Westminstenders: Waiting for a Valentines Miracle

[RedToothBrush]

Guess what folks, we get to do it all over again for Valentine's Day!

Bet you are all looking forward to that.

May has already been told by the EU its a non-starter, and with there being a vote scheduled again in a fortnight, there is little incentive for the EU to shift. And every incentive to just let us stew and think things over.

We are trying to renege on what we signed up to with the Withdrawal Agreement. Which only proves the EU needs the Backstop. Our credibility as a nation to do deals with is shot through the floor. With everyone but those who think they can stitch us up at least.

There is one key development with the latest vote:

The emergence of a new Brexit voting block within Labour, I believe led by Carole Flint. They are supporting Brexit and are prepared to vote with the government and against the Labour Whip.

This negates the Tory Rebel block, meaning May has a majority if she has the ERG on board - this being a big if, of course.

Many other potential rebels who threatened to quit from government, were detered from doing so by a promise from May and the promise that they had another show down on the 14th they could use to block No Deal.

In not quiting they are showing they are committed to some deal brokered by May and not an alternative by Parliament. This is important. There may be no realistic opportunity for anything else to be realistically be tabled by anyone else now.

I don't think they will quit now, if they can see a potential deal present itself.

The way forward now looks to be the Withdrawal Agreement or No Deal only. Keep this in mind and in focus. This will become an increasing pressure and increasingly definitive. Revoke is still on the table, but I just can't see May doing it. Ever.

Whether May can get the EU to back down on the backstop seems unlikely. Its going to be more backwards and forwards on it. Before it becomes obvious its going nowhere. Its just theatre.

What the ERG do next is important. My best guess is they will split into No Deal Hardliners and last minute WA Compromisers. This will leave May short of a majority, but not as far as she has been especially with Labour resolve weakening. I think she may yet get her deal over the line with Labour support of some sort. Probably unofficial rather than direct from public instruction the front bench.

Here's the logic: Corbyn has said he will now discuss matter with her. He still wants to pin Brexit on her and destroy her, but he still wants Brexit and he still wants to keep the Labour Party together despite its differences over Brexit. All without making a clear Labour policy. How does he do this?

The same way he handled the Immigration Bill is possibly the best guess. Plus how can he stop his rebels...? {innocent face emojy} He gets to look tough against May outwardly and make lots of Remainy noises without more outward support for a particular policy. Those awful stupid Northerner MP (or MPs from backward towns if you live in the Metropolian North) who know nothing and screwed Remainia. It plays people off along splits in society, in the hope they don't notice Corbyn really orchestrated it. His MPs in leave areas get to look Leave without consequence, and if it all goes wrong he still get to pin it on May. Thus saving his marginals in both the North and the South 'cos those evil Tories'. And he does stop No Deal in the process. Yes, call me cynical, but thats how he could try and game it. Ultimately Corbyn and May do have certain aligned mutual interests, afterall.

And given there are few alternatives now there apart from Revoke or No Deal, once you think it through doesn't seem as far fetched as it initally sounds. Corbyn certainly seems to have form for it. His priorities are his Party, managing his north / south cultural divide and being seen to kick the Tories.

It'll go to the wire whatever happens, and its hard to see many ways out of this now. We are running out of time, opportunities and options. Of course, this works for May and has been her plan for some time. The question is merely, if she is serious about preventing no deal (and I believe she is) how she persuades either the ERG or Labour to back her.

Afterall, after the WA is done and dusted there is still everything to play for.

Pm

There is not enough understanding in this House of how little trust there is that we mean what we say when we say we respect the result of the referendum

For a vast number of people this will always be the poison in the swamp.

If - as there is every reason to - someone believes the referendum itself is not legitimate, then all that flows from it is fatally flawed.

Even if there had been no discoveries of irregularities in the conduct of major campaigns, the sheer 52/48 split means you cannot ram Brexit down the throats of over half the country. You couldn't in 2016, and you won't now.

With the WA though, what changes can she make?

Hint: She won't. She can't. And she knows this.

Its just everyone else who needs to work it out.

Sure she'll have a crack at it, as she'll view it as having nothing to lose (our reputation obviously counts for fuck all these days) but ultimately, she knows there is no where else for anyone to go.

