Westminstenders: The beginning of the dictatorship and the end of Boris?

[RedToothBrush]

Brexit is being fought in the UK media and parliament on the premise that the EU is being difficult and obstructive.

The fallacy can not be understated.

What the UK fails to understand is the right of the EU to put their own interests before the UKs. It doesn't under that our demands cannot be met even if the EU wanted to for practical and legal reasons - not political ones because our understanding of the situation and law is so poor.

The net result is the slippage of the next phase of Brexit talks being pushed to Christmas by the EU due to lack of progress by the UK. Barnier is open to more regular and intense talks but this is bad news for the UK with the a50 clock ticking.

The main stumbling block is NI a with Barnier warning not to use the border as a way to test EU resolve. Brexit always about the NI border. The UK have never provided a solution to the EU that does not produce a hard border. The idea being pushed by the UK will create one despite claiming it won't. The reality is the only viable solutions are either staying in the single market and customs union or NI being granted special status and being different to the rest of the country. The former is opposed by the government, the later opposed by the DUP.

The DUP are getting a taste of their own medicine. They have been warned that Assembly Members might have pay frozen and if they don't reform Stormont they won't get their Billion Pound Booty. Plus Ian Paisley Jr just found a new scandal for the party.

May is trying to channel Venezuela by getting rid of democracy when it suits. The Great Repel Bill (aka as the Withdrawal Bill) faces it's challenge. The much feared Henry VIII in clause 9 are not only facing criticism from Remainers but also from the secretive crackpots of Tory Bastard Club (aka ERG). The TBC want hard cliff edge Brexit. May seems to support given her goodwill burning interference at the Home Office which seeks to discriminate against all foreigners and make them sign a register. The visa system and how it will attract much needed staff for the NHS makes the mind boggle.

The Repel Bill also could end the possibility of transition due to clause 6 which requires us to leave the ECJ. Given the May's ambition to make EU citizens display their stars in job applications this is totally unable to the EU. If it passes the chances of transition drop dramatically. Bye bye Smooth and Orderly.

Then there is the May-Bot paradox: the one were she gives a friendly speech to the EU and a nasty on to the Swivel Eyed Loon gathering. As if neither will be reported to the other audience.

On top of this May is attempting the Parliament Rigging Act as she has a 'majority Government'. Yep I know, this is the general election version of 'will of the people'. The Rigging Act seeks to stack parliamentary committees with Tory majorities so they can stop any bill they don't like getting anywhere need the main chamber this limiting the power of opposition to irrelevant. Sadly I think this one will get through due to maths of the HoC atm.

We shouldn't forget the role of the HoL though and the lack of a majority government (why do you think May is saying majority government? It's down to the Sewell convention and trying to make the case it applies when the argument is it doesn't for a minority government).

The other development is the rumours that Boris is for the boot. And Rees-Mogg might get a promotion.

There is such a thing as a citizenship service in France.
Both men and women have to do this.
It's seen as the most boring 3 days of your life.

I dint think such a thing will come back again.
3 days or so is too short to brainwash people.
Longer period (like 1 year as for military service) is too long. We do not have the infrastructure to accommodate that many people for so long anymore. And the people to do the training.

The military would be horrified about having to fight a war - or even "peace-keeping" - with reluctant conscripts.
Soldiering is a skilled occupation now.

Officers would also be worried about being dragged before a war crimes tribunal as a result of feral conscripts losing it against civilians.

and the lessons of conscript GIs fragging their officers in VietNam have been thoroughly noted.

Gulliver in reverse – Britain and the illusion of sovereignty

http://borderlex.eu/gulliver-in-reverse-britain-and-the-illusion-of-sovereignty/

As it leaves the EU and forges new trade arrangements Britain will have to adopt rules and regulations largely set by others.
The much prized sovereignty pursued by Brexit proponents increasingly appears like a contrived illusion,

As a medium-sized economy, outside the EU and with no say in its policy-making, the UK would be reduced to a passive rule taker, not a rule maker.

A kind of Gulliver in reverse, it resembles a small person bound by multiple threads woven by giants.

Nearly 20 years here and one of the first question i get asked is 'where are you coming form?'

A lot of towns and villages are full of people with very very narrow horizons. I've only ever lived in England and Wales and am white British, but we moved around a lot as a child. I got sick and tired of being asked where I came from every time I opened my mouth because my accent was different. I eventually moved to an area which had seen rapid expansion - and hurray, we are all 'incomers' here, and don't live in streets where everyone is related to everyone else and has ancestors who have been there since the Domesday book.

