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Brexit

Westminstenders: On An Election Footing

966 replies

RedToothBrush · 25/07/2019 16:22

Boris Johnson has set out his strategy.

He is challenging remain Tories to put their money where their mouth is, or to shut up.

His majority, soon to be just 1, is fragile but he intends to tough it out.

His Cabinet, is to all intents and purposes an ERG take over of the Tory Party, not unlike the Momentum take over of the Labour Party. And Johnson is looking to purge the party of its liberal wing, whilst pretending that he is liberal to make it acceptable to long term loyal Tories who might still waiver and merely vote for the rosette or like the veneer of respectability.

It has been made clear to Tory MPs that they will have to sign up to a No Deal Strategy should a snap election be called - or face the prospect of deselection. Disloyality will not be tolerated as Hunt's Cabinet backers all found out when they were sacked rather than be allowed to resign as Grayling was.

Instead Johnson reaped his revenge bringing back quitters and disgraced MPs as a deliberate 'fuck you' to moderates and remainers.

His message is clear and made all the clearer by the appointment of Dominic Cummings.

Today the Treasurery opened the piggie bank and told all departments to prepare for no deal. That is what is going to happen.

Parliament can not stop no deal. Johnson will drive it through regardless, even if its technically illegal. The default of no deal makes it an impossible juggernaught to stop without triggering a GE before the 31st October.

Technically speaking there are just 3 parliamentary days left this can be done.

And a GE is no guarentee of stopping no deal anyway. Cummings coming on board spells it out. Its a campaign strategy to reinvigourate the Leave Campaign and make all the promises that were made before. Of course there is no way of implimenting any of these before 31st October, so they just sound nice and people will believe them because they want to believe them. They want to trust and have hope for the future.

Yet with no trade deals and third party status, and crippling gridlock at ports and extra red tape for exporters and importers to deal with, it is inevitable that the economy will take a big hit. And Johnson's promises are expensive. His £39 billion he wants to withhold, is peanuts in the scheme of things and given what he is proposing.

The plan might sound nice, but it doesn't actually add up.

If we want a deal we will STILL have to sign up to conditions that Brussels sets out EVEN IF we no deal.

Meanwhile the US is ready and waiting to fleece us, because we aren't prepared to admit this and are too proud to see that this is a better option than have corporate American feast on the bones of the British economy.

Human Rights and Workers Rights are very much in the cross hairs with this. Health and Safety standards that have been set by London and then imposed on the EU will be burnt.

All the while the EU will be blamed for our own folly.

The worst thing is, people will actually buy it too.

Things are going to get a hell of a lot worse in this country, not because we lack optimism and hope, but because our egos are too big and we have been too idealist rather than recognising very real obstacles and finding ways to overcome than rather than just trying to ignore them. We will find out all those Paragraph Cs in good time the hard way because of the lack of attention to detail.

PFI and outsourcing will look like minor hiccups when the shit hits the fan.

I do hope that the puritians of the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats and the Remain Referendum Campaign are happy. This is also their mess. They have spent 3 years naval gazing and still don't understand nor know how to respond. This is where a General Election becomes a very real danger because they are clueless as to how to combat a reunited Leave campaign.

Be careful what you wish for going forward.

OP posts:
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ListeningQuietly · 25/07/2019 21:02

The default legally is leaving on WTO terms on or before the 31st of October
Link to the UK's agreed WTO schedules please
A lot of work has been done to ensure ports etc stay open for free flowing goods.
but no results have been achieved
All aerospace etc has now been agreed.
Link please
Financial services have even been agreed,
link please
GE will come in the new year not before.
How does a 2020 GE meet the FTPA ?

Jason118 · 25/07/2019 21:04

@urbanlife lovely spoonSmile

Mistigri · 25/07/2019 21:05

All aerospace etc has now been agreed.

This is utter bollocks - either ignorance or a flat-out lie. You won't get away with that on here.

There is a unilateral, time-limited, restricted agreement for aviation which ends, if I am not mistaken, on 31st December.

Mistigri · 25/07/2019 21:08

A lot of work has been done to ensure ports etc stay open for free flowing goods.

