Brexit discussion thread V - No Pic/GIF dumps please

FrancieBrady

Itssoeasy wrote: »

Was one of those no confidence votes that succeeded in the 1970s and it passed by one vote ? It involved an SDLP MP who got langers in a pub near Westminster and it played a part.

That is the kind of stuff it hinges on. The DUP have not been brave enough yet even though their red lines have been crossed and they have been literally shafted by May.

Sand

hill16bhoy wrote: »

In a multi-seat PR system, the Liberal Democrats for instance, would become a far more attractive electoral proposition. If the Lib Dems had, say, a solid 20% of the vote and seats, British politics would have a far more efffective bulwark against extremes.

Agreed, effective political representation is a guard against a feeling of disenfranchisement and resentment. However disagreeable people may feel UKIP's agenda was and is, it was surely better that roughly 10-15% of HoC seats were held by UKIP in 2015 than what did occur where the clear break between the people and their MPs was expressed in Brexit. The vast majority of MPs backed Remain, but can we really say the MPs were representative of British society?

I think there is a persistent desire for a strong/single party government in the UK (and indeed Ireland - the last election and a minority government were viewed almost as the end of civilisation by some). Seeking consensus is seen as weakness. A refusal to even entertain or engage with the opposition parties is seen as admirable. Elections are a contest, and the winner takes all. Modern democracy is apparently 30-40% of the voters ruling the remainder of the people without consultation. Multi PR might have made the HoC much more uncomfortable for either of Labour or the Tories, but it surely would have been better for the UK as a whole.

In hindsight, Brexit should not have been a shock. That the Tories have decided to disregard the genuine complaint expressed in Brexit and instead reinterpret it as a demand for more of the same is depressingly not a shock either. The UK is a society at war with it's own constituent parts.

Mr.Nice Guy

Suppose May faces a leadership challenge and wins it. She then can't be challenged for another 12 months. In the aftermath of seeing off the challenge, couldn't she then threaten that if her deal doesn't go through Parliament she will call a second referendum with a binary choice: Remain or No Deal?

Seeing as a Remain vote would be the most likely outcome, Brexiteers would surely have to swallow their pride and vote for her deal lest the whole enterprise be cancelled at the last moment. Likewise, Brexit-supporting Labour members, such as Corbyn himself, would surely have to support it.

What other alternatives would the Brexiteers have? A General Election being called would either result in Corbyn being elected and most likely pushing for permanent membership of the Customs Union, which Tory Brexiteers don't want. And if May is returned as PM, she has a mandate to offer a second referendum to the people. It's lose-lose for the ERG.

McGiver

PlasticPatrick wrote:

The world and European economies will not always be so buoyant and make no mistake the Germans and French will look after themselves when the time comes.

PlasticPatrick wrote:

If you sell your soul to the devil he will eventually be dropping by to collect.

Oh no, the German myth, please not again.

Germany is the greatest, most industrious, highly organised and functional country in Europe. Always was, always will be. By its sheer size and output it will always be the dominant economic power in Europe - Deutsch Mark or Euro, EU or no EU - nobody can change it. But there is no German conspiracy, alright?

Folkstonian

oscarBravo wrote: »

You're entitled to your beliefs, but if an organisation is set up with the express purpose of preventing war between its member states, and half a century later there hasn't been war between its member states, a reasonable application of Occam's Razor would suggest that it has certainly been effective.

It's easy to argue that Europe would have been at peace anyway, insofar as it's always an exercise in navel-gazing to boldly assert what would have been. But if you're going to argue that the EU hasn't achieved one of its core objectives, despite that core objective having been achieved, I think the onus is on you to make a convincing case for your counterfactual.

Well I think the contrary is true, actually.

YOU appear to be defending the assertion that the EU is the single most important factor in the maintenance of peace, so the onus in any debate would be on YOU to provide a compelling case for the motion.

But correlation does not equal causation, and I simply queried the credibility of the claim, offering the rebuilding of Germany after WW2 and the Cold War/ the NATO-Warsaw Pact stand off as alternative explanations.

Remarkable how quick people can be to jump on even gentle examinations or critiques of the EU in this thread

ThePanjandrum

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Explain what happens to the service industry your economy relies on under WTO rules.