Its the WA or No Deal.

I think the US has a wonderful phrase:

The fruit of the poison tree

It's the bedrock of their legal system and means that evidence procured unlawfully may not be put before a court. Cases have been abandoned due to this.

The referendum is the fruit of a poisoned tree.

(There's no equivalent in the UK. If the police break the law to get evidence against you, that's just bad luck, old bean.)

DGR I've said it before: You can not go far in a Brexit conversation before you hit the word 'trust'.

Its impossible. It doesn't matter who you talk to, everyone says the same thing.

Just adding myself to this thread, so I can join you all and add my voice to the wails of dispair.

I'm half Irish, which gives me some comfort, as I could fuck off BUT I love the UK and think it is a fantastic country in so many ways and I am just horrified at what is happening.

I am gobsmacked that politicians think we can somehow weasel out of the GFA and create a fantasy scenario of border control without a hard border?!?!

EIGHT weeks to go!!!!!! That's it and look at the state we're in. What country in the would want to do a FTA with us? We look like the biggest bunch of idiots ever.

Unfortunately though I worry that her gun/willy waving about the WA has just made leavers want to drop out more. I genuinely think she has underestimated how quickly they have jumped on the bandwagon there. Anything less is a cop out and won't go away once we leave. There will be pushes for more straight afterwards and riots etc.
I think MP's know the disaster looming, but the public will be baying for blood. As i've said before I don't believe ERG and hardliners will let any "defeat" of their wish list go because they've stirred up such public anger about it and believe their own hype.

Despair!!! Not dispair (agitation at parliamentarians has blown my spelling).

noblegiraffe
While the WA will NEVER be as good as revoke it is not necessarily as bad as people claim. The EU WANT the UK to be a successful and cooperative ally, very much, but with the UK deciding it does not want to be an EU member it can't have the same benefits as other members. The UK is looking at what the EU does for them in a 'taking' sense and less about what the UK can GIVE to the EU. The UK is the spoiled child.
The WA only nails down a few things, most is up for negotiation and I would be pretty sure that if 1 year into negotiations a UK Prime Minister strongly backed by parliament said 'we would like to stay and be a full member' the EU would be delighted.
The EU is not just about money or trade but an attempt to have a comfortable and peaceful life for all it's members. It is necessarily a bit cumbersome because it is reaching out over a wide variety of life expectations and traditions cultures and languages unlike a similar number of people in the USA for example who are (roughly speaking) united in 2 main languages and a former colonial 'mix' of Europeans.

While the WA will NEVER be as good as revoke it is not necessarily as bad as people claim.

So we won’t be facing a second referendum in Scotland and potentially breaking up the UK? Companies leaving the UK? Stuff I don’t understand about financial passporting?

I mean, I know with all the fuss about No Deal and people dying due to lack of medication and food the WA looks great in comparison, but all the issues that were kicked up when we voted to Leave are still there in the background as far as I can tell.

Incidentally, there's some irony in tilting at the DUP for wanting schroedingers Northern Ireland, when write large, the UK has wanted cake and eat it with the EU, as the list of opt-outs shows.

Sadly I think we have to accept that there's a fault line in the pysche of the nation, and some people like to define themselves in the negative ... what they are not, rather than what they are. Cod psychology suggests that's an attitude entrenched from deep-rooted insecurity. Which begs the question as to how someone living in a stable, prosperous and developed country can feel remotely insecure - about anything ?

Maybe "Leave" is like a spam email promising penis enlargement, and the current unedifying spectacle is people trying to get the lid off ?

but all the issues that were kicked up when we voted to Leave are still there in the background as far as I can tell

Of course they are! The EU were never to blame for the long list of grievances given for wanting to leave.

If we are eventually going to end up with no deal we may as well get it now.

I like food. We have time to plan basic contingency plans at least, even if we get an eventual no deal.

People can only put off big decisions for so long, and from what I see they have for the last 18 months. A deal would give enough confidence for people to do some decision making now. There will probably be a huge sigh of relief, a bit of a bounce and then a long slow hiss of air going out the economy. But its much more managable than the cliff right now.

Its not good, but as I say. I like food.

