Westminstenders: And so it begins

[RedToothBrush]

Promises made that can not be kept.

We have already fallen at the first stumbling block: the desire for parallel talks on exit and future relationship that May wanted has been rejected. Not that this is a surprise seeing as we were told this.

This isn't two years of negotiations for a good deal. Forget any suggestions that it is. It's two years of damage limitation and domestic pr.

For both the UK and EU.

I do believe that May's attitude - which seemed to be more friendly in her speech and letter yesterday - has burnt all our bridges.

This talk of the world needing the EU's 'liberal democracy' isn't aimed at the EU though. Her use of the words that produced uproar in the HoC yesterday was deliberate. Why use it? It was always going to produce a reaction.

When May says she will have a consensus at home to achieve this goal one of two things must happen: to prove just how much we need the EU to make a political reversal possible at the expense of her head or to vilify the EU to a point that Remainers suddenly change their mind.

To get a good deal for the UK she can not satisfy her hard line Brexiteers. It is impossible purely because to do otherwise is like breaking the laws of physics. Trade is done mostly with who you are closest too. This is the inescapable truth. We are leaving the EU but not Europe as keeps being pointed out.

If we want to trade we have to accept EU regulations. If we do not, we do not trade. Rules we can now no longer influence by must obey.

We can not reduce immigration. We have had control of non-Eu immigration and that is not going down due to skills shortages. To combat this schools are getting less money.

In terms of sovereignty and British parliament we just gave that away. The 'Great' Repeal Act is a power grab by the executive. It seems to give the powers of the monarch to Mrs May and take them away from parliamentary scrutiny. At the same time we are forced to become beholden to Trump's America. A man who screws people for a living and has not a shred of honour.

Using security as our bargaining chip misses the obvious. If we do not cooperate we endanger Brits abroad and ourselves domestically. Are we really prepared to stop?

The opportunities of Brexit Britain are bleak. This will be normalised.

Good luck folks. We are gonna need it.

I love NS's letter to May.

I might move up to Scotland on the basis of Nicola Sturgeon's letter . It must be lovely to have a grown-up in charge.

My favourite Telegraph btl comment on the Gibraltar story:

It looks like our European friends have learned nothing from history.

The UK is at its very best when faced with this sort of behaviour, I almost feel sorry for the EU, they cannot possibly win this.

The comments below the Telegraph article are comedy gold.

Well, they are certainly not well informed. I noticed at least one poster claiming that "Gibraltar wants nothing to do with the EU". Not sure how a 95% vote for Remain suggests that. However it does illustrate the low mental power of some of the Leave cheerleaders.

Now if we could turn that level of stupid into energy, we'd power the world.

If it weren't for the fact she really really wants an independent Scotland, I would wish NS was out there negotiating for the UK. Though I partly think she could get a better deal for the UK than TM and her stooges even with independence being her aim

NS wants the best for Scotland. That makes her a formidable foe - even people who may have to fight her on that generally recognise that and respect that (myself included).

TM wants whats best for TM and the Tories. That makes her a dishonourable foe and people who may have to fight her on that will have no respect for her (as we are starting to see).

When Mrs. Thatcher (who - whatever your politics - was cut from the same cloth as NS) famously declared of Gorbachev that he was "a man I could do business with" I believe she was referring to that - he was putting Russia ahead of himself.

Local 48% group posting on FB:
"I was out with a couple of people tonight, planning the Festival. We got on to the topic of where to put banners ... and the UKs first roundabout was mentioned. Next comment was "someone decorated it with EU flags over the weekend" . Other person I was with responded "Yeah, bloody well done. What a mess this country's got itself into".
(I just listened and didn't 'fess up to having been one of the roundabout decorators.... wanted to hear their unbiased opinions of it).
Very pleased that our act of decorative resistance was noticed, commented upon and that the pro-EU message being supported outside of our 48% group"

It will be really interesting to see if May goes for an early repeal of the fixed term parliament soon. Currently the election will be in 2020 one year after our 'exit'

I think we may be able to gauge how well the talks are going re timing of the election - if it's starting to go really tits up she will have to call early rather than risk showing how idiotic they are. Labour is in it's death throws at the moment so it would make sense soon BUT the public are weary. Two months of campaigning now could turn really nasty and could show weakness rather than strength becoming all about the referendum itself

I think there is a risk however small that the Libs could pick up the Labour seats rather than the Tories (certainly in Remain and marginal areas)

Add the additional yearly amount of 18 year olds, a potential to get the young to be motivated and actually get out and vote there could be a different landscape in 3 years especially if FOM is actually stopped. That is the thing that most young people I know are concerned about.

So will she stick or twist?

Lurking I agree with you on Mrs T and Gorbachev.