We go on the WTO General Agreements on Trade in Services, we already trade on them with many countries.

Explain the WTO Rules Of Origin and vehicle exports to the USA, note that the UK

Read the Rules of Origin on the WTO site for yourself. We currently export to America on WTO anyway. We export vehicles to the USA under WTO rules.

Tell us how the UK will get a good deal with India etc. without accepting lots and lots of immigration. Refer to the billions promised to Southern Africa in your answer.

Negotiation. Anyway, we currently have a lot of immigrants from India and are happy to have more if it is for our benefit. What do you want me to say about UK foreign aid? We give a great deal of foreign aid - in 2015 we gave slightly more than 0.7% of our Gross National Income, Ireland gave just over half of that. Some of the aid is worthwhile, some is not, we need to use it properly and perhaps provide more of it in return for trade.

Comment on the 2.5% shortfall in tax revenue so far since the referendum. Contrast and compare to every other OECD country that isn't a potential war zone.

Feel free to provide details of the statistics you are using and your definition of "tax shortfall."

Unless you can address these points, and more, you are in cloud cuckoo land.

Not at all, living in Cloud Cuckoo Land is not dependent on whether a person can address particular points, unless you are Humpty Dumpty.

OK?

Larbre34

Folkstonian wrote: »

Well I think the contrary is true, actually.

YOU appear to be defending the assertion that the EU is the single most important factor in the maintenance of peace, so the onus in any debate would be on YOU to provide a compelling case for the motion.

But correlation does not equal causation, and I simply queried the credibility of the claim, offering the rebuilding of Germany after WW2 and the Cold War/ the NATO-Warsaw Pact stand off as alternative explanations.

Remarkable how quick people can be to jump on even gentle examinations or critiques of the EU in this thread

Hate to interrupt your tête-á-tête, but the most basic answer is that the supranational integration that emerged after WWII and that was the genesis of the EU, is the most important factor in the maintenance of peace.

Soviet ambitions scared the hell out of every leader trying to rebuild their crippled countries. NATO established in 1949 as the military bulwark. The ECSC founded in 1951 was proposed as the economic side of that same coin and by 1957 it included common cause of social and political cooperation. Thats what maintained the peace, common goals and strength against a common enemy.

The Rape of Lucretia

The most intriguing questions of the last 48 hours :

Where is Boris and what is he up to ?

For Forks Sake

The Rape of Lucretia wrote: »

The most intriguing questions of the last 48 hours :

Where is Boris and what is he up to ?

He was spotted having dinner with Farage last night. Bannon is also in the UK this week, make of that what you will.

Capt'n Midnight

theguzman wrote: »

Financial markets, some people may know the price of everything but the true value of nothing. There is far bigger things at play than mere financial markets.

Yeah, like the £500m a week in lost revenue since Article 50 was triggered.

ThePanjandrum

Deleted User wrote: »

I take it that that is supposed to be a chart of the pound against the US Dollar. What's it supposed to show? The pound fell heavily after the Referendum but that was a good thing, it was overvalued anyway and letting it fall makes our exports more competitive. Germany has used the Eurozone to get the same result.

But the rates are not necessarily a good measure of the comparative underlying strength of an economy, it's based on what people think that other traders will think will happen. I buy tens of thousands of foreign currency each week through brokers and the first rule is not to depend on their predictions, they are more interested in maximising their commission rather than in benefiting their customer.

Shelga

What happens if the DUP withdraw their support of the government? Wouldn’t that trigger a GE, regardless of what happens with the potential vote of no confidence in May?

Is there any chance of them doing this?

rogue-entity

theguzman wrote:

...some people may know the price of everything but the true value of nothing.

The value you speak of has no material benefit, its like "thoughts and prayers".

theguzman wrote:

There is far bigger things at play than mere financial markets.

I'm sure that will be great comfort to folks that may find themselves less and less able to afford to put food on the table and pay the bills.

Anthracite wrote:

What confuses me about this question is that you clearly have some means of accessing the internet.

