and that program has a lot of similarities with the people who are obsessing and contributing so much on this thread.
Blah blah blah, "people on the other side just throw insults and don't bring anything to the debate", says someone slinging insults and bringing nothing to the debate. Try pinning a leaver down on what they're looking forward to when we leave and it almost always goes silent these days - nothing promised is looking likely to be delivered, and the consequences of leaving look equally likely to be disasterous.
Farage says no deal is not a problem , not really a surprise though is it?.
ION,
Corbyn is not playing a long game, and he will not drop his support for Brexit just because the vast majority of Labour supporters want him to.
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Both tory and labour plans are unicorn fantasies.
True. The difference is that the Tories are saying "It's either our unicorn fantasy or it's a disorderly disastrous hard brexit and anyone who says otherwise smells", whereas for Labour it's aspirational and they're not making stupid ultimatums.
And it comes back to the same thing as ever- we're still in fantasy brexit land. You can't really blame Labour for playing fantasy brexit when that's the game their opponents are playing. If they keep doing so once/if the Tories ever start playing actual brexit then that's very different
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Corbyn is complicit in this mess by his inaction.
He's supposed to be a leader but Labour, like the Conservatives, have said and done nothing of any relevance over the last two years.
“You can’t really blame Labour for playing fantasy brexit when that’s the game their opponents are playing.”
Thats a really poor excuse for Labour’s ineffectiveness!
I’m liking the UKIP, Farage mugshot condoms.
Presumably the message is “if you really want to **** it up, get yourself a Farage” 😳
He’s supposed to be a leader
Moreover, he's supposed to be the leader of the opposition. Not really seeing much opposing of late.
Labour ceased to be a genuine opposition party with the death of the "great" John Smith in 94, there has been no leader since who has had even a sliver of John's integrity and honesty.
Thats a really poor excuse for Labour’s ineffectiveness!
You do actually know that they are a political party with aspirations of governing don't you? Ignoring the 'will of the people', when it's been expressed as emphatically and unarguably as it has, is political suicide, especially when many of the people voting out are your core voters! It's amusing cos I bet the very same people who criticise labour for not being a serious party of government, are the same people who want them to oppose the result of the referendum.
Like others, I also would like them to be more anti and lead the case against brexit, but they're doing the only thing they can do. This is the tories mess, it's simple political common sense to keep it that way as long as possible. It's fairly unlikely there'll be an election before March, I'm pretty sure labour's strategy is to play the 'cleaning up the tories mess' card, just like the tories did after the financial crash. This could not only keep labour in power for a long time, but they'll be able to use the crisis to bring in some transformative if not revolutionary policies (UBI for example).
Look I know leave won but by no stretch can 52:48, more than two years ago and under the circumstances that it took place, be considered emphatic and unarguable.
If labour’s policy really is to enable a shit Tory Brexit in the hope that they will then get to win an election or two off the back of it then they are actually worse than the Tories in my book.
then they are actually worse than the Tories in my book.
The alternate way of looking at it is that they do bail the tories out before the shit hits the fan there is doubt the tories would use that against them. The Labour heartlands were pro brexit and would be vulnerable to the hard right liars pretending to give a **** about them. No point dodging Brexit if the rabid right are allowed free reign over the country and the Labour "moderates" regain the party power to drag it ever rightwards in the dim hope the traditional voters wont notice.
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If labour’s policy really is to enable a shit Tory Brexit in the hope that they will then get to win an election or two off the back of it then they are actually worse than the Tories in my book.
I think their policy is to wait in the wings til it becomes obvious to everyone that there's going to be a shit Tory Brexit and then stop it. Could be wrong but that's basically how you crack the "will of the people" problem, you need to wait til there's a solid, shitty brexit on the table before you can oppose it.
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But then I also think they thought this would have happened a year ago, the fact that the Tories haven't even managed to deliver a shit brexit at this point is pretty much incredible.
<span style="font-size: 0.8rem;">Look I know leave won but by no stretch can 52:48, more than two years ago and under the circumstances that it took place, be considered emphatic and unarguable.</span>
What I meant was that 'the will of the people' in this case has been expressed, via the referendum, in an unarguable manner. Not polls, not by knocking on doors and extrapolating, not by analysing social media or going on instinct, but by an actual vote, which happened to have the biggest turnout of any vote conducted in this country for decades. Any politician who ignores that won't be a politician for very long.
If labour’s policy really is to enable a shit Tory Brexit in the hope that they will then get to win an election or two off the back of it then they are actually worse than the Tories in my book.
They want to completely deconstruct the neoliberal consensus and bring in transformative policies which will last for a generation. They're not going to be able to do that if they're in opposition. And yet they are accused of not being 'serious', whatever that means.
I think their policy is to wait in the wings til it becomes obvious to everyone that there’s going to be a shit Tory Brexit and then stop it.
