Are we sleep-walking out of Europe ?

Frank Yang posted:

It seems to me that the Remainders are really the victims....

Not this remainer. Please don't pin that one on me.

Frank Yang posted:

It seems to me that the Remainders (and the people who have been cheated into the idea that Brexit are good) are really the victims - Politicians like Johnson resigning from the cabinet, running away from his responsibility, rich Brexiteers such as  Rees-Mogg, John Redwood, Lawson and Ashcroft have all been moving their own wealths into EU jurisdictions.

I’d actually say that’s remarkably accurate - a very small proportion of leavers want to leave for the same reasons that the forces behind Brexit want to leave.

The rest of us are basically pawns or collateral damage.

Just read old news in the Telegraph that he who's name must not be mentioned, wants to use the UK-US trade negotiations to force the NHS to pay much more for drugs. “America will not be cheated any longer, and especially will not be cheated by foreign countries.”

This got me thinking: Next he will dictate Britain to get rid of the NHS altogether, because a tax financed insurance system has an "unfair" advantage over private American insurance companies, which of course have to be admitted to the British market. Even if it's not in the original trade agreement: you know by now how he respects written paper. And because Britain has no other big partner and is in dire need of a trade agreement, it will have to accept all terms. And slowly, slowly, Britain will be transformed into a US state with different social welfare, health insurance etc. Not necessarily worse but different.

IMO, regarding social welfare, Britain thinks much more European than American. I doubt that such a scenario would be in the interest of the British citizens.

And still people think that the EU is Britain's worst enemy? Good luck!

jfritzen posted:

This got me thinking: Next he will dictate Britain to get rid of the NHS altogether, because a tax financed insurance system has an "unfair" advantage over private American insurance companies, which of course have to be admitted to the British market. 

Don’t worry about Trump and the NHS... the recently appointed Heath and Social Care Secretary has received tens of thousands from the chairman of a free market think tank who’s clear policy is to abolish the NHS.

Eloise posted:

jfritzen posted:

This got me thinking: Next he will dictate Britain to get rid of the NHS altogether, because a tax financed insurance system has an "unfair" advantage over private American insurance companies, which of course have to be admitted to the British market. 

Don’t worry about Trump and the NHS... the recently appointed Heath and Social Care Secretary has received tens of thousands from the chairman of a free market think tank who’s clear policy is to abolish the NHS.

...and his precedecessor Hunt co-wrote a book about privatising the NHS from memory.....

https://www.independent.co.uk/...ocracy-a6865306.html

Dave***t posted:

Frank Yang posted:

It seems to me that the Remainders (and the people who have been cheated into the idea that Brexit are good) are really the victims - Politicians like Johnson resigning from the cabinet, running away from his responsibility, rich Brexiteers such as  Rees-Mogg, John Redwood, Lawson and Ashcroft have all been moving their own wealths into EU jurisdictions.

I’d actually say that’s remarkably accurate - a very small proportion of leavers want to leave for the same reasons that the forces behind Brexit want to leave.

The rest of us are basically pawns or collateral damage.

Yep, good luck to you all. Now, somebody has to deal with this mess, and the UK government has to be governed...

Alley Cat posted:

...and his precedecessor Hunt co-wrote a book about privatising the NHS from memory.....

Quite impressive writing a whole book from memory!

Having seen a bit more of the 'deal' proposed by the PM at Chequers I'm now thinking that the hard Brexiteers are right in the sense that:

- this weakens the UK's position making us 'rule-takers' from Brussels with no right to influence those rules

- it proposes a lot of additional red-tape (e.g. to work out where imported goods are going and to calculate whose duty rates apply) which will add costs to government and to business 

The Brexiteers' 'dream' of taking back control looks dead.  Of course, this is entirely of the Brexiteers' own making for seducing many voters with idealistic but unrealistic ambitions so I have no sympathy for Johnson, Gove, JR-M, Farage & co but it seems a heavy price for the UK to pay.  

So, assuming the rest of the EU doesn't reject the PM's proposal, we now seem to be facing a choice between the PM's deal which seems to offer no new material benefits to the UK while losing our voice over rules we will have to follow, or leaving the EU with no deal next March, which still looks awful for an unprepared business and the economy. So the PM's proposal looks to be the lesser of the two evils.  We Remainers will continue to say that staying in the EU still looks better than what is on offer but surely Leavers won't be satisfied with this either?  Those who propose another referendum, e.g. a confirmatory one of the negotiated deal, are regularly rebutted by the argument that 'the people have spoken'.  Hitherto that argument has been played out between disappointed Remainers who propose another referendum and Leavers who say the one we had in 2016 was decisive. However I'm now wondering how Leavers' voices will be heard if they think 'we voted to leave, but this deal doesn't deliver it!'.  Can we really be facing an outcome where both sides are unhappy? Is that democracy working?

