Westminster: Brexit is the hard right's weapon of mass distraction

[BigChocFrenzy]

The fervour and divisions over Brexit have suspended normal party politics.

The staggering incompetence & unsuitability of Corbyn as a leader, together with the resulting impotence of Labour has removed the normal checks & balances in UK politics.
There is a vaccum where the Official Opposition should be, so Theresa May is under pressure only from her right.

I fear Thereas May and the Tory rightwing are taking advantage of Brexit to complete the destruction of the post-WW2 social contract and the welfare state.

Meanwhile, the constraints of civilised discourse have been loosened and those with racist or social Darwinist views now feel free to spout their poison openly.

Putin is pouring petrol on all the fires and Arron Banks is lurking < sinister emoticons required >

Zoe Williams:
"Behind a smokescreen of bogus patriotism, ideologically driven cuts to the NHS and all our public services are unpicking the bonds of nationhood"

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/05/brexit-theresa-may-falklands-war-nhs-cuts

"We should be marching against the crisis in adult social care, the closure of care homes, the systematic exploitation of carers, the £4.6bn cut from social care budgets this decade.
We should be .... asking:

“What exactly is the plan, if we’ve decided we can no longer afford to care for the elderly and the disabled?
What do we do with them instead?”

"We should be marching against cuts in education funding"

"Every morning we wake up to someone on the radio explaining, despairingly, that you can’t fix the hospital bed crisis until social care is fixed, and you can’t fix that until council tax brings in more, and it can’t bring in more because wages are too low."

"But when everything breaks at the same time, that is not a coincidence: it is a plan.

As surely as Margaret Thatcher had an economic plan on employment, rights, industry and wages,
this century’s Conservatives have a plan on public services, which is to smash them beyond all recognition."

I really want to believe she has a strategy aimed at keeping us in the Market but May is not a pragmatist though, she is the Vicar's daughter who confuses stonewalling with being a tough and has an obsession with controlling immigration. I do think she put the three Brexiteers in as a tactic but it was a political tactic, aimed at her party not the electorate. However I think she really believes she can negotiate "the best possible deal" because she perceives herself to be a hard negotiator and the UK to have greater power in the negotiation than it has. Her Achilles heel though is that she will not negotiate on Freedom of Movement or the ECHR, she has made that very clear so she won't get the unicorns of special access for the critical sectors of the UK economy, that is the bit she cannot achieve but thinks she can. She has maintained this delusion by not listening to realists like Sir Ivan.

the idea that a hard brexit automatically benefits the rich is false. These people are company directors, they are shareholders, they have pension funds invested in British shares. The destruction of trade will cost them personally. Some of them are too stupid to realise this, and some of them are not, primarily, motivted by money. But I do not believe that Britain's monied class will, as a group, willingly agree to make itself poorer in pursuit of some ill-defined political objectives." That assumes a degree of homogeneity in the rich / business class that I am not sure exists. The business community as a whole is predominantly Remain and they have been making the case to deaf ears all along, and are now just getting on with their contingency plans, Project madness. However there are plenty of businessmen for whom a hard Brexit with deregulation is an opportunity, the private bankers, those that will make money from turbulence, those who seek power like Banks. Rich people will be innoculated from turbulence by having people who are skilled managing their money into the safest options (mostly overseas including ironically the EU). The private banks mostly called the Brexit vote and their customers if anything benefitted in the weeks after. Even if that is an illusion there is still that complacency. I think these groups are a minority but they are the ones making themselves heard saying what politicians want to hear.

Hammond was saying promising things earlier in the process but now he seems to have been brought to heel. He is the one sign that a long game is being played, except that his budget looks to have thrown him to the wolves.....

The traditional Tory business supporters - and donors - (whom one could regard as the "productive" rich) would lose significantly.

So when are they going to do something about it - start voting with their wallets and resign the Tory party membership and make it 100% clear why?

With each passing day, I am convinced that one of the PR essentials of Brexit - whatever shape or form it takes - is that it cannot, just cannot result in a situation where UK citizens are somehow disadvantaged when compared to citizens of rEU.

