Westminstenders: The wrong homework

[HashiAsLarry]

I'm no rtb but I'll give it a shot, though her efforts deserve much more than me.

The August negotiation round has, well, fizzled out in much the same way as any other. It's taken over a year to get to written position papers and there's still no clue as to a direction from the UK government.

Japan, meanwhile, is about to sign off on a deal with the EU. A deal we want to copy.

@faisalislam
^but if post brexit britain's trade deal with third biggest economy in world is to be based on Brussels' deal, what about rest? TTIP? Canada?
...when PM signs off statements like this on primacy of EU-third party deals, one wonders how temporary the temporary customs union will be^

The NHS is now launching a drive to recruit foreign GPs, like the ones that have left thanks to Brexit. It's a good job they'll be £350m a week better off now. Oh hang on...

Ian Paisley MP @ ianpaisleymp
1/2 The Daily Telegraph article is defamatory. It is devoid of fact or logic. Referred to my lawyer.
2/2. I will refer myself to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.

Huh? I have done nothing wrong and it's defamatory but yeah there is enough reason to refer myself to parliamentary standards?

Is that rigged in favour of government now too?

This all really restores faith and confidence in elected representatives.

I guess this is normal behaviour in NI politics though. Grab the lawyer at the slightest hint that you've been caught with pants round your ankles.

So Leadsom's committee move: what's the point of having committees if they have a built in Tory majority?

They of course, as we have already said, have got to ask themselves, would they vote for this if Labour were in power?

I know that you can't infer too much from Local Elections, but they do provide a guideline. UKIP's collapse could be seen a year ago, there was a small Lib Dem surge which petered out about February, and Labour despite the constant anti-Corbyn propaganda held their own until about February when they began to have their own surge, which is continuing.

Strong and stable = Weak and Wobbly
Smooth and orderly = shambolic and ?? chaotic? It doesn't need to alliterate this time, although alliteration helps.

Peregrina you predicted tory hatchet job on each other because of brexit; I wasn't figuring on the DUP doing the same Wonder what's behind the Paisley story.

To be fair on Paisley washes my mouth out , referring himself to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards can be in order to clear himself of any wrongdoing rather than admission of guilt.

I am also assuming he can now refuse to discuss it with the press as it has been referred to the Commissioner for investigation. Seems an astute move to me.

Doddery, Peregrina.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/08/brexit-40-mps-hardline-soft-hard-legislation

Why are 40 hardline MPs setting the tone of the Brexit debate?
In every battle there are die-hards, last-ditchers, merchants of death or glory. Forty Tory MPs are lining up like lemmings to race to the Brexit cliff edge. They arewriting an open letter that demandsno fancy transitions or economic areas, no single markets, no pseudo-Brexits. For them, Brexit is the second coming. On the appointed day in March 2019, the dark cloud of Britain’s European age will roll away. Britain will jump off the cliff and fly free, into the warm golden sun of global free trade. Along with Icarus.

The 40 MPs have made an early mistake. As long as “hard Brexit” was an unquantified body of opinion on the parliamentary backbenches, Theresa May lived in fear. But 40 MPs out of 650 is not a majority. It is a tiny number, should push come to shove on keyBrexitvotes. What it does indicate is the absolute necessity of assembling a coherent, cross-party coalition to ensure that legislation on whatever deal is eventually struck passes parliament in an orderly fashion.
With every month that passes, the cliff edge nears and its reality becomes more ominous. This week came an early shudder of what is in store, with the EU legislation repeal bill. Hard Brexiters cannot mess about. If they want to disengage at once, they must concede massive extra powers to Whitehall –so-called Henry VIII clauses– by the hundred. Sensible parliamentarians are appalled at what is now proposed. This is no ordinary “statutory instrument” procedure. It is amassive transfer of power from legislature to executive, without so much as a clearly defined sunset clause to restrict its duration. If MPs can hold their nerve, they can delay this nonsense and insist on an orderly transfer of power from Brussels under a sensible transition. All else is silly play-acting.
Earlier this week, the former EU president Herman Van Rompuy wasasked by the BBCto comment on the Brexit talks. He gave the same answer to every question: just pay up. He is “real EU”, a classic corporate entity. It does not really care about Europe’s economy or its borders or its misbehaving eastern bloc. It faces losing 20% of its income when Britain leaves. It cares about its budget. Give it the cash, said Van Rompuy in as many words, and Britain can have any Brexit it wants.
What that is remains genuinely open. There is no constituency in parliament or in the opinion polls for hard Brexit. Even on immigration, the polls suggest the issue is not numbers but details, notably pressure on public services. Yet British politics is now so entrenched, so polarised, that soft Brexit still lacks traction, wandering between free markets, customs unions and Norway options. There must be some sort of parliamentary coalition for the duration. I repeat the maths: 40 MPs is not a majority of 650. What are the other 610 doing about it?

Well I've spent the morning putting together a 7 page complaint about standards on the local council which relate to whistleblowing and a councillor who is no longer fit to be in office.

I'm not a happy bunny.

David Allen Green @davidallengreen

1. Imagine a general election.

Imagine Corbyn and Labour are largest party but with no overall majority.

Imagine a DUP-like deal with SNP.

1. Imagine Corbyn then brings forward a "Austerity (Withdrawal) Bill" providing ministers with widest powers to make or break law.

1. Imagine the minority Labour government rigging the committee system so that they have majorities, outside scope of that DUP-like deal.

1. Imagine the minority Labour government getting rid of Queen's Speech for two years, so that there was no chance it could lose that vote.

1. Imagine the minority Labour government legislating that any deal it does with EU can be implemented as law by ministerial discretion.

1. And now imagine what the Tories would say to any of that.

/end

(ht @HuwSayer for prompting this)

What if the Express suddenly became anti-Brexit ????

www.nytimes.com/2017/09/08/business/dealbook/trinity-mirror-shell-media-tabloid.html?mcubz=3

LONDON - The publisher of The Daily Mirror, a left-wing British tabloid,
said on Friday that it was negotiating to acquire the print assets of the
Northern & Shell Media Group, which owns two rival right-wing tabloids,
The Daily Express and The Daily Star, and OK!, the celebrity magazine.

The announcement came after Trinity Mirror, which publishes more than 150
newspapers in Britain and Ireland, including The Manchester Evening News,
said in January that it was in early-stage talks to acquire a minority
stake in a new company that would include assets of Northern & Shell.

If completed, the sale would signal the exit of Richard Desmond, Northern
& Shell's colorful chairman and founder, from the news media industry. Mr.
Desmond is a billionaire who made his money in the pornography and
celebrity magazine businesses.

"There is no certainty that any transaction will be agreed or completed,"
Trinity Mirror said in a news release on Friday.

Trinity Mirror had shown interest in Northern & Shell's newspaper brands
as recently as two years ago, but it did not reach a deal. Instead,
Trinity Mirror acquired the newspaper publisher Local World Holdings in
November 2015 for 187.4 million pounds, or about $246 million, including
debt.

Northern & Shell is the publisher of The Daily Express, The Sunday
Express, The Daily Star and The Daily Star Sunday. The company has owned
the tabloids since it acquired their publisher, Express Newspapers, in
2000.
It also publishes the celebrity magazines OK!, New! and Star.
The transaction is subject to shareholder and regulatory approval.

Northern & Shell previously owned the British television broadcaster
Channel 5 but sold it to Viacom in 2014 for £450 million. Northern & Shell
bought Channel 5 in 2010.

The discussions come as newspapers have struggled with falling circulation
and declining print advertising, and publishers are looking to control
costs to remain viable.

Tbh, if the Express became Remain-supporting, its readers would probably just abandon it. The acquisition is likely about sharing costs between the Mirror Group and the Express titles rather than changing the direction of the paper overnight. Any change in editorial is likely to be quite gradual.

Robert Peston:
Early next week we will learn whether Theresa May can govern - when she faces two life-or-death votes, both of which are seen by her opponents as outrageous attempts to rig our democracy.

The first vote is on the second reading of the European Union (Withdrawal) bill, which would give ministers unprecedented power to make laws without consulting parliament.

The second vote, disclosed by HuffPost, would guarantee this minority government a majority on important legislative and scrutiny committees.

The two initiatives are connected - in that the most discussed compromise to soften the undemocratic impact of the EU (Withdrawal) Bill would be to create a new committee or use an existing one to oversee which EU-related laws are translated into pure British law without the involvement of parliament.

But obviously such a new committee would be a fig leaf if it contained a majority of May yes-people.

So although it looked yesterday as though most Tory critics of May's approach to Brexit would not side with Labour in Monday night's EU bill vote, those critics will have to think again.

In giving May a majority on the second reading, Brexit-wary Conservative MPs such as Grieve, Morgan and Soubry could find themselves undermining their own plan to effectively protect MPs' rights through later amendments to the bill - because Tuesday's attempt to rig the composition of parliamentary committees would demolish any such protection (forgive the Lewis Carroll logic here - such is parliament).

Having lost her majority in the general election she chose to call, for a while May talked the talk of reflecting the will of the people by trying to work consensually with MPs of other parties.

It is now a case of consensus conshmensus. With the aid of her most important minister, the wily chief whip, Williamson, she will attempt to rule by diktat via the gaming of parliamentary rules.

She has returned back from holiday with the spirit of the Venezuelan approach to democracy seemingly coursing through her veins.

If nothing else, at least we have proof that witchcraft and voodoo are as effective as homeopathy ...

Robert Hutton‏ @RobDotHutton
Astonishing Lobby briefing yields repeated No10 assertion that "the govt has a majority on the floor of the House."

Q: "Has anyone told the prime minister the result of the election yet?"
A: "The govt has a majority."
Q: "Does the PM accept the result?"

Implication from No10 is that @WestminsterDUP is now part of the govt.

RAPID FACT CHECK: Theresa May does NOT have a majority on the Commons.

Westminster Unionist‏***@WestminsterDUP*
The absurd extrapolation was Brand's. The Govt's position on the committee of selection is entirely sensible.

Robert Hutton‏***@RobDotHutton*
Are the DUP part of the government?

Westminster Unionist‏***@WestminsterDUP*

No

Robert Hutton‏***@RobDotHutton*
Thank you. Is there then a way in which it is correct to say that the government has a majority in the Commons?

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/09/07/new-bigotry-name-tolerance-jacob-rees-mogg-shows-time-stand/
A new bigotry in the name of tolerance? Jacob Rees-Mogg shows it's time to stand up against liberal orthodoxy

No one expects the secular inquisition. Poor Tim Farron didn’t during the general election campaign: never mind Brexit, he was asked, what were his views on homosexuality? Sex and sin? His embarrassed spluttering lasted for weeks and eclipsed anything else the Liberal Democrats had to say.

'Poor Tim Farron', who was questioned about this every bit as much (if not more) by right wingers in order to discredit him and aid the Tory vote, by splitting the LD vote with Labour in LD / Tory battlegrounds.

Sky News‏*@SkyNews*
Boris Johnson says he is 'rock solid confident' of EU deal

news.sky.com/story/boris-johnson-says-he-is-rock-solid-confident-of-eu-deal-11024934

Staedtler‏*@Staedtler*
He isn't, but he's determined to paint Theresa May into a corner.

Eurosluggard‏*@eurosluggard*
1/20 I'm wondering whether Boris Johnson will be sacked soon. Hear me out...
2/ When #TheresaChavez™ became PM, Boris was still seen by many as a credible future PM, & had a power base.
3/ Bringing #Boris into Cabinet was (in terms of party management, not the national interest) a canny move by our Bolivarian leader...
4/ "better in tent pissing out, than outside pissing in"; if travelling abroad, he can't be plotting at home; "give him enough rope" #Boris
5/ (FWIW: I actually think #Mayduro's main reasoning was just to prevent #Boris from plotting & building support at home.)
6/ After election- with May weakened- we got pathetic spectacle of Boris's friends leaking to the press that he was loyally backing her.
7/ Most media even fell for this for a bit, buying the whopping lie that #Boris was leader-in-waiting & May surviving at his pleasure.
8/ May also fell for this bullshit put out by #Boris & his fans for a bit, thinking she was so weak she needed his backing to survive.
9/ But think about it for a sec. Can anybody honestly say they still think #Boris will ever be PM? No. He's shot, a busted flush, finished
10/ I always knew #Boris was a bad joke & moral outrage. But his execrable performance as Foreign Secretary has destroyed others' illusions.
11/ Not just "prosecco", "punishment beatings", "go whistle" but I'm still amazed he got away with this one...
12/ #Boris going to Libya & telling warlords that what leaders do in democracy is game elections for party advantage
13/ I don't think #TheresaMay is clever or Machiavellian enough to have planned this or known it's happen. She just wanted #Boris tied in.
14/ But by appointing Boris as Foreign Secretary, #TheresaMay has destroyed him, or rather caused him to destroy himself, doing us 1 favour.
15/ Given how pitifully weak #TheresaMay is, what she needs is to keep any serious leadership rivals close (Cabinet) so they're neutralised.
16/ That used to be #Boris; now he's just deadwood. A bedblocker, as well as a liability. So she may cull him & bring the new generation in.
17/ The non-entities (or rising stars) Tory commentariat is referring to when they talk about the party leadership "skipping a generation".
18/ As Cabinet ministers, these ppl would be loyal to #TheresaMay & fight to keep her in office, while they build up their own power base.
19/ They would defend & protect #TheresaMay (at least for now) cos they know their time to shine isn't now so they need to fight her corner.
20/ #Boris, in contrast, is worse than useless to #TheresaMay now. She gets no political benefit from him. That's why I think he's toast.//

www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/banks-complain-eu-citizens-are-no-longer-a-safe-bet-due-to-brexit-a3629011.html
Banks complain EU citizens are no longer a safe bet due to Brexit

