Westministenders: Its time to fire the starting gun. At our own heads.

[RedToothBrush]

Its time for the suicide. The note will say simply, "The EU made us do it".

David Davies, says that despite May’s assertion that no deal is better than a bad deal for the UK, that actually we don’t know this as he hasn’t got round to quantifying the impact of no deal.

He still has no answers for anything apart from “I dunno” and “I’ll do it later”. I can’t wait for when the dog ate my homework excuse.

After 9 months. That’s how far we’ve got. Brexit negotiation skills will have 18 months (not 2 years as it’ll need to be ratified). We are still hiring people for the Brexit department. What about all these EU agencies that the UK will have to replicate and hire and train up in 2 years time?

I’m still waiting for Davies to tell me what all these potential benefits he keeps going on about are too. Benefits for who exactly? Ah yes we know the answer to this one too, even if its not being said. Its political elites and elites with lots of money who can consolidate power and enslave the population through debt and desperation. Goodie. Just what I’ve always wanted. As long as I can wave my Union Jack. Oh. Shit. Bugger.

Nicola Sturgeon, has been doing a good job of showing Brexiteers exactly what they look like to Remainers by holding up the mirror of irony to the Vampires of the 19th Century State. The sight of them tripping over themselves saying its irrational to hold a ‘blind vote’ and that the economic argument is flawed is hilarious. If you are not British.

Hammond has been forced to u-turn on NIC budget announcement as it was not in the spirit of the manifesto. What happened to the manifesto pledge to the protect interests in the Single Market. Lets be honest, the New Tory Manifesto read simply: “We’ll wing it and see what we can get away with”. I wonder how many people would vote for that.

Its Brexit at all costs. No matter what. We must keep the foreigners out. Even though Davis hasn’t done an assessment on the financial impact of migration. Just think about that for a second. Actually don’t because you might actually want to shoot yourself in the head.

At best the government are still relying on Game Theory as a basis for their negotiations and the EU are already going, “Er we don’t think so”.

Perhaps this is the intention of May’s tour to build consensus. She’s handing out guns and bullets to anyone who displays rational thought, to blow their own brains out.

May’s weakness is her manner and her chip on her shoulder for the law. Her own party are not immune to it. She seems to think trade deals are not done based on goodwill. May’s weakness is Britain’s folly.

Pass the blindfolds round, and get on your knees and await our own execution by our own hands.

Bang.

RIP The United Kingdom and Northern Ireland. I will remember you with nostalgic fondness but equally with bitterness and shame. Our finest hours are long since passed (and were tainted with the excesses of exploitation anyway) and we must accept this as part of the process of ‘accepting Brexit’.

Now its time for the empty hand to start being shown and the blame game to begin in earnest. The politics of hate have only just begun and the divorce has not started yet. Scotland, Northern Ireland and Gibraltar are the kids we might not get custody of.

We’ll be blacking up again, running around groping women like Benny Hill and pushing people back into the closet as we hit the off switch before you know it. As well as having nice shiny new ID cards we’ll have to pay for the privilege of owning and carrying at all times, to prove we aren’t nasty illegal immigrants or those equally nasty legal ones clogging up our NHS (by working for it).

Don’t worry though. Uncle Donny will save us. If he doesn’t die suddenly after eating a bowl of Russia soup or have a fatal heart attack after accidentally falling out of a tenth story window.

www.planforbritain.gov.uk that website......... cringing so much it hurts. It looks visually appalling, some spelling mistakes and like a really naff campaign. Absolutely dreadful. Did none of the cool London design agencies want to take on this job then?

I would LOVE to see a May Sturgeon debate...

May has done how many press conferences to date?

That's a good point actually, I can't imagine May in an election tv debate. As PM would she get out of that, or get away with sending in a crony.

Oh plan for Britain website is working now.

Just to remind you all of the 12 point plan from the website, to see how well its going so far:

The Government has set out 12 negotiating objectives ahead of the UK leaving the EU.

1. Providing certainty and clarity

We will provide certainty wherever we can as we approach the negotiations.

1. Taking control of our own laws

We will take control of our own statute book and bring an end to the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice of the European Union in the UK.

1. Strengthening the Union

We will secure a deal that works for the entire UK – for Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and all parts of England. We remain fully committed to the Belfast Agreement and its successors.

1. Protecting our strong and historic ties with Ireland and maintaining the Common Travel Area

We will work to deliver a practical solution that allows for the maintenance of the Common Travel Area, whilst protecting the integrity of our immigration system and which protects our strong ties with Ireland.

1. Controlling immigration

We will have control over the number of EU nationals coming to the UK.

