Has anyone seen Alistair Campbell and TeeJ in the same room?
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/11/labour-lib-dems-brexit-britain-economy-society
He is too right wing and not green enough 🙂
You should read his weekly column in The New European.
“We accept the result of the referendum. But the Brexit as delivered, far from working, is daily damaging the real interests and needs of the people of this country, in ways large and small, and as a matter of urgency its workings must be reviewed and where necessary, new arrangements negotiated and put in place.”
Hard not to agree with that.
Oh, and is now “too soon” to have a proper investigation into how we got here?
The big red bus thing is interesting, as although it was obviously intened to misslead and stoke anti-EU sentiment, the way the livery was worded, gramatically speaking was only a suggestion, not a promise or a commitment.
"let's fund the NHS instead" isn't a commitment to give the NHS an extra 350m a week, its more of a question/ suggestion.
Still more than a bit worried about the ones they still plan to do away with… the detail will be interesting (ie just which further rights and protections will we lose).
Hmm… I think I’m justified in being worried…
https://twitter.com/labourunionsuk/status/1656694114476343303?s=21
The big red bus thing is interesting, as although it was obviously intened to misslead and stoke anti-EU sentiment, the way the livery was worded, gramatically speaking was only a suggestion, not a promise or a commitment.
I'm pretty sure UK law protects against this. Even if it's factually correct it can still be withdrawn if it's deemed misleading.
I'm not sure why anyone should be surprised at workers rights being in the Tory firing line. It was literally pointed out all the time before the referendum (with the stuff about economic damage, supply chains and non-EU immigration). But, Project Fear and all that. 🤷♂️
I’m pretty sure UK law protects against this. Even if it’s factually correct it can still be withdrawn if it’s deemed misleading.
What law protects against what? How are you going to withdraw a bus that hasn't been seen in 7 years?
Who gives a **** about the ****ing bus?
Everyone with a modicum of sense knew it was bollocks.
Some Leavers believed it - I pity them.
Some Leavers knew it was bollocks, but wanted to have a tantrum - well, boo hoo.
It is seven years too late for this.
What are we going to do, in the here and now, to improve our situation? That is all that matters. Any improvement is going to be a part-reversal of Brexit - that is just logic. So someone in a position of influence needs to put their big boy pants on and tell it like it is.
Until then it is just piss in the wind.
Has anyone perused the Schedule of Retained Law for the bonfire at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/schedule-of-retained-eu-law.
Basically it's housekeeping that should be going on all of the time, surely?
Especially telling is where it says that these laws have already been revoked in WAL, SCO & NI since Brexit, so England has kept them just to make the bonfire look bigger.
Some are listed as having no effect since 1977! (edit, I found 1972), (edit 1958 - Maintenance Orders Act)
Some are on the books in error.
Some don't have a reason for revocation because the Department has yet to comment, but on the list anyway. just sloppy?
Will he **** off now?
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/amphtml/nigel-farage-leave-uk-brexit-failed-111255330.html
Some don’t have a reason for revocation because the Department has yet to comment, but on the list anyway. just sloppy?
Sloppy? You not been paying attention to the last few years?
More importantly how many are they going to slip in at the last minute, these will be the ones that really impact us ordinary folk.
Will he * off now?
Depends if he's satisfied with the pile of cash he's made *ing up the UK's postwar settlement for his masters. 🤷♂️
So very predictable
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65612295
One of the world's biggest carmakers has called on the government to renegotiate part of the Brexit deal or risk losing parts of its car industry.
Same BBC report said the UK will struggle to create a native battery industry.
Each day the UK feels smaller and less significant.
It's okay though, because EE at least are clawing some of that money back by reintroducing roaming charges in the EU from next month!
Ah good old ‘rules of origin’ shocker , suddenly ‘sneaks’ up although it’s been well known for years.
The owners of the UK's biggest manufacturer, Jaguar Land Rover, are currently being wooed by the Spanish government to host a gigafactory that had long been assumed to be being built in the UK
If this happens there will be 'scenes'
Unsurprisingly, the government have known this was coming for years and done absolutely nothing about it and now it’s the eleventh hour and their only ‘policy’ is to plead with the EU to renegotiate the agreement
More ‘magical thinking’ from the Brexiteers? Well who’d have thunk it?
He added that although the government under Boris Johnson wanted a "gigafactory" built in the UK, "essentially there's no industrial policy to back that up".
This for me is a key statement in the BBC story from above - no policy, no strategy AKA s**t Govt.
Policies & strategies require grown-ups in Govt to think past the end of the day, year and (more importantly) their time in office. I wonder though, is this the real 'British Disease', the reason that the country has basically been free-falling economically for the past 100 years. Personally it mirrors what I see day-to-day at work, a Management class so focused on getting through the day 'unmolested' that they've just no focus on the longer term.
Thoughts?
TBH the carmakers have also known this.
I’m always surprised that we don’t seem to have an existing U.K. battery maker willing to produce e.v. Batteries TBH. (Not as sexy as some unknown startup without a track record though)
I wonder though, is this the real ‘British Disease’
I agree, but I don't think there has ever been a tradition of competent government in the UK. We've always just been winging it - sometimes it pays off, because it made us flexible and mobile, and enabled individuals or small groups/corporations to see opportunities and get things done; but often it doesn't, especially when faced with more organised opposition.