I did wonder last night, where all the objections had gone to the WA, if the backstop was the only thing MPs seemed to want negotiated.

I thought most of them thought the WA was a shit deal - end of. Not just the backstop bit.

I can't help feel that there is some stealth move afoot to make such a fuss about the backstop, that the fact it is generally considered crap and we'll be worse off under it, is all conveniently forgotten.

Or am I missing something?

"schroedingers Northern Ireland, " - love it @DGRossetti

I keep thinking that I cannot see the country psychically enduring any extension beyond 29th March. If we are at this frenzy now - with more than a month to go, how the deuce can the collective consciousness of the UK bear up ?

.

A deal would give enough confidence for people to do some decision making now.

That's a deal we have to wait at least two weeks to know if it's done or not ? And get to two weeks plus, and it's still not done ?

Margo yes - this is why May IMMEDIATELY talked solely about the backstop, despite many MP's suggesting she could have chosen CU for example. The fact they didn't come up with anything like this yesterday maybe shows they haven't been talking enough about it amongst themselves

Right now they are all desparate to show they support Brexit. Once out a lot of the pressure will go, simply cos so many people will not understand anything more than 'we got Brexit'. For MPs they can legitimately claim they have delivered Brexit.

There will be Kipper Voices but I think they will loose some of their effectiveness. MPs won't have their hands tied in quite the same way. The mandate of the referendum will be spent.

I'm not convinced about this. The new narrative is that the referendum result was a vote for the hardest of hard Brexit. This is the story that parliament seem to have accepted and has not been challenged. Because of this while we are attached to the EU in any way anything bad during the transition period will be blamed on us not having left and still being tied to the EU. There will be constant pushes to break the agreement and go no deal. We will enter another phase of negotiations where no deal will be used over and over as a threat to try and get what we want and our failure to no deal as the single reason we aren't in unicorn and fairy land. The EU will be accused of holding us back and tieing our hands. I can't see how this isn't just going to go away if we agree to the WA. The damage has been done.

{But LeClerc - that is exactly what is wrong with the WA - it gives us no clarity about the future which could still be no deal after more years and years of fighting among MPs about it.}
This is of course true however from 30 March onwards the vast majority of the UK stays exactly as it is, with food and meds arriving on current schedules etc.
It will be down to the UK government giving itself a bloody good shake and actually negotiating which admittedly looks unlikely.
However, life as it stands will be pretty much as now.
Yes companies that are planning on leaving will leave. At many levels things will be deteriorating probably with violence in places, but this will happen anyway, but at least 80% of the UK can continue as 'normal'.
A 'crash out' has a far worse outcome because the government is so divided that no rational decisions will be made. The 'blame game' will turn it into a massive stalemate while people will go hungry and family members will accidentally die in their homes or on a trolley in A+E because so much of the UK infrastructure is disrupted all at once.
It will not be the deliberate actions that cause the problems but an essential truckload of goods being late here and there has a massive impact.
Even a 'crash out' no deal is not actually 'instant'. LEGALLY it is but in reality it will take many months to actually disengage. Both the EU and UK have made 'no deal' plans, which obviously are a form of deal. The EU is being very generous in NOT stopping flights, ferries and trucks for up to 9 months or a year. This is of course on THEIR terms and can be withdrawn immediately with no say by the UK. Legally they don't have to do this, they could just slam the door on 30 March.
You are right, there is no clarity for the future. NO ONE in government has a bloody clue what will actually happen on 30 March.
They may have a massive wish list, but nothing significant is defined.

Sadly I think we have to accept that there's a fault line in the pysche of the nation, and some people like to define themselves in the negative ... what they are not, rather than what they are. Cod psychology suggests that's an attitude entrenched from deep-rooted insecurity. Which begs the question as to how someone living in a stable, prosperous and developed country can feel remotely insecure - about anything ?

Oh god yeah.

If you look at how politics has run since 1997 you can see it.

In 1997 people voted FOR Blair. It was viewed as positive. A new era, a new direction.

Ever since then the vote has split off, as a vote AGAINST whatever it happened to be and has been ever more negative.

We do have a national identity crisis, but a lot of it is down to US not knowing what direction we want to take than anything the EU has done. There is a total lack of vision.

Once you've paid the dane-geld ....