Resurrection posted:

TOBYJUG posted:

What's more likely- TMs resignation or being ousted out by the end of today ?

May won’t  resign. She epitomes far too much the arrogant, self belief of the liberal political elite. She is way beyond anything other than messianic self belief dressed up in kitten heels. If as Home Secretary she had moderated her views on mass immigration, multiculturalism and a wide open doors policy, which she could have done tacitly under EU rules, and had complete control over outside of the EU, then we would not be on page whatever of this extended discourse. 

In my opinion she is worse than Blair in terms of having a God .....

Breaking the barrister's rule of never asking a question for which you do not know the answer -

Did you vote Conservative (lead by May) at the last election?

Will of the people and so on.

Adam, I'd be surprised if Resurrection would vote for anyone as left wing as the conservatives!

The media are loving the turmoil in the Tory party over the last week or so which is fair enough. 

I wish they had spent more time on the precise terms of the deal proposed by the PM though which to me at least seems a decent effort at implementing our departure from the EU without hurting the economy.  Sadly,  I haven't seen many lines on the forum devoted to the content of the document  - just the regular sentiments from the usual axe grinders.

I think the deal proposed by May more or less represents the essence of votes cast in the referendum too which is no mean feat.

Ray

thebigfredc posted:

The media are loving the turmoil in the Tory party over the last week or so which is fair enough. 

I wish they had spent more time on the precise terms of the deal proposed by the PM though which to me at least seems a decent effort at implementing our departure from the EU without hurting the economy.  Sadly,  I haven't seen many lines on the forum devoted to the content of the document  - just the regular sentiments from the usual axe grinders.

I think the deal proposed by May more or less represents the essence of votes cast in the referendum too which is no mean feat.

Ray

Agreed.

I haven't had time this week to search for the initial details nor the amendments from JR-M and Co. And, as you say, the Press just don't seem to provide that information up front. I also admit i'm somewhat biased against that BBC presenter, Laura Kunesberg. I don't quite know what it is, but she always seems to be sneering at the difficulties of the Gov, but never outlines their proposals clearly.

TM has the support of her Cabinet......well, the current Cabinet

She has the support of most of her Conservative MPs

She has the luke-warm support of about half of Parliament

She has yet to get the support of EU Ministers

She has to persuade Mr Barnier to support her proposals (and he has indicated that important parts are unacceptable)

And she has made it clear that SHE is in charge and that chap who replaced DD (what's his name?) is akin to a poodle.

She has no idea how many of the UK electorate support her proposals but seems disinclined to ask them.

Happy Holidays !!

TM certainly deserves a break walking in the hills with her other half. The lady certainly has resilience.

That said, the position she will return to after her hols certainly doesn't look like it's going to be any easier.  The noises coming out of the EU strongly suggest that the Chequers proposed deal isn't going to fly, at least in relation to this dual tariff and customs duty collection idea.  From a practical view it looks very hard to make work, and it pretty much invites the EU to contract-out to a non-member the enforcement of a bit of its external frontier, which always looked a big ask on principle. And then of course, the UK is wanting to cherry-pick one of the four freedoms.  

What are the next steps, I wonder? 

Based on recent media reports, (fake news ?) Mrs May was giving the Windrush (and associated) people (ie most immigrants) a hard time when she was Home Secretary. I also have it on good authority that the PM is convinced that the Brexit result was more about immigration than anything else. Of course, this might or might not be true.

On this basis, she might also believe that delivering Brexit - in any shape or form - will reduce immigration and thus secure her position as PM until retirement.

However, IMHO the UK population is inconsistent. According to the media, we condem the Gov for giving the Windrush people a hard time and we want them all to stay, but on the other according to my source and the referendum, we want Brexit in order to limit immigration.

When people are inconsistent, trouble usually follows.

Don Atkinson posted:

Based on recent media reports, (fake news ?) Mrs May was giving the Windrush (and associated) people (ie most immigrants) a hard time when she was Home Secretary. I also have it on good authority that the PM is convinced that the Brexit result was more about immigration than anything else. Of course, this might or might not be true.

On this basis, she might also believe that delivering Brexit - in any shape or form - will reduce immigration and thus secure her position as PM until retirement.

However, IMHO the UK population is inconsistent. According to the media, we condem the Gov for giving the Windrush people a hard time and we want them all to stay, but on the other according to my source and the referendum, we want Brexit in order to limit immigration.

When people are inconsistent, trouble usually follows.

Two things.  One, while it may or may not be true that immigration was the main issue in the referendum, I do think it's true that if immigration had played no role  at all, Brexit would not have come out on top.