This is exactly the issue. That recent book written about Boris Johnsons time in office said precisely this. He would announce 'policy' literally on the hoof without even discussing it with his aides or anyone in the departments tasked with delivering it. The example they gave was when he announced he had a plan to reform social care. he didn't. He hadn't given it a seconds thought, hadn't discussed it with anyone and just blurted it out when he was in a corner. Same with the 40 new hospitals, nuclear reactor every year and the car battery manufacture. Literally verbal incontinence, blurted out with absolutely no substance to it whatsoever.
His 'oven-ready deal' was just back of a fag packet stuff, chucked out there to make it go away. No thought at all was given to things like this. It was all just fingers crossed and hope it somehow sorts itself out. That seems to have been the whole principle behind brexit from day one. I wonder how many more of these time-bombs are waiting in the wings? Lots and lots, I'd imagine
And since Johnson its just been one long leadership campaign (as Cruella has continued this week) as a sucession of clueless Brexiteer ****-wits take their turn in the wheelhouse of the Titanic. No time for actual governing, planning, or anythign useful.
Brexiteer numbskull Kemi Badenoch is now tasked with sorting out this particular self-inflicted car crash. I'm sure it'll work out briliiantly for us all
The only "scenes" will be the ones in old boys clubs because they've not managed to milk the government grants for consultant fees, just like the last UK battery factory and the Ineos knock-off landrover factory.
TBH the carmakers have also known this.
But they can just up sticks and move to a country with a more welcoming, business-friendly environment that isn't run by a bunch of clowns.
Its hardly like there aren't many to choose from, within a stones throw
This always happens. They're jangling for more subsidies and tax breaks from the UK. This time around, it's more likely that they will leave tho.
Or avoiding tariffs which importing and exporting from the UK attracts now.
It's the stacking of tariffs that really hurts. Pay tariffs to import RoW parts. Pay again when moving a sub assembly made with UK, EU & RoW parts across a border. Pay again when selling a completed vehicle made up of parts from multiple territories across a border. Rules of origin stuff is what people didn't, and still don't get, about how inferior the "oven ready deal" is (and will be, as it's not "done" yet) to what we have lost.
Ahahahahahahahahaaaaaa!
It's the way she tells 'em.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
I see she's also backed it up with the usual explanation that the new trade agreement selling English fruit gums and custard creams to Nepal will more than compensate for the death of the car industry
^^^
Honestly, if anyone is still genuinely taken in by bullshitters like Badenoch, they are an utter ****ing cretin.
Honestly, if anyone is still genuinely taken in by bullshitters like Badenoch, they are an utter **** cretin.
allow me to introduce you to the membership of the Conservative & Unionist Party......
allow me to introduce you to the membership of the Conservative & Unionist Party……
Just reinforces my belief that Conservative party members genuinely are ****s
They're a very discerning bunch. I seem to recall that their previous darling, with similarly stratospheric approval ratings, was a certain Miss L Truss
That all went well.
allow me to introduce you to the membership of the Conservative & Unionist Party……
The only person whose name on that list that I recognise and who isn't a raging psycho is Tom Tugendhat.
High Priestess Penny of the Coronation Cult rapidly distanced herself from that whack-job event in London earlier this week.
the membership of the Conservative & Unionist Party
It's the electorate that worries me. The last two opportunities they've had they have gone into the polling booth and ticked the box marked 'Xenophobic-Nationalist-Fantasy'.
🤷♂️
Is that the working title of the next Bond film?
Is that the working title of the next Bond film?
Yes. The final scene is Bond taking down a squadron of SU-27s in a Spitfire whilst whistling Colonel Bogey.
He then strafes a dinghy of refugees in the Channel to use up the last of his ammo on the way back to base.
I’m always surprised that we don’t seem to have an existing U.K. battery maker willing to produce e.v. Batteries TBH.
There probably is, but not to the costs required to make it feasible for the tiny base of car makers we have left here.
I think there was a book about 15years ago titled "no labels" it talked about how the sri lankan government was losing money to the likes of Nike but cutting them so many tax breaks, they were effectively paying them. By building the factories and not charging for use or any tax.
That's where we're going.
Personally it mirrors what I see day-to-day at work, a Management class so focused on getting through the day ‘unmolested’ that they’ve just no focus on the longer term.
That was my experience of working in larger enterprises. A "what will serve me best here" approach from the managerial class, compared with the small company, what's best for the organisation as this needs to pay the bills until I retire.
I think there was a book about 15years ago titled “no labels” it talked about how the sri lankan government was losing money to the likes of Nike but cutting them so many tax breaks, they were effectively paying them. By building the factories and not charging for use or any tax.
That’s where we’re going.
The book is No Logo by Naomi Klein. Anyone who hasn't read it, really should, because its exactly where we're headed. The 'Freeports' so lauded by the Brexiteers are the favourite of authoritarian regimes everywhere. The Burmese and Sri Lankan gob=vernemnt call them 'Export Processing Zones' which isn't as catchy as 'Freeports' but they're the same.
Its an area where not only tax laws are different, but entire areas are handed over to be ruled by independent authorities with a level of autonomy fromn the state to basically make up the rules as they go along. You'll be unsurprised to hear that the first thing to be water ed down are employment rights and environmental controls.
If you look at their history then you'll see why the Brexiteers are so keen on them.
But definitely read No Logo and the follow up The Shock Dcotrine, as they are both blueprints for where this lot would ideally like to take Post_Brexit Britain
A “what will serve me best here” approach from the managerial class, compared with the small company, what’s best for the organisation as this needs to pay the bills until I retire.
Also the approach taken by our current political class and the wellbeing of the country.
