What can we do to stop politicians lying to us in future campaigns?

[OneArt]

I understand that politicians make false promises, stretch the truth, cherry pick the information they present, and so on. That's par for the course.

But it now seems to be widely acknowledged that the Leave campaigners lied. As in, they made numerous statements which were factually incorrect and which they must have known to be so.

Even more shocking, it has been claimed that they deliberately spread rumours attacking the integrity of people who disagreed with them. See the video below.

www.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=0dosmKwrAbI&app=desktop

We can't have a democracy in which our votes are based on lies.

I feel much more passionately about this than the actual outcome of the referendum! Can anyone tell me what I can do to stop this happening again in future campaigns? I've already written to my MP.

Read biasedbbc.org.

They quote a variety of ex and current bbc employees explaining how the bbc is left wing. Just read the quotes from highly respected presenters...

Well I have had a look at that - you don't think it has a rather clear bias all of its own!?!

biasedbbc.org/

It is a myth.

Asprilla that's the first thing I said too

with the Canadian election of Justin Trudeau someone made a web page with all his political promises which is updated on a regular basis.
I thought the concept was excellent.
in case someone would want to do one for your minister here a link to ours;
www.trudeaumetre.ca/

Figment,

It has an admitted bias! An admitted bias is fine, a hidden bias less so. Regardless of its bias, they did not invent the direct quotes from very many respected Bec journalists and presenters.

The National Audit Office are very precise and factual - certainly in the field I work in not much gets past them.

I am not sure you understand how the EU works, Larry, if you think unelected officials are dictating the terms of Britain's exit.

The EU acts as a body here. It is not up to individual states to gum up their individual legislative bodies sorting out Britain's business.

If Article 50 is triggered then the European Council will meet (comprised of the heads of state or government of the member states along with President of the European Council and the President of the European Commission. The current president of the European Council is Donald Tusk of Poland). The Council's role in Europe is to deal with crises and provide a sense of legislative direction to the European Commission. Far from being a group of faceless bureaucrats, the European Council is in fact composed of directly elected representatives at the highest level, including Britain's directly elected representative, i.e. the Prime Minister. The Council will agree on a framework of EU proposals. Britain will obviously have her own ideas.

Britain would negotiate the proposals with the European Commission, which is the legislative body of the EU, composed of commissioners, one appointed by each member. The Commission answers to the European Parliament, which has to vote on whatever deal is arrived at. The European Parliament is composed of 751 directly elected members. A simple majority vote is required. The European Commission must also vote - 20/27 is the threshold.

Your idea of bureaucracy gone mad does not square up to reality. If you don't know anything of how the EU is organised then it is your own fault, Larry. The information is all available.

By 'dominant political discourse' I mean Tory election manifestos since at least the days of Margaret Thatcher and the deliberate fomenting of the concept of 'them and us', plus the continuous demonising of the EU.

Oh math,

You are one of those people who believe everything written on paper. If merckel says nein, then something is just not going to happen, regardless of what is written on paper. Equally if four or five heads of big states agree on something, the ec will just have to make it happen.

Look at Greece. How did the Ecb buy national debt. I remember reading that it was not legally mandated to do so. But a way was found..

Oh sily me.

Far preferable to just pull facts out of my arse.

Math,

Do you believe cecilia malstrom then? Because what she said is how it should theoretically happen.

What I have said and what Malmstrom explains are completely in accord.

The negotiations the UK undergoes with the Commission will be about undoing all the details of membership including as far as I am aware any refunds due to each party. It will be akin to divorce mediation, and it is a complex process because of the level of intertwining. There are legal obligations on the part of both parties, and financial obligations that have to be disentangled. Then after the technical exit is accomplished, the UK negotiates a trade deal, as Malmstron says, and trades on the level of WTO membership with the EU until /unless something better can be worked out.

Yes,

You and her agree. But it ain't going to happen that way. Trade will be an integral part of the exit negotiation, not something that takes place afterwards.

One Art the exchange between Math & Larry exemplifies why politicians can get away with lies and mistruths.

