Westminstenders: The Brexit Apprentice

[RedToothBrush]

Theresa May is increasing looking like she is running an episode of the Apprentice with two teams trying to compete in their plan for Brexit. Complete with the obligatory reprehensible contestants.

On one side we have Team Creationists intent on hard Brexit and on the other we have Team Sensibles desperate to get a softer deal.
May herself has been held hostage by seasoned expert negotiators the DUP. Once No 10 has reported the deal was done, only for the DUP to say it wasn’t. Then it said, it would be settled today. But the DUP disagreed and said ‘the weekend’. Now its 'next week'.

Meanwhile the Queen has been messed about with a scapegoat over when her Queen’s Speech will be. It’s likely to be a week on Monday.
Meanwhile the Brexit department is also in chaos.

The Number two in the department was sacked and replaced by a Remainer, and the number three quit amongst reports that he no longer thought Brexit was achievable and that there was no way that the Great Repeal Act could pass through the Lords. He has been replaced by the Head of the infamous Arch-Brexit Whatsapp group.

Oh and Gove got hired. Nuff said on that one.

After some slight back tracking from David Davis, Hard Brexit is still on in all its glory. Negotiations are going ahead next week. Well that’s what we are saying. The EU, on the other hand, don’t won’t to go ahead until we have an officially sworn in government. Which seems pretty fair enough.

Tune in to find out which Team wins this week’ The Brexit Apprentice

The barrister on a 'zero hours' contract? They have no shame, do they?

There are so many reasons to be angry and concerned just now, then along comes a comment like the 250p/h MP quote and ots just so unspeakably arrogant and out of touch and it makes me furious anew.

A Tory MP who was yesterday made a minister at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) once claimed to know what it was like to live on a zero hours contact…because he was a £250-an-hour barrister.

I wonder what his wife and servants read ?

They have no shame, do they?

No, no they don't.

And if we (we the people, we our elected representatives, we the independent judiciary) squander this golden opportunity to, as they say, Take Back Control, then the country really is a failed state.

May making 'private' visit to tower. Ever The coward. Because of her and her government Grenfell cannot even be discussed in parliament. The cowboy firm who did refurbishment should be arrested now! They and the management firm and the conservative council should all be arrested for corporate manslaughter. There will be over a 100 dead and the fire service says they can't go in to start recovery as building still alight. I cannot believe what has happened, I have never been so angry or as powerless. This government needs to resign NOW!

www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2017/06/15/the-illiberal-persecution-of-tim-farron
The illiberal persecution of Tim Farron

Good article RTB and made me sad and angry for Tim Farron and the LibDems all over again.

Meanwhile, the Tories continue to cover themselves in glory.

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/stewart-jackson-tory-mps-facebook-messages-abuse-thick-chav-constituent-a7790296.html

May making 'private' visit to tower.
I read that as the Tower. I didn't realise Brenda was that pissed off

mistigris ninon I am sorry but Kensington is not a small discrete area of posh housing, it spreads west to Shepherds Bush and Hammersmith, including West Kensington tube. You could just about point to Barnes as a distinct entity because it was formerly a village and has a village centre / pond / green but nethertheless you would find that residents tend to identify with Richmond more than Hammersmith across the bridge. I do think it is legitimate to make a connection between the pockets of affluence (Holland Park to the south as well as Kensington High Street and around Hyde Park to the east ) and deprivation in the borough as a whole.

Huff post reporting fears of over 100 dead with no one in the top four floors getting out.

Unfortunately that has been my own evaluation since the start.
I've always thought that casualties form this fire would go into the hundred. Not happy to see that I may be right :(

The 'persecution' of the LD is nothing new TBH (or not in the last 20 years I've been here)

That's been my fear too pink
I'd like to be wrong on this more than anything ever.

Looking at that fire, how could it not be. Corbyn is visiting later this morning.

Excellent article Red and what I suspected, I think it is Brian Paddick who should be examining his conscience this morning. Issues like abortion are not just cut and dried in terms of right and wrong and liberalism. Of course I believe it is a woman's right to chose (and have fought for that for decades). Would I have made that choice, I don't know, it would have been a very difficult one for me personally. I would certainly respect the right of a woman to think abortion was the wrong moral (or indeed emotional ) choice for them personally. Homosexuality is different because it is not a choice to be gay but gay Christian friends say that they can respect the right of gay Christians to read the scriptures and reach a conclusion for themselves that it is not right for them to be in a same sex relationship personally, it is only when they inflict that conclusion, along with prejudice and discrimination, on others that it becomes illiberal.

