Westministenders. For God sake Boris, is that the best plan you can come up with?

[RedToothBrush]

Its now five months from the referendum. Plans for leaving should be well advanced by now. Shouldn't they? We should have got past this ridiculous idea that we can have our cake and eat it. Yet the plan is a secret, well apart from when the EU leak things to the press or junior ministers let their underlings carry their notes for them.

A photo taken this week outside Downing Street, suggests that the ‘Have Cake And Eat It’ Plan really is seriously being considered by the government. This plan is 'clear' it has been spelt out many times by the government and yet no one has a fucking clue what it is apart from a car crash of utter nonsense, wishful thinking and fingers in the ears. Its so clear that Theresa May has admitted she is losing sleep over it, and has faith that God will steer us through via her moral compass (which I suspect to have been left on top of a rather large electro-magnet given her track record so far)

Still this, however, seems to be better than the ‘Fuck You’ Plan (or should that be 'Fuck EU') that is official UKIP policy and is to ignore a50 and leave the EU unilaterally. And possibly illegally, so no one will ever want to make an international agreement with the UK.

And this, is still at least better than ‘We Have No’ Plan that Labour have.

Other suggested plans are:
The ‘Lets Leave the UK and Screw Ourselves Another Way’ Plan as supported by the SNP which the majority of Scots seem to be against
The Welsh are quietly cultivating the ‘Shh Nobody Mention We Voted Leave But Are Now Going to be Difficult’ Plan as they suddenly realise they are about to be shafted financially and might lose the Welsh Assembly in the process.
NI might still go down the ‘Lets Unify Ireland and Start Another Chapter in Violence’ Plan though, the alternative might well be the ‘Lets Stay in the Union and Start Another Chapter in Violence’ Plan anyway, so they are screwed due to the immense thoughtfulness of the English.
Meanwhile the Lib Dems are all about the ‘Lets Just Not Do This and Instead Risk a Revolt’ Plan.

If anyone does actually have a coherent plan, then there are lots of parties who would love to hear from you.

Lets be honest about the secrecy though. Its not about the EU knowing our plans. They already know what all our options are, or more to the point, aren't. The government want to keep it out of parliament because they want to control it, and because they don't want the press to know. They do not want transparency, as they are so weak and so fearful that they will be shown up for what they are, even when there is no opposition.

So we are screwed. Unless somehow someone comes to their senses and puts it to the EU that a50 isn’t fit for purpose and that a new treaty must be done to respect the democratic will of the people and the EU let us go down that route (Hey didn’t I say that months ago?).

Tomorrow we have the completely pointless and costly vanity by-election for Zac Goldsmith. The referendum about Heathrow and not at all about Brexit. Latest betting 2/7 on Goldsmith and 5/2 on the Lib Dems. I think Goldsmith with his good looks will just sneak it, unless turnout is really low. But it will be close.

Sunday we have the Italian Referendum, which some have suggested would the Italian Bank Melt Down (and start of a new Eurozone Crisis) though many here say this fear is massively over stated through Brexit tinted spectacles. Sunday also sees the Austria Presidential Election Re-run with the Far Right Candidate currently looking like he has the slight edge.

A50. The Supreme Court case starts next week. Scotland say they have a veto. Wales say they are worried about the Devolution Problem. NI still might have their defeat in the High Court overturned and there is the Good Friday agreement. The Supreme Court might insist that the Great Repeal Act might need to be passed before we can invoke a50. And the plan if the government lose is merely a 3 line Bill which they want to rush through in 5 days no one would dare defy. Well except the Lib Dems are already saying they want amendments to ensure parliamentary scrutiny and what is the point of the Lords if they don't. So there is a fair old chance that if the government loses given the wider scope of the Supreme Court Case, a 3 line bill simply won’t cover everything it needs to.

We still don’t know if the ECJ might get involved. It seems the Republic of Ireland, might have a say in that too. An ECJ referral would mean a 4 to 8 month delay, even with the sensitivity and the importance of the case.

Don’t forget if you were planning on going/worried about it the 100,000 March on the Supreme Court is off. Due to not being planned in the first place although Leave.Eu will tell you different.