The first hurdle (possibly overlooked in the Rush To Brexit) is that RoI citizens will fall into the rEU category. Who would like to imagine the scenario, post A50 where an RoI citizen can apply for a job that a UK citizen can't, because they have the intrinsic FOM that the EU is built on.

she perceives herself to be a hard negotiator and the UK to have greater power in the negotiation than it has. Her Achilles heel though is that she will not negotiate on Freedom of Movement or the ECHR, she has made that very clear so she won't get the unicorns of special access for the critical sectors of the UK economy, that is the bit she cannot achieve but thinks she can

May also believes she can cherry pick aspects of the customs union. According to her speech she wants to be an associate member of some kind, with preferential access but not subject to EU trade policy or the external tariff. Not going to happen.

I don't think the lack of preparation on the customs front is a sign that the government isn't planning anything wild - it may just be a testament to the vast amount of work that Brexit has generated that the government doesn't have the funds or the manpower to implement.

Even if we went onto an EFTA deal we'd need to be expanding customs right now to be ready in time, and that's the bear minimum.

The new IT system which was only apparently designed to process only a third of the current projected volume - where is the money to pay for a further upgrade - and people to organise that? It's projected to go live in December 2018 I think - any upgrade would cause delays.

As an aside, I don't know why the UK is so hopeless about big IT systems, we need to get the French in.

But lurking, that's a completely obvious scenario, why would an EU citizen being able to apply - or more realistically, accept - a job that will require many more hurdles for a UK citizen be any sort of wake-up call? It's a completely logical consequence of getting rid of FoM. Even the most enthusiastic Brexiteer must have grasped this.

Sadly there's a decent chunk of Brexiteers who think our expats are old wealthy people who bring nothing but benefit so will be welcomed or that the sun naturally shines out of our arses so much that we'll be waved through without barriers. Not to mention those who think our talent shouldn't be allowed to leave the country its a very small subset, but it does exist

May also believes she can cherry pick aspects of the customs union. According to her speech she wants to be an associate member of some kind, with preferential access but not subject to EU trade policy or the external tariff. Not going to happen.

I don't doubt that she believes she can get a better deal than Cameron. However, if she were serious about the "good deal or no deal" bluff, she'd be getting her ducks in a row with regards to the infrastructure required to continue trading in the event of a hard brexit.

There are no ducks in sight, let alone ducks* neatly lined up ready to fly in a hard brexit victory V. Ergo, hard brexit is not really on her agenda.

(* Or is that geese? Sorry for wanton mixing of metaphors if so)

Even if we went onto an EFTA deal we'd need to be expanding customs right now to be ready in time, and that's the bear minimum

Agreed. I think the secret May strategy is EFTA with an EEA transition period.

Sorry, brexiters! Though actually I think this would not meet with any fundamental objections from not-completely-insane wing of the Leave ranks, eg David Davis.

As an aside, I don't know why the UK is so hopeless about big IT systems, we need to get the French in.

When I said this once, someone pointd out that we do often get the French in. The problem isn't with the contractors but with how the UK govt manages contracts. For whatever reason the French govt is much better at this, we have massive IT systems here that manage stuff like healthcare payments and reimbursements pretty seamlessly, and the govt systems for online tax and social security declarations are good too.

We need to line up our next new thread starter unless bigchoc is happy to be RTB's stand-in again :)

It will all come out in the wash and I really want it to be true but I don't see her making the concessions it will take. If it is her of course, a lot can happen ..... Major, or his successors, could pull it off again if she is going for complete political suicide......

How did we managed to get to 900+ posts in two days

I'm going for option 2 from BigChoc
She thinks she can do better than DC and that she 'knows' how to deal with the EU from her past experience.
I believe she has little issue with option 1 though and has made that much clear (which I imagine will give her more power in negociations. A way to say she really means it iyswim)

Re the EFTA/EEA option: I'm sure that's why Norway want to be involved in the Brexit discussions as they don't want the UK to get a preferential deal (eg one without FoM or budget contributions) than the rest of the EFTA members.

