EU Referendum – are you in or out?

Migration figures just in

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47400679

Non-EU up, EU down, net is pretty much flat

How will the brexiteers handle this. Will their pea brains finally realise leaving the EU will do nothing for net migration, and in actually fact it will increase the influx of the migrants they hate when they voted to leave because they thought the opposite would happen.

The whole sovereignty issue confuses me too. People seemed to be brainwashed into believing our laws are made by unelected EU officials –

Yep. Presumably because the laws are “made in Brussels” they imagine some unaccountable Belgian bloke churning them out. On top of that, to the leavers perceive the EU as an external 3rd party imposing law rather than an association of its member states.

Non-EU up, EU down, net is pretty much flat

I recall seeing figures like that last year.

most EU law is focussed around protecting our rights and freedoms. I’ve not yet come across anything that has disrupted my life for the worse. Has anyone,

No, because there isn’t any. The EU regulations we’ve adopted into English law are as close to 100% as makes no odds laws we’ve either voted for or even proposed.

Migration figures just in

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47400679

Non-EU up, EU down, net is pretty much flat

… exactly as I predicted like two years ago. The decline of the pound’s value means we’re suddenly more attractive to immigration generally, the toxicity generated by brexit is turning off EU migration, there was only ever going to be one outcome. If we’d stuck “leaving the EU means more brown people” on the side of a bus remain would have won by a landslide.

On top of that, to the leavers perceive the EU as an external 3rd party imposing law rather than an association of its member states.

I think this is an important point and I’m surprised it’s not mentioned more. There’s a very “us vs them” mentality in certain quarters which neatly overlooks the fact that we are, in fact, an EU member and when we talk about “the EU” doing something that by definition means we’ve done it. We have the lion’s share of MEPs in the EU parliament, only France (nominally) and Germany has more.

Ie, in a very real sense, we are the EU. Far from those pesky bureaucrats in Brussels telling us what to do, it’s the other way around. The UK has been a primary driver of EU policy for decades, we should be championing that.

Yet we don’t mention it… straight bananas are a bigger headline ☹️

….actually change their vote given the chance?

I was staunch Remain

Then after a period of grieving, I would probably have settled myself as a reluctant democratic leaver, ie: that we had a vote and that result should be honoured.

But subsequently, having seen the shambolic nature of what the leaders of Leave want, and the harm it is doing / will continue to do, I’m even further on the Remain side than before.

(I realise I should probably punish myself for daring to weigh up subsequent information and revise my opinion like this. Traitor!!)

The decline of the pound’s value means we’re suddenly more attractive to immigration generally

Actually you would expect the opposite as the earnings available here are less in their local currency terms and therefore less attractive. That said the figures show a reduction in low skilled immigration and an increase in higher skilled immigration, which is a result many Brexiters would be happy about.

EDIT: Show is too strong, suggest would be more appropriate.

Given that the report was linked in the very post I replied to, if you expected the opposite then your expectations were demonstrably inaccurate.

I already knew what the figures said, the point is that one would expect a slide in the currency to reduce immigration, not maintain it or increase – so other factors are driving it. Indeed the article suggests the slide is responsible for some of the reduction in EU figures.

Madeleine Sumption, from the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford, said the data showed Britain was not as attractive to EU migrants as it was a couple of years ago.

“That may be because of Brexit-related political uncertainty, the falling value of the pound making UK wages less attractive, or simply the fact that job opportunities have improved in other EU countries,” she said.

Actually you would expect the opposite as the earnings available here are less in their local currency terms and therefore less attractive.

That’s taking a very narrow view of immigrants, as if they’re all coming here with nothing, and sending “home” every spare penny they can earn. If you’re selling up and moving to Britain, the money from your house sale, and your savings, will go further when you get here.

When discussing EU citizens moving here, you can’t dismiss the idea that there are far bigger changes than currency movements at work as well, that I’d agreed with… the fact is we’re treating them like shit, and our politicans are celebrating in that… not very welcoming.

all these MP’s resigning because its not what they believe in

makes you wonder if they had got a vote in the local elections based on what people know now about them and their attitudes

our local one has been getting some proper flack for going independant , she also took her petition to jezza and he turned her away i suppose now she thinks hes a cock and voted with her own two little feet

i reckon theres very little credibility left in politics democratic vote or not

I don’t doubt that there are several factors at play here, if there’s one thing we’ve learned in the last three years it’s that things in the real world are often way more complex than a yes / no tick box.

Point stands though. I’m no economist and my reasoning could well have been way off the mark, but my expectation was still proven correct even if my working out was wrong.

Still, project fear, eh?

A fall in EU workers wanting to come here means having to fill essential positions from elsewhere… so yeah, RoW migrants are the main source of that… so their figures have to go up… sound logic, economist or not.

A fall in EU workers wanting to come here means having to fill the positions from elsewhere

well we do have 1.56 million unemployed and a shedload more joining them soon. Maybe some employment schemes and a few training top ups to get them in the fighting british spirit (edit…do you really have to put a sarcastimojo for every post)

Still, project fear, eh?

