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Brexit

Westministers: Boris and May give us the Brexit Leeming Plan.

995 replies

RedToothBrush · 17/01/2017 15:17

Theresa May has made a speech.

It’s a wish list for hard core Brexiteers. It’s a large corporate executive’s wet dream for exploitation.

Even requests for a white paper as recommended by the Brexit Committee have been ignored. Thus meaning there is no chance for proper scrutiny. Plus whilst on the one hand parliament have been told they will have a vote on the end deal, this is merely slight of hand, with Davis stating that if parliament vote against this, then we will leave the EU without a deal in a chaotic exit. Thus making the vote an exercise with a gun to parliament's head.

Workers Rights and the Welfare State die with Brexit. Even the precious NHS. Especially the precious NHS once its been stole off to the highest American bidder.

May is being lobbied by her hard right and to save her next she listens only to them. She has no interest in listening to anyone else. The demographic and voting patterns favour her to head this direction. There is nothing to be gained for her personally by doing anything else.

She is already laughing her head off in glee at the collapse of the NI assembly. It plays right to her agenda.

Under the wheels of the bus go the JAMs, under go the disenfranchised who rarely vote but came out in force for the referendum, under go single mothers, under go the disabled, under go those with mental health concerns who struggle with already bureaucratic systems set up to ‘catch them out’, under go the EU immigrants especially those who have families here and may not have equal rights in future, under go British Citizens living abroad who might find themselves without healthcare or pensions, under go our Human Rights and any chance of challenging the state’s authority and interference in our every day lives, under go small business who will drown in red tape, under go Scotland and NI.

Yet this is ‘for the children’ or ‘the grandchildren’. Its spineless and cynical and offers nothing for those currently able to vote but under the age of 40. Won't you think of the children? Its fine if you are already retired and have a nice little pension isn't it?

The National Interest? This is a foreign concept. Probably an EU one.

The Baby Boomers are net beneficiaries of the welfare state. The young are unlikely to have a welfare state in a few years and are already net contributors. They have now been robbed of the choice over their future and in patronising tones effectively told they are irrelevant.

And of course Uncle Donald is a fan. You can almost see his vampire fangs reading to get his teeth into the UK and suck the life blood out of it.

It is a horror show.

Its all about selling Theresa May to the Express and the Mail and they love it. Her speech is to set the scene of how committed she is and to lay the blame at anyone who challenges her. It attacks the EU and paints them as the aggressor who are there to prevent poor little Britain from getting what it wants. If Brexit goes wrong, it was all an anti-British plot. Not a collective self inflicted brain haemorrhage. She's gone full on Farage and out Farages Farage.

This all comes perhaps a week before the Supreme Court Ruling.

Funny timing eh? No not really.

It’s a pre-emptive strike.

What on earth will they say? Will this merely allow May to dismantle our current legal system by gathering support for a General Election Manifesto that outlines its demise? Thus extending the mandate for Brexit even further. Probably.

I fear that the courts may only serve to strengthen May in the long run due to the lack of opposition and a Labour party that is imploding, with dozens of its MPs being rumoured to be looking for employment elsewhere. I fear that without a media able to effectively hold May to account in the face of her media baron supporters.

Our only hope really lies within the Conservative party itself and whether May is able to keep a lid on the various on going power struggles. The only trouble is that one of those challengers is a certain Brutus in the form of Mr Gove. I struggle to work out who would be worse; Gove or May. And of course this only highlights the issue that who else is there with in the Conservatives who isn’t a reptile? Even Arron Banks commentated that during the referendum he found Labour MPs nice people and the Conservatives unpleasant almost to a man. High praise indeed.

Meanwhile in America, NATO is obsolete and so Europe will have to consider an EU Army and Russia is firmly getting its claws in. And yeah, just Donald Trump. That Project Fear thing was just fake scaremongering wasn't it? Right? Right?

sigh

What on earth can possible stop this insanity? Not necessarily stop Brexit, but at least stop the PURE INSANITY.

OP posts:
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The80sweregreat · 18/01/2017 14:33

Just want to add that my dad, 95, who fought hard in WW2 for five long years and worked all his life voted remain. He has a private pension, he is not rich but wants the Uk to stay together and believes in the EU. Life long labour supporter too.
Not all the older folk were leavers!

The high court ruling is being disclosed on Tuesday. That will be interesting.

officerhinrika · 18/01/2017 14:41

I have just caught up with Boris Johnsons remarks. It's taking me some time to winch my jaw back up. What the fuck do they teach them at Eton & Oxford?

BuntyFigglesworthSpiffington · 18/01/2017 14:46

Where's the diplomacy? Bad tempered name calling before anything has even begun is such a fucking stupid note to start on. Is he hoping to score brownie points with his cronies? What a twat.

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 14:48

What the fuck do they teach them at Eton & Oxford?

A sense of privilege certainly.

howabout · 18/01/2017 14:51

Having lived in the US I can testify that the scandal of their system is not how little they spend but rather how much.

However having paid progressive employment health insurance and having had to make co-payments in addition to "insured" payments, pre-Obama care, I have some sympathy with the argument that the costs of Obamacare have not been fairly spread. I also think there is likely to be a gain for other countries if the US starts to question the profit levels within their system.