Discussions in this referrendum are
Person 1:State "fact"
Person2: challenges fact and explains why it is incorrect
Person 1: says noooooooo you are wrong and points to someone else who belives the way they do [there is no discussion about if the "expert" is correct or deluded too]

The "fact" is then picked up as being gospel truth and requoted by observers. Unfortunately the requote is being done by press barrons with their own agenda - the welfare of the British public is not one of them.

Trade cannot be an integral part of the negotiation. It will most certainly be something that preoccupies everybody. Clearly, some of the details of the uncoupling will involve trade, various deals, treaties, etc. But as Malmstrom states, the UK cannot negotiate a separate trade deal with the EU while still technically a member of the EU. You can call that bureaucracy if you like.

Larry

I think you should perhaps start listening to the BBC coverage, rather than filtering your views of it through sources like this.

I also think you should reflect a bit on what you think you mean by "left wing".

Unescorted you are absolutely right! This thread is a microcosm of the whole system.

I cannot understand why the advertising standards authority has no jurisdiction over political bodies

Errr - because political bodies have a major say in their funding, perhaps?

The problem is that in normal general elections there is accountability because you can have votes of no-confidence, by-elections, the opposition can (theoretically) hold the winning party to account at PMQs and if a party is seen to lie in their election manifesto they are decimated at the next election (see what happened to the LibDems)

With the referendum how can we hold them to account? taking Boris Johnson as an example - no-one who lives outside Uxbridge and South Ruislip has any power to hold him to account, and given that in the last GE he had twice as many votes as the 2nd-place candidate I doubt his own constituents will send him packing. Both sides of the referendum campaign were cross-party temporary groupings with no long-term political reputation to maintain. We can't sack the bastards who ran the leave campaign for our economy going tits-up - though if the referendum had gone the other way, it would have been a lot easier to hold the remain campaign to account if/when their assertions started to unravel.

Muststop,

How do I hold Juncker to account?

By voting in National and European elections. Juncker was put forward as a candidate by the party with the most seats in the European Union and he was then voted in by an majority of heads of states of the EU member states.

This is an interesting concept.

I voted Leave in spite of the leave campaign, not because of it!

Despite people being in agreement with me, if they were lapping up 'facts' that weren't true then I'd challenge them and explain why I didn't agree. My background is business, accounting, economics and economic history and it's been important to me to ensure that people are making their choices based on the right assumptions to make the next stage of finding a majority view on what to negotiate for and compromise on to achieve it. The Leave Campaign was a shower of shite from the start.

Having these rebuttals come from me who is in favour of Leave carried far more weight than the vitriolic ranting, raving and personal attack style that some Remainers choose to continue with to this day.

So the hope now is that those of us whi prefer to debate rather than insult continues to grow so we find the Centre ground sooner and can speak just as forcefully those few on the fringes for a more harmonious future.

larrygrylls - just like Unescorted says, the EU parliament is made up of political party groupings from throughout all the member states and each grouping democratically elects a leader just like the parliamentary conservatives have David Cameron (and soon his successor) as leader and the parliamentary labour party have Corbyn (and sooner or later his successor). In both of these they have their own methods of democratic selection without the whole electorate getting to choose that individual. If Junket lied or abused his power he would lose the confidence of the elected MEPs who put him there and you could certainly lobby your own MEP to hold him to account (so long as you aren't unlucky enough to have one of the MEPs who actively choose not to engage in EU politics as a protest)

Muststop,

You are right in theory but we are just too far from the people who make decisions on our behalf. I think we have lost the concept of our MP working for us in Europe.

Do you not feel it is your duty as a citizen and upholder of democracy to challenge those that are voted in to make decisions on your behalf. You cannot blame a system that you have not engaged with or educated yourself about so you could make a fully formed decision.

Many of the comments and assertions pre & post referndum tipped into the Juncker is unelected / the EU is unelected when clearly it is not the case. Just because some of our elected MEPs decisded not to engage with this process does not mean that the process is broken. It is up to the electorate (ie you) to challenge the gumph that we were being fed.

Furthermore the directives are just that, a direction / steer agreed by the elected heads of state. It is up to the elected MPs in each state to enact the directives in the way that will fit within their own statutes and legislative structures. This is why we have situations where different states will have slightly different takes on EU directives. The level of subordination is down to our parliment and our law structures. Other member states have taken different views.