But these figures are exactly what many Brexiters wanted, so its hardly Project fear.

i wonder if maybot is going to split the tories and a great big **** you to rees mogg…..have that

The idea that any person can fulfil any role is dangerous… if you need a specific role filled NOW, then you’ll get the right person in, not just any person. A few “training schemes” might help in some industries, but the idea that we can fill all key roles with people born here and currently not working is just jingo bingo.

if you need a specific role filled NOW, then you’ll get the right person in, not just any person

oh how they would laugh down the job centre

But these figures are exactly what many Brexiters wanted, so its hardly Project fear.

The only “brexiter” likely to have voted to leave the EU because they wanted to see a sharp increase in non-EU immigration to the UK will be those who have non-EU families looking to come here. And they’re not the ones doing all the shouting.

Why not pop along to Leave.EU’s Facebook page, tell them how great you think it’s going to be that post-Brexit we’re likely to see a huge upsurge in immigration from predominantly Muslim countries, see how many people agree with you.

I was staunch Remain

Then after a period of grieving, I would probably have settled myself as a reluctant democratic leaver, ie: that we had a vote and that result should be honoured.

But subsequently, having seen the shambolic nature of what the leaders of Leave want, and the harm it is doing / will continue to do, I’m even further on the Remain side than before.

(I realise I should probably punish myself for daring to weigh up subsequent information and revise my opinion like this. Traitor!!)

I’m in a similar boat, if there’s a Ref2 and if we end up remaining the like of the ERG and Farage will be shouting from the rooftops that Brexit was sabotaged, the EU turned up ‘Project Fear’ to 11 and at the last possible moment, the EU stole Brexit, there will no doubt be calls for a ‘best of 3’.

But in truth, it’s those guys who **** it, truthfully, if, as they said so many times before the vote they’d accepted freedom of movement (with caveats around new EU states), remaining in the single market and customs union, then it would have probably passed.

I mean for remainers it’s would have been a bitter pill to swallow and frankly the worst of both worlds, but for a lot of leavers it fulfilled the whole blue passports / not being under ‘control’ of the EU parliament etc. The damage to the economy would be workable.

If you were hell-bent on breaking up the EU, you would be a huge step closer, once you’re out on a stable platform you have all the time in the world to thrash out the UKs new place in the world.

They didn’t want that though did they, they wanted a complete, and full break, the exact opposite of what they’d been saying (publicly at lease) for years.

Have many people changed their mind? Well yes, quite a few, if recent polls are to be believed, although the grim reaper is a big help to Remain – he’s taken out nearly a million Leave voters since Ref1, where as around the same number of Remain voters are now old enough to vote. Other factors could make a meaningful difference too – hold an election in a cold/wet month and you’ll get a lower turn out, especially when it comes to older voters. It’s knife edge stuff.

I would probably have settled myself as a reluctant democratic leaver, ie: that we had a vote and that result should be honoured.

Leaving aside the question of whether the result deserves to be honoured at all given that if it were mandatory it would’ve almost certainly been ruled illegal in the court case a couple of weeks ago, and also the fact that democracy and mob rule are not synonyms,

This is another leave propaganda masterstroke, that so many people think this. There’s several ways of “honouring the result” without just blindly following the will of a statistically insignificant majority.

If we’ve spent three years spunking money up the wall just to conclude that, actually, it can’t be achieved in the timescale given without causing grievous harm to the country so let’s call the whole thing off and have a rethink, we’ve still honoured the result by taking it seriously rather than ignoring it.

If we took the result, analysed the results and decided to implement changes which addressed the reasons why people voted to leave, that’s still honouring the result of what was an advisory referendum – parliament will have acted on that advisement.

“We voted to leave three years therefore we must leave regardless, it’s the will of the people” is misguided at best IMHO.

rone

I’d take a punt it would still be leave.

People are angry at stuff, and even more frustrated than in 2016.

I keep saying it but- it’s possible if you reran the vote, ie all possible and fantasy brexits, regardless of how ridiculous, hard, soft, insane, and incompatible they are, lumped together, then it might be leave still. But if it’s Actual Possible Agreed Leave which is a known quanitity, against Remain, it’ll be remain every single time. The brexiteers knew there’s no real brexit that could ever win, that’s why the entire campaign was about making shit up and pretending all brexits were possible and compatible.

Nigel Farage is to launch a nationwide march of angry Brexiteers, who will spend two weeks crossing the country to express their fury at Theresa May’s “Brexit betrayal”.

I’m guessing they’ll be popping into every Spoons along the way for refreshment.

That’s a lot of pints of tetleys.

Except Nigel is not actually marching with them just waving them off and then meeting them at the other end. Suckers.

And another thing those idiots who spend all day in Parliament Sq waving flags and holding idiot boards. Is that a job? Who pays for that?

So seriously if it’s run again and its still leave will it be a cart blanche hard exit …or you really really lost this time

that a job? Who pays for that?