Please god, please...
What would you have labour do?
If they say - " we are against brexit and will scrap it" then that easy pickings for the tory press and the tories " denying the will of the people"
Second referendum is also fraught with political danger - from not getting a remain result to creating more divide in the country to again being an easy target " denying the will of the people"
some come on - all of yu that are so critical of labour over brexit what would you have them do?
I think picking apart the Tories efforts while not allowing the easy targets for political point scoring has served them well. I want conference to come up with a stronger policy as the time is right. But to allow the tories enough room to hang themselves has been about the best they can do
What I meant was that ‘the will of the people’ in this case has been expressed, via the referendum, in an unarguable manner.
It's blatantly arguable. On face value as presented it's the will of half of the people. Looking at actual numbers it's the expressed will of a quarter of the people.
17 million votes for Leave = "the will of the people," the other 16 million votes for Remain = "we won you lost shut up stop moaning why do you hate democracy?" **** that right off.
This must be a step in the right direction..
**** that right off.
That and what does the vote out mean. If the will of the people was so clear then why the **** are our glorious leaders still confused about what it is?
What would you have labour do?
Be honest.
Doing nothing is the best course of action for them politically, I get that. Wait for the inevitable implosion of the Tory party and then capitalise on picking up the pieces.
But the referendum was as close to 50:50 as makes no statistical difference and a lot of Leave voters didn't really vote for Leave reasons. Corbyn is uniquely placed as a Eurosceptic which gives him credibility amongst fence-sitters; if he were to go "yeah, the EU isn't perfect but let's stay in and try and fix the problems we perceive" I expect there would be massive support for him / them.
Hell, Labour could even get in bed with the LibDems, a superparty to take down the brexiters. He could go down in history as the politician who brought us back from disaster.
Unicorns, I know.
+1 cougar. I expect politicians to be reasonably honest and to argue for what they believe in, not dishonestly duck the issue and hope to pick up the pieces later on.
I expect politicians to be reasonably honest
I hope and demand that politicians be reasonably honest. I expect that with a few exceptions (such as the aforementioned Tom Watson) they're actually all lying, self-serving shitehawks.
https://twitter.com/MirrorPolitics/status/1043598858373226496
also Times reporting that mays aides planning for General election in November
Hell, Labour could even get in bed with the LibDems, a superparty to take down the brexiters.
Why would they? Their declared intention is to combat poverty, reduce the wealth gap, re-empower the public sector, rebalance the economy, give more power to workers through greater trade union membership and a whole host of other stuff. Stopping brexit isn't even on the agenda.
And really, coalition with the libdems? The party still stained by their collaboration with the tories, and which has recently declared labour to be 'appalling'.
What I meant was that ‘the will of the people’ in this case has been expressed, via the referendum, in an unarguable manner.
This has been argued ad nauseam. 52/48 does not demonstrate the will of the people, it is the will of half the people. Half said they didn't want to be in the EU, half said they did. I'm not going to argue the toss over a few percentage points. Whatever we do, half the people will be unhappy with the outcome because we are not all suddenly accepting the result. So, what is a government to do? Well for a start, not piss off the half of the population that was quite happy to placate the other half, because you'll still have half the population pissed off. Something more intelligent and grown up is required. Which is unlikely given the track record of the halfwits and ego-maniacs we have at the helm.
Corbs will go with whatever his party decides on 2nd ref, as we said earlier. Quite astute I reckon, cos he can't be blamed politically whichever way it goes.
But also, it's his principles a d has been since before Brexit. And we could be much closer to a second ref by the end of next week.
an actual vote, which happened to have the biggest turnout of any vote conducted in this country for decades
Agreed. Ish.
EU referendum turnout - 72.2%
1992 election turnout - 77.7%
1997 election turnout - 71.3%
Average GE turnout 1922-2017 - 72.9%
So yes, a bigger turnout than we’ve had since Blair got in, but a little below what we used to expect until recently.
Labour ceased to be a genuine opposition party with the death of the “great” John Smith in 94, there has been no leader since who has had even a sliver of John’s integrity and honesty.
I always describe myself as a "John Smith Labour' voter. Still truly missed.
Corbyn is playing it right. You can't win on the Brexit issue as it is not party political, all parties have the same problem. You cannot suggest overriding the vote as however close it was it was still the result and people who didn't understand the complexities before the vote won't understand any other complexities either and it will just be used against him.
How do you think the electorate will react when they realise they've been deliberately lied to by both major parties for years on end? If anything the Tories are being more honest, May ducks the question when asked if brexit is good for Britain and if she'd vote for it next time.
How do you think the electorate will react when they realise they’ve been deliberately lied to by both major parties for years on end?
When are we swapping the electorate for one that can think independently and is actually interested enough to notice?
