with no backstop, no alternative to backstop, yet no hard border)

 

5 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

MPs making compromises based on the result is perfectly fine & I respect that, but it's clear that the amount of MPs in the commons do no represent the majority which voted for leave.

 

Answered this already. The MPs were elected in a general election - one held AFTER the referendum. They're not required to represent a Leave majority, unless voters choose to mainly elect pro-Leave MPs. They didn't choose to do that.

They voted on all sorts of issues, including Brexit, and elected the MPs that they did.....who are our valid, elected representatives.

 

5 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

Parliament cannot reach an agreement on this, because the majority of the vote is not adequately represented in parliament, which is why I feel brexiteers certainly have a right to be aggrieved. 

 

Parliament has been unable to reach an agreement because "Leave" was never properly defined - and MPs prefer all sorts of different terms of exit, none of them invalid.

 

The majority of the vote IS represented because the vast majority of MPs have been ready to support versions of Brexit.....but different ones, and no compromise has been secured.

The situation hasn't been helped by May excluding any idea of compromise except within the Tory Party ("party over country") or by Boris now coming in & trying to railroad through the most extreme version of Brexit (No Deal) against the will of parliament, while perverting our democracy.

[ozleicester]

Politics is broken.

 

Lies, untruths and deception are in greater use and more successful than at any time in the past

 

Another vote will become another dispute.

 

Asking the populace to decide about things that they, in the main, cannot understand is pointless and part of the reason for the failure of modern politics.

[Nick]

14 hours ago, FerrisBueller said:

The way they bang on about it, you'd think Churchill flew a Wellington topless to Berlin, Parachuted out and killed Hitler single-handedly with a Cigar to the tune of God Save the Queen.

Churchill now there’s a fella.... had two stints as PM and if my history serves me rightly don’t think he was ever elected by a people’s general electorate!

[Facecloth]

1 hour ago, Swan Lesta said:

Churchill now there’s a fella.... had two stints as PM and if my history serves me rightly don’t think he was ever elected by a people’s general electorate!

Won the 1951 election I thought?

[Wortho]

5 hours ago, ozleicester said:

Politics is broken.

 

Lies, untruths and deception are in greater use and more successful than at any time in the past

 

Another vote will become another dispute.

 

Asking the populace to decide about things that they, in the main, cannot understand is pointless and part of the reason for the failure of modern politics.

And the wonderful Jo Swinson has said that should there be a 2nd referendum and the vote is to leave she will still not accept it. Great!!

[The Fox Covert]

On 16/09/2019 at 12:12, Foxxed said:

So Boris silences your MPs then ignores a law your MPs have passed.

And now Boris has announced that he may refuse to ask the Queen to recall MPs and the Lords to Parliament, even if the Supreme Court rules the prorogation of Parliament to be unlawful.

Reported in that doyen of progressive political opinion the Daily Express (!)

[Facecloth]

57 minutes ago, Wortho said:

And the wonderful Jo Swinson has said that should there be a 2nd referendum and the vote is to leave she will still not accept it. Great!!

Got a link to her saying she wouldn't respect a leave vote in a 2nd referendum? 

 

From what I've seen her stance was clear. General election, she'll campaign on revoking article 50 and cancelling brexit. If lib dems won a majority, it'd be hard to argue she wouldn't have a mandate to do so. If we don't have a GE or she doesn't get into power, she'll back a 2nd referendum.

[Nick]

2 hours ago, Facecloth said:

Won the 1951 election I thought?

Ah yes - my bad  

[Carl the Llama]

6 minutes ago, Facecloth said:

Got a link to her saying she wouldn't respect a leave vote in a 2nd referendum? 

 

From what I've seen her stance was clear. General election, she'll campaign on revoking article 50 and cancelling brexit. If lib dems won a majority, it'd be hard to argue she wouldn't have a mandate to do so. If we don't have a GE or she doesn't get into power, she'll back a 2nd referendum.

She's said she wouldn't go against the manifesto she was elected on by voting in parliament for a leave deal - even following a 2nd referendum. A perfectly democratic statement given her constituents voted for her on the back of those views.  The Sun have printed a bitter article about it because it doesn't support their view, including Tory statements about her disrespecting the public (no surprise that Tories don't understand sticking to manifesto pledges) hence the opinion above. 

[Kopfkino]

25 minutes ago, Carl the Llama said:

She's said she wouldn't go against the manifesto she was elected on by voting in parliament for a leave deal - even following a 2nd referendum. A perfectly democratic statement given her constituents voted for her on the back of those views.  The Sun have printed a bitter article about it because it doesn't support their view, including Tory statements about her disrespecting the public (no surprise that Tories don't understand sticking to manifesto pledges) hence the opinion above. 

But the 2017 Lib Dem manifesto opposed Hard Brexit and suggested a second referendum based on Remain v whatever deal was put together. How would voting for a leave deal, approved by a second referendum, go against that manifesto pledge? I'd have thought the pledge of another referendum is a pledge to do whatever it says, not still ignore it cos it didn't confirm her desires.