However the majority of people in Scotland do not agree with you on NS and TM according to latest polling.

natcen.ac.uk/news-media/press-releases/2017/march/i%E2%80%99ll-have-what-she%E2%80%99s-having-scots-share-pm%E2%80%99s-vision-for-brexit-deal/

In the interests of balance, I should say that there are many Scots who don't like NS. You only need to look at some of the threads on Scotsnet which is why I no longer post about Indyref on Scotsnet

I'm sure TM would love to have the mandate that NS and the SNP have, with just under 50% of the vote (reflected in the number of MSPs)

But there again, TM is making no attempt to bring the 48% on board, so maybe she just doesn't care.

according to latest polling

I thought the dangers of polls was well understood by now ?

Just so you know 4 years of 18 year olds is just over 3million people (ONS)

I'm in Scotland too howabout.
I think that NS is a very competent politician, but don't want independence. However, I would be wary of assuming that just because a poll now suggests support for TM's Brexit, that another indyref would return a "No". Such over-confidence feels familiar.

Really interesting discussion by a bunch of very despondent EEA leavers (and a few reluctant remainers) here:

www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=86428#disqus_thread

One interesting point, following on from a discussion of the impossible task of making Britain's ports and customs infrastructure Brexit-ready in two years, is that the EU is not doing anything on its side either (to prepare for a massive increase in customs and other regulatory workload at ports).

Math, Cambridge Analytica might be totally above board. The issue is that they were used by both Leave and Trump campaigns. If Trump does end up getting impeached, it raises questions that ought to be looked at, to establish that things here were totally above board. Given how things are panning out over in the USA, I think it would be helpful to restore a bit of confidence that our own system is not vulnerable to exploitation by foreign influences. Its the questions that it raises rather than there definitely being something wrong. For me, as the Trump investigation has gone on, the ties that exist in the Trump Cabinet and Russia have just been one after another to the point where you start really scratching your head. Bannon and Breitbart are certainly at the heart of that. By extension, anything or anyone that has close links with the Trump Campaign needs a close examination. Its about having that confidence.

misti I really want to take that as a positive but aren't they better prepared anyway and likely to face less impact as its just us and what comes through us, whereas we have the other EU27 and those we don't have some customs agreement with?

pretty in fairness I think Scotsnet may be slightly over representative of anti NS sentiment in Scotland.

I get very irritated with NS, partly because we share very very similar backgrounds but she purports to represent the only rational view. Mine is very different. If she even just occasionally said - aye well that's what I think anyway instead of constantly invoking the will of the Scottish people or the Scottish Parliament it would be a start. She could do with being herself more and not always the FM and accepting dissent within the Party ranks rather than the highly disciplined SNP Party line. I understand that comes from years of plugging away in the political wilderness and in AS's shadow. To move forward and respond to the electorate she needs to debate ideas more openly and be seen to be doing this.

Other than that I really like NS and have a great deal of respect for what she is trying to do to work for a better Scotland for all.

Interesting that John Curtice who I don't always agree with does not himself have quite the same analysis.

http://archive.is/DlO5I#selection-161.342-161.459

He also points out that the respondents to the survey are chosen entirely at random, unlike most polls.

But if you do accept the premise that the Scots aren't that different in their attitudes to the rest of the UK after all, then perhaps that just illustrates that NS is listening to the electorate a bit more than TM

And at least Curtice mentions the finding "As many as 47% think that ‘Scotland is an integral part of the UK and so should accept the UK-wide vote to leave the EU’, while just slightly more, 51%, believe that ‘Scotland is a nation and so should not have to leave the EU when a majority of Scots voted to stay’." I could quibble with the order he put that in but that would be petty - a finding that is conspicuously absent from Howabout's link

the EU is not doing anything on its side either

perhaps - just perhaps - the EUs concern over the UKs trade with it is much much less than the UKs concerns. Maybe they just don't envisage selling us as much after Brexit ?

More Brexiteer Scotch mist .

Misti, is it because the increase will happen over lots of different entry points so the impact won't be felt the same way that it will be in the UK?
Plus if goods have to wait, they might not be in as much hurry as we will be here. (Other sources of supply in the EU if they really need it for example)

poorboy I think I am right in saying pretty and I have 2 teenagers apiece who will likely cancel each other out in any Indyref2.
Squishy I take your point about polling but it does support my gut feel that the Scottish EU result was very muddied by the threat of Indyref2 and how best to avoid / promote it. Scotland is much further away from the Continental mainland than the South of England and has much lower levels of EU integration so it always seemed counter intuitive to me that Scots were inherently more pro-EU.

Scotland is much further away from the Continental mainland than the South of England and has much lower levels of EU integration so it always seemed counter intuitive to me that Scots were inherently more pro-EU

And yet Scotland has the Auld Alliance, and strong Italian connections ?

Howabout it's not the Indyref that will be impacted by the increase of the young so much as the potential impact on a Tory party being elected with a full and firm majority in 2020 if May doesn't deliver

I fully agree with that article regarding the HUGE number of bills and modifications that will need to be done. Plus the fact we will have to implement some new bodies to deal with a lot of the stuff the EU is currently dealing with.
The problem with that isn't even the fact that we don't have the resources. It's the fact that compare to the EU, the uk is small. Can it realistically have the ressources to have some many more agencies to deal with all that??