How do you think the electorate will react when they realise they’ve been deliberately lied to by both major parties for years on end?
We we don’t seem to have cottoned on after the last 370 odd years of lies what make you think recent events will change anything?
Who knew swashbuckling free traders were such big girl's blouses?
https://twitter.com/DanielJHannan/status/1043225725703204864
It’s the lack of shame shown by the likes of Hannan that makes me want to puke. Put him in front of a bunch of blue rinsed Home Counties Himmlers and he’ll be talking about self reliance, Britain being ‘great’, rule Britannia, don’t fire til you see the whites of their eyes etc.
But he will also play the wounded snowflake just to get something, anything out on Twitter that his vile supporters can latch onto.
A horrible, weak, vain bully.
Someone explain to Hannan that diabetics are allowed to eat cake. He might want to take us back to the 60s but we're not there yet.
Well the next battle for remain is the Labour Party conference, getting them to agree to a vote or an ability to stop it all will put some clear difference between the 2 parties and give people some choice.
Nobody can give a decent outcome with a straight face at the moment.
Someone explain to Hannan that diabetics are allowed to eat cake. He might want to take us back to the 60s but we’re not there yet.
Well, yeah, but if the stockpile of insuliun runs out she will be in trouble if she eats too much cake.
Not Dan the
Daniel Hannan, a Tory MEP and one of the faces of Vote Leave, declared: "Absolutely nobody is talking about threatening our place in the single market."
not sure where we stand now.
But probably best to ramble on about some cake bollocks.
Useless information.
Did you know that more people voted for the 2010 ConDem coalition (17.5m) that for Brexit (17.4m)?
Of course they didn’t know what they were voting for at the time, but...
Who would have guessed that the government hasn't done any prep.
http://www.itpro.co.uk/policy-legislation/31939/government-systems-unprepared-for-no-deal-brexit
I, boringly, kept asking "clued up Brexit Cheerleaders" about the changeover between IT systems for Customs about a year ago, on here and elsewhere… and the lack of acceptance that contingency was needed (old system not being patched up to cope with implications of being outside the CU, and new requirements added to the scope of the new system without any acceptance that it would impact/delay the implementation of that)… I'm sure that's all been sorted, and we're not relying on a transition period that isn't in the hands of the UK government to guarantee… that would be crazy, right?
NO transition without a deal on NI and a deal on NI is not possible for May.
There’s a part of me that really wants an NI fudge that’s unacxeptable to ROI, and for ROI to veto the deal, sending the U.K. crashing out with nothing.
its not the greater part of me! Given that ROI (or “Southern ireland”/“Eire” if you’re a brexshiteer) will be a bit ****ed by a no-deal Brexit, the best solution for them would be no Brexit at all
But it would be a hell of a kick in the nuts by the little guy. 😀
Another 3 blokes video
I'm kind of reminded of 'Touching the Void', where Joe Simpson has had is accident and his partner Simon Yates climbs down to where he as landed. It went something like "Simon's face said it all, you’re dead mate, you are so ****ed.'
This should be interesting
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-45622161
Gives Corbyn a nice out to change tack on his Brexit stance if it’s “the will of the people” (in his party)
Little by little they are coming round. Still not sure I could actually vote for them though.
This current Labour leadership will NEVER allow there to be any path back to EU membership. They will NOT support any vote that could prevent us leaving the EU.
Kelvin - why do you say that - its completely at odds with their public announcements
On that subject: why would Len McCluskey be saying that a second referendum is a bad idea? The vast majority of the job losses following Brexit will be in the sectors that are directly represented by Unite, or no union at all.
What does he get out of Brexit?
This current Labour leadership will NEVER allow there to be any path back to EU membership. They will NOT support any vote that could prevent us leaving the EU.
Are you writing for the mail there??
They know their position is at odds with the membership, in the same way as allowing Members to deselect them is democratic then accepting that you represent the members not yourself is democratic.
tjagain
Kelvin – why do you say that – its completely at odds with their public announcements
I think it's fair to distrust Labour. Look at what they have done rather than what they say, and the Great Abstainers don't look so good.
The current Labour Leader, and Shadow Chancellor, want Brexit. They willl not stop it. They will not allow the country to vote to stop it. They will not allow party members to vote to stop it. They will not allow party members to vote to allow the country to vote to stop it.
tj, I guess you didn't hear John McDonnell just now on the radio insisting that there would be no remain option in a new referendum. Of course it may not be up to him, but that's Labour's current position. What a shambles.
Trying to maintain that constructive ambiguity is getting ever harder
Corbyn has agreed to abide by what membership votes for, likely that'll be an 'all options' ref
I've not seen the wording yet but I'd be surprised if a resolution for Conference which took a reported 6 hours to draft was clear and unequivocal.