Also bollocks.

Some work has been started aimed at putting customs infrastructure and new Border Inspection Posts in place. Now expected to reduce capacity on the Channel crossings by 40-60% rather than 60-85%.

LonelyTiredandLow · 25/07/2019 21:08

As we have debated before on these threads - anti-intellectualism is being ushered in, and fast!

He will be working alongside Sir Edward Lister, who has been running the transition team. Lister is expected by some ministers to stand down following Brexit, leaving Cummings as the prime minister’s most senior aide.

Full guardian article on Cummins and changes to the Civil Service here.

LonelyTiredandLow · 25/07/2019 21:12

Leaver posters seem to hear soundbites from Brexiteers and consider them 'done'. So have we magically had new policemen and solved the UK's issue around productivity since BoJo blathered on about it yesterday? Detail Leavers, it's all in the detail. If you can't post detail and facts (that is the killer here) then don't bother telling us magic unicorns have already arrived.

Or, better still, take some time to read over the last 3 years of threads and educate yourselves.

BoreOfWhabylon · 25/07/2019 21:13

PMK

NoWordForFluffy · 25/07/2019 21:14

The default legally is leaving on WTO terms on or before the 31st of October.
A lot of work has been done to ensure ports etc stay open for free flowing goods.
All aerospace etc has now been agreed.
Financial services have even been agreed,

We are much more prepared than this thread will let us believe.

I'm trying to work out if you're trying to convince us or yourself.

SwedishEdith · 25/07/2019 21:15

Nick Gutteridge
@nick_gutteridge

1/ I've done this before but on a day like today it's worth remembering the striking difference in the way the EU and UK see the backstop. From the Brussels furnace, based on convos with officials/diplomats, the EU perspective (not advocating either way just reporting as ever).

2/ EU negotiators acknowledge the Withdrawal Agreement is 'toxic' and are aware why, even if they don't understand the British reasoning. They see the backstop as a rare UK triumph, securing tariff and quota free access to the Single Market with few of the usual strings attached.

3/ Member States have always been a bit uncomfortable with the Ts & Cs of the UK-wide backstop because it doesn't contain some stuff they'd want in return for such market access - things like fishing rights, dynamic alignment on environmental and social/employment standards etc.

4/ It also separates access to the Single Market for goods from services, which some EU countries with service-based economies find a bit disconcerting. They fear that under the backstop the UK, which is 80% service-based after all, could exploit that for competitive advantage.

5/ The UK-wide backstop also sets a precedent ahead of future trade talks by giving Britain that quite significant quota and tariff free access to the EU market before negotiations have even begun. As one official put it they see it as 'a kind of gift from the EU' in that regard.

6/ The EU official sums it up: 'The Brits managed to have in a Withdrawal Agreement a quasi Customs Union. No tariffs, no quantitative restrictions and no other impediments with respect to quotas. Something the EU has never given to any other country in the world except Norway.'

7/ 'The common perception in the UK is the Withdrawal Agreement of Mrs May is toxic. The reality is that given the red lines of the Government this is not badly negotiated and it’s fairly close to Chequers, that’s the truth of it.' Chequers minus, to coin an @adamfleming phrase.

8/ Remember that Chequers, whilst loathed in the UK for keeping us too close to the EU, was loathed in Brussels and Member States in equal measure for trying to replicate many of the economic benefits of Customs Union and Single Market membership without all the obligations.

9/ A diplomatic source says of the backstop: 'Since the whole thing became so toxic nobody really managed to explain what the UK negotiators secured, something for which you have to fight for years in any ordinary trade agreement and that comes with a lot of conditions attached.'

10/ A problem with the EU's reasoning from a UK perspective, of course, is it's based on the premise of 'why wouldn't you want a Customs Union?' It also doesn't address the DUP's opposition to regulatory alignment for Northern Ireland only and resulting checks in the Irish Sea.

11/ So, what happens if PM Johnson ditches the backstop and asks for a GATT 24 standstill agreement? From the EU perspective you quickly enter 'very complicated negotiations which have the purpose to basically cover exactly the same benefits the Brits already obtained in the WA.'

