Westminstenders: What The Hell Happens Next?!

[RedToothBrush]

John Bercow has just spent over at an hour dealing with a Points of Order, in which he has argued that he is defending the soverignty of the House of Commons and that is his duty, not to simply to be a cheerleader for the executive.

Taking back control seems to have rather upset ERG Brexiteers.

As Jess Phillips astutely pointed out:
"People only care about procedures, and protecting and conserving the procedures, when they don't like the outcome of the thing that is about to happen and never when it is going in their favour."

And given what we have seen the Executive do over the last few months in terms of trying to use procedure for its own political gain, this is quite a fair point.

There are however certain constitutional questions this is all raising. And we have a very real constitutional crisis here.

Bercow has ruled that he CAN allow an amendment (because the previous vote had prevented only a motion and a debate) put forward by Grieve to go to a vote.

This amendment would - if it is passed by the house - require May to report to the house within 3 days if the WA fails to pass next week.

This would be a significant victory, if it passed because at present the position is where May can delay reporting back to the house until it start to get to the point where politically the opposition can't influence things, and a 'meaningful vote' will in practice be more like a gun to the head by the Executive, rather than the House of Commons acting in a sovereign manner and being free to make its own decisions rather than be forced into a corner by Parliamentary Procedure and the politicking of Parliamentary Procedure to undermine the independence of the HoC.

Allowing more time for the opposition to hold the government to account, does not necessarily change anything. It just means the executive can not just run down the clock in the way it perhaps has been intending.

The HoC could of course, vote against the amendment.

The WA is to come to the HoC next week.

And we have no idea what the hell is going to happen next.

Well the next story on the BBC site is that the team whose supporters were delayed got beaten 9-0 so perhaps they were better off on the motorway!

Did you LeClerc - sorry I missed it.

I found this general point interesting:

We've not had a huge amount of transparency with regards to much on Brexit over the last few years, particularly not the kind of preparations that are going on for no deal.

"There's definitely been an increase in secrecy more generally across the civil service as a result of Brexit, just because of how politically difficult it's been for many reasons.

"There are the divisions inside the country, the government, parliament, the cabinet and that's kind of fed into this level of secrecy."

This confirms one’s not imagining it. I don’t think it’s merely about political difficulties, I think it’s about control.

they have to work regardless of whether they get paid.

In theory essential workers who are obliged to work get paid back pay when the government reopens. In practice this doesn't help much in a prolonged shutdown when bills still have to be paid ... some will phone in sick and moonlight elsewhere.

Is May trustworthy?

I'm living in the US at present and I am really shocked that a country that makes such a talking point of slavery in its past doesn't make any real comment on making people work without pay. Pay are taking sick leave to work other temporary jobs.
When Brexiteers say that things cannot get worse in the UK I look around me and question that.

Gosh this is a surprise.

{What about the poooooor little turtles, hamsters, doggies, birdies, and so on though, they must feel so left out!}
Yep, bring them on, the cuter the better.
There was a very fine looking corn snake in a news item today. It had been delivered in an Amazon package. It was presumed to have hatched in the box which was for a kettle.

Errr no. Don't right off the zombie just yet.

.

Finally got to the end of the thread. Had the last thread to catch up on and today was just crazy. I wonder what tomorrow will bring. It's great to see parliament doing something. I hope it will be enough. I can't help but imagine all of this in the text of some yet to be written history book. I hope it won't end in war.

And yeah. Also no surprise.

I not species-ist. All animals welcome for distraction from this shit show and for blood pressure calming properties.

{When Brexiteers say that things cannot get worse in the UK I look around me and question that}
People that don't travel don't seem to realise how minimalist life can be in many countries. You might see a picture of a woman making a meal over a fire in Africa perhaps, and not appreciate she has probably had to walk 4 miles to fetch the water, an afternoon collecting firewood before getting on with preparing the meal, and it is the same every day.

Laura Kuenssberg@bbclaurak
This is interesting - No 10 is considering accepting Labour backbencher amendment to give more protection on workers' rights and environmental protection to help get more votes for deal next week

No one trusts her and what's the point in workers rights if you have no job as its a Brexit deal which loses jobs as per the Labour Red lines.

How about the US for being worse?

One tweet I read said they were OK as the dad was one of the still being paid but others were not so lucky. The dad was a diabetic, the mum had graves disease and she had epilepsy. If the dad didn't get paid, they could not afford healthcare and their meds.

Honestly the shutdown stuff is gut wrenching.

"1993 there was 2,750 trucks in and out of Dover, today there's 12,000.
We had 2,000 customs clearance staff in 1993, today we have 200."

"Ramsgate has no customs. So all the trucks would have to go to the same two places - Dover or Folkestone.

I was intrigued by a newspaper report today with the new ferry company assuring the government and everyone that ferries will be sailing at the beginning of April, ready for the deadline, but both Ramsgate and Ostend port managers are saying the facilities won't be ready probably until the end of April.

Place Cat King

In England, there has been a prolonged teacher recruitment problem.

{But Beata Pawlak, a secondary school teacher from Poland, says she found it difficult to find work as a teacher or teaching assistant when she moved to live in London.
She has a postgraduate degree and English-language qualifications and 16 years of teaching experience in Poland but has struggled to get into teaching in London.
Taken from the BBC website, talking about transferring higher qualifications to other countries.
Instead, she became a nanny and said many other fellow professionals had ended up in jobs such as cleaning or in other non-graduate work.
"I know the work is below my skill level but in the end decided it wasn't worth the effort of applying again and again for teaching work. It was humiliating," she said.}
In some places skilled surgeons are flipping burgers as their qualifications are not recognised.

@LouiseCollins28 thanks, that's interesting. We've seen a lot of fear from Labour about losing their core voters if they don't support Brexit - but I don't see them deserting en masse to the Tories. So I was intrigued to know what someone who was saying Labour would lose their vote would do electorally speaking. All still up in the air I guess.

{When Brexiteers say that things cannot get worse in the UK I look around me and question that}

Just look at Venezeula. It's a wealthy (largest exporter of oil), developed country but mismanagement and populist policies have destroyed it. Soaring inflation, food and medicine shortages, riots and millions fleeing the country.

There are some strange definitions of 'fear' being bandied about.
To me, fear is what you feel when you are stuck in a small room with a hungry tiger. It is not the 'staying in the EU fear' of a fraction of a penny change in the interest rate.

Henry Newman
‏*@HenryNewman*

In Parliament just heard @andreajenkyns saying Kenya trades with the EU on WTO terms (and holding up import of Kenyan flowers as an example of post-Brexit No Deal trade possibilities)

In fact Kenya does have a trade deal with the EU.

See here -

trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2015/october/tradoc_153845.compressed.pdf …

Worth reading the whole thread to see people trying to inform themselves, research, question their understanding etc. Obviously doesn't include Jenkyns.

twitter.com/HenryNewman/status/1083046715589124098

To go back to that chart from the BBC originally posted by umpteennamechanges on page 34 of the previous thread, it seemed rather disingenuous of the BBC that it did not include a straightforward revoke/remain option. Is that because that polling hasn’t been done, or because they don’t want to report it?

Lots of charts showing quite different results on the whatukthinks site whatukthinks.org/eu/topics/the-brexit-process/?post_type=questions

The cat is right.
Please email or put pen to paper and encourage members who are acting in your interests and write to your own MPs.

It’s so important that we all do this. It makes a huge difference.
Whilst politicians are personally ambitious, they do hold voters’ opinions in huge regard - hence the almost religious reverence for the Will of the People.

Keep writing and emailing. It makes a difference.