Speaking of the Great Repeal Act. This is supposed to be started in May. This would give it less than two years to be ready before we left the EU. Yet it has a load of hurdles to leap in its sheer complexity, and there is a real danger this will not be long enough. If not done correctly it has the potential to mean the legal system would “fall over”. This is basically the legal equivalent of when you mean yourself in a time travelling sci-fi creating a paradox which threatens the very existence of time itself.

A127. Another treaty, another challenge? Possibly, but maybe only a way to bargain for the EEA rather than something more. But it just shows the legal headache Brexit is. We still could end up in the ECJ on any number of other issues – not just a50. You know this legal headache the government is ignoring by having no lawyer in the Brexit Cabinet, and UKIP are just plan delusional about.

Anyway UKIP have a new leader. Paul Nuttalls. (sic – see Stuart Lee). He wants to privatise the NHS though he denies having said it either on camera or on his blog. Everytime anyone says ‘Paul Nuttalls to you, remember to say ‘Oh the one who wants to privatise the NHS?’ Just to make sure everyone is away that he wants to privatise the NHS. Repeat Ad nauseam. Hell this is what Labour are going to be doing, as they are bloody terrified. Why? Simple. He will, of course, be hugely popular despite this cos he’s got the right accent and says the ‘right things’. By ‘right things’ I mean cos he spouts utter bollocks. Which probably means he’s also electable seeing as utter bollocks is now political currency. Plus Labour are rather lacking in any policies, so utter bollocks policies easily fill the void.

Talking of utter bollocks, I haven’t mentioned Trump yet. The Greens have requested a recount and are supported by the Democrats, though they say they haven’t found anything dubious themselves yet. Trump says it’s a scam. Goebbels once said when telling the Big Lie accuse your opposition of what you are guilty of yourself, so I'm not betting either way given that is the political strategy Trump has employed with gusto. I dread to think of the mess that would cause if the recount came out in favour of Clinton.

So another couple of fun weeks on the cards, which will have you reaching for the gin and wondering if there is anyone left alive who actually gives a toss about what happens to real people and isn’t prepared to commit economic and democratic suicide.

Only another month to go before the 2016 Repeal Act comes into force. 2017 looks smashing.
Shamelessly stolen from David Allen Green

Loving Lord Sumption's tie. Slightly bemused about the confusion on divorce law

DH is English / French and I am Scottish. We got married in England. We live and own property in Scotland. We are already subject to more than one divorce jurisdiction depending on how we choose to organise our affairs. My French MIL is disgusted by the English and Scottish rules on inheritance having been advised that, unlike in France, in the UK it is perfectly acceptable to go around disinheriting your offspring.

EU law is adopted into the UK to the extent that our sovereign Parliament accepts it (the best way of rebutting the "take back sovereignty" argument). Our acceptance of the legal rights conferred by non-UK jurisdictions are nothing to do with the EU and vice versa.

Love Lord Sumption's tie.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/ukip-arron-banks-mary-beard-rome_uk_5845c2d5e4b07ac7244927f6
This is the whole Aaron Banks v Mary Beard saga.

I want to go back to that point I made a few days ago about post truth: At first what Banks says seems very funny and ridiculous. But put it into this context and it starts to be a little more worrying:

Elliott Lusztig @ezlusztig
1. Hannah Arendt in her book The Origin of Totalitarianism provides a helpful guide for interpreting the language of fascists
2. She noted how decent liberals of 1930s Germany would "fact check" the Nazis' bizarre claims about Jews like they were meant to be factual
3. What they failed to understand, Arendt suggests, is that the Nazi Jew hating was not a statement of fact but a declaration of intent
4. So when someone would blame the Jews for Germany's defeat in WW1, naïve people would counter by saying there's no evidence of that
5. What the Nazis were doing was not describing what was true, but what would have to be true to justify what they planned to do next.
6. Did 3 million "illegals" cast votes in this election? Clearly not. But fact checking is just a way of playing along with their game.
7. What Trump is saying is not that 3 million illegals voted. What he's saying is: "I'm going to steal the voting rights of millions of Americans".