1. Securing rights for EU nationals in the UK, and UK nationals in the EU

We want to secure the status of EU citizens who are already living in the UK, and that of UK nationals in other Member States, as early as we can.

1. Protecting workers’ rights

We will protect and enhance existing workers’ rights.

1. Ensuring free trade with European markets

We will forge a new strategic partnership with the EU, including a wide reaching, bold and ambitious free trade agreement, and will seek a mutually beneficial new customs agreement with the EU.

1. Securing new trade agreements with other countries

We will forge ambitious free trade relationships across the world.

10. Ensuring the UK remains the best place for science and innovation
    We will remain at the vanguard of science and innovation and will seek continued close collaboration with our European partners.

11. Cooperating in the fight against crime and terrorism
    We will continue to work with the EU to preserve European security, to fight terrorism, and to uphold justice across Europe.

12. Delivering a smooth, orderly exit from the EU
    We will seek a phased process of implementation, in which both the UK and the EU institutions and the remaining EU Member States prepare for the new arrangements that will exist between us.

Ha! I was just about to screen shot those 12 objectives so I could see how many they achieve in two years' time.

They will not want to remind voters of their party's association with the decline of mining towns whilst trying to court those voters.

I can't see the voters in the Orgreave area voting Tory in a million years - unless they have all had complete personality transplants in the last 30 years. Does May not realise how much Thatcher is still hated?

She would get out of it, if, like Indyref1, the PM claims that "It is a matter for the Scottish people and not for WM"

So the best you'd get would be NS up against Ruth Davidson.

So WM/TM can decide if/when we get a referendum, will bankroll the pro-union campaign (the Scottish Office Twitter feed already spends most of its time promoting the benefit of the Union) but doesn't need to get involved in any head-to-head debates.

Yet another case of having your cake and eating it Maybe that's why they believe in European everlasting cake - they're already enjoying Unionist everlasting cake

#5 is very interesting.

What was it that someone's MP said? "Controlling immigration is not the same thing as reducing it"

Sturgeon retweet: "Just imagine Brussels had told the UK that they are not allowed to have a referendum. That's the difference between Scotland's 'two Unions'."

Quite. All that 'prison' and 'key' business up there. Demolished in 23 words.

Never thought I would be rooting for NS in any situation but if NS and TM go head to head.....

The only way I'd feel remotely positive about leaving the eu is if NS was leading the negotiations for us. And considering she is solely Scotland focused largely by her own admission, that's really saying something

The links between Richard Cook/Constitutional research Council and the Conservatives via Steve Baker, MP, member of the Executive Committee of the 1922 Committee, and Saudi Arabia via the Saudi Ambassador and his father should be investigated, given the expected boost to arms sales that Brexit is expected to bring.

It's not surprising to see Saudi Arabia wielding influence in the affairs of another state, given its huge financial resources and the perception that Brexit would drastically weaken Britain's trading position. The UK now stands to become a client state of Saudi Arabia.
............
Woman
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Goals_Institute
'Western Goals UK was relaunched in 1989, becoming the Western Goals Institute, independent of the U.S. foundation. Gregory Lauder-Frost, then a leading member of the Conservative Monday Club, was invited in February to join Thomas J Bergen, Peter Dally, Professor Antony Flew, Linda Catoe Guell, Dr. Joseph Labia, Trggvi McDonald, Rev.Martin Smyth, MP, the Lord Sudeley, Dr. Harvey Ward and Rev. Basil Watson, OBE, as Vice-Presidents of the institute.[6][7] The institute's stated aims were to "combat the insidious menace of liberalism and Communism within all sectors of British society"[8] and its initial activities included denouncing what it described as "extremist" left-wing Labour Party candidates. The institute was also critical of the United Nations, its Director Andrew Smith stating "western nations (when dealing with the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait) have seen fit to submit themselves to the writ of the UN, a body largely composed of regimes hostile to western democratic values."[9]

The institute stated its aims on the BBC in 1991:
"Western Goals works to establish networks and links with conservative groups dedicated to the preservation of the cultures and identities of western nations. We are conservatives who believe in traditional conservative values. A multicultural society does not work. We wish to protect the way of life we had before immigrants arrived. It was a mistake to permit these people to come here. Politicians must now accept this. Large numbers of immigrants reject European culture and wish to remain alien in religion and culture. We want European culture in European countries. We would seek to have treaties with countries to permit resettlement.".[10]....

