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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.

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GhostofFrankGrimes · 17/01/2017 21:02

May could have blown raspberries for 20 minutes and Brexiters who have still lauded it as a brilliant speech. Intellect free guff is "winning" the debate.
Plenty of people happy to sign documents without reading the small print (boring legal stuff).

RedToothBrush · 17/01/2017 21:02

Ben Howlett, the MP for Bath, said: “I’m pleased the prime minister has listened to Conservative backbenchers who have called for a vote on the final deal in parliament. I still want to see Britain retain all the benefits of a single market, and call on the government to hold a full debate.”

Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary, Keir Starmer, went further, suggesting the prime minister was “ruling out a hard Brexit at this stage” and had caved in to Labour demands to seek tariff-free access to the single market.

“For many months, we in Labour have been demanding fullest possible access to the single market, emphasising the risks of leaving the customs union, arguing for a collaborative relationship with our EU partners, emphasising the need for transitional arrangements and the entrenchment of workers’ rights. Today the prime minister has rightly accepted these in her plan and I acknowledge that.”

Are Starmer and Corbyn in agreement?

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unicornsIlovethem · 17/01/2017 21:03

FOM in the treaties only applies to workers.

Most of the people coming in who aren't workers are refugees ( who will still always have the right to enter) and family members of immigrants who meet the home office tests.

It is also worth remembering that the Uk was offered a limit on immigration from Eastern Europe when Poland etc joined and Tony Blair didn't take it up because cheap workers were good.

The same opt out was offered when Romania and Bulgaria joined. Again David Cameron didn't take up the opt out because cheap workers = good.

whatwouldrondo · 17/01/2017 21:04

Interested to see that the Desmond Express Channel 5 offering at 8pm was a documentary about what a great opportunity Australia offers for those with the skills and / or money......

SwedishEdith · 17/01/2017 21:04

"Either works. The EU wasn't working for us so we are leaving."
"If the EU want to cut off their nose to spite their face then we are better off out of the crumbling club"

So this "FYI I was on the fence about Brexit/Remain. I thought either would work" probably isn't true then?

unicornsIlovethem · 17/01/2017 21:07

To be fair Edith, (s)he probably wasn't in a position to vote.

SwedishEdith · 17/01/2017 21:07

" isn't that exactly what Canada have just negotiated? Whats so hard to comprehend, a free trade deal. Loads of countries have them without having to have free movement of people."

Well, yes, It's taken 7 years.

RedToothBrush · 17/01/2017 21:10

www.ft.com/content/a7fdb5b3-a0d9-36ee-ba47-9efa7808f43f
Theresa May’s speech means the Brexit phony war may be ending

David Allen Green

In a way, the speech is an admission by Britain that the EU has won the first (informal) round of the negotiations, by providing the terms of the departure. The EU said that there would be no membership of the single market without freedom of movement and the UK has now conceded this.

Interesting observation.

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unicornsIlovethem · 17/01/2017 21:12

It's also worth noting that while CETA has been signed by all countries it won't come into force until its ratified by the EU parliament so perhaps not until late Spring 2017. We'll have plenty of time though. 2 years is loads, we'll probably really only need to start a month or so before. Hmm

RedToothBrush · 17/01/2017 21:14

Simon Usherwood @Usherwood
1) May still doesn't have coherent plan. 12 principles = brainstorm, not rigorous model
2) May not in control of Brexit. SC ruling matters, but more consequential is position of EU27, who look at disorganised UK
3) May's focus still v.much on CON party and backers (D.Mail), rather than country at large.
4) big danger that actions don't match words down line, leaving hostages to fortune.
5) May is trying to be bold and clever at same time: high-risk (certainly), but not necessarily high-gain
(belatedly) 6) May went with "you need us more than we need you" line, which raises Qs on understanding of economics and, indeed, of EU

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Peregrina · 17/01/2017 21:14

Didn't irate Breton farmers once spread soft fruit across the road thus causing a huge traffic jam?

I'll get my coat.

woman12345 · 17/01/2017 21:15
Grin
Peregrina · 17/01/2017 21:17

Wasn't David Allen Green a Leave supporter or am I mixing him up?

refusetobeasheep · 17/01/2017 21:17

So many have been in denial since the referendum result ... wonder if this will change that at all

unicornsIlovethem · 17/01/2017 21:19

I think he was a reluctant remainer.