Quite apart from the fact that stroppy UK with its size and sense of entitlement is not exactly going to be a welcome fit to the organisation

How did we managed to get to 900+ posts in two days

Without ever being a "trending" thread. (Is this the busiest thread on MN right now?)

It's about Brexit.
I suspect MN is trying to avoid bum fights there....

Norway will oppose any deal where the uk gets a more preferential deal than they have.
They've already said so and have asked to be involved in any talks about the uk joining the EEA. Somehow they aren't trusting the system and are worried about a repeat of what has happened when the uk join the eu - preferential treatment, less financial burden etc...

But lurking, that's a completely obvious scenario, why would an EU citizen being able to apply - or more realistically, accept - a job that will require many more hurdles for a UK citizen be any sort of wake-up call? It's a completely logical consequence of getting rid of FoM. Even the most enthusiastic Brexiteer must have grasped this.

You underestimate the dimness of some Brexiteers (which for Mumsnet balance, is countered by some equally bad thinking from passionate remainers).

Remember a lot of Brexit is about "feeling". The one "feeling" that has to emerge post Brexit is that the UK - and by extension UK citizens - are somehow better off. Which - the way things are going - is pushing a stone uphill.

For all Trumps mood music, there is some move in the US to prefer UK/EU citizens over pure UK citizens. Certainly in tech research which is where my brother works. Meanwhile in the UK, I have been asked by recruiters a few times recently if I hold dual nationality (my name is a giveaway). Which has never happened in the 30 years I have been working.

They're right to be concerned. However, I think that the E27 and the rest of the EEA countries have the measure of the UK. We're trouble

I'd need to read up more on the history but I suspect when we were finally accepted into the EEC, there was a hope by the existing members that we'd come to feel more European and be a constructive member of the community.

We didn't

We certainly didn't get invited because we were "rich" we weren't We asked to join. And thereafter complained all the way. Even when we got our way (like encouraging the eastward expansion), we then complained about the consequences - that it was the EU's fault that the very East European countries that we encouraged to join were then exercising FoM. Despite the fact that we'd been given the option to restrict it

If I were the EU or EFTA, I'd say good riddance. We're nothing but trouble (or at least, the Eurosceptics that have dogged Parliament are).

But there again, I don't believe in everlasting cake and unicorns

Prettybird
Spot on!

On the infrastructure point - I know people involved in the Heathrow expansions over the years who say the next runway is currently a 10 year point.

Dover has nowhere to expand to unless you either drill into the cliffs or build into the sea, Folkestone, Hull and Southampton could expand but the access is poor etc. All port expansions for custom checks are realistically about 10-15 years off, if the funding and government backing were announced tomorrow.

LH actually on the grounds that it's all about feelings, it is also possible for TM to create a feeling that the uk has got its own way when actually it had to step down on a lot of things....
A bit like we all have the feeling that there is nothing we can do to save the NHS and we have the feeling it's all people faults for daring to be ill
Or that there are much less immigrants thanks to TM strict immigration system
Or that the uk will get their soveignety back....

Crikey, this thread has lasted 2 days !
(Brexit Arms lasts a month or more easily - ours must be more scintillating !)

I'll start a new Westminsters thread when we reach about 960 posts

Let me get this straight, Theresa May is a fleet-footed master politician who is capable of manipulating the Tory backbenches, the right-wing press and the Brexit-voting public into supporting an outcome that they are virulently opposed to, and she has such brilliant tactical nous that she can achieve this by taking the country to the very edge of oblivion in the form of the hardest of hard Brexits, before her carefully-crafted plan of sheer Machiavellian genius pulls us back from the brink at exactly the right moment.

Nice one, but April Fool's is still a few weeks away...

I agree Red about feelings. When EU leaders reiterated that it is hard Brexit or full membership, the DM was celebrating our victory, while the FT said we lost the first round.

Can I be pedantic and say it's "Westministenders".

Only because I have told like-minded friends to look out for the Westministenders threads as a haven of reasoned discussion schills and trolls aside on Mumsnet