Westminstenders: Don't Panic!

[RedToothBrush]

It's official

Brexit is like an episode of Dads Army with the government, being Captain Mainwaring's trusty band of elite forces doing battle against the evil Mr Barnier.

Yesterday Parliament gave back control to the executive as it surrendered parliamentary sovereignty to Janus faced May. Grieve, it has to be said, truly did look like a broken man as he gave his speech in the commons. Not that we should have too much sympathy. After all he did just put party before country.

So where are we now? The ERG are happy. They have successfully bullied enough until everyone else gave up and folded. They now have no incentive to compromise, as they know that no one can stand up to them. They want no deal, and it's no deal they will force.

The EU are thoroughly fed up and it's difficult to see them do anything but cut us loose saying Brexit means Brexit, this is what you wanted. They have stepped up planning for no deal and their plans were already much more advanced than ours.

We go into the next round of talks with a solution to the Irish Border looking further away than ever. Not helped by the fact that brexit nationalism is restricted to England alone, with many being happy to let NI be sunk into the Irish sea and the favour the rebuilding of Hadrian's wall in order to keep out the foreigners.

It's hard to resist simply sitting down wailing "we doomed". But try to resist and keep saying, you are against this crap. If only so history books don't just say we all agreed to this clusterfuck.

Here have a fluffy bunny to help comfort you.

I did like this, from The Register article

Whitehall STEM boards and working groups – often staffed by policy wonks – don't include enough practical industry or commercial experience to spot key problems and deliver effective solutions, the report said.

Also, one of the comments which mentioned that as far as politicians are concerned, the only degree that is valued/valuable is PPE (or words to that effect)

Yes I'd have qualms about any referendum ever again, given that it can be influenced by malign or external forces. The Peoples' Vote is maybe a more simple question than before... do you like the deal that's been negotiated, or would you prefer to stay? It seems logical to have a choice when you can see what Brexit would actually mean. (However I don't suppose the Govt would put those options on the paper!)
And I agree that it's not up to us whether we can turn round before March and request to stay after all. The EU might just say no and then where would we be? So how can we be given that choice?
The March may be a way of showing dissatisfaction with how it's going.... hoping the Government take note.

Yes I'd have qualms about any referendum ever again, given that it can be influenced by malign or external forces.

Isn't there a saying about refereda being the tool of tyrants ?

Of course the Great British Public were softened up for the idea of referenda by the sleaze and expense scandals previously where they lost a lot of respect (and considering the low bar involved, that was something) for politicians.

I guess this is an endemic problem in any complex system. When you aren't directly aware of what a particular component does, it's very easy to ask "what does this do ?" without really understanding the answer. I'm sure that's been packaged into a story about a CEO who walks around his company firing all the people whose jobs he can't understand.

I am also dubious about another referendum - if Russia bought the last one, what’s to stop them doing it again? The government sure as hell isn’t investigating the corruption.

What’s needed is for some brave MPs - or ideally the Labour Party as a whole - to come out and tell the truth. Any form of Brexit will leave us worse of than we are now, at minimum. They need to oppose the whole damn thing and put Remain in their manifesto.

Wonder if this will gain any traction:

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/campaign-to-stop-brexit-by-momentum-grassroots-piles-pressure-on-corbyn-over-second-referendum_uk_5b2b920be4b0040e27401b02?guccounter=1

The basic information was 'out there' well before the actual vote. The main problem being that many ignored the relatively 'sensible' phase (because there were more exciting things to look at) but then the ridiculous 'posters on buses' and similar nonsense kicked in and all reasoned discussion was ignored.
Business on the other hand probably took notice at the early stage and started to create plans.

Anyone care to suggest who the UK's next 'best buddy' will be?
Any country Russia/USA/China/??? or bloc with a big pile of money prepared to invest in the UK.

Business on the other hand probably took notice at the early stage and started to create plans.

Unlikely. "As above, so below". I think part of the problem businesses have had is trying to operate when quite a proportion of senior management "don't see the problem".