But that makes the second thing even more crucial - it's less important that the populace is inconsistent on immigration.  What matters far more is that many politicians and successive governments, especially pro-Brexit politicians and recent Tory governments, have been inconsistent on immigration.  They say they'll lower immigration because they think that's what voters want to hear & will find persuasive, but they have very little intention of ever doing so.  Because they know that at the national level economically the country needs immigration, even if on a local level it might look to Joe Bloggs that it does not.  Hence the oft repeated 'aspirations' (not policies, we're now told!) about tend of thousands, while the numbers change much less than you'd expect if you took the claims seriously.  There's also the fact that immigration was used in the EU referendum as a dog whistle call to racists - the referendum could only directly comment (if at all) on immigration from the EU.  Whereas a lot of those concerned about immigration are more concerned about non-EU immigration.  Yet immigration, especially from Muslim countries such as Turkey, was played up no end in the campaigning.  Even though immigration from Turkey wouldn't have been affected by the Brexit result either way.  This resulted in a sense among some (don't forget that small margins shifting would change the overall result) that Brexit should lead to less immigration overall when in fact it does little to affect immigration from non-EU countries.  Hence the UKIP lurch even further to the right, increased attacks on Muslims (e.g. as evinced by the Tell Mama report) and so on.

It doesn't matter that many millions of people voted on other grounds than these - with such a close result, if over 95% of people voted on other issues, this issue could still be said to have made the crucial difference to the result.

Until politicians stop using immigration as a cynical dog whistle issue to gain votes without actually caring very much about it, this kind of thing will keep happening.  Or worse.

Don Atkinson posted:

Based on recent media reports, (fake news ?) Mrs May was giving the Windrush (and associated) people (ie most immigrants) a hard time when she was Home Secretary. I also have it on good authority that the PM is convinced that the Brexit result was more about immigration than anything else. Of course, this might or might not be true.

On this basis, she might also believe that delivering Brexit - in any shape or form - will show that she is trying to reduce immigration and thus secure her position as PM until retirement.

However, IMHO the UK population is inconsistent. According to the media, we condem the Gov for giving the Windrush people a hard time and we want them all to stay, but on the other according to my source and the referendum, we want Brexit in order to limit immigration.

When people are inconsistent, trouble usually follows.

I should have included the words in bold, to try to make my point clearer.

Dave***t posted:

Don Atkinson posted:

Based on recent media reports, (fake news ?) Mrs May was giving the Windrush (and associated) people (ie most immigrants) a hard time when she was Home Secretary. I also have it on good authority that the PM is convinced that the Brexit result was more about immigration than anything else. Of course, this might or might not be true.

On this basis, she might also believe that delivering Brexit - in any shape or form - will reduce immigration and thus secure her position as PM until retirement.

However, IMHO the UK population is inconsistent. According to the media, we condem the Gov for giving the Windrush people a hard time and we want them all to stay, but on the other according to my source and the referendum, we want Brexit in order to limit immigration.

When people are inconsistent, trouble usually follows.

Two things.  One, while it may or may not be true that immigration was the main issue in the referendum, I do think it's true that if immigration had played no role  at all, Brexit would not have come out on top.

But that makes the second thing even more crucial - it's less important that the populace is inconsistent on immigration.  What matters far more is that many politicians and successive governments, especially pro-Brexit politicians and recent Tory governments, have been inconsistent on immigration.  They say they'll lower immigration because they think that's what voters want to hear & will find persuasive, but they have very little intention of ever doing so.  Because they know that at the national level economically the country needs immigration, even if on a local level it might look to Joe Bloggs that it does not.  Hence the oft repeated 'aspirations' (not policies, we're now told!) about tend of thousands, while the numbers change much less than you'd expect if you took the claims seriously.  There's also the fact that immigration was used in the EU referendum as a dog whistle call to racists - the referendum could only directly comment (if at all) on immigration from the EU.  Whereas a lot of those concerned about immigration are more concerned about non-EU immigration.  Yet immigration, especially from Muslim countries such as Turkey, was played up no end in the campaigning.  Even though immigration from Turkey wouldn't have been affected by the Brexit result either way.  This resulted in a sense among some (don't forget that small margins shifting would change the overall result) that Brexit should lead to less immigration overall when in fact it does little to affect immigration from non-EU countries.  Hence the UKIP lurch even further to the right, increased attacks on Muslims (e.g. as evinced by the Tell Mama report) and so on.

It doesn't matter that many millions of people voted on other grounds than these - with such a close result, if over 95% of people voted on other issues, this issue could still be said to have made the crucial difference to the result.

Until politicians stop using immigration as a cynical dog whistle issue to gain votes without actually caring very much about it, this kind of thing will keep happening.  Or worse.

Hi Dave,

A very nice summary.