But that's liberal media and that it may support our viewpoints implies that we are brainwashed.

hill16bhoy

Sand wrote: »

Agreed, effective political representation is a guard against a feeling of disenfranchisement and resentment. However disagreeable people may feel UKIP's agenda was and is, it was surely better that roughly 10-15% of HoC seats were held by UKIP in 2015 than what did occur where the clear break between the people and their MPs was expressed in Brexit. The vast majority of MPs backed Remain, but can we really say the MPs were representative of British society?

I think there is a persistent desire for a strong/single party government in the UK (and indeed Ireland - the last election and a minority government were viewed almost as the end of civilisation by some). Seeking consensus is seen as weakness. A refusal to even entertain or engage with the opposition parties is seen as admirable. Elections are a contest, and the winner takes all. Modern democracy is apparently 30-40% of the voters ruling the remainder of the people without consultation. Multi PR might have made the HoC much more uncomfortable for either of Labour or the Tories, but it surely would have been better for the UK as a whole.

In hindsight, Brexit should not have been a shock. That the Tories have decided to disregard the genuine complaint expressed in Brexit and instead reinterpret it as a demand for more of the same is depressingly not a shock either. The UK is a society at war with it's own constituent parts.

I agree that it would have been more democratic for UKIP to have 10-15% of the seats in the House of Commons after the 2015 election, but paradoxically, had the UK had PR and multi-seat constituencies for the last 40 years, I think it would have been a lot harder for UKIP to achieve their aim of leaving the European Union as the issue would likely have been a much more fringe one because in a PR system the Tories would likely not have had the vocal pro-Brexit minority that they did - they would probably have been a mainstream, pro-Europe centre-right party a la Fine Gael with a support base of around 25-30% and a seat count in that range too, ie. they would never have gotten a majority.

Instead the whole Eurosceptic/Brexit issue has infested the Tories for 30 years. All the Eurosceptics crowded into the Tories and set the agenda when they were in government, which because of the UK system is almost always majority, one party goovernment.

This Eurosceptic agenda been led to a large extent by the UK right-wing media. The media is business which relies on advertising and it skews right for that reason. I think a two party system also leads the media, particularly the right-wing media, to be more rabid and sensationalist in how they frame things because the "threat" of a Labour government is ever-present. That is certainly what happened in the UK.

I certainly would have complaints about how certain issues are framed in the Irish media, but overall, we don't have anything like the rabid, frothing at the mouth sensationalism of the Daily Mail or The Sun.

That's because there's no real prospect of a genuine left-wing government here. We always end up with centre-right governments. That's where the needle always lands.

I don't agree that there is a desire for single party government in Ireland - I think it's very much the opposite, and I'm quite happy with that. It's stronger in the long run.

seamus

Folkstonian wrote: »

But correlation does not equal causation, and I simply queried the credibility of the claim, offering the rebuilding of Germany after WW2 and the Cold War/ the NATO-Warsaw Pact stand off as alternative explanations

What a coincidence then that the first pan-european political and economic union in 2,000 years happened at the exact same time that Europe has experienced the longest period of unbroken peace in 2,000 years.

It's just a correlation though, one has nothing to do with the other.

It's not like any other large economic blocs are at peace. The Russian Federation, sure jaysus they're bombing the crap out of each other constantly. And the United States? Endless interstate warring.

Capt'n Midnight

ThePanjandrum wrote: »

Explain what happens to the service industry your economy relies on under WTO rules.

We go on the WTO General Agreements on Trade in Services, we already trade on them with many countries.

LOL
Todays word is Passporting. It's the advantage you have over places like India and the Philippines when selling services into the EU at the lower end of the market. At the higher end of the market relocations to the EU are happening.


Explain the WTO Rules Of Origin and vehicle exports to the USA, note that the UK

Read the Rules of Origin on the WTO site for yourself. We currently export to America on WTO anyway. We export vehicles to the USA under WTO rules.

Your cars have lots of EU parts. Today they are EU cars. After Brexit they won't be EU cars , in fact they may not even be considered 'UK' cars and so will attract heavier tariffs.


Tell us how the UK will get a good deal with India etc. without accepting lots and lots of immigration. Refer to the billions promised to Southern Africa in your answer.

Negotiation. Anyway, we currently have a lot of immigrants from India and are happy to have more if it is for our benefit. What do you want me to say about UK foreign aid? We give a great deal of foreign aid - in 2015 we gave slightly more than 0.7% of our Gross National Income, Ireland gave just over half of that. Some of the aid is worthwhile, some is not, we need to use it properly and perhaps provide more of it in return for trade.