12/ These take place on the basis of Article 218, not 50, meaning Member State ratification is required. The French, Belgians and others will demand fishing rights. Ditto a LPF on social/environmental/labour rights. Greece and Italy will want Geographical Indication protection.
13/ 'You will see all kinds of preconditions that we haven’t seen
before.' The upshot, says an EU official, is the UK will end up having to negotiate 'all the prerequisites' built into the backstop in terms of market access but only on 'a worse basis' and with more risk involved.

14/ 'With the UK-wide backstop they obtained tariff and quota free access to the EU market. If we start from scratch because there’s No Deal are we seriously going to give them the same thing right away? It will be a nightmare and in the meantime we'll have the disruption.'

15/ As for PM Johnson's GATT 24 idea, it's 'unthinkable'. Why? 'It would give an unprecedented opening to the Single Market without any safeguards. They're out of the ecosystem, legislation checks, safety standards. It would amount to full access to the SM without any strings.'

16/ So all of this is why the EU side can't understand the UK obsession with ditching the backstop. One diplomat argues 'Europe needs to make the case that what we offered is not such a bad deal'. Truth is that horse has long since bolted and started a new life on the moors. ENDS

BigChocFrenzy · 25/07/2019 21:21

This would be an improvement - and popular with Westministende cat-lovers 😂

Petition: Larry the Cat to be the next Prime Minister

www.change.org/p/the-people-larry-the-cat-to-be-the-next-prime-minister?

Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
mrslaughan · 25/07/2019 21:26

Is Jeremy really a closet Tory?

ListeningQuietly · 25/07/2019 21:30

Jeremy is a sleeper mole
he was put in place by the Tories in the Thatcher era and activated a few years ago
its the only sane explanation

yolofish · 25/07/2019 21:46

Storm was a damp squib. I'm sure there is a metaphor in there.

BigChocFrenzy · 25/07/2019 21:49

View from the US

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-prime-minister-uk-msnbc-lawrence-odonnell-last-word-a9020711.html

Explaining the prime minister’s Brexit strategy to US viewers, he said:

“Boris Johnson says he will simple lead the United Kingdom out of the European Union without any exit deal at all,
which would instantaneously bring a level of chaos to Britain not seen since World War II.”

Peregrina · 25/07/2019 22:14

The US of course, did very well out of WW2. They saw the British Empire begin to be destroyed, and the UK in hock to them for decades. They humour us when we mention 'Special Relationship'.

Emilyontmoor · 25/07/2019 22:20

Urbanlife Financial Services have been agreed? The why have banks and other financial service companies already implemented contingency plans and established offices in EU countries and moved jobs to them? www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/brexit-city-of-london-jobs-financial-services-banking-impact-a8975711.html%3famp This is an example of complexity being simplified. “Financial services” covers a lot of markets and activities. Yes sensible arrangements have been quietly agreed by the City authorities and the EU to avoid a full on financial crisis but all in the EUs interests, no deal means the end of passporting and those activities will migrate to the EU. The complete obliviousness of Tories (with the exception of Hammond ) to the impact on the Service sector (80%of the economy and massive contributor to the Exchequer) is just symptomatic of the sense of entitlement and traditional snobbery about trade that pervades the Tory party. Why Boris got away with “Fuck business”. Except that business is how we earn 80% of our living, as a result of an economic plan put in place by Thatcher, you know Big Bang, free trade, membership of the EU. It WAS a success. She must be turning in her grave...

Mistigri · 25/07/2019 22:27

The Telegraph just emailed me to gush about Blow Job. (I must have signed up in a distracted moment years ago).

Mostly I just let these things go to spam but this annoyed me enough to contact their digital services with a request to be forgotten as per the GDPR.

Motheroffourdragons · 25/07/2019 22:35

This reply has been withdrawn

This has been withdrawn by MNHQ on behalf of the poster.

RedToothBrush · 25/07/2019 22:46

Oh goodie....

We have another update about my very favourite MP Jared O'Mara!

www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/jared-o-mara-sexually-harassed-junior-member-of-staff-l6vw796pg
Jared O’Mara ‘sexually harassed’ junior member of staff

An MP has been accused by a junior member of his staff of waging a persistent campaign of sexual harassment that has left her feeling “intimidated and degraded”.