Jam -Grin

Mistigri · 17/01/2017 21:20

woman12345 one of my favourites was when, early in our time in France, the cauliflower growers decided to protest about people not eating enough cauliflowers (or something like that) by dumping truck loads of them in the road.

I'm not sure why we're letting this discussion get derailed (I know I'm guilty too. If there is anything that we should have learnt in the last six months, it's that ardent leavers are almost never interested in an honest exchange of views, and that they rarely have the knowledge base required for a sensible conversation anyway. We are wasting our energy with this one.

StripeyMonkey1 · 17/01/2017 21:20

I am feeling pretty gutted by the May announcement, but even more so by the lack of any real Opposition response, other than from the Liberal Democrats. Is Labour really going to wave this right wing Brexit through and vote for article 50 on this basis?

I also agree with this:

In a way, the speech is an admission by Britain that the EU has won the first (informal) round of the negotiations, by providing the terms of the departure. The EU said that there would be no membership of the single market without freedom of movement and the UK has now conceded this.

woman12345 · 17/01/2017 21:21

May's focus still v.much on CON party and backers (D.Mail), rather than country at large and this has been the case for 40 years.
It's been appeasement not government, through all the tory administrations.
Kinnock had failings, but he did not appease, and John Smith the best PM we never had.
Now it's a game of 'how low can you go.' Except it is not a fucking game.

GhostofFrankGrimes · 17/01/2017 21:21

So many have been in denial since the referendum result ... wonder if this will change that at all

wait till the price rises hit peoples finances. Then there will be hell to pay (but very little self reflection).

unicornsIlovethem · 17/01/2017 21:24


‘COMING together’ to make a success of Brexit is difficult if you believe it is a heap of shit, it has been claimed.
Despite pleas from ministers, many Britons are finding it hard to believe in something they do not believe in.

Susan Traherne said: “I’ve always believed that Europeans are our friends with whom we no longer want to have wars. So it’s hard to change to seeing them as potentially hostile weirdos whose food is poisonous.
“I see the pound plummet, major employers preparing to leave and the imminent break-up of the UK and my heart sinks when they say it should be rising.
“It’s just a bit difficult reversing all your beliefs completely, that’s all. I bet it’d be the same for Brexiters if it had gone the other way.”
Brexiter Wayne Hayes said: “No, if we’d lost the referendum I would have turned my back on 20 years of calling it the EUSSR and pushed for much closer integration.
“Completely. 100 per cent.”

Daily Mash but as always, accurate enough!

Peregrina · 17/01/2017 21:25

John Smith the best PM we never had.
Cruelly taken from us too early, and we would have been spared Blair. Although the early years of Blair were not all bad.

When people's pockets are hit it will be spun as that EU doing us over again - not May and her incompetent venal self serving cronies.

Mistigri · 17/01/2017 21:27

Wasn't David Allen Green a Leave supporter or am I mixing him up?

As I understand it, he is agnostic about the EU in the sense that he wouldn't necessarily vote to join it, but didn't vote to leave, because he recognised the legal, constitutional and economic implications.

CrystalMcPistol · 17/01/2017 21:28

the cauliflower growers decided to protest about people not eating enough cauliflowers (or something like that) by dumping truck loads of them in the road.

I love a good truculent French protest!

whatwouldrondo · 17/01/2017 21:29

Both great links, my first thought on the speech was that May was trying, yet again, for a rebranding of the whole idea of hard /soft Brexit. She knows she is between a rock and a hard place. She cannot get from the EU what she needs to placate the forces unleashed by the leave campaign / Sun/ Daily Mail/ Express without serious economic consequences so she is desparately trying to sell to the "people" that she is leaving the EU, hook, line and sinker, whilst saying to the most competitive parts of the economy i.e. financial services / scientists she will not damage them. She is desperately hoping that she can find a way though this that she can sell to both sides i.e it's not membership as far as the people are concerned, it is as far as our business / knowledge economy need.... First rule of marketing, if your product is shit you will be found out whatever you say......

Mistigri · 17/01/2017 21:32

I am feeling pretty gutted by the May announcement, but even more so by the lack of any real Opposition response, other than from the Liberal Democrats. Is Labour really going to wave this right wing Brexit

Does anyone understand what Labour's position is, and why they are congratulating themselves for May's speech? They are making themselves look fucking stupid, and that's a polite, understated way of putting it.

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