You spent about £4Bn in aid to get prospective deals with countries who only buy 1-2% of your exports. Also to be blunt, team UK hasn't increased market share despite the fall in sterling.

BTW Irishaid consistently comes out as being very cost effective because it's not used as a political football.

Comment on the 2.5% shortfall in tax revenue so far since the referendum. Contrast and compare to every other OECD country that isn't a potential war zone.

Feel free to provide details of the statistics you are using and your definition of "tax shortfall."

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/sep/29/britain-bill-brexit-hits-500-million-pounds-a-week

Seriously if you could get that artificially inflated £350 million figure on that big red bus you'd still be down billions. All that loss of revenue means higher taxes or less public spending on stuff like the NHS. How long will it take the UK economy to grow 2.5% ? How long will it take to grow 2.5% more than the OECD average ?

If you look at things like Excess Winter Mortality you can see one aspect of the human cost of tanking your own economy
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-45876204


Unless you can address these points, and more, you are in cloud cuckoo land.

Not at all, living in Cloud Cuckoo Land is not dependent on whether a person can address particular points, unless you are Humpty Dumpty.

So far you have only posted opinions and asked questions.

You have to understand that the negotiations so far have been on easy mode. Ireland and the EU have a vested interest in keeping the UK going without letting them take advantage of that at our expense.


Places that don't care about human rights like China, Indian and the USA will be quite happy to asset strip your country.

BTW WTO is not a replacement for ANY of the EU free trade deals with 70+ countries.

Tell us how many countries UK airlines can fly into after Brexit ?

Folkstonian

seamus wrote: »

What a coincidence then that the first pan-european political and economic union in 2,000 years happened at the exact same time that Europe has experienced the longest period of unbroken peace in 2,000 years.

It's just a correlation though, one has nothing to do with the other.

It's not like any other large economic blocs are at peace. The Russian Federation, sure jaysus they're bombing the crap out of each other constantly. And the United States? Endless interstate warring.

That long period of unbroken peace in our part of the world also coincides with France and Britain developing nuclear weapons - compelling arguments exist for this being the decisive factor

Or perhaps, it can also be argued that following the comprehensive defeat and rebuilding of Germany as a modern democratic country - Western Europe has comprised entirely of liberal democracies.
Again a compelling (and very old, written about by Kant in the 18th century I think) argument exists for this being the key factor in ensuring nations are particularly reluctant to use military force and do not go to war with each other

I’m not even trying to argue you are definitely wrong. You may be right. I’ve no idea how you would go about proving it conclusively. But I don’t think it’s right that you try and paint any line of thought that the EU may not be the key to European peace as patently absurd.

Strazdas

hill16bhoy wrote: »

I agree that it would have been more democratic for UKIP to have 10-15% of the seats in the House of Commons after the 2015 election, but paradoxically, had the UK had PR and multi-seat constituencies for the last 40 years, I think it would have been a lot harder for UKIP to achieve their aim of leaving the European Union as the issue would likely have been a much more fringe one because in a PR system the Tories would likely not have had the vocal pro-Brexit minority that they did - they would probably have been a mainstream, pro-Europe centre-right party a la Fine Gael with a support base of around 25-30% and a seat count in that range too, ie. they would never have gotten a majority.

Instead the whole Eurosceptic/Brexit issue has infested the Tories for 30 years. All the Eurosceptics crowded into the Tories and set the agenda when they were in government, which because of the UK system is almost always majority, one party goovernment.

This Eurosceptic agenda been led to a large extent by the UK right-wing media. The media is business which relies on advertising and it skews right for that reason. I think a two party system also leads the media, particularly the right-wing media, to be more rabid and sensationalist in how they frame things because the "threat" of a Labour government is ever-present. That is certainly what happened in the UK.

I certainly would have complaints about how certain issues are framed in the Irish media, but overall, we don't have anything like the rabid, frothing at the mouth sensationalism of the Daily Mail or The Sun.

That's because there's no real prospect of a genuine left-wing government here. We always end up with centre-right governments. That's where the needle always lands.

