Westministenders: The One Where We Finally Get A Leadership Challenge?

[RedToothBrush]

Tick tick tick.

What do we think?

Yes? No?

Another week of wtf-ing at British politics.

Owen "only a madman would actually leave the Single Market" Paterson and David Davis have been on a jolly to the USA to discuss trade deals. Who is funding a few backbenchers doing this?

Owen Paterson MP
@OwenPaterson
Really positive discussions on the future of UK/Oklahoma trade relationship. Sadly impossible to implement with the Draft Withdrawal Agreement as UK will not control its own tariffs or regulatory environment

Replying to @OwenPaterson
Mike K Retweeted Owen Paterson MP
Nobody tell @OwenPaterson that Oklahoma isn’t able to enter into trade agreements either as that’s a matter for the federal government in the US. I’m sure it was a nice junket anyway.Mike K added,

twitter.com/mpk/status/1063902476041158658

Some of the comments are good.

Replying to @mpk @OwenPaterson
Also note that Oklahoma represents slightly less than 1% of US GDP. In European terms it’s about level with Romania or Greece. About 7% that of the UK. It’s absolutely desperate stuff to think this would even move the needle in terms of replacing lost trade from the EU.

Michael Cross
@mdcrossy

They’re over for the beef lobby cash I expect.

Mike K
‏***@mpk*

Ah, of course. Looking for opportunities to offload that hormone-filled beef with a dodgy animal welfare record which can’t be sold to the EU..

Mike K
@mpk

Clarification: Oklahoma’s more a grain state, so this is probably about opening the UK markets up to the dumping of overproduced wheat (thus undercutting local farmers) more than it is about beef.Mike K added,

Owen Paterson saying he'd protect farmers. Just didn't say which ones.

Even the Chair of the Tory party in Boston and Skegness said, much as he loathed the deal, it was better than the chaos of No Deal or the climb down of No Brexit.

Climb down of Brexit is best of all. Sharp humilation now, followed by swift economic recovery.

This deal is simply long drawn out painful humiliation and hassle followed by climb down (or rather clamber back) into the EU.

Some of the stuff that leaches away - up to £6 billion of the city’s £26 billion cross border trade not covered by equivalence (ie private, retail and commercial banking, fund management, insurance etc) may never return.

It's funny how keen they were on the EEA/EFTA which they must have been when citing Switzerland and Norway, but now that's not the deal they want. All bar Nadine Dorries of course, who wants the full EU package, but doesn't seem to know why it's not an option if you want to Leave.

Very late placemat King - thanks for the updates, but God it's painful.

I read the ERG thing. They don't seem to have grasped that we can't negotiate a trade deal Super Canada or Super Mauritania or whatever until we have a withdrawal agreement.
And we can't have a withdrawal agreement that destroys the Good Friday Agreement. Unless you are the kind of stupid twat that wants to destroy the Good Friday Agreement like, say, the DUP MPs. Or you are too much of a stupid twat to realise ta importance.
Or you didn't know that Dover was important.
Stellar bunch of dickheads.

Companies that have moved out, or are intending to move out won't return, they can't afford to move twice and with the volatility and gross stupidity of the UK governments (both main parties) there is no stability for the longer term. It's a bit more serious than moving your deckchair further along the beach.

If the UK had said calmly to the EU at the beginning that we would like to leave, can we talk about it, things could have worked out. Instead we have had 2 1/2 years of abuse, name calling, disrespect and have not even presented a full list of what the UK would like to achieve.
Those in Europe at all impacted by trade with the UK speak English and have been following this shitshow since day one and each new headline,in the press or TV with further namecalling of other EU countries is banging another nail into the coffin.
Read the zillions of threads on MN about 'abusive partners' and it is a perfect example of what the UK has been doing.
The EU is sad that the UK wants to leave as there are millions who work jointly across Europe in high tech industries who have every wish to remain but this must be destroyed to achieve what?

The EU knows full well that ‘the UK’ as a whole doesn’t want to leave. Not Scotland, not NI, not the majority of the population - simply slightly more of the referendum voters. Not even the majority of MPs,

They can see what has happened in this country - a population pulled to a cliff edge by a motley, disparate bunch of MPs, dodgy media, even dodgier figures such as Banks and Farage with a bit of help from Russian and neoCon Americans.

It’s not dissimilar to what the French went through with Pétain - who divided their country within living memory.

Most European countries are familiar with crackpot nationalism. It’s just very odd that this should be happening to us, now.

