Westministenders: Teetering on the edge

[RedToothBrush]

12 weeks to go.

There is rising confidence in the Extreme Brexiteer camp as well as open comments about how they can deliberately force through No Deal. Remember No Deal is the default. Every political crisis that takes up time makes no deal more likely and the ERG can just be obstructive to facilitate a political crisis. Parliament DO NOT have the ultimate power to stop Brexit - unless the government effectively allow an option to do so. And there is no sign May will let this ever happen. No Deal takes us back to pre-industrial revolution Britain in many social and economic ways. Which will please Jacob Rees-Mogg no end.

No Deal prep is now costing us a fortune - and is no where near sufficient in its scope. Won't someone think of all the extra that could have been put into the NHS.

Parliament returns next week. I hope you have enjoyed your Christmas break. What will happen in 2019 no one knows; the only certainity is turbulance and lurching from crisis to crisis. If we don't get hit by Brexit, maybe it will be the US shutdown crisis or the collaspe in the Chinese economy that will get us. Economists are nervous and thats generally not a good thing for the average person on the street.

Time to get in the euros, stock up on the tomatoes, invest in books and otherwise batten down the hatches financially whilst we await the coming storm in the hope that the forecasters are as good as Michael Fish in 1987.

whymewhynow referenced a Guardian article about it which also had interviews with others which make it more interesting.
I think it worked as a discussion piece just to get people talking and questioning. I have not seen it and can't but it will be interesting to get your 'take' on it RTB.

Thanks Mother
{We would need to apply to rejoin and under article 49 , it would require a unanimous vote by the rEU.}
In my view IF the UK had been acting like grown ups and had been making a real effort to negotiate properly from the outset, something that the EU would have gladly helped with then getting a unanimous vote from the EU27 would have been relatively easy.
Now, as the UK gov have spent over 2 years arguing like spoiled brats and hurling insults at all and sundry, that possibility is getting remote.

Mother Of course the UK will have lost business and money even with a quick Rejoin, compared to never having left.
We have also lost some even if Revoke happens tomorrow, because some things won't return
However, better to Revoke or, if need be, to Rejoin quickly, rather than to stay outside the EU for 20 years.

The reasons for the EU probably still offering / accepting a Fast Track Rejoin - if the UK decides within say 3 years of Brexit - instead of the full A49 process, are:

• that the UK would still be mostly geared up to the EU and its agencies
  So there isn't the usual long period of adjustment during the Accession period

• that analysts here think that for several countries, Britain leaving with No Deal would be as bad as as the 2008 financial countries
  (Of course that is further indication that for the UK a No Deal would be more like economic Armageddon)

The EU tend to make pragmatic decisions, rather than emotional self-harming ones
and it is most certainly in their interests to have the UK back in

There would be much support to avoid a complete UK humiliation - Versailles taught the continent better than that
So a quick Rejoin is quite likely to retain UK opt-outs, especially if the reality check of Brexit No Deal brings a new PM & govt with new pplicies, attitudes and politeness

The RoI would especially drive this within the EU and there is great sympathy for them and trying to keep the GFA on track.

I know we nearly all want a Revoke now, but don't rubbish all the alternate plans if that doesn't happen:

Cameron & Remainers rubbishing EFTA was a big reason why after the Ref the Brexiters were able to switch so quickly to demanding a hard Brexit instead and get so much public support

Let's not posion the well again

Grieve amendment selected for debate!! Woah!

The UK is a valuable market for the E27 and they know they will sell far less to a bankrupt and humilated offshore archipelago

So anything that doesn't involve damaging the SM - which would cause much worse harm - or damaging the GFA;
the EU would be willing to treat the UK, formerly its #2 economy and #1 military power, as a special case

Sam Coates Times**@SamCoatesTimes
NEW

The government say they think their motion is "bomb proof" - ie cannot be amended by things like the new Grieve amendment.