But obviously as a liberal you have to be perfect whereas if you are not liberal you can be as hypocritical, prejudiced, self seeking, and immoral as the average right wing Tory MP. Hypocracy is particularly rife across the comments on both the Tower Fire and the shootings in America this morning.

metro.co.uk/2017/06/14/boris-johnson-slashed-londons-fire-services-in-2014-and-told-rival-politician-to-get-stuffed-6708609/

According to Metro, in 2014, 10 fire stations and 552 fire fighter jobs lost.

Hammond has a plan and is briefing the FT (where else!)

"Philip Hammond will warn on Thursday of the dangers of a “hard” Brexit, in a highly anticipated speech at Mansion House in which the chancellor will urge Theresa May to put the economy at the heart of exit negotiations."

"The chancellor wants Mrs May to push for a significant transition period to allow British business to adapt to leaving the customs union and single market after Brexit in 2019 and to soften her stance on immigration controls."

Re the barrister. I have an inkling of where he is coming from in that a junior at the bar is self-employed and it can be very stressful working without a pipeline of work as are all zero hours contracts.

However, when the work is paid at £250 per hour when it does come in, that is a fundamental difference and he really ought to drop the self-pity and recognise that and if he can't, don't bloody well say it!

I just read that Farron article and this stood out for me:

The most troubling instance was in 2006, when he voted to reduce the abortion limit to 21 weeks and introduce compulsory counselling to women wanting one. This is liberally intolerable but it was some time ago and never repeated. Farron abstained from votes on abortion three times in 2008 (when Theresa May voted for the proposal to reduce the limit to 20 weeks), then abstained again in 2011, 2015 and 2017. As Farron says: He got it wrong, he has changed his mind, he pledged to always vote on the basis of the evidence. A single vote in 2008, which is not repeated despite several opportunities for him to do so, seems insufficient to cost Farron his job. And if it should cost him his job, he should never have been elected to the leadership in the first place.

The statement that this is a single vote is bizarre when it clearly states he abstained 6 times. In my view abstaining is not voting with the evidence. It is copping out and pretty much as bad as voting for a restriction just without the courage to stand for his convictions. Having read the article I find the, admittedly small, amount of sympathy I had for him diminished even further. I am sure there are lib dem voters that are not pro-choice, but all the ones I know most certainly are. I also do not think voting to allow services to be restricted because someone is gay is acceptable to be honest. However, you dress it up.

If he does not feel that he can continue to support progressive policies of the lib Dems and follow the brand of Christianity he chooses to follow then I think he is right to leave. You should not expect the liberals to compromise their beliefs and progressive aims in order to accommodate his religious choices.

The fact is he was only elected to be leader because the options were so damn small at the time.

Laura Kuenssberg‏Verified account @bbclaurak 2m2 minutes ago
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Queen's Speech announced for next Wednesday

So May spared 20 minutes of her precious time, no press allowed with a couple of residents. She really shows her contempt now, what an insult to all the people involved. Also reports that at least one class of children have half their pupils missing at the school nearby. No council or housing association officials around to help victims, what sort of country is this?

Laura Kuenssberg‏*@bbclaurak*

Queen's Speech announced for next Wednesday

Negotiations now start with the Palace to arrange this

But obviously as a liberal you have to be perfect whereas if you are not liberal you can be as hypocritical, prejudiced, self seeking, and immoral as the average right wing Tory MP.

I don't think you have to be perfect, but if you are going to be leader of the liberal democrats it seems pretty important that you generally hold views that are, you know, liberal. I didn't vote labour during the Blair and brown years because I did not feel they held views that were consistent with what I saw as core principles of the labour party. While Farron is not as extreme an example I am not convinced he is the best representative for liberal ideals.

And let's face it "hypocritical, prejudiced, self seeking, and immoral" do seem to be pretty consistent with right wing Tory ideals right now, so no problems for them there. If they acted any other way they would probably get chucked out the party.

Has anyone checked the DUP agree this time.

Bigly He was not voting against abortion, he was voting on the time limit. There is a scientific argument as well as a moral one that around 20 weeks is when a foetus becomes a viable infant. I don't think that justifies interfering with a woman's right to chose especially when the overwhelming majority who chose late term abortions do so for heartbreaking medical reasons. However there is an argument which is why it succeeded in getting to a vote in the first place.