Westministenders. Boris we wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy Constitutional Crisis?

[RedToothBrush]

Its twelve days to go until the end of the HoC 2016 calendar and we can already tell that everyone is wishing it was Christmas already. Poor Theresa though, she doesn’t get to play with toys on the last day of term. Instead she has a grilling on the lack of spending on health and social care spending by a commons select committee.

Hopefully the next couple of weeks will calm down a little though as thoughts turn elsewhere.

The A50 case has come to an end. There is no way of telling which way the judges will go but the decision to appeal may yet haunt the government as it will bring the issue of devolution to a head, whether they win or lose. The ruling is due in mid January.

Win and they are going to have to amend the Devolution Acts and potentially impose Brexit on people with certain national identities who voted against it. This is profoundly undemocratic and a betrayal of the principles of Devolution and the expectations of the will of the people.
Lose and they could face a full blown constitutional crisis, with NI or Scotland or both having a veto over Brexit, and the government effectively unable to trigger a50 in line with our constitutional requirement. Which is again, potentially profoundly undemocratic and against the referendum and the expectations of the will of the people.

It was a scenario that predictable and avoidable at several junctions yet the government under Cameron and May ploughed on regardless. It a scenario that we are now locked into, due to deciding to use the courts rather than just go through parliament.

It could also massively restrict the power of the executive under the Royal Prerogative. Ironically this is something that David Davis has campaigned for, for years so I guess he gets a victory however the decision goes.
So the chances of some kind of crisis with regard to our constitutional makeup and the union seem inevitable in the new year.

The government despite a defeat in Richmond Park continues to lean right and characterise anyone with concerns as unpatriotic or not honourable. This is the last resort of the desperate.

They have however, conceded to Labour that they will publish a report on their Brexit plans before a50 is triggered. In return Labour have promised that they will let a50 be triggered by the end of March. Is this a good thing? It remains to be seen. In some ways this is a blinder for Labour.

They are pro-Brexit but anti-lack of plan in theory. This only works if the plan actually has substance. If there is no substance in the plan and its nothing more than empty words then they face having to go back on a commons vote committing them to a deal with the Conservatives. It could therefore be a trap for them. It marginalises the none English Nationalist voices too. Voices that are important and deserve to be heard. Voices that if they are not listened to, will have consequences.

What will the Sleaford and North Hykenham (yep again) by election bring?

A vote of confidence in the government, a new ever growing and rising fear of UKIP or something else. How will this colour the start to the New Year?

I don’t know. 2016 has apparently been the year of gin as people turn to the drink to cope. Everything is now Brexitty and Red, White and Blue.
But whose’s? Britain’s? The USA’s? Russia’s? Or France’s?

We look forward to, or more to the point we fear what 2017 could bring. A feeling we have not felt to this degree in many years. A General Election with a UKIP breakthrough. The end of peace in NI. A repeat of the age old betrayal of Scotland’s by the English. The Welsh damned to irrelevance and marginalisation. Brexit vettoed and the subsequent political fallout. The end of the NHS. A bonfire of rights. A new Italian PM and possibly new Eurozone economic crisis. Fillon or Le Pen and at last a real victory for the far right in Europe. The chance of Merkel’s Last Stand. Putin’s partnership with Assad and a new genocide we are powerless to stop. Erdogan pulling the plug on the EU door and unleashing a new wave of refugees onto European shores. The horror of ISIS both within the West and within the Middle East. Trump’s neo-fascism and rise of a New World Order. There is something in there for everyone to dread.

Which will it be? Probably something we have not yet foreseen such are these times.

Act 2 of Brexit in Westminstenders land is bound to be just as dramatic and of course, we leave 2016 in true soap fashion on a real cliff hanger.

All the more reason to enjoy the holiday period and break whatever your politics.

Mike Smithson ‏@MSmithsonPB 16m16 minutes ago
Tonight’s Local By-Election summary
CON lose all 4 seats being defended 3 to the LDs & one to IND. Worst election night TMay's leadership

Yes Swedish, this is the only reference I could find, but it seems the Con vote and the Lab vote are down. Libdems gaining:

www.aldc.org/category/by-election-results/

Grayling started dealing with the cyclist problem today outside the Palace of Westminster - he swung open the door of his ministerial car and knocked a cyclist flying, sending his bicycle crashing into a lamppost shock

Scary stuff BigChoc - I cycle too - to and from the station every day - and cars that stop at double yellow lines make me so nervous. I hate the way some drivers seem to think that as long as there is someone in the driving seat, they can do whatever they want on double yellows - drop off their children for school - or a transport minister in this case etc. People who do this should be prosecuted. Mustn't derail and turn this into a cycling thread... but that video made me so angry.

prettybird pleased your DS gives Blair a chance! Thatch,on the other hand!
Thanks for the results HesterandSwedish It'll be a case of vote LD, get Gove, next time? Blackburn result is horrendous for labour, even though they held on. Barbara Castle would've been livid.

I have written on here before that in general journalists are experts in writing articles that the readership of a particular medium want to read. I would not even say that they even have literacy skills since articles in the Daily Mail so often have not even been proof read and are full of basic errors.