Could be paid for by leave or remain….

It might well be a “Hard Brexit” in two years time, but the transition that a vote for the Withdrawl Agreement in a referendum would give us would avoid a “Hard Exit” this year. That’s the beauty of a WA vs Remain referendum, an utterly insane break down of everything is avoided this year, and buys some time for some sense to come out of nowhere and overcome our currently intoxicated politicians, even if Leave win. Maybe.

Is that a job? Who pays for that?

Like Steven Bray? I believe he is self funded.

Ahh… the sweet smell of “sovereignty”…

On currency, the US wants to “ensure that the UK avoids manipulating exchange rates in order to prevent effective balance of payments adjustment or to gain an unfair competitive advantage”.

https://amp.ft.com/content/09bfe7ca-3bae-11e9-b72b-2c7f526ca5d0

This is the first thing I’ve seen that seems offers a way for a 2nd ref vote to pass Parliament.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/feb/28/labour-moving-towards-plan-to-let-mays-brexit-deal-pass-if-it-faces-public-vote

Failing Grayling strikes again

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-47414699

I wonder if anyones totted up how much Failing Grayling has personally cost us all over his years of incompetence? He must have topped a few billion by now?

I’m wondering if anyone could beat him, and the only person I can think of is IDS and how much his Universal Credit shambles will end up costing us all

Was just about to post that BBC link!
Maybe they can take it from the £350 million per week they’ll be giving the NHS…

meanwhile back at the ports – surprise surprise the IT will be a disaster because complex systems to integrate and no-one’s planned on teaching people to operate them

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/02/28/brexit_border_it_systems/

But these figures are exactly what many Brexiters wanted, so its hardly Project fear.

EU citizens(including us currently)= more rights,

Non-EU citizens(including us soon)= less rights.

There’s several ways of “honouring the result” without just blindly following the will of a statistically insignificant majority.

Actually it’s very definitely statistically significant; from memory the breakdown was akin the lines of:
17.6 million Leave
16.1 million Remain
12.9 million non votes

I totally agree with your point though, but what is ridiculous to me is for everyone across all parties and political beliefs (including the media) to repeat the mantra “will of the people”, when in fact it’s the will of 17.6 people or just over 1/3rd of those eligible to vote.

What is more tragic is that about 29 million people (otherwise known as the majority) are now being ignored. Their hopes, wishes, desires, fears and futures are being totally ignored. Astounding.

This is disenfranchisement at its biggest, in your face worst. For no politician to recognise that 29 million people or almost 2/3rds of the electorate are being swept under the carpet is utterly bizarre.

I include the 12.9 million non-voters in this because people rarely not vote for no reason or idleness. Whether we think those reasons are valid is largely irrelevant – reasons are reasons. I suspect, given the public unrest over austerity measures and crumbling public services, many people felt totally hacked off with the whole
Political process in this country (actually other countries too – Trump didn’t get in by happy chance) so didn’t want to engage, though it was interesting how big the turnout actually was, meaning there is very strong feelings over this from all sides.

I think that if push came to shove, even the disaster capitalists like JRM don’t want to crash out because they need a drop in value to shove it all back into UK stocks but not one so big and messy that there’s nothing worth investing in

So Farage will be leading (when he can be bothered to turn up – a bit like the European parliament, so don’t hold your breath) a march that will follow a very similar route to the 1936 Jarrow March.

Only this time the participants will be marching to demand the right to be put out of work and into poverty rather than the more logical opposite.

As dear old David Coleman would have said:

“Quite remarkable”.

Brexit – the gift that keeps on giving.

At least they’ll be able to drop in and visit all the places that will be closing.

that 12.9m includes EU citizens (i.e. not a UK passport holder) who live and work in the UK and therefore pay taxes and vote in everything else, but were excluded from voting. can’t find the specific number via google

Things getting crazier see
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/mar/01/brexit-delay-could-leave-uk-open-to-legal-action-german-mps-told

So there is a remote possibility that we could get a public vote sooner than anticipated if the uk was forced into a vote as a result of an extension.
In that case perhaps the candidates could divide into remain and leave. Euro elections are pr if I remember in which case what do put down as second choice?
(I know it is party lists not policy that gets an mep elected but if one of the parties happened to make it policy then the vote could turn into a referendum?)

Even crazier Raab is not going to vote for the WA as a protest over the intransigence of the EU.
May has full confidence in Grayling and US (sic) has published the terms of our trade surrender.

So EU have given May much of what she asked for… but Raab and others don’t want a key part of what she asked for (all UK Customs Backstop)… so Raab blames EU for agreeing to something May wanted, and they said they didn’t want, because they are being intransigent.

The way USA, China, Japan, India etc have responded to our “efforts” to seek post Brexit trade deals must be worrying even those that believe in the likes of Fox & Co now… that needs to be at the centre of any campaign pushing to work with the EU when it comes to RoW trade deals, rather than alone (as member or “partner”).