Graph showing that the US public purse pays out just as much for healthcare in terms of GDP as the UK.

<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=www.kingsfund.org.uk/sites/files/kf/media/web-2_v5.jpg&imgrefurl=www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/health-care-spending-compared&h=1088&w=1468&tbnid=7s78wNuyuMtwdM:&vet=1&tbnh=156&tbnw=211&docid=rvuy7Qw7ef9o0M&usg=__8oebOppurGjxnmIYLXWOGnqZsZI=&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiqiO6T98vRAhXHnRoKHTfjB4IQ9QEIJDAA" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=www.kingsfund.org.uk/sites/files/kf/media/web-2_v5.jpg&imgrefurl=www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/health-care-spending-compared&h=1088&w=1468&tbnid=7s78wNuyuMtwdM:&vet=1&tbnh=156&tbnw=211&docid=rvuy7Qw7ef9o0M&usg=__8oebOppurGjxnmIYLXWOGnqZsZI=&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiqiO6T98vRAhXHnRoKHTfjB4IQ9QEIJDAA

Peregrina · 18/01/2017 15:00

There have been four Old Etonian PM's since the last war.
Eden - Suez. Tarnished
Macmillan - reasonably successful, I think.
Hulme - a mediocrity as a PM, and now largely forgotten.
Cameron - an unecessary Referendum designed to shut up the Eurosceptics which has split the country and destroyed his political career.

I think they would be wiser to tell them to stay out of politics for the time being.

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 15:13

There have been four Old Etonian PM's since the last war.
[snip]

Macmillan - reasonably successful, I think.

When he wasn't Prime Minister maybe. However he presided over the Blue Streak fiasco, which made Britain a laughing stock. And thanks to his belief that "a chap would never lie to another chap" he allowed the Profumo affair to undermine the UKs relationship with the US (again).

The only thing I (as a child of the 60s) remember SuperMac for is standing up to Mrs Thatcher for "selling the family silver".

Hulme

Home, surely ? Although given how the British upper classes like to play fast and loose with their names, it's an easy mistake Norman, St John Stevens ...

woman12345 · 18/01/2017 15:16

My contribution to our war effort is to carry on working on books banned by Michael Gove when he removed non white non native English authored books from his new English curriculum. (Yes, really he did)
and the now un taught
"The Lord of the Flies" (by English man but strangely missing from syllabuses now) in which white English privately educated boarding school boys turn into bestial fascists when stranded on a beautiful pacific island while the adults conducted a nuclear war elsewhere.

EmilyAlice · 18/01/2017 15:20

Alec Douglas-Home. Could have won the upper-class twit of the year competition any time he cared to compete. Only four? It feels like lots more than that. Actually I quite liked Macmillan as Tories go. Sort of old-fashioned noblesse oblige chap and a terrific stiff upper lip about his wife's carryings-on. Grin

woman12345 · 18/01/2017 15:25

It's not the posh that's the problem it's the knowing cruelty.
Lord Carrington was posh but wise.
The patrician class sometimes used to have class.

woman12345 · 18/01/2017 15:31

Has anyone commented on Jack Straw's prosecution? They went for Blair with limited success, and look like they're picking off the Banquos of Labour.
www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/17/libyan-dissident-abdel-hakim-belhaj-wins-right-to-sue-uk-government-over-rendition

Noticed that no one, including those still living have been prosecuted for, fore example, sinking of Belgrano, vicarious negligence in Jimmy Saville crimes in hospitals, still very quiet on NI child abuse cases.

Wonder why they've zoomed in on Straw right now?

Peregrina · 18/01/2017 15:31

Yes sorry, couldn't remember Home, pronounced Hume's, spelling. All I remember is that he barely moved his lips when speaking.

I had forgotten the Profumo affair, but it finished Macmillan off. Macmillan was one of those who I thought had died years ago, when he finally popped his clogs in the mid eighties. Profumo himself, eventually did the honourable thing and resigned and went to do voluntary work in the East End.

I digress.

TuckersBadLuck · 18/01/2017 15:33

Norman, St John Stevens

Norman St John-Stevas if we're being pedantic Grin

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 15:33

Wonder why they've zoomed in on Straw right now?

Wrong school tie ?

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 15:37

Actually I quite liked Macmillan as Tories go

So not a Scot then ?

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b07v3vzz

I know it's unavailable now, but it reports (with official material) how Macmillan put the well being of the Conservative party ahead of national interests.

Thank God that would be unthinkable nowadays.

woman12345 · 18/01/2017 15:37

www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/18/supreme-court-to-deliver-brexit-ruling-24-january at 9.30am

European parliament's Brexit negotiator labels Johnson's WW2 jibe 'abhorrent' Guy Verhofstadt, the head of the liberal ALDE group in the European parliament and the parliament’s chief Brexit negotiator, has described Boris Johnson’s world war two jibe about the French president as “abhorrent and deeply unhelpful” and urged Theresa May to condemn it.