They are not in general equipped to critically appraise what they write. When I first started to study China, it came home to me just how guided by stereotypes and the journalist's own unconscious, or possibly conscious, with the reader's perspective in mind too, coverage of China matters was. The coverage of Tiannanmen as a democracy protest is a case in point. The students in the square deliberately played up to the western perspective because the western Press were in town for a visit by Gorbachev. The Statue of Liberty was ironic, a way to get Press attention.

In fact there had been protests by students and academics that had not gained the attention of the western Press throughout the 80s. The introduction of the market economy by Deng Xiaoping in 1979 had empowered the students and academics to fulfill their traditional role in the Confucian system of government for the literati elite to draw the rulers attention to the failures of government that affect the people and suggest remedies. Even at the start of the Tiannanmen protest Deng went down to the square and listened (and there were times Mao did too until it got uncomfortable and he cracked down). The protest was not in favour of democracy in a western sense, it was about airing ideas to improve government in a Chinese sense. However blue collar workers unhappy after a decade of rising wages, with rising prices and stagnant wages (often a precondition of revolution, not desperation but frustration when a period of improving standards of living come to a halt) started to flood to the square and that was when what followed played out in the eyes of the world.

Few journalists got that, and if they did, it was not what their readers wanted to hear. In that context most journalists take what they have researched, from peoples' experiences, experts or government and feed it to their readers in a digestible form, influenced by the agenda of who they work for.

Fisk is a rare example of a journalist who actually does have first hand knowledge of what he is writing about, and cares. There are about four on China who get a voice in the western Press but even then what you get is their particular perspective.

I never read coverage and assume it is any sort of truth.

CON lose all 4 seats being defended 3 to the LDs & one to IND.

Why isn't that being trumpeted in the Press?

Labour came 4th in Sleaford, but there wasn't a great lot of difference in the votes cast for them, UKIP or the Lib Dems, but we never heard the last of how Labour was finished.

www.newstatesman.com/2016/12/should-we-have-intervened-syria-i-don-t-know-and-neither-do-most-armchair-generals

I think this is pretty fair comment.

Its worth posting those results from last night in full:

Higher Croft (Blackburn) result:
LAB: 58.2% (+12.1)
UKIP: 25.0% (-8.3)
CON: 16.7% (-3.8)
Labour HOLD

Leven, Kennoway & Largo (Fife) result:
SNP: 37.0% (-4.1)
LAB: 28.4% (-6.9)
CON: 18.5% (+11.7)
LDEM: 14.3% (+4.3)
GRN: 1.8% (+1.8)
SNP hold

Moreton Hall (St Edmundsbury) result:
IND: 56.0% (+22.4)
CON: 21.7% (-22.1)
LDEM: 10.4% (+10.4)
LAB: 7.2% (-15.4)
UKIP: 4.8% (+4.8)
Ind gain from Con

Blackdown (Taunton Deane) result:
LDEM: 71.2% (+49.9)
CON: 22.5% (-30.4)
IND: 6.3% (+6.3)
Other Ind and Grn didn't stand this time round.
Ldem gain from Con

Chudleigh (Teignbridge):
LDEM: 51.5% (+38.8)
CON: 35.6% (+2.8)
UKIP: 6.7% (+6.7)
LAB: 6.1% (-8.8)
Ind(s) and Grn didn't stand this time.
Ldem gain from Con

Bovey (Teignbridge) result:
LDEM: 43.9% (+20.3)
CON: 33.1% (-4.2)
IND: 8.9% (-1.5)
LAB: 5.4% (-7.4)
UKIP: 5.1% (+5.1)
IND: 3.6% (+3.6)
LDem gain from Con

Welshpool Llanerchyddol (Powys) result:
IND: 48.9% (+48.9)
LDEM: 32.1% (-17.7)
CON: 19.1% (+19.1)
Ind gain from Ind

Of course council byelections really aren't everything. What is important is Westminster voting intention...

Westminster voting intention:
CON: 40% (-2)
LAB: 29% (-4)
LDEM: 14% (+4)
UKIP: 9% (+2)
GRN: 3% (-1)
(via Ipsos Mori / 09 - 12 Dec)

Britain Elects ‏@britainelects
14% for the Liberal Democrats is their highest share with any pollster since December 2014.

(They got 23% at the 2010 GE for reference)

The shift has happened straight after the Richmond Park By-Election, so I would say that the result there has changed a significant number of people's thinking.

Why isn't the press shouting about this? What's the editorial position of the press? They don't want people to know. Especially if the effect is down to Richmond Park and people starting to think the Ldems are a viable alternative again.

Notable these gains all in traditional LDem country again. And the general southward trend for Labour across the country.

Of ourse they don't want to. That would be acknowledging that people aren't that happy with TM. Which is just an impossible idea to bring up ATM.

They are still busy talking UKIP up, which I see as trying to talk down Labour, but the Blackburn result isn't especially good for UKIP. I would also see those west country seats as places which wouldn't normally go for Labour, but perhaps took a punt on them last time, and are now reverting to their old ways. I think Labour needs to watch its step, but I think those writing its obituary are being premature.