1. Banks is using history as a means to justify what comes next re: Immigration.
2. History (and sport) has long been used in the past as a propaganda tool. The most notable example is indeed the Nazis and how they harked back to the Roman Empire and how they used elements from it to support their supremacist views and the very idea of the 3rd Reich. Quite interesting that we see Banks using the Roman Empire in particular...
3. The Right Wing has been responsible for challenging science and history in a way which is has undermined education: think creationism in the US. (Noting here the UK government wanting to expand faith schools because 'they are better' when the evidence actually is they are not, and they help to increase social and cultural division). This is generally about social control and not about furthering humans.
4. History is written by the victors. In the context of the Referendum Victory, who is now writing history?
5. Is Banks being literal or is this a statement of intent of what he thinks of academics and how they should be treated?

As I say, Bank's attack on Mary Beard is simply ridiculous on the surface of it, but do scratch beneath that and think about what other messages its sending out to readers - and what reaction it is trying to provoke.

Remember the article that talked about the discontent of the lower classes being focused on the middle classes who 'told them what to do or what to think' rather than the real elites like Trump with his Golden Doors who position themselves as sharing the same contempt for the middle classes, because the lower classes had very little direct contact with this section of the elite therefore their anger was not necessarily focused on them.

Banks is very carefully stirring the pot.

I do think he knows exactly what he is doing, and unfortunately Mary Beard was a good target because it was bound to provoke 'stupid' comments directed back at him. Mary Beard, bless her though, was incredibly restrained and incredibly polite in the face of it.

Bank's is NOT being stupid. Quite the opposite. He is positioning himself in a particular way with his followers whilst perpetuating the vilification of academics and middle classes who have a certain education. Its effectively an entrapment situation. We need to spot these and not bite. We need to learn a response that challenges the inaccurate assertion without telling people they are thick.

Its true that there is no such this as 'the truth' or indeed a definitive single 'history' as Banks states. In this case though, he is exploiting this truth. (On this note, the recent BBC series A History of Black Britain is superb and I do think well worth watching in this context to explore what we have as a nation done much to forget or 'whitewash' out of our history. This of course is just the tip of the iceberg).

His explanation, is not a legitimate alternative to Mary Beard's version of history just because he says it is. It needs a bit more to it to contain substance, but he is trying to frame it as having another kind of legitimacy despite that.

See what Bank's is doing for what it is - and what it is not...

Howabout - in Scotland, it is not possible to disinherit children completely . They have a legal right to one third of the moveable estate if there is a surviving spouse or one half if there is not.

pretty how many Scots do you know who have more than tuppence ha'penny not tied up in their house which they are perfectly entitled to and generally do leave to the step-parent?

I agree - but there are all sorts of cultural differences between the countries (like our obsession with home ownership especially ones with garden in contrast to a more relaxed view to renting and living in apartments.

The point remains that in the UK it is not possible to disinherit completely the children as in Scotland, they Tyson legal rights to a proportion of the estate.

One could just as easily be horrified at the way that in France, children can evict their deceased parent's long standing spouse from the marital home.

French system coming soon to the Scottish jurisdiction . Sorry being a bit flippant now. Scottish inheritance law is currently being debated and some of the proposed changes may have quite far reaching impacts. It bothers me how little people are aware of the law when organising their financial affairs espewww.redstonewills.com/news/item/changes-to-scottish-succession-law-what-they-mean-to-youcially when remarrying.

Sorry link here

www.redstonewills.com/news/item/changes-to-scottish-succession-law-what-they-mean-to-you

Good article in the Times today by daniel finklestein on Populism. He recommends 'What is populism' by Jan Werner Muller.

He says:

1. populists claim they embody the will of the people and the national interest. Anyone else is not a real person, they are the 'elite/establishment/metropolitan/liberals/just don't get it' -

1. Then you attack anybody who challenges the populists - so this means you attack politicians 'westminster bubble' and judges 'enemies of the people'

Birdy Dare you to post that on the Trump thread ...

For me, policy wrt combatting any enemy must remain within international law.
If we think they are no longer tenable, or Western voters no longer accept them - e.g. rejecting MENA refugees - then we & our allies must first change those laws,

The UK rightly waged all out war vs the Third Reich in WW2
However, unlike on the Nazi side, the UK did not deliberately order war crimes and genocide as general policy.