Some sort of conscription could backfire. Think of how things got shaken up during the war years with people moved from one end of the country to the other, and different classes mixing with each other. The deference which some wealthy thought they were entitled to went out of the window, when such people realised that they had to earn respect.

Richard North in a btl comment on his latest blog:

"I'm asking Mrs EUReferendum to buy emergency stocks of food and other essentials."

Some sort of conscription could backfire. Think of how things got shaken up during the war years with people moved from one end of the country to the other, and different classes mixing with each other. The deference which some wealthy thought they were entitled to went out of the window, when such people realised that they had to earn respect.

That's why we have commissioned officers from the right families to keep the riff-raff in check. That said, one of histories ironies is that it was an egalitarian Royal Navy which become the dominant world superpower at the expense of the French and Spanish who insisted on class before ability.

May challenged to debate Brexit issues with MEPs

< but she's too frit >

https://edition.independent.co.uk/editions/uk.co.independent.issue.130917/data/7943891/index.html

European Parliament Green group co-leader Philippe Lamberts had stern words for Ms May about her non-attendance:

“The impression I get of her is that she is a lady out of her depth,

meaning that she is reaching the very edge of her skills now, and I think it’s starting to show.

The fact that Ms May hasn’t come, and if I were her advisor I would have advised her the same,
I think she had more to lose by coming and I think it was the right calculation for her.
If she were coming to Brussels or to Strasbourg I think she would risk further weakening the UK’s position.”

< pretty damning about her lack of ability - of course the EU rumbled this months ago >

Conscription worked well in Germany, but cost too much to continue the civil component when there was no need for the military.
If Germany decided they couldn't justify the costs ....

"I'm asking Mrs EUReferendum to buy emergency stocks of food and other essentials."

How come he gets to talk Britain down without being branded a traitor?

Nearly 20 years here and one of the first question i get asked is 'where are you coming form?'

The first question you get asked in my village - regardless of who it is - from a stranger is almost always how long you have lived here.

There's two sides to this. Some of the 'greys' use it as a way to almost assert authority over you. Some of the newer people who have moved in, during the last ten years or so, do it to establish a common link or understanding of your background (lots of southerners have moved into the area).

I personally am starting to have a real issue with the question. It almost straight away sets up people for some kind of stereotyping or even discrimination.

However if its any consolation, I do think its not necessarily an anti-foreigner thing. Its more a 'local place for local people attitude' or a symptom of nomadic lifestyles of the middle classes who don't have the same fixed roots they once did.

The UK has a real thing about this, and I think that the diversity of our accents and how we form identity from that is quintessentially British.

I must admit, I am also having real issues with it at the moment, because of this superiority thing going on and how it highlights a clash of cultures. It actively prevents people from integrating. This doesn't just mean people of difficult religions or skin colours. This also includes making it extremely difficult for the mobile middle classes to form the next generation of people who are caretakers and custodians of their local communities though the closed cliqueyness of them.

The problem also being that these cliques are oblivious to how unwelcoming and hostile they can be to new people, and just put lack of involvement down to 'not caring'. The lack of willingness to nuture this by the established community, is part of the problem.

Some sort of conscription could backfire.

The Tories currently have just 6% of the 18 - 25 vote. They didn't exactly go well with the 25 - 49 age group either.

Not entirely sure they have a huge amount of ground to lose over proposing the idea. Even if its deeply unpopular with the young, they still clearly need something pretty radical to turn their fortunes around.

Think of how things got shaken up during the war years with people moved from one end of the country to the other, and different classes mixing with each other.

What do you think will happen with the young unemployed and our lack of farming labour if we have a labour shortage? They will be forced one way or another to move around the country for work. There will be no unemployment benefits.

I can well see unemployment benefits being wrapped up/linked with national citizen service in someway.

Going to be a Bad flu winter apparently
That should worry Tory HQ

They will be forced one way or another to move around the country for work. There will be no unemployment benefits.

I think there could be unexpected benefits. As with MIL during the war years - coming from one of those villages where everyone had lived there since the year dot and a trip to a town ten miles away was a huge event - her horizons were opened massively by being directed into munitions work and eventually going to the other end of the country. So much so that she never wanted to go back.