I googled to see if there was any press coverage outside the local press in the boroughs concerned. There isn't but there are some interesting comments on the news on Conservative Home........ Some recognition that going UKIP lite instead of heeding the concerns of the Tory remainers is a dangerous strategy.

www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2016/12/council-by-election-results-from-yesterday-109.html

Wonder how lib dem gains compare to previous by-elections in election cycle? Taunton Deane is pretty impressive.

I don't doubt that the Lib Dems are picking up moderate Tory votes. The question is, (for me at least!) is will there be enough in those places where Tory votes are weighed rather than counted?

www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/16/on-the-irish-border-people-fear-brexit-will-bring-back-the-bad-old-days
Not dramatic, but the mundane depression brexit will bring.

'The coverage of Tiannanmen as a democracy protest is a case in point.'
I was in Tiannanmen a year after. Chinese perceptions were different, to say the least. To counter the people's army ,who are regarded as the nation's children, seemed uncivilised. The 'revolt' egged on by the west, was a tragedy for all. The coverage was partial and ill informed. It's had repercussions for how subsequent world events were covered. It's simply a matter of reading, thinking and researching. Ill researched coverage has global repercussions, as we are learning. Even lovely Channel 4 news, wants to watch its partiality and ignorance on reporting, from 'Arab Spring' though Greek Grexit crisis to now in the Sufi civilisation, decimated, that is Aleppo.
We used to teach students how to delineate between fact and opinion, I don't think it's taught now.

I'm sorry, but what are you saying about Tiananmen Square? That the army didn't kill thousands of people? Or that the killings are ok because most people in China don't seem to mind?

' Estimates of the death toll range from several hundred to thousands. It has been estimated that as many as 10,000 people were arrested during and after the protests'. edition.cnn.com/2013/09/15/world/asia/tiananmen-square-fast-facts/
Potentially equivalent to number of women killed by partners in UK each year.
Each untimely death is abhorrent. But the reporting in the west was biased, with an 'ed'.

www.change.org/p/theresa-may-mp-remove-men-s-rights-activist-philip-davies-mp-from-women-and-equalities-committee/sponsors/new
We know his type, please sign.
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/anti-feminist-mp-philip-davies-speaks-against-domestic-violence-bill-hour-block-a7479066.html.

March on January 21st www.facebook.com/womensmarchlondon/

"Potentially equivalent to number of women killed by partners in UK each year."

I strongly disagree with this comparison. Obviously every death is a tragedy. But there is a difference between personal crimes, and being killed by the state in a single act of mass murder.

The personal is political.

I suspect women in China are also killed by their partners.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/feb/05/china-womens-rights-crackdown-exposes-deepening-crisis-in-chinese-society?client=safari

The above was written by a journalist, who may be biased. However, lacking my own international fact gathering service I have to rely on journalists.

The Chinese state killed up to 10,000 protestors in an act of mass murder at Tiananmen Square.
How is that diminished by the annual 100 individual murders of women by their male partners in the UK ?
10,000 is 100 years x 100 murders, a century of murders committed in a single atrocity. By the State.

It is also 714 x Bloody Sundays.
44 years later, that single Bloody Sunday still leaves a stain on Britain's reputation. Still causes pain and anger in Ireland.

We have to hold a country to account for the murders that its rulers order.
A state that deliberately murders its own people is terrifying.
We should not attempt to diminish state atrocities by comparing them to individual murders, however horrific, of women, or of ethnic minorities, or anyone else.

Even If Theresa May ordered the army to shoot dead "only" 100 protestors in London, I'm sure we wouldn't diminish such a horrendous act by comparing it to individual murders by private individuals carried out over a year.

The number killed in TS equivalent to number of women killed by partners in UK each year. However I'm sure Jack the Ripper's campaign came under that figure and that doesn't make what happened with him less brutal.

The TNS death toll is = to the number of UK women murdered by partners in 100 years, not 1 year
Shows the sheer magnitude of the TNS atrocity

A disturbing analysis of how post-truth happened, by a retiring US conservative talkshow host who refused in join in, so was villified & forced out:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/15/opinion/sunday/charlie-sykes-on-where-the-right-went-wrong.html?_r=0

"In this binary tribal world, where everything is at stake, everything is in play, there is no room for quibbles about character, or truth, or principles.

If everything — the Supreme Court, the fate of Western civilization, the survival of the planet — depends on tribal victory, then neither individuals nor ideas can be determinative."

"The state of our politics also explains why none of the revelations, outrages or gaffes seemed to dent Mr. Trump’s popularity.

In this political universe, voters accept that they must tolerate bizarre behavior, dishonesty, crudity and cruelty, because the other side is always worse;
the stakes are such that no qualms can get in the way of the greater cause."

"we had succeeded in persuading our audiences to ignore and discount any information from the mainstream media.
Over time, we’d succeeded in delegitimizing the media altogether — all the normal guideposts were down, the referees discredited.
.... We destroyed our own immunity to fake news, while empowering the worst and most reckless voices on the right."