to ask how you’re preparing for Brexit?

[CircleSquareCircleSquare]

There is so much uncertainty surrounding what will happen with trade deals and goodness knows what else, that I’m starting to wonder about making some sensible plans.

We have put a stop to some planned works we wanted to do to our house, we have downsized to one car and we grow a small amount of veg. We keep some stocks of food in the house but we have a large family so I never feel like we’d have enough.
We have discussed not taking a holiday this summer and DH is taking every training course possible at work in order to diversify his skills should his industry go tits up.

I’m wondering what decisions you’re making in your homes for what could possibly be a really uncertain time for a few years.

You just proved my point! You're clearly pro Irish unification but with no regard to how complicated and violent such a change would be!

Bunch of bloody hypocrites. Just using NI as a blackmailing chip.

Fool. The issues with NI were spelt out in advance. Why you and your idiotic cronies act as though you've been unfairly blindsided is beyond me.

I actually don’t think the issues were sufficiently spelt out in advance.

A savvy MP with knowledge of the Good Friday Agreement could have tabled an amendment to the EU Referendum Act to ensure that the referendum could not be held unless and until parliament had agreed in advance what the UK’s position would be with regard to the single market and customs union in the event of a leave vote and whether we would abandon the Good Friday Agreement or not.

There’s a good chance a majority of MPs would have supported that amendment.

But it’s fun watching remainers tie themselves in knots

I could say it’s fun watching Brexiters tie themselves in knots with hair-brained schemes but it’s not, it’s just depressing.

If remain had won, nobody would even be discussing the border in NI

Yes, but that’s the whole point of the blackmail isn’t it. We have to have remain or the IRA will bomb you.

We want PEOPLE children, families to stay safe, for the violence NOT to return.

Again, this is the point. You’re saying ‘we want people to remain safe, but only if they do it the way we want. So we’re going to use the threat of violence to subvert a democratic vote.’ But you pretend you’re all virtuous by using the IRA as a proxy.

Might I remind you @Eltonjohnssyrup Northern Ireland voted to remain

My entire point elendon, as I said upthread: But (as remainers are so keen on banging on about). NI voted to stay in the EU. So they have tacitly given their acceptance. We could offer a referendum.

So stay. Have a referendum. Go to Dublin. Stay.

But that’s not what you actually want is it? You don’t want NI to stay. You don’t want the nationalists to be happy. You don’t want peace. You want 52% of the UK electorate to have their voice ignored and a democratic vote nullified because you think you can manipulate the IRA into acting as the armed resistance to remain.

I suspect if those threats were used to force the rest of the UK into remaining, then it might be a completely different part of the UK where bombs started being manufactured...

Eeesh. Now who’s the one threatening violence?

Good point Tokyo but I think anyone with Irish roots, myself included, considered the problem in advance. Apparently not Elton though.

The NI border is one of the many reasons I voted Remain.

I doubt there's anything really to worry about unless you're involved with immigration or have some sort of benefit from the EU (e.g. farmers).

Eltonjohnssyrup are you aware you're posting on a public forum? Because what you are saying is verging on the kind of thing that could get you arrested.

The NI border was discussed during the ref debate, it was a good reason to not vote to leave, the fact that the majority of people in NI voted remain has been highlighted many times here. The people of NI have voted twice, once for GFA and once to remain in EU, it looks as though both of these votes are going to be ignored.

No one is threatening violence, no knows what would happen but you shouldn't ignore history.

It’s not. Because I didn’t say I was intending to do it. But I really cannot understand why remainers think that there won’t be a reaction back. There will be.

I don’t understand why it’s perfectly fine to say that the IRA are going to bomb the shit out of everybody if we leave, but to point out that if threats of violence are used to force us to remain there may well be a similar reaction on the other side.

It’s just fucking hypocrisy again. ‘Do what we want or you’ll be bombed’.

‘Don’t you think that might incite violence from the other side?’

‘How very dare you threaten us’.

It’s fucking bullshit.

The question is what the majority in NI wants.

I’d be happy for NI to stay in the EU. I’d be happy for NI to unite with RoI.

But - it’s not down to me or other Remainers it’s down NI citizens who show no sign of wanting either of those things for the moment in sufficient numbers to effect them.

But - it’s not down to me or other Remainers it’s down NI citizens who show no sign of wanting either of those things for the moment in sufficient numbers to effect them.

Except for voting in the referendum to stay in the EU.

So when you’re trying to use that to force the whole UK to stay in, it’s absolutely crucial and must be listened to.