< 😂😂 whoops, here comes a bomb - Time for ministers to hide under the table >

.

Look like it'll be warfare from MPs. Buckle up, here comes the end of this debacle.

Activities such as the ports of Rotterdam and others that have lashed out tons of money. If the UK were to end up back in via some mechanism it is not necessarily money wasted as it could be viewed as improvements that will make onward trading a little more efficient.
How the UK gets from where it is now to being 'stable' again, either in or out is anyone's guess now.

Brexiters spitting out their dummies over Bercow decision
e.g. telegraph:

Steven Swinfordd@Steven*_Swinford

We are now in full-fledged constitutional crisis territory.

Bercow has accepted the Grieve amendment which his own clerks say is against the standing orders of the House.

This is going to be carnage.^
.....
Alex Wickhamm@alexwickham*

One ERG MP suggests he and his colleagues could protest by referring to John Bercow as "Mr Remainer" rather than "Mr Speaker" in the Commons...

< rude and might even get them suspended ? >

Now death threats from anonymous person on Conservative website:

Nick Boles MPP@NickBoles*

Received this charming message through my website last night.
If the inadequate who sent knew anything about me he would realise I need no reminding that my days are numbered!^

{the EU would be willing to treat the UK, formerly its #2 economy and #1 military power, as a special case}
Unfortunately I see that as a very significant problem. Unless the UK really experiences a significant period of real shit that it has caused, it will forever be 'crowing' about how it 'defeated' the EU. That would be so toxic and run permanently. The almost total destruction of Germany by the end of WW2 changed their outlook on life massively, and probably for the better. The UK needs a similar 'resetting' of it's place in the world, preferably without killing a significant part of the population.

The police absolutely must protect MPs from the aggressive Brexiter demonstrators outside the HoC

1pm for the Grieve amendment apparently, Bercow deciding whether it's voteable.

I wish I'd taken a screen shot this morning as it now seems to have disappeared 🤔 but on the BBC app they had a graph showing the results of 11 polls taken over the past few weeks on what 'the people' wanted now...

In every poll more wanted 'no deal' than any other option (which were a PV, WA, revoke from memory).

I'm a huge remainer but I think that goes to show that we're somewhat in a bubble on this thread when we talk about revoke and PV sadly

Crawling back to Rejoin would be enough of a humilation

• which is why it would be very difficult for any UK govt to do without months, maybe a couple of years of economic disaster

My concern is more that a Tory govt would never decide to go through such a humilation,
rather than that the EU would try to make it worse by removing optouts etc

Already, the UK has suffered economically and would continue to do so, even with a Revoke tomorrow

I know it's probably wrong, but in a way I'd like to think the escalating behaviour of the "Brexiteer" thugs (just for the record, I'm calling them out as a rentamob with no connection to the political dimension of Brexit) is actually a good thing for moderates and remainers. Especially as it's being called out in the MSM.

The more yobbish they get, the harder it is for people who have claimed to be moderates to ally themselves with the bad boys of Brexit.

Not exactly a tide turning, but certainly a direction of travel shifting slightly.

Oh...here it is, found it!

Umpteen That doesn't agree with the polls we've posted over the last months,
including the giant 25k YouGov poll which had Remain several pts ahead of No Deal.

Did you misread, or was the BBC playing silly buggers

e.g. from the poll analyst Peter Kellner:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/20/polls-stay-eu-yougov-brexit-peoples-vote

In every poll more wanted 'no deal' than any other option (which were a PV, WA, revoke from memory).

Yes, but I'm sure people would also want a lot of things that may not be possible to deliver. No income tax. Free prosecco with every episode of Call The Midwife. No rain on bank holidays ?

Just draping "the will of the people" around an idea doesn't make it a good idea, let alone possible.

mother The law is A49, but that can be Fast-Tracked, as he said,
or the UK - if it decides in 10+ years - can go through the whole process like a completely new member

Without context that poll is a waste of electrons.