Imagine trying to suggest to a boss like Dyson that perhaps the company should look to preparing for a negative Brexit. You'd be sidelined at best, or at worst let go for "an attitude problem".

I seem to recall a bit in where Britain joins the Warsaw Pact...

I know some multi nationals have been making plans, they are increasingly despairing of getting any sense out of the meetings they hold with the government. They are quietly drawing up plans to disinvest in the UK and move that investment to other Eu sites. But because of fears of the public backlash if they were upfront about this they are not saying a word about this, just announcing small long planned investments, the serious money is going to go elsewhere.

Business, especially UK business, are used to working within a given legal & trading framework.
They often have problems handling even minor changes to this

When the entire framework is torn up and reset to Year Zero,
many have no idea of the consequences,
or that they need to invest significant resources in planning how to deal with this.
Year Zero is not a major topic at Business School.

Although many international businesses are aware to some extent, through the EU stakeholder warnings,
most UK businesses - even though the same EU warnings are available to them - have not even bothered to read them.
Because we're British
and we'll muddle through

So the Uk will lose some business abroad
and some other businesses - not just minnows - to going broke through wilful ignorance & arrogance.

Service businesses that are solely dependent on Uk private customers having discretionary spending money

• e.g. restaurants, hairdressers, nailbars etc -

can do very little planning, other than not expanding and also ruthlessly closing down any business that can't do well even before Brexit bites.

Being right when everyone else is wrong can be fatal to your career prospects.
You'll be sacked long before being proved right that the King / Boss is in the Altogether

If you think the company is doomed unless …
then assume "unless" won't happen there and move jobs to where it does

Being right when everyone else is wrong can be fatal to your career prospects.

Not if you're the Brexiteers favorite poet ....

When I lived in the US, alongside the presidential ballot, there were a number of issues put to the vote locally. I can't remember exactly, but I think about 6-7, ranging from a new charter school to the legalisation of cannabis to ending battery farmed eggs.

About 8 weeks before the vote every household received an A4 booklet setting out the process for the vote and the issues to be decided. Each issue received a double-page spread, containing a summary of the arguments, a summary of the arguments against, where to find more information and the exact text that was proposed to be inserted into legislation.

If we ever have another referendum, it needs to be managed along these lines, not how Brexit was run. Going on official documents only, I knew more about chickens in cages than the consequences of leaving the EU...

If we ever have another referendum

We won't.

OK change my assertion to multinationals then. I think that might actually make the situation worse somehow as the multis 'simply'(!) shift staff around and most likely will receive grants from the EU or host country to help the move.

I think that might actually make the situation worse somehow as the multis 'simply'(!) shift staff around

dual nationals considered ....

@Olennas
You mean no big red buses and promises of unicorns?

By the way, in the way of keeping an eye for odd things post-2016, does anyone have any proper knowledge about the alleged CO₂ shortage ? All seems a bit odd to me.

(So where's all that CO₂ by-product of brewing going to ?)

I emailed MNHQ yesterday to see if Brexit could be made more prominent as it will stuff everyone.
I see that Mcdoogles ice creams being withdrawn is more important to MN, along with naming your child.

From today's i:

TV Apology for lunch taken 3 minutes early.

Japanese officials have apologised in a televised news conference after it emerged a civil servant occasionally took his lunch break three minutes early. The unnamed 64 year old in Kobe was docked half a day's pay over the "habitual" slipping away just before noon, which he did 26 times over a seven-month period.

Just thinking of the talk yesterday about different cultural practices outside the EU. Don't think David Davies would last very long in Japan.

Yes Multi Nationals can move staff pretty easily, we were shifted very easily out of UK alongside a fair few other Brits.

Japanese officials have apologised in a televised news conference after it emerged a civil servant occasionally took his lunch break three minutes early. The unnamed 64 year old in Kobe was docked half a day's pay over the "habitual" slipping away just before noon, which he did 26 times over a seven-month period.

In times gone by, he'd have (literally) lost his head.