I am really loving the idea that JRM has spent the day trying to work out who has lied to him about the letters, trying to encourage more people to send in their letters and slowly realising that he doesn't have the support he thinks he has.

John Major said in his Nick Robinson interview that the ERG were a party within a party, that they had their own whips and were acting independently. He said it was unsustainable.

Owen Paterson's constituency is very farming dominated. But they still all vote for him! 😡

Conversation
Adam Fleming
Adam Fleming
@adamfleming
A #BREXIT UPDATE: EU27 ambassadors and
@MichelBarnier
this afternoon discussed an ultimate end date for a potentially extended transition/implementation period of December 2022. The Westminster situation was described as "volatile". (1)
5:21 pm · 18 Nov 2018 · Twitter Web Client
177
Retweets
222
Likes
Adam Fleming
Adam Fleming
@adamfleming
·
3h
Replying to
@adamfleming
They also discussed 2 "problems" in talks about the political declaration on the future relationship:
the UK wants to include a Chequers-style free trade area in goods...
and wants the status quo in internal security.
The political declaration could be 14-20 pages long (2)
Adam Fleming
Adam Fleming
@adamfleming
·
3h
Spain also raised some serious concerns about Gibraltar which officials suspect could grow in the coming days. Although the message to the member states was: keep a lid on your concerns and they'll be dealt with in the negotiations over the future relationship. (3)

Sarah Wollaston MP @ sarahwollaston
Suggest for his next press conference @JacobReesMogg leads all 48 of the #Mogglodytes in single file to Mr Brady’s office bearing aloft their little letters. What a spectacle that would be

At least we would know who had actually written & end the weekly circus of threats. The #standupforbrexit cabal don’t stand for anything but chaos

Wow.

The thought of Boris and DD meeting to decide which of them will be PM. To have one of them representing our country would be deeply shameful.

Faisal Islam Retweeted
Mark Stone@Stone_SkyNews
·_
As @SkyNews^ reported on Friday night, the EU say that there can be no renegotiation of the 585-page #Brexit withdrawal agreement (UK negotiators agree with this view too!)^
but the 8-page outline of the future relationship is still subject to negotiations now

Steven Swinfordd@Steven*_Swinford (Telegraph)
·
Dom Raab reveals he has been talking to the 'gang of five' who stayed in Cabinet since resigning about how they can change the PM's Brexit deal.

So serving Cabinet ministers are working with those that quit to try to force the PM's hand

Katy Ballss@katyballs* (Spectator)

Raab tells Andrew Marr he would back Theresa May in a confidence vote
- another sign anti-deal Brexiteers are split on best way forward

Carole Cadwalladrr@carolecadwalla*

This quote from @DamianCollins, the chair of fake news inquiry, absolutely hits nail on the head.
What’s going on is so much bigger than Britain.
We are one part of much darker global forces.
But we haven’t even recognised this.
Let alone started to investigate it

BCF, You said this months ago if I recall.

Does anyone else think Jeremy Vine is a leaver?

We are one part of much darker global forces.

Yes, billionaires keen to replace the aristocracy of yore- not just in wealth but political power.
It's what the French call the Ancien Regime version 2.0. And global.

Thanks again Red (et al). Sorry I’m late again - busy couple of days at work

Lewis Goodall @ lewis_goodall
Over the past 72 hours three Brexiter Tory MPs have speculated to me that the party might well split if there’s a confidence vote and May wins. Quite an irony of the past three years if it’s the Conservatives, not Labour, who end up going their separate ways.

And thats why the are more afraid of putting in letters than we realise.

Tom Newton Dunn @tnewtondunn
Brexit latest: May risks two more Cabinet resignations after refusing to negotiate Irish backstop - but Gove will stay on until the end;

www.thesun.co.uk/news/brexit/7772140/theresa-may-resignations-irish-backstop/amp/?__twitter_impression=true
Theresa May risks TWO more Cabinet resignations over her refusal to negotiate the Irish backstop deal
Allies of Penny Mordaunt and Andrea Leadom have revealed the Cabinet ministers could quit if Mrs May fails to ensure Britain retains the power to leave the Customs Union when it wants to

Helena Lee
The Times:

Don’t hunt May like Thatcher, Tories told

#tomorrowspaperstoday

Alex Wickham @alexwickham
That would be the Andrew Mitchell who spent half of last year trying to convince colleagues to oust May on behalf of David Davis