But when it’s suggested it could be used as the basis of an Irish referendum which might scupper that, then suddenly it’s irrelevant.
Just more hypocrisy...:

You want 52% of the UK electorate to have their voice ignored

It’s 37% of the UK electorate if you want to be accurate about these things.

Which leads back to what I said before.

It was not sufficient for some people to have discussed or considered the Irish border issue before the referendum.

We should not be having this conversation now.

We should have had this conversation two years ago and the referendum should not have been called until parliament had decided what its position would be in relation to the single market and customs union, and the Good Friday Agreement.

You were describing 'Provo' funerals where people shot guns over coffins in balaclavas. And then you were suggesting there would be 'a reaction'. Sounds like you're in the know there.

I don't feel qualified enough to talk about the Irish border situation so I wasn't judging. I was warning you because terrorism laws mean you don't need very much evidence at all to arrest somebody on suspicion of it.

But by all means continue because the Brexit stuff you're spouting is shite and it's really not my problem if you're arrested or not.

Elton if what you are saying is that a resumption on some kind of republican violence is likely to trigger an upsurge of unionist violence then I agree with you and we are back to the sorry mess we were in before.
I think that remainers have seen this as a problem for a long time, alongside the nicety of having signed an international treaty.

I don’t know where the figures come from about immigration not effecting wages, but from my own experience that is utter rubbish. My friends husband and work mates were all left jobless when the building company he had worked for 15 years sacked them all ( sorry no work for you next month) because they wouldn’t drop their rate to min wage, this is skilled tradesman, good honest people, ( don’t get me started on the myth how lazy All British builders are, there are just as many lazy and unqualified immigrants) The owner then got 6 polish so called builders over, 1 spoke sort of English and set them up in a static caravan at his farm and charged them rent, how is a married man with kids going to do that. It has been over 3 years since this happened and he has been in and out of work, behind on his mortgage and generally had a bad time, As he says he doesn’t care if Brexit messes up the country, immigration messed him up, There is always two sides to a coin, perhaps people in their ivory towers with your polish cleaners etc, should look a bit further down the ladder to understand why people voted like they did, Oh in a side note 3 of the builders from Poland were later found to be claiming JSA as well.

Except for voting in the referendum to stay in the EU.

They were voting to stay in the UK and the EU, not to be in the EU and out of the UK, or in RoI. Any voter in any unionist stronghold could tell you that pro-Remain is not the same as a pro-reunification, albeit some of most hardcore loyalists oppose a hard border.

Voting in a referendum to stay in the EU isn't the same thing as voting for a United Ireland.
If the people of NI want a united Ireland and they can get the republic to agree to it then that is their choice. I thought that this wasn't the case.
Leavers were told that the GFA didn't need to be impacted, but as we have now decided to leave the single market and custom Union there is a significant issue to be dealt with. Part of the issue is just voting for an undefined away goal, just to leave eu rather than a towards goal, ie a hard or soft Brexit.

With regards to Good Friday Agreement and NI I think the UK and RoI are best left to work out themselves, without the EU interfering to negative effects - because they are using NI as a bargaining chip which is pretty nasty in my view.

If you think that, you need to trouble yourself to sit down and read the GFA.

There will be a better idea of the provision of eg: schools, health and social care that will be required to meet need.

What makes you think this will happen. Take schools - Local Authorities are charge with finding school places, but they are not allowed to open new schools themselves in areas of shortage. They have to persuade either a free school or an academy chain to either open or expand an existing school. Nasty EU for making them do this? No. Policy of Westminster. They could change the law now to give control back to Local Authorities, but central government doesn't appear to like local democracy, so they won't do it.

not to be in the EU and out of the UK, or in RoI

Should say: Not to be in the EU and out of the UK but in RoI.

user there are people who have been impacted by immigration and this has not be acknowledged as much as it should be because as a whole the UK has benefited. There is a lack of foresight in voting for something that will mess the whole country up because the poorest will be the hardest hit by things like food and energy price rises. I can understand why people did what they did and still think it wasn't a sensible choice for them as much as anyone else.

No they voted to stay in the eu AS PART OF THE UK.

They didn't vote for reunification! (However much you'd like to convince yourself that's the case)

Lake it seems to me that that because of the way Tony ran government, we know now any concerns about immigration were deliberately ignored. So instead of proper counting of who was coming in, there was just this shock, then a massive groundswell agaisnt it ie all the impacts it had.. That were surpressed. So how anyone can make direct claims that the whole UK benefited it beyond me and I think that groundswell, and ultimately the strategic voting and referendum... Tells us something very different of that reality on the ground. Yes sure business benefited cheap labour etc but poor people in poor areas were massively hit, those people quite frankly can't see things getting worse.