Watch this space, I reckon.
At least there is a chance of a possibility of a glimmer of hope.
The captain - again a huge misrepresentation of what he said. He said he did not believe that it should be on the ballot paper but it was up to conference and parliament to decide
Democrats you see. Not technocrats
The key sentence of the final draft says: “If we cannot get a general election Labour must support all options remaining on the table, including campaigning for a public vote.”
He said it would be a vote on the deal and they would be "respecting the referendum result". You know as well as I do what that means.
Are you writing for the mail there??
They know their position is at odds with the membership, in the same way as allowing Members to deselect them is democratic then accepting that you represent the members not yourself is democratic.
😀
Thecaptain - still total misrepresentation.
Thats his opinion. However he says its up to conference and parliament to decide the wording.
You see he is a democrat. He has his opinions, he will voice them but he will be bound by democratic processes.
So he is NOT saying staying in WILL not be on the ballot, He BELIEVES it should not be but that decision is one to be made in a democratic style
stop swallowing anti Corbyn / anti labour propaganda. Look to what is actually said
Conference motions are fudged to prevent the members forming Brexit policy.
MPs face three line whips to prevent them forming Brexit policy.
Listen to the actual words of the Labour leadership. See how their people act at conference and in parliament.
It is not anti Labour propaganda @tjagain.
I have done and its quite clear and is as I put it above
Unlike Blairs labour or other parties Labour leaders cannot dictate to their membership. Its a democratic party.
Just rolling back a few days to the “it’s not our new immigration policy honest gov” report that set out the new immigration policy.
It really is the last nail in the coffin of social mobility. If one can import highly skilled workers (that someone else paid to train) but you can’t import low skill workers, then the logical thing for companies to do is try not to let those low skilled (indigenous) workers climb into higher skill higher pay jobs. Not only will it be cheaper to import skilled staff, there is also a disincentive to reducing your stock of low skill workers.
Probably ok if you come from a middle class family, get the right grades, go to the right uni doing the right course, and start from day one as s highly skilled worker, but don’t make any mistakes along the way.
Back to the days before university expansion post war - skilled, affluent workers, not particularly allied to any country.
People (particularly poorer, less skilled people) are eventually going to see it as privileged foreigners taking all their aspirations away. Wait for the nationalism that releases.
Labour leaders cannot dictate to their membership. Its a democratic party.
The members want a referendum that includes Remain.
They will not get it with the current Leadership.
Just keep repeating "democratic" if you want.
Kelvin - but that is clearly not what O donnel has said
As an example - guardian headlines:
McDonnell: new Brexit referendum should not include remain option</h1>
Shadow chancellor says he would back second referendum but only if it is a ‘vote on the deal itself’
What he actually said
But he argued that while it was up to parliament to decide the question, he believed it should be just “a vote on the deal itself”.
And the composite motion?
“If we cannot get a general election Labour must support all options remaining on the table, including campaigning for a public vote.”
Now that is not what McDonnel wanted - but as a democrat he is bound by that
See the difference? McDonnel and Corbyn are not able to dictate policy. They are democrats and will be bound by conference
Should we all email out labour candidates and say we will vote for them if the party goes pro Eu?
Already contacted mine Zippy. And I voted for him (my Labour candidate) at the last election, despite the leadership's position on Brexit at the time, because I thought it might change as things progressed. Others still think that it might. It seems clear to me now that it will not.
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Should we all email out labour candidates and say we will vote for them if the party goes pro Eu?
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I actually spoke to ours, she was canvassing at the last local elections
All she could say was that Labour would mittigate the effects of Brexit
All I could say was that in that case I couldnt vote for them
i thought this was a good analysis of Labour's current position.
It tends to agree more with Kelvin than TJ but is definitely worth a read:
http://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2018/09/24/labour-s-people-s-vote-stitch-up
Labour leaders cannot dictate to their membership. Its a democratic party.
A wee steer now and again would be handy! Instead of sitting on the fence, looking at his worn out hush puppies.
Corbyn has shown utter incompetence and a complete lack of backbone throughout this whole farce.
tj,
I was actually listening to him as he spoke. Intentions quite clear, no misrepresentation there.
A wee steer now and again would be handy! Instead of sitting on the fence, looking at his worn out hush puppies.
Corbyn has shown utter incompetence and a complete lack of backbone throughout this whole farce.
Exactly this. When I heard that he was going to wait to see which way the Brexit wind was blowing during the party conference to determine what to do next, I was wondering where is his leadership? I am all for listening to your party members, but there are times when he needs to take charge, which never seems to happen.
All she could say was that Labour would mittigate the effects of Brexit
Ahh so they do have the blueprints for the magical unicorn tree... knew someone had them...
[edit] smartarse forum substitution stuff [/edit] so apologies if it's bin dun - this might appeal to some