The West may indeed end up with all out war against militant Islam.
However, this should not involve deliberate mass murder of civilians, as committed by Putin and admired by Trump.

How far do we go wrt Islamic militants in the Uk if there are frequent mass attacks in the future ?
The UK had mass internment of the UK German population in WW2, also encouraging Germans to leave the UK as WW was starting - all within the laws of war.
However, torture and mass murder of civilians would not be, at home or abroad.

Also, anyone wanting the UK PM to authorise breaking international rules of war is asking her - and any UK military who obey those unlawful orders -to face the ICC.
The USA & Russia have the might to flout internaional law; the UK does not.

Brexit & Workers' rights
Very different visions between the Lexiters - who wanted to reverse inequality - & hard right Brexiters.

Leaver Moggy:
“We could say, if it’s good enough in India, it’s good enough for here. There’s nothing to stop that."

Leaver Priti Patel (then employment secretary) boasted to the rightwing Institute of Directors about the "bonfire of workers' rights" she wants after Brexit.

The Open Europe (pro-Brexit) thinktank have a hit list of workers' rights to repeal - which they claim bring zero benefit to business, just costs, including:

. Working time rules (£4 billion a year )
. Agency worker regulations (£500 million)
. Parental & maternity leave regulations ( £60 million)
. Harassment regs flowing from EU law (£180 million)
. Various health & safety regs (e.g. asbestos regulations £23 million)

A similar Brexit group, Economists for Britain, also identified removing gender equality and working time as "benefits" to business.

As has been said elsewhere to Moggy - do you drink the tap water in Delhi?
Bet you he doesn't. When he does, then he can say that what is good enough for India is good enough for us.

Oh dear Theresa - this does not look good. At one time you believed in Parliamentary Sovereignity, but now when it's expedient for you not to, that has gone out the window.

Of course, she could just have been referring to Europe, but it applies to Westminster also. The fact that it's been removed from the organisation's website doesn't send a good message.

Exactly, Peregrina

Leaked - the Great Plan for the UK to Leave:
. Row out into the Atlantic without a life jacket
. Drop paddle overboard, oops

re: peregrina's post, did Milliband find that or somebody working for him? I'd like to think that Milliband is on the case, the Brexit detective.

I think Ed is coming across so much better now than he did as Labour Leader.
He's comfortable being himself now - I think his 'team' tried too hard to mould him into someone he just wasn't and it fell flat.

On the subject of Faith Schools there is an interesting challenge going to be made in the courts against the schools adjudicator by the Roman Catholic Church. They want to establish the principle that Priests are the final arbiters of whether a family are practising Catholics for the purpose of schools admissions whereas the adjudicator has ruled that there is obvious potential for unfairness and in consistency.

You could argue that the loosening of the regulations on the proportion of places that have selection criteria based on faith is a pragmatic way of bringing experienced education providers

Sorry pressed too soon in a bouncy train!

The proposals on faith selection criteria could be seen as a pragmatic way of bringing experienced education providers into the Free School programme.However if further than that the church succeeds in changing the rules so that the decision about which children are selected rests with Priests rather than any sort of fair and objective criteria then that is a different matter all together.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/education/2016/nov/20/catholic-church-court-priests-faith-school-places?client=safari

I don't like the idea of a Priest deciding how much a person is practicing their religion. Those of us who go to Church almost certainly have suspicions that some people attend regularly, but obey the letter of Christianity, rather than the spirit, and know those who don't go all that often but do try to practice what Christ preached. This just sounds like a charter for getting people to kowtow to the Priest. Another part of Theresa May's messy meddling,

Or a charter for Priests to exercise their own prejudices....

The weird thing is that many c of e schools were originally set up to civilise heathens/help 'troubled families'.

Although to be fair, many public schools were also set up with the same aim in mind.

natcen.ac.uk/media/1319222/natcen_brexplanations-report-final-web2.pdf
New report out on 'understanding the leave vote'.