Yes. I think most of us now know (and some of us have always known) that Brexit involves many, many issues, one of which is EU migration. The "inside information" is that "Mrs May" (not you, not me, not Uncle Tom Cobbly....) "Mrs May" believes that Brexit Voters, voted for Brexit with immigration top of their list of concerns.

Of course she could well be wrong in her belief.

The Governor of the Bank of England thinks a No Deal Brexit is looking like a real possibility. Other sources have expressed similar points of view.

If the Government is faced with a stark "No Deal" situation from the EU - not a "Bad Deal", just a stark, but clear "No Deal", what sort of "Meaningful" vote would Parliament get ?

Don Atkinson posted:

The Governor of the Bank of England thinks a No Deal Brexit is looking like a real possibility. Other sources have expressed similar points of view.

If the Government is faced with a stark "No Deal" situation from the EU - not a "Bad Deal", just a stark, but clear "No Deal", what sort of "Meaningful" vote would Parliament get ?

Do you like WTO, or do you not like WTO? However, the answer would always be the same: You are getting WTO, like it or not.  

Resurrection posted:

Don Atkinson posted:

The Governor of the Bank of England thinks a No Deal Brexit is looking like a real possibility. Other sources have expressed similar points of view.

If the Government is faced with a stark "No Deal" situation from the EU - not a "Bad Deal", just a stark, but clear "No Deal", what sort of "Meaningful" vote would Parliament get ?

Do you like WTO, or do you not like WTO? However, the answer would always be the same: You are getting WTO, like it or not.  

And I'm sure everyone in the country will be absolutely delighted with the 3% drop in their standard of living!

Don Atkinson posted:

The Governor of the Bank of England thinks a No Deal Brexit is looking like a real possibility. Other sources have expressed similar points of view.

If the Government is faced with a stark "No Deal" situation from the EU - not a "Bad Deal", just a stark, but clear "No Deal", what sort of "Meaningful" vote would Parliament get ?

Unless negotiations become entrenched into two irreconcilable positions with bad feelings on both sides, I suspect the result will be an agreement to extend the Article 50 period to allow both parties to do further work to agree a negotiated exit.  After all it is in the interests of both sides to have a negotiated exit.  An extension of Article 50 would likely irritate Rees-Mogg and his colleagues but the majority of MPs on both sides of the House would I think vote for a pragmatic extension rather than fractious chaos.

I was at a meeting this morning where some senior Gov’t officials were expressing serious concern for the consequence of a hard Brexit, in the direst terms.

One issue is that goods that without a customs agreement trucks carrying goods at places like Calais will take an estimated 45 minutes to process - 15 times as long as the average time of 3 minutes now, which if true will seriously slow goods in both directions,, effectively reducing throughput significantly, creating shortages and pushing up prices sharply, especially affecting food imports.

But even more of a concern is an anticipated risk that if Brexit is perceived by EU countries, or their citizens, as also having a negative effect on them, they could decide to completely block the ports out of a desire to hurt the UK out of spite or retaliation, regardless of additional pain to themselves in so doing. (‘They’ in this context not necessarily meaning anything officially sanctioned.)

Given the modern supply culture of ‘just in time’ and hence minimal stock or storage space for stock in the supply chain, even with just slowed trade there is considered to be a very real risk of food shortages immediately after Brexit, exacerbated by associated panic buying, with real potential for riots and lawlessness if the worst scenarios come to pass.

And its not just food - among essentials, apparently most petroleum cones via the EU these days, also at least some gas supplies.

For the optimists among us, hopefully the UK Gov will seek genuinely to seek the best for Britain and the British people at large and so simply not allow hard Brexit. As for the pessimists, time to hole up, stock up, and prepare to sit it out - for which investing in solar power sufficient to power your hifi may be the only way to ensure solace.

Innocent Bystander, this is now about 1 1/2 years after Brexit intent of separation papers were filed and y'all sound as feckless a group as it can be?  Classic dominant submissive power struggle with Britain obviously the weaker partner.  Oh, they are so bad for us and abuse us but we need to stay suckled to the breast of the EU for our own good.  We'll die if we don't!  Oh, woe is us, why are we sleepwalking out of Europe?  Boo hoo hoo.

Seriously, you all need to start planning to succeed rather than spend these years planning to fail?

Spoken like a true hard brexiteer, Florestan.  What you suggest is that we should treat a worst case scenario as a fait accompli when it is in fact far from accompli, and may well not even happen.  The principal thing that will stop it happening is if people refuse to assume it's going to happen and resist it.  To put it in the kind of emotive terms often used around Brexit, the same attitude you espouse would have had us learning German and stockpiling Kartoffelsalat in 1939.

The ridiculous and self-contradictory caricature of attitudes towards Brexit here I will grant though, especially to an outsider, because the quality of public debate is so low - it's an irreconcilable set of mutual loathings the Tory party has sicked on to the country as a whole.