Jared O’Mara sent a series of messages to the 20-year-old woman, often late at night or early in the morning, in which he repeatedly declared his feelings for her and commented on her appearance.

She claims that he also regularly made “sexist, misogynistic and lewd comments” about other women including female politicians, creating an “increasingly toxic” environment in his office.

and

The woman claims in the letter to have previously raised concerns about Mr O’Mara’s inappropriate conduct with Gareth Arnold, his chief of staff. “He then spoke to Jared O’Mara, who apologised and claimed that he would immediately stop,” she said. “However, it has not.”

Mr Arnold announced his own resignation this week in a Twitter post, labelling Mr O’Mara “the most disgustingly, morally bankrupt person I have ever had the displeasure of working with”.

When The Times asked Mr O’Mara today about the woman’s allegations, he replied: “It’s all true.” He offered her his apologies but went on to say that many of his comments were “jokes and I am not apologising for them”. He said that the messages he sent to his junior employee were “never sexual”. He added: “Nor did I ever have any attraction to her”.

In a public statement today, the MP apologised to his Sheffield Hallam constituents for his decision to stand aside “for a few weeks”. He claimed that he needed help with “issues regarding self-medication”. He added: “I have not been honest with you about the depths of my depression and self-loathing.” He went on to criticise Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader, and party officials for failing to offer him adequate support.

Mr O’Mara, a former music events organiser, also confessed in the statement to having recently “told a staff member I was in love with her”. He claimed that he had been suffering a “delusional episode”.

and

A Labour Party spokesperson said: “We take the welfare of our MPs very seriously and, while Jared is no longer a Labour MP, we are concerned for his welfare and we have continued to provide support to him, and will continue to do so.”

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Pudner · 25/07/2019 23:00

Have been away for a while but back with a new name. Pmking with this gem from the wonderful
Waterford Whispers Grin waterfordwhispersnews.com/2019/07/25/johnson-cabinet-a-whos-who-of-amoral-incompetent-bastards/

BigChocFrenzy · 25/07/2019 23:04

Very irrational
Definitely unfit to be an MP though, whether from MH or merely that he's a shit

RedToothBrush · 25/07/2019 23:10

Tory Right's anger over senior aide to Johnson
Brexiteer MP rejects 'powerless' job in first big row

Boris Johnson's attempts to lock in the support of hardline Tory Eurosceptics suffered a serious blow last night after one of the most senior Brexiteer MPs angrily turned down a ministerial role.

In the first rift between the new prime minister and the faction that backed him for the leadership, Steve Baker told Mr Johnson that a job in the Brexit Department would have left him 'powerless'.

Tory Eurosceptics accused Mr Johnson of 'binning off' the European Research Group of Brexiteers now that he was in power. They blamed Dominic Cummings, the former head of Vote Leave who has been appointed the most senior adviser in Downing Street.

Mr Cumming has made little secret of his disdain for some members of the ERG, describing them as a "narcissist delusional subset" and a "metastisising tumour" that needs to be "excised".

The row highlights the fragility of Mr Johnson's grip over the Conservative Party and parliament. With a majority of only two his allies believe it is increasingly likely there will be a general election.

In a warning shot Mr Baker, 48, said on Twitter after rejecting the job that 'disaster awaits us' unless Britain left the EU on October 31.

One Eurosceptic Tory MP said: Steve has been badly treated, this smacks of poor man management.

Arguably without Steve Baker we would already have signed the withdrawal agreement, we would be trapped in the backstop forever and Theresa May would still be prime minister. Some people clearly have short memories".

It continues, but I can't be arsed to type the rest.

Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
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RedToothBrush · 25/07/2019 23:11

The Guardian and the Telegraph

Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
OP posts:
RedToothBrush · 25/07/2019 23:12

The Indy and the Express.

Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
Westminstenders: On An Election Footing
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tobee · 25/07/2019 23:34

That Express front page with the "new golden age" for the country is probably the biggest lol I've had today. Grin

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