...In line with the ‘Reagan doctrine’ policies of its American patrons, Western Goals UK had established links with militant, and often violent, anti-Communist groups internationally. These include the Angolan UNITA movement (in October 1988 Western Goals facilitated the visit to London of UNITA’s leader, Jonas Savimbi) and the Salvadoran Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party, whose leader, Roberto D’Aubuisson, became one of the group’s international patrons.[13] It was also claimed that Western Goals may have been used by its U.S. partners as a conduit for funds to the Nicaraguan Contras following the ‘Contragate’ scandal.[14]

The institute was reaching out to a variety of robustly conservative associations which were also opposed to communism. In August Lauder-Frost was forging links with Joachim Siegerist* of Die Deutschen Konservativen e.V., in Hamburg, and London's Time Out magazine carried a report headlined "Bad Taste" in September saying that the Western Goals hierarchy, in addition to courting Jean-Marie Le Pen, and Franz Schönhuber of the German Republikaner Party, had been dining at Simpsons-in-the-Strand, London, with El Salvador's Arena Party President Major Roberto d'Aubuisson, who subsequently became one of the institute's patrons.[15]...

...Lack of adequate finances reduced campaigning to their occasional policy papers, the regular glossy newsletter, press releases, and letters to editors. The institute's last newsletter, which they called a "Special General Election edition", in June 2001, carried a leading article by Stuart Millson entitled "New Labour: A Disgrace to Britain"; an article entitled "MacPherson Report Condemned" in which they stated: "over the last quarter of a century, the racial-industrial complex, with its nasty, parasitical, semi-criminal fringe of self-styled anti-fascists and anti-racists, has emerged as a very serious threat to our freedom"; and a long article entitled "National Identity" by Gregory Lauder Frost in which he argued "we must act now" and added that "within 20 years Britain's capital city will have a majority non-British population."[39]"

*(Joachim Siegerist, son of a Latvian Waffen SS member and currently a Latvian parliamentarian).

WGI was wound up in 2001 but its legacy remains.
..........
Rev. Martin Smyth, MP, bio:
Grand Master of the Orange Order 1971-1996 (all through the Troubles therefore).
Presbyterian Minister.
President of the Ulster Unionist Party.
Vice President of the Monday Club <a class="break-all" href="https://en.wikipedia.orgen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Monday_Club" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">en.wikipedia.orgen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Monday_Club a hard right, racist element of the Tory Party until IDS gave them the boot in 2001, since when they have become a fan club of the Tories rather than an integral part of the Party.
Opponent of the Anglo Irish Agreement.

Simon Wren-Lewis, Prof. Economic Policy, Oxford Uni, fellow of Merton College:

He previously opposed Scottish Independence, but now says Brexit changes everything

“The bottom line is that the case for Scottish independence is now much stronger than it was in 2014.
Then a brighter future outside the UK was patriotic wishful thinking.

Now, if they can stay in the Single Market, it is almost a certainty.”

“Brexit changes everything.
The economic cost to the UK of leaving the EU could be as high as a reduction of 10 per cent in average incomes by 2030.
If Scotland, by becoming independent, can avoid that fate then you have a clear long term economic gain right there.

But it is more than that.

If^ Scotland can remain in the Single Market it could be the destination of the foreign investment that once came to the UK as a gateway into the EU.^

By accepting free movement, it could benefit from the immigration that has so benefited the UK public finances over the last decade.

No, that is not what you read in the papers or see on the TV, but I’m talking about the real world, not the political fantasy that seems so dominant today.”

https://www.commonspace.scot/articles/10552/top-oxford-economist-changes-mind-back-financial-benefits-scottish-independencee_

Thank you math what it smelt like.

One stat which stuck out in Channel 4's coverage of election expenses scandal is recent membership figures: Conservatives150 000, Labour is 528 000 Greens 55 000 and Lib Dems 82 000 SNP 120 000
UKIP 39 000

With such modest numbers for UKIP and Conservatives, it's easy to see how money wins elections and why funding and election expenses are so important.

And these gruesome head chopping misogynistic terrorists who appear to be funding them.

Or our new bosses/owners.

Mhairi Black to Tory MP (mouths)

"dinnae talk shite, hen"

http://metro.co.uk/video/mhairi-black-tells-tory-minister-dinnae-talk-shite-hen-1425991/?ito=vjs-link

Again, SF are playing such a long game. Knowing all this as they do, who can blame them for waiting for independence day this time next year when they are re united with the ROI.

Britain feels dirtier by the minute.

