Westminstenders: 10 day count down

[RedToothBrush]

10 days to go...

... Wake me up when the shit show is over.

Mockers
Its not a Tory Gerrymander.
The Boundary Commission are apolitical.
The current boundaries do not reflect demographic shifts so some votes are worth a lot more than others.
Regular apolitical redistricting is a good thing

Just musing about a failing/quirk of the d'Hondt system: with the resignation of the three Brexit MEPs (and one more having the whip withdrawn), surely with a list system that is supposed to reflect proportionally the parties that people voted for, then they should lose the right to be an MEP for that party and should be replaced by the next Brexit MEPs on the respective regions' lists

If an MEP resigns - as the lovely Alyn Smith will have to do if when he wins the Stirling seat in the GE - or dies, then that is what happens.

Caveat: I know it doesn't work that way but it should

Unrelated interesting graphic from my Linkedin feed
This is for one rural English county ....
Where will those people come from as they are not being born in that county

Tory Brexit policy expected to do great harm to UK foreign trade and hence the economy:

NIESR@NIESRorg

UK’s global competitiveness ‘under threat’ from EU exit -
Our new briefing on UK #trade and #tradepolicy after #Brexit is out now! Read it here:

#GE2019Economists
#GeneralElection2019
#GE2019

@NuffieldFound

2019 UK GENERAL ELECTION BRIEFING: UK TRADE AND TRADE POLICY AFTER BREXIT

from National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR)

https://www.niesr.ac.uk/sites/default/files/publications/NIESR%20Election%20Briefing%20-%20UK%20Trade%20and%20Trade%20Policy%20after%20Brexit.pdf

• The UK has a close trading relationship with the EU.
Just under 50 per cent of total trade is directly with other EU countries, and the UK is also immersed in intricate global value chains involving EU businesses.

• With the UK’s exit from the EU, UK’s global competitiveness is under threat because trade is regarded as a key driver of productivity, employment and business creation;
it can boost wages and income, and foster knowledge diffusion and technology adoption.

• While striking early trade deals with non-EU countries will be important to help offset some of the drag that will result from more restricted trading arrangements with the EU,
NIESR research suggests the benefit will be small even if the UK is able to establish FTAs with all Anglo-American and BRIICS countries.

• Political parties offer a variety of Brexit options ranging from staying in the EU to a hard Brexit.
Previous research has established that the closer the link with the EU, the less disruption there will be to trade.

• The governing Conservative party is looking to implement the revised deal that was struck between the EU and the UK in October that is looking to achieve a free trade agreement (FTA).
Under this deal, the UK will exit the Single Market and the Customs Union and will instead be free to strike new trade deals with third countries.
The Labour party offers a ‘permanent and comprehensive UK-wide customs union’ and ‘a close alignment with the Single Market’.
The Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party support continued EU membership.
Plaid Cymru favour membership of the EU Single Market and Customs Union
and the Brexit party seeks an exit without a deal.

• The UK runs a trade surplus in services of around £100bn (in 2018) which helps offset some of the deficit in goods trade.
By exiting the EU, service sector trade will then be more exposed because even the most ambitious FTAs have a limited coverage for the services sector.

• All UK regions are exposed to the EU through exports, but the geographical location of exporters is not uniform across the UK.
London and the South East, the East of England and the North West dominate this landscape, accounting for around 60 per cent of total exporters of goods.
London dominates services trade, accounting for around 1/3 of total exporters.

• As a member of the EU, the UK also benefits from trade agreements with third countries such as Canada, Japan, Turkey etc accounting for around 14% of total exports.
Of the 74 countries with which the EU has deals, the UK has signed agreements with 49 of these countries, representing approximately 7% of total exports.

• A loose trading relationship such as an FTA raises the opportunity to strike new deals with other large countries such as the United States, China and India.
Our research shows that distance matters and the benefits of these potential deals would not compensate for the benefits that the UK would lose from exiting the EU
....
• The total value of UK exports and imports of goods and services (total trade) amounted to around £1,300 billion in 2018, representing 61% of total GDP.

The EU is UK’s largest trading partner accounting for £642 billion of total trade, or just under half of all UK trade flows (ONS Balance of Payments, 2019)

InMySpareTime
@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime here's the link I think you were after

Thank you!

Alas, it wasn't; the one I am thinking of is a text document. But that one is a good persuasive bit of argument -- it's just not from a research group but by an individual with a brain.

^More Brexit MEPs leaving Nigel's coven. No sign of the Gammon's demanding they stand down and force by elections for changing party.
I wonder why^

Because the Euro elections don't work like that. If one