Andrea Leadsom - please stand for leadership!

[Millyonthefloss2]

Anyone agree?

I voted Remain. I listened to Andrea's speech today and she didn't say "NOTHING". She said quite a bit.

I'd thought she might be the best of a bad lot to stand against May (well, except I'd rather that the brexiteer least likely to win should stand!), but having read that she wants to invoke Article 50 asap and thinks we can have everything sorted out by spring, I have to conclude she's delusional.

I usually vote Tory. However, I'm struggling to work out which, if any, of the 5 candidates I would actually want to see as PM. I think the only one I could remotely support would be Theresa May. I really wish there was another viable option.......but until Corbyn goes and Labour sort themselves out, there really isn't.

As for Leadsom.......I think she is utterly vile. A smiling, simpering liar who is patronising and irritating. If I hear the smug words "as a Mum" leave her lips even one more time I think I shall explode. I am also worried by her failure to rule out a role for Farage in negotiating Brexit.....can you imagine?! I suspect his resignation from UKIP today is to pave the way for some involvement of him in the Brexit process. The whole thing is repulsive.

uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/conservative-leader-betting-andrea-leadsoms-101900342.html

Checking the odds.

OMG the eyebrows and plastic smile - and also the strategic photo op in front of a children's playground (gag).

Please God don't let this vile woman become the prime minister of this country.

How can the future of this country be in the hands of a small number of hard line conservative party members? I know a number of our local conservative activists, and I really cannot think of a less representative bunch of people. What have we come to?

That's something that I don't get ... why would it be important to have someone who campaigned for Remain as the next PM?

Does it imply that people hope that parliament will overrule the referendum result? Or that the act of negotiating a deal for the post-EU existence should only be done halfheartedly?

I was struggling to understand Teresa May's appeal, but I was thinking I was just biased as I never liked her and that opinion dates back to long before the last election. She leaves me cold. I was thinking other people saw something in her that passes me by, but does her appeal lie in the fact that she didn't want to leave the EU?? How does that work given that we are leaving?

I think you'll wait a long time for Corbyn to sort himself out. Or do you just mean resign and take with him the hard left that he's been putting into key positions so that they can regain control of the Labour party?

Vrl123

The country needs someone as close to neutral as possible.

We also need someone with as much experience of governing the country as possible.

At the risk of stating the obvious, the vote to leave the EU does not have the support of a substantial part of the population. More than that, Leadsom's credibility and her capacity to inspire trust has been irretrievably tainted by her involvement in such a vitriolic and divisive campaign, not to mention the doubts as to her backers and affiliations.

Most of all, you need to remember that "brexiting" is not the only thing this country will be doing between now and 2020 - hopefully.

I don't want a leader with 'appeal'. I don't care whether they leave me cold or warm.(or what their eyebrows or shoes or whatever are like FGS ). I want someone who has accepted that a small majority has voted to leave and is now capable of moving forward from this point to the least-worst exit strategy.

'I was struggling to understand Teresa May's appeal, but I was thinking I was just biased as I never liked her and that opinion dates back to long before the last election. She leaves me cold. I was thinking other people saw something in her that passes me by, but does her appeal lie in the fact that she didn't want to leave the EU?? How does that work given that we are leaving?'

Yes I suspect May will appeal to those who wanted to remain - which I suppose is understandable, but I get a cold dread at the thought of her as PM. Someone said she is Teflon.

For goodness sake everyone. When the dust settles, we must all become party members - of whatever party we choose - so that we never again end up in a position when a crucial decision is to be made by a tiny number of people - around a 134,000 conservative party members, the overwhelming majority of whom are (and this isn't meant as an insult - more a comment about systemic failure) - really quite old and certainly pretty wealthy.

I agree that leaving the EU is not the most important thing the UK will do in the next few years, or at least it had better not be. When we leave the EU, we had better make it work, so what we are moving to is what matters rather than what we are leaving.

TBH That is why i voted out (for my children's futures - the EU is a slowly sinking ship) and it is why I think Andrea Leadsom is the right person for the job. A career politician just doesn't cut it in this environment, you need someone with experience .

You're right, fig. I think there's a problem though, in that liberals/moderates often have to vote tactically so may find it difficult to sign up to one party.

Figmentofmyimagination - had you never noticed this phenomenon before (that leaders resign half way through a term and the party elects the new leader without involving the electorate)?
Margaret Thatcher - John Major
Tony Blair - Gordon Brown

then examples where it didn't involve a new PM, but still meant a new leader representing literally millions of voters :
Gordon Brown - Ed Miliband
Ed Miliband - Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Corbyn - ??

The EU is not a "slowly sinking ship", although I know some Leave voters are hopeful that they have holed it below the waterline as a result of this vote. I very much hope they haven't - as indeed will the Eastern European states that Putin has his eye on. Couldn't help noticing this morning that Lugovoy was on the radio this morning, very pleased about Brexit.

None of the appointments you have listed were made at a time of acute and unprecedented constitutional crisis.

I lived in the US at the time when Thatcher went, the americans were gobsmacked that the PM could be ousted mid-term like that. But then again, their presidential election system doesn't always lead to good choices.

I really think it is a slowly sinking ship because it has tied itself to the euro. Monetary union without full political integration was never going to work, and sure enough it hasn't.
Now that the UK is leaving, it may prove a wake up call for the rest of the EU and they'll have three options:-

1. Integrate a lot further so that they can make the euro project work. (the French always felt the the British prevented this)
2. Call an end to the euro, which will be incredibly messy (who will write off these huge debts - Germany?)
3. Keep drifting on from crisis to crisis until the whole thing falls apart - that's not really an option but you could call it the status quo.

There isn't another option for the euro countries, and thank God the UK has voted to distance itself from that.

ok so you want to join all the parties in case there is a leadership change at a time of acute crisis? Fair enough. Its your time and money.

Agree entirely with Errol.

Vrl Don't be foolish. I thought you wanted to be taken seriously.

Having to pay for a vote in who becomes party leader/PM is rather shitty. maybe £12 pa for libdem, £25 for tory wouldn't break my bank but it's a significant amount to a lot of people. Although Eds £3 associate membership has been abused, its not a bad idea but perhaps only if combined with the tories 3 month rule?

Lol Errol i researched that over the weekend. We'd get a lovely array of multicoloured posters around election time...!

if you think I am wrong, then call upon your knowledge of monetary unions and tell me one that has ever worked without political union?

Or, if you don't know one (I don't either), then clearly you think it either doesn't matter or you have an idea of how the eurozone could break new ground by making this type of union work for the first time ever?

I can't believe that so many fell for it, without being able to answer that question, but I don't know anyone who does know how it can be done without political union. So, what is the answer that gives you such certainty that the EU hasn't been in deep trouble since 1999?

Its a sinking ship for a many reasons. Political, economical, social...

I guess its why no one would come out and say a good word about it during the campaign?

and they didn't campaign for it using its own emblem - the EU flag. They know its a tainted brand.

David Cameron's biggest mistake was trying to renegotiate before calling a referendum. What he came back with was so insignificant it was barely worth mentioning (and he didn't). However, EU leaders felt that they'd made big concessions to the UK. After that, there was no point in campaigning to stay in but reform from within, because we all knew that nothing we could say would change their views.

IF David Cameron and the EU had not clarified that point for us, but rather left us with a shred of doubt, then i think the referendum would have gone the other way.