Key points (i'll try and keep this to ones which are not as well know/publicised:
Turnout favoured Leave Turnout played a potentially decisive role.
Those who said they leant towards Remain in the runup to the Referendum were more likely to not vote (19% vs. 11% of Leave supporters). If turnout among supporters of both sides had been equal the vote would have been closer still.

Leave brought together a broad coalition of voters
The Leave campaign’s success was underpinned by a broad-based coalition of voters which is much more wide-ranging than the ‘left behind’. This included three main groups; affluent Eurosceptics, the older working class and a smaller group of economically disadvantaged, anti Immigration voters.

Further to this, is this breakdown of the population into various groups:
Middle class liberals (25% of population): 8% Leave
Younger, working class Labour voters 25% of population: 39% Leave
Affluent Eurosceptics 23% of population: 75% Leave
Older working classes 16% of population: 73% Leave
Economically deprived, anti-immigration 12% of population: 95% Leave
(Thirty four per cent of this last group did not vote in the 2015 General Election but did in the EU Referendum - the highest figure for all these groups.)

We also identify two other groups of Leave voters – one is similar in characteristics to the Economically Deprived Anti-Immigration but are much older and have less strong views about immigration and the positive economic impact of leaving the EU. Politically speaking they are much less likely to support UKIP or no political party, and identify strongly as British. We call this group Older Working Class.

The final group likely to vote Leave are more middle class, Conservative voters with anti-welfare views, who we call Affluent Eurosceptics. (This group are 37% anti-welfare)

My guess though is that there will be a lot in this group are more likely to want the single market than the other two previous groups as their focus is not immigration but other issues (eg sovereignty). The point about being anti-welfare is worth noting - you can't please this group and the 1st group at the same time over welfare. A lot of what May is doing panders to this group but she's trying to push the immigration thing at the same time. It ultimately won't work as its the same problem that is levelled at Labour - the voter base is too wide.

The final group are the Younger Working Class Labour Voters – they are more undecided on the impact of leaving than the other groups, and most likely to be Labour voters and identify as working class.

If you look at how these voted its difficult to see how UKIP or the conservatives could take votes from this group. They are more likely to simply not vote if they don't vote Labour.

Identity politics played a role
The Leave victory was not about objective demographics alone. Matters of identity were equally, if not more strongly, associated with the Leave vote – particularly feelings of national identity and sense of change over time.

Those most likely to vote Leave were:
• Those with no formal education qualifications (78%) or whose highest qualifications are CSEs or O-levels (61%)
• Those with an income of less than £1,200 per month (66%)
• Those in social housing provided by a local authority (70%) or housing association (68%)

A more detailed geographical analysis by the Resolution Foundation shows that the vote was more highly polarised at Local Authority (LA) level; the Leave vote was over 70% in eight LAs, and higher than 60% in 102.

These groups, again are highly unlikely to switch to a Conservative vote even if they are Leavers if the Conservative go for this anti-welfare approach.

The groups most likely to vote Leave were:
• Those finding it difficult to manage financially (70%) or just about getting by (60%)
• Those who believed Britain has got a lot worse in the last ten years (73%)
• Those who think things have got worse for them rather than other people (76%)
• Those who perceive themselves as working class (59%)
• Those who see themselves as English rather than British (74%) or more English than British (62%)

It is clear that the Leave vote was most concentrated amongst those with least economic resources. However, in order to win the Referendum, the Leave vote mobilised a broader base of supporters. Almost half of those who said they were ‘doing alright’ financially voted Leave, as well as almost 40% of those describing themselves as middle class.

Significant that the working class did NOT vote leave as much as been hammed up in the press. 59% is a majority, but its not as much as has been pushed. Equally 40% of middle class voters is also higher than you might have been lead to believe. By their very nature they will NOT be ill educated.

The papers with the highest proportion of Leave votes were the Sun and Express (both 70%), the Mail (66%) and the Star (65%).

The other newspaper where the majority of the readership voted Leave was the Telegraph, though the proportion was lower (at 55%).

Perhaps the surprise here is the percentage of those readers who voted Remain!