I don't agree that there is a desire for single party government in Ireland - I think it's very much the opposite, and I'm quite happy with that. It's stronger in the long run.

The two party system means that all of the loons and nutters on the right and left of British politics who want to be MPs have no choice but to join the Tories or Labour. Overall, this is extremely bad for the system and means their presence in the parties is a toxic one.

Add in the fact that 80% of newspaper sales in the UK are of right wing / hard right papers (definitely not centre right) and the whole thing is a mess. Too many angry fruitcakes in key positions of responsibility or influence.

BonnieSituation

charlie14 wrote: »

My point was that from the 2016 referendum vote some, myself included at the time, appear to feel there is support for a more moderate brand of unionism as per the UUP rather than that of the DUP.

That seems a very faint hope imo when you consider the subsequent 2017 Westminster elections compared to the same in 2015 where both were on a FPTP.
DUP increased their vote by 10.3%. The UUP vote decreased by 5.8%

I know what your point was.

The reason that this happened was because FPTP entrenched your vote.

Why would anyone in Larne vote for the UUP candidate knowing that Sammy Wilson will romp home?

So you have moderates on both sides voting for the extremes to ensure their vote counts.

So yes, the DUP share went up but don't forget that was after the bloody nose they got at the last Stormont elections. So of course wavering Unionists would back the winning horse; it's a tough one to properly quantify. There's no doubt that the unionist vote is going down. But let them have it...

First Up

theguzman wrote: »

This is why so many voted for Brexit, the arrogance of the Remainers and pontificating drove moderates to vote for it. The language and tone used against Brexiteers was the best recruiter they had. Brexit was a fight back against the left and against political correctness and liberalism.

Some fight back.

cryptocurrency

Britain have been humiliated on the world stage by the communist EU. The UK is a permanent seat holder of the UN Security Council and is getting humiliated like this. They have only one real course of action to save face here and the credibility as a power on the world stage and that’s to get rid of May, go for a no deal and severe security ties with the EU citing the unfriendly threats they’ve made to them. A few months of military brinkmanship would seen see the EU offer a simple free trade deal.

First Up

cryptocurrency wrote: »

Britain have been humiliated on the world stage by the communist EU. The UK is a permanent seat holder of the UN Security Council and is getting humiliated like this. They have only one real course of action to save face here and the credibility as a power on the world stage and that’s to get rid of May, go for a no deal and severe security ties with the EU citing the unfriendly threats they’ve made to them. A few months of military brinkmanship would seen see the EU offer a simple free trade deal.

Your first sentence says it all. You must miss how things were in the 1890's.

Bigus

cryptocurrency wrote: »

Britain have been humiliated on the world stage by the communist EU. The UK is a permanent seat holder of the UN Security Council and is getting humiliated like this. They have only one real course of action to save face here and the credibility as a power on the world stage and that’s to get rid of May, go for a no deal and severe security ties with the EU citing the unfriendly threats they’ve made to them. A few months of military brinkmanship would seen see the EU offer a simple free trade deal.

If all else fails fight.....marvellous modern thinking.

cryptocurrency

There seems to be a lot of anger at how the EU has treated the UK there and despite what the media is saying or our own commentators saying “ it’s of their own making, they could back down and cancel it all” the fact is that eventually there will be a more hardline approach from the UK once this government they have goes. I just worry that we’ve backed the wrong horse in the long race. If the UK capitualates here they will have to hand back that UN seat as even Uganda won’t take them seriously. This is their biggest challenge since WW2 and they either take it or come out swinging. If I was British I’d be 100% behind the salvaging of national pride.
We do live the a age where people are softer and weaker so I don’t expect they will but you have to say that many developing nations would have had a much stronger will, both at public and government level then this lot in the UK. They’ve no grit to dig down and fight for the win.

Calina

cryptocurrency wrote: »

There seems to be a lot of anger at how the EU has treated the UK there and despite what the media is saying or our own commentators saying “ it’s of their own making, they could back down and cancel it all” the fact is that eventually there will be a more hardline approach from the UK once this government they have goes. I just worry that we’ve backed the wrong horse in the long race. If the UK capitualates here they will have to hand back that UN seat as even Uganda won’t take them seriously. This is their biggest challenge since WW2 and they either take it or come out swinging. If I was British I’d be 100% behind the salvaging of national pride.
We do live the a age where people are softer and weaker so I don’t expect they will but you have to say that many developing nations would have had a much stronger will, both at public and government level then this lot in the UK. They’ve no grit to dig down and fight for the win.