One thing about Brexit, is, you kind of know that like rats, moral and political sewerage (CRC, Baker, Smythe, Monday Club, Saudi) is never more than 6 feet away, but it's like the plague now, we are seeing these rats in our kitchens. (UB40 ) ( Old timer's reference)

And BigChoc, did you see lovely Dawn Butler today:
www.newstatesman.com/politics/media/2017/03/watch-dawn-butler-mp-speaks-sign-language-commons

Eyes down, tory election bingo, first ones:
Karl McCartney and William Wragg among more than 20 Conservative MPs facing allegations of electoral fraud

And:
Tory MPs under investigation include the former cabinet minister Anna Soubry, Neil Carmichael, Scott Mann, David Nuttall, Kevin Foster, James Heappey and Marcus Fysh

Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, so its not 'the UK and NI', its just the UK.

Actually, it is called 'The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland'. A hodge podge, if you will, and in due course, part of Great Britain will vote itself independent.

We can call it 'Diminished Britain and Northern Ireland' at that point. Unless of course Northern Ireland follows Scotland.

(For Olympic purposes, it was assumed everyone was happy with just 'Great Britain' ).

And massive [eyeroll] at 'die on my feet, blah blah'. Seriously? Dying?

Woman Karl my joint favourite puffed up flub of a Tory, and star player of Brexit bingo at the Sadiq session of the Brexit Select Committee? What a surprise, he seems such a, er, puffed up flub of aTory......

Seriously living in a constituency that the Tories swung at the last election, I have never known such an intensity of campaigning. Somebody paid for those "researchers" that rang twice weekly through the campaign. You could not go to the shops or garden centre without having to run the gamut of a Minster or Dave himself looking very out of place amongst the greenery Plus we got an actual signed letter from Dave personally addressed Dear Ron that had clearly had a going over by Cambridge Analytics because unlike the "researchers" it did not mention Immigration I may have been quite cross with the researchers going on about immigration, along with the rest of the local "metropolitan elite" / not really British people*. A significant amount of it though was out of government coffers, the sudden materialisation of school capital funding (especially when it was from a maintenance fund but was used too convert adult education buildings for a secondary school) and free school approvals were just ones that because i was part of an activist group on education were not under my radar. Now parents are gearing up in the face of £400 per pupil cuts to funding......

• That is a new one from the self styled Brexit Barmy Arms tribe in the last couple of weeks, that we are not just traitors but not actually British. Sorry I was born in the same northern maternity home as Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, and it says so in my passport. So until, what with Yorkshire having a bigger economy than Scotland and with a more complex financial services hub than Edinburgh (Leeds), we Yorkshire folk are freed from the prison / yoke of Westminster and get back control, I am as British as it comes......

Significantly the ROI does not want this to happen because it cannot financially afford to take responsibility for NI and probably wont for a long time. [Anon]

...As of reports of three days ago, Fianna Fail is working on plans for a united Ireland.

The unification of Ireland would be a rational response to Brexit. Within the context of the EU unification might well be both affordable and even profitable in the future, because rational regional planning would be made possible if the border was eliminated. The border cuts a natural region apart at the moment.

I suspect the only aspect of unification that is giving anyone real pause in Ireland is that the batshit evangelicals so prominent in NI public life would end up with a place in Irish public life.

I can assure you that the majority of people in Northern Ireland do not want to be a part of a Republic of Ireland that is effectively a religious state

Not so fast there, Ron.
NI is effectively a far more religious state than Ireland is.

woman afaik, it's the election agent - they are often the ones who actually fill in the expenses forms for their consituencies - who would face charges, not the MPs.
< even if some MPs deserve manslaughter charges for some votes on cuts to services >

If it is proved that election agents knowingly filed falsely low expenses - not through incompetence - they would almost certainly receive a fine, not a jail sentence.

However, it could well lead to elections being voided and by-elections being called.
That might prompt May to call a GE, to avoid the embarassment of byelections caused by fraud.

The electoral commission have also referred the Tory party’s (former) national treasurer to the CPS to see if the faults in their national declaration amounted to criminality.
This could end up with the ex-treasurer being charged,

Oh no, there's more evidence of Heseltine being a decent man (a political crush that shames us all ).Here's his post-sacking letter to TM - principled and unapologetic.

I shouldn't be surprised, but I am losing patience with the blind stupidity, incompetence and ignorance of this government.

Have governments always been this ignorant and we never noticed before, because Divine Intervention or the Civil Service rescued them in time ?

The government has said in response to a Parliamentary Question that

it doesn’t know how many custom officers it currently employs nor how many it has employed over the last few years.

It says that information could only be collected at “disproportionate cost”.

I expect that a government planning to leave a Customs Union might at least know ... how many bloody customs officers it currently has

• if of course it had been doing any planning / thinking whatsoever for leaving the Customs Union