More people were sure that leaving the EU would lead to a fall in immigration than were sure that the economy would be worse off (66% and 43% respectively). Whilst the Leave vote was low amongst those who felt the economy would be worse off (17%), it was high amongst those who though there wouldn’t be much difference (68%) as well as those who thought it would be better off (84%). This supports the argument that the Remain campaign failed to persuade enough people that there would be a significant economic downside of leaving the EU

Significant. If economy heads south there will be political repercussions somehow simply because expectation does not match the reality.

Those who voted Remain were significantly more likely to select education, poverty and inequality, and the economy as their concerns. Those who voted Leave were significantly more likely to select immigration. The biggest single distinguishing factor in terms of general priorities for government is immigration (47% of Leave voters compared to 16% Remain voters). This confirms that the issues that were most important in the EU Referendum – immigration and the economy – broadly matched voters’ wider policy concerns.

It is also worth noting that Europe and the EU was significantly less likely to be selected overall than every issue other than unemployment, and less likely to be selected than education, the NHS, and immigration for those who voted Leave. This suggests that people were more focused on the domestic issues, rather than the detailed arguments about European relations.

In other words, remainers far from being ignorant of inequality and 'out of touch' were much more likely to consider it a priority and be concerned about it. And people made a vote about the EU based on domestic issues and not the EU! And they were not terribly interested in the EU's role. That's a pretty incredible point. It show the degree to which BOTH leavers and remainers were ignorant.

We looked at the relationship between how people voted and what they thought the UK’s long-term EU policy should be. This shows that a significant majority of those who think the UK’s long-term policy should be to stay in the EU and reduce its powers voted Remain in the Referendum. However, at the same time, around one in five, even though their underlying preference was to stay in the EU, voted Leave.

Well there's a big fallacy busted.

People identified as ‘authoritarian’ were significantly more likely to vote Leave than those identified as ‘libertarian’, 66% compared with 18% respectively. However, there was no significant variation by whether people identified as left or right leaning, and much less than in usual elections. Those identified as anti-welfare were significantly more likely to vote Leave than those who were pro-welfare

Again welfare a big issue.

(Leave vote by welfarism: anti-welfare - 75%, neither - 54% and pro-welfare - 30%)

Older people were significantly more likely to vote than younger groups – we found that 93% of those aged over 65 voted compared with 70% of those aged 18-34.

And we've already covered how people who didn't vote were more likely to, had they bothered.

Leave vote by agreement with statement: ‘politicians do not listen to people like me’
Agree - 58%, neither - 36%, disagree - 37%.

May onto a loser on this as well.

But on the other hand, very obvious that there is a ceiling to how much of the vote share UKIP can attract and they still need to get those particular people to the polls for the next General Election (and By-Elections).

Which does make tomorrow's by-election in Sleaford and North Hykenham (sic) very interesting. Perhaps much more interesting than Richmond Park. What type of Conservatives / Leavers are there, and can UKIP motivate people to start voting? And what will Labour / Remain voters do? Will they show up, and will the Lib Dems see an increase, even though this a heavily leave constituency.

The idea that there could be a huge Leave backlash given how the Leave vote was split.

If you look at housing ownership Sleaford and North Hykeham comes in with just 8% in local authority housing and 2% in housing association. Indeed quite the opposite its 31% Owned and 45% Owned/Mortgaged This does not smell of that Economically deprived, anti-immigration group that most identify with UKIP as mentioned above.

Its much more the Older Leave voter group and the more Affluent Leave group. 20% of the population are retired. This is particularly high. (I think its actually one of the highest in the country) 64% are in work which is above average and ownership of detached houses is particularly high.

So the test is perhaps whether UKIP can persuade the older voters and get their core vote out who normally don't vote and whether the affluent voters decide to vote Conservative in a show of support or stay home

Or switch to Lib Dems completely.

I think its more interesting that last week on that basis.

It will be a Conservative hold, but what happens here is more telling to my mind, as the Older Voter and Affluent groups are the two leave groups which are now less predictable in party allegiance than the Low Income, Anti-immigration group (where turnout rather than party loyalty is perhaps the bigger unknown). I am not expecting UKIP to increase the number of votes they get. I am expecting Conservative turnout out to be down. I am expecting Lib Dem share to be up. But by how much?