Dunno who you are hanging out with cos where I am there is a lot of derision at how idiotic the Brits have been along with some relief that the EU places more value on a remaining member rather than a leaving member.

The hardline approach will be tempered by the need to trade. There are no hardliners reafy to step up because such as exist, Johnson and Rees Moggs, have shown no desire to step up to the mark.

The UN permanent seat is entirely separate to this debate. Russia still has a seat, after all. India had an argument for one.

Also, please note this mess was completely self inflicted.

Bigus

cryptocurrency wrote: »

There seems to be a lot of anger at how the EU has treated the UK there and despite what the media is saying or our own commentators saying “ it’s of their own making, they could back down and cancel it all” the fact is that eventually there will be a more hardline approach from the UK once this government they have goes. I just worry that we’ve backed the wrong horse in the long race. If the UK capitualates here they will have to hand back that UN seat as even Uganda won’t take them seriously. This is their biggest challenge since WW2 and they either take it or come out swinging. If I was British I’d be 100% behind the salvaging of national pride.
We do live the a age where people are softer and weaker so I don’t expect they will but you have to say that many developing nations would have had a much stronger will, both at public and government level then this lot in the UK. They’ve no grit to dig down and fight for the win.

Fight to win what ?
Is it not all about soft power today , like Ireland does diplomatically?

And anyway who gives a damn about UN seats ? Does This enrich a nation ?

cryptocurrency

Calina wrote: »

Dunno who you are hanging out with cos where I am there is a lot of derision at how idiotic the Brits have been along with some relief that the EU places more value on a remaining member rather than a leaving member.

The hardline approach will be tempered by the need to trade. There are no hardliners reafy to step up because such as exist, Johnson and Rees Moggs, have shown no desire to step up to the mark.

The UN permanent seat is entirely separate to this debate. Russia still has a seat, after all. India had an argument for one.

Also, please note this mess was completely self inflicted.

Russia has one because they are an extremely powerful country with an independent foreign policy. India would have a fair claim to one due to its size now and it’s growing military.
The UK as an EU vassal state would have no credibility among these nations.
An EU army would only realistically can have one so that would be Frances seat, the UK staying in the EU would almost certainly be a fast track to losing theirs or sharing with the EU. The UK needs to leave the EU to keep this seat and the influence that comes with it and to do that credibly they need to start flexing a bit back at Brussels and b seen to be doing just that.

Bigus

Speaking of fights I was wondering what the future of the falklands might be in all this Brexit turmoil and Britain wanting to get off the world .

As usual somebody's ahead of me .

Argentina is going to use the EU un shackled to UK to negotiate a re take of the islands .

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/argentina-falkland-islands-brexit-no-deal-malvinas-jeremy-hunt-faurie-south-atlantic-talks-a8602331.html

cryptocurrency

Bigus wrote: »

Fight to win what ?
Is it not all about soft power today , like Ireland does diplomatically?

And anyway who gives a damn about UN seats ? Does This enrich a nation ?

In the long term keeping that UN seat is much more important to the UK then falling out with the EU. When you operate at their level then the seat is vital. Germany knows this hence the calls for the EU army and the seat via the backdoor.

Imagine if Japan had come back with the deal May did and presented it to the nation? The Japanese would probably expect some hari Kari ceremony on national TV by the government to wash the shame away. I still can’t believe that May actually presented this deal with a straight face.

cryptocurrency

Bigus wrote: »

Speaking of fights I was wondering what the future of the falklands might be in all this Brexit turmoil and Britain wanting to get off the world .

As usual somebody's ahead of me .

Argentina is going to use the EU un shackled to UK to negotiate a re take of the islands .

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/argentina-falkland-islands-brexit-no-deal-malvinas-jeremy-hunt-faurie-south-atlantic-talks-a8602331.html

Another reason why the UK needs to go hard brexit and flex now or the UK is finished. No seat, no overseas territories, no influence, no credibility....it’s all now on the line.