Bojo's mate:
^AfD politician says Germany should stop atoning for Nazi crimes
Björn Höcke sparks fury by calling for tradition to end and labelling Holocaust memorial a ‘monument of shame^

TheMartiansAreInvadingUs · 18/01/2017 15:39

There has been plenty of comparaison re how much the uk us spending g in health care. And as a proportion of its GPD, it's much lower than a lot of other eu countries.
It's worth rembering though that other countries have system in place for health care that are working better than the NHS. Singapore comes to mind there.

Another comment about a pp who said that we couldn't afford the level of benefits we are giving out. and that all countries will have to reduce it.
Actually done countries are introducing a national wage whereby every person in the country will get that minimum wage regardless.
There is also a lot of talks about how capitalism the way we've done it until now is dying and needs to be replaced by something else (see the fact that we will need less and less people to do the same jobs, plus environment issues etc)

I wish people would wake up thevthe factvthat old systems aren't working anymore. And that looking after your population (benefits, NHS etc) is actually good for the economy and the country as whole (plenty of studies around that idea)

MsHooliesCardigan · 18/01/2017 15:41

woman I remember doing Lord of the flies about 35 years ago and being told that it was aiming to represent a microcosm of society and thinking 'Hang on, why are there no girls in it then?'
There was an excellent documentary a few years back by Andrew Neale called 'Posh and Posher' looking at how politics in this country has become increasingly elitist and more and more difficult for 'ordinary' people to enter. His argument was that we needed to bring back Grammar schools (which I don't agree with but could see his point). The way in which the government is disproportionately filled with those from Eaton and Harrow and their ilk, considering that a fraction of 1% of the population go to these places, infuriates me.
So many people get into politics via unpaid internships which are only possible for those with rich families. In the past,people could get in through the Trades Union route which doesn't really exist anymore.

Peregrina · 18/01/2017 15:47

Only four OId Etonians sinc WW2. Loads of them before that, when they were born to rule Grin.

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 15:50

I remember doing Lord of the flies about 35 years ago and being told that it was aiming to represent a microcosm of society and thinking 'Hang on, why are there no girls in it then?'

because if the first statement is true, the second observation is redundant ?

howabout · 18/01/2017 15:58

Sorry MsHooliesCardigan been waiting ages for an excuse to comment on your fab username Grin

Would that be Andrew F Neil whose decidedly working class Scottish name you are misspelling? (I also disagree with him on grammar schools, but I have the luxury of living in fully comprehensive Scotland.)

lurkinghusband · 18/01/2017 16:05

Macmillan was one of those who I thought had died years ago, when he finally popped his clogs in the mid eighties

Not sure if it's an age thing, but MrsLH and I find occasionally find ourselves learning of a celebrity death with the first reaction "I thought they died years ago." ... the most recent being Richard Adams ....

Peregrina · 18/01/2017 16:09

HSBC to shift some staff to Paris.

Hmm, global, international Britain, hey, Mrs May? Businesses need concrete plans, not pie in the sky, "we hope, we might".

RedToothBrush · 18/01/2017 16:23

Jamie Glackin ‏*@JamieGlackin1*
An intriguing negotiation tactic. Aim for the worst possible Brexit and hope your opponent has more sense than you do.

Law and policy ‏*@Law*andpolicy
The Supreme Court president will speak for five minutes, just so the other ten justices can have a head-start in running away.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-38664909
Hard Brexit 'could rip country apart', Sadiq Khan warns

www.independent.co.uk/voices/mental-health-camhs-theresa-may-jeremy-hunt-cuts-community-care-a7533421.html
A week after Theresa May's speech on mental health, a women's psychiatric ward is closing due to cuts

After declaring children and adolescent mental health servicesthe 'single biggest area of weakness in NHS provision', Jeremy Hunt pledged an extra £250m a year. However, around half of CCGs in England will spend the extra money allocated for CAMHSon other services

www.newstatesman.com/2017/01/we-clearly-don-t-understand-sovereignty-i-wish-we-d-shut-about-it
Since we clearly don’t understand sovereignty, I wish we’d shut up about it

Includes this gem:

Last April one pro-Remain politician said that the referendum was:
"...about how we maximise Britain’s security, prosperity and influence in the world, and how we maximise our sovereignty: that is, the control we have over our own affairs in future. (...)"

"International, multilateral institutions... invite nation states to make a trade-off: to pool and therefore cede some sovereignty in a controlled way, to prevent a greater loss of sovereignty in an uncontrolled way, through for example military conflict or economic decline."

Can you guess who?

OP posts:
AnnieKenney · 18/01/2017 16:27

Wrongtrouser: I do think the Leave vote can be described as an act of vandalism. I wouldn't personally have used the term Lager louts as a metaphor but it is a metaphor. I think it is an act of vandalism based of a significant proportion of Leave voters believing that Britain is better / superior to our European neighbours and that we'd be better off alone because of this. The facts do not support this viewpoint but it is certainly prevalent amongst Leave voters I know. Of course I could not possibly claim to know the thinking of 17 million voters and have made it clear throughout that it only resonated with me insofar as those Leave voters I know.

I don't think posters should have to feel obliged to defend every word of an article to think their general point merits some attention. Your mileage may of course vary.