Banks in London are no longer considering EU citizens a “safe bet” as uncertainty grows over their status post-Brexit, it was claimed today.
The London Assembly, which has investigated the rights of EU nationals, warned that some lenders had “become nervous” and were turning down customers for mortgages or loans.

www.politicshome.com/news/uk/political-parties/conservative-party/theresa-may/news/88799/theresa-may-i-am-not-robotic
Theresa May: I am not robotic

I'm afraid, that's not for you to judge and your lack of self awareness is actually part of the robotic problem Maybot.

Ha! DS2's school has sent home its half-termly "British values" sheet. On democracy.

A legal challenge to the Tory-DUP deal is to be heard in London in the next few weeks.

The basis of the claim is that any political agreement between the government and the DUP is in breach of the Good Friday agreement under which the government undertook to exercise its power in Northern Ireland “with rigorous impartiality on behalf of all the people in the diversity of their identities and traditions”.

The legal challenge also argues that the political deal breaches the Bribery Act 2010 and is in any event unlawful as a corrupt arrangement.

Meanwhile... DUP deny that their £1 billion sweetener is contingent on Stormont being restored.

"Not a penny" of the £1bn negotiated as part of the DUP-Tory deal will be released unless Stormont is restored, a Civil Service source has told the BBC. The £1bn in extra public spending for Northern Ireland was agreed in June, in exchange for the DUP's support for the minority Conservative government... But the DUP said the cash does not depend on local government at Stormont.

It's not been a good day for the DUP .

Re: Boris Johnson, TM might actually gain some political kudos if she did sack him. He no longer appears to be a threat but remains an enormous liability to the UK's reputation. (And, scratching head hard, has he achieved anything since becoming FS a year ago?)

For goodness sake. Isabel Oinkshott and Nigel Farage still getting an incredibly disproportionate amount of BBC airtime considering their representation (and lack of) and positions.

Farage attending German political gathering. Not a hint of irony about him being a bootlegger hobgoblin trying to spark political coups. He talked about unelected old men running Brussels. Had a laugh at the irony of that. Ok, he is an MEP. Doesn't represent in the capacity he was elected for, though. Not an elected MP. So unelected (wrt that sphere) old man eroding domestic politics. You are right Nigel. Enough of you and your types. Is Suzanne Evans elected by the general population? Another one always on, for some reason. Anyways, the member states Council representatives are gov't members and are elected by their respective countries. They set the agenda and the Commission carry it out in compliance with the treaties. So the people who set the EU agenda are democratically elected by their respective populations in a way Farage failed to be, despite numerous attempts.

Oinkshott says he is there at the political party gathering to represent British interests. not a meddling non-MP old man then. It would have been tickety-boo with Oinkshott et al if there had been MEP's etc. from the other member states political attending political rallies and supporting certain parties during the General election here, then. Donald Tusk alongside TM in Glaxo. With Tim and his spaniel in .. wherever. With Corbyn. They would have been frothing at the mouth.

To hell in a handcart. It is time to wake up from this bad dream soon.

Wonder how Farage and the other Kipper MEP's will vote in the EP
on the question of sufficient progress being made on the Brexit discussions? Of course we are more likely to hear from and about the Kippers, despite them only making up around a third of British MEP's. From their airtime, one would be forgiven in thinking British MEP's were exclusively UKIP.

Will they be happy with the Con's negotiations or will they feel not enough progress has been made to move on? Or will they vote at all?

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-theresa-may-speech-tory-party-conference-eu-parliament-vote-a7934721.html

Ha! DS2's school has sent home its half-termly "British values" sheet. On democracy.

Is it good? Does it talk about the relationship of the Courts, the Media and the Government? Does it talk about transparency and accountability? Does it talk about debating issues and representation of the interests of all people regardless of how they voted. And how this is an ongoing process that never stops? Does it talk about the Overton window?

Or just about voting and elections? With winners and losers. And parties.

Or worse, 'The Will Of the People'?