Going to be a Bad flu winter apparently
That should worry Tory HQ

Nope, it will kill a few of us plebs off.

Irish passport forms sent for...

David Lammy‏*@DavidLammy*

Absolutely pathetic non-answer. Govnt have done 50 studies of impact of Brexit on economy. Publish so Parliament and the public can see

I'll stick my neck out right here and say that if the Treasury are doing an exercise in contingency planning to the extent Hammond is saying, then these impact studies can't be too clever can they?

Can't think why on earth the government is trying to keep them secret.

www.ft.com/content/6ce603d6-0ec4-3bc0-a7ca-0d893e1e69ac
Overseas territories warn of ‘catastrophic’ post-Brexit funding loss and Falklands risk

Anguilla gets 36% of its budget from the EU.

Travel was a particular concern for territories such as Anguilla, which has described itself as “Britain’s forgotten EU border”. The island is only five miles from the much larger French and Dutch St Martin, which many residents rely on for school, work and social services.

Pitcairn Islands would have problems with isolation if they could not continue to have the same freedom of movement with other EU overseas territories nearby such as French Polynesia

Monserrat is still reliant on aid since a volcanic eruption 20 years ago.

The Government of St Helena noted that St Helena was a net importer, and that the depreciation of Sterling had thus already had a disproportionate impact on its economy. Capital aid from the EU had formed as much as 10% of its GDP, which had allowed significant improvements to the island, including cliff stabilisation, wharf widening, customs and freight terminals, and rebuilding of roads.

The governor of the Falklands is worried about how it will affect support for the UK's claim to the islands and whether Spain in particular might side with Argentina.

Eighty per cent of all Falkland Islands exports go to the rest of the EU, other than the UK

Some see real opportunities for them, but even the most optimist think Oversea Territories will just be forgotten making any benefits outweighed by the problems.

They have written to David Davis

Letter here
www.parliament.uk/documents/lords-committees/eu-select/Correspondence-2017-19/11-09-17-Overseas-Territories-letter-to-David-Davis-MP.pdf

A Hard No Deal Brexit will cripple these territories.

The British Virgin Islands is already struggling following Irma and it has been suggested that civil unrest is a real possibility with looters and armed gangs roaming the island. The UK has set police over to try and help manage the situation. They last thing they need would be May dropping the Mother of All Brexit Exit Bombs on them.

I would get the most enormous satisfaction, if within the next couple of months, we could have a number of by elections, 8 or so, with Labour, LibDems and SNP taking all the vacated seats. Then the Tories losing their majority completely, even with the DUP stitch up, and their chairpersons being booted off all the committees. The Tories wouldn't half bellyache about it, but it would be exactly what they voted for.
(Fantasy, I know.)

I would get the most enormous satisfaction, if within the next couple of months, we could have a number of by elections, 8 or so, with Labour, LibDems and SNP taking all the vacated seats.

I have my dolls and pins ready

Oh, and apropos of the crisis meme, Birmingham is continuing it's role as trailblazer by having it's bins uncollected for about 3 months (well to be fair ours has been collected once in 3 months).

So we've already got that "Winter of Discontent" look. Plus storm Aileen to ready move those black bags and boxes around.

(Little tip for any Brummies near the "Velo" course on Sunday. Move your rubbish bags onto the route of the ride. I have a feeling that they will be magically cleared away before the race. Remember: Birmingham has hopes pretensions of hosting the 2022 Commonwealth games).

So what are you doing with your bins LH?
And why is it that we haven't heard a word about that either??

So what are you doing with your bins LH?

We can easily store a couple of months rubbish securely (mainly by reducing our wastage ...)

And why is it that we haven't heard a word about that either??

You tell me ?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-41230192

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-41242437

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-41232076

I'm getting my dolls and pins out ready for Strictly (there is a "Strictly BitchPod" group on Facebook which is our autumn/winter entertainment)..... I can always multi-purpose

It must stink. And attract vermin.

Anyone see Giles Fraser with Liam Halligan on Daily Politics? What a strange little jolly without any substance at the end. The bit where LH started going about the opportunities which Brexit may present. Oh YY from GF. But no mention of what opportunities. That was the talk it up twaddle method over airwaves. If there are opportunities, what are they? Just, there are lots of opportunities. Too many to mention or allude to a single one.

DUP going to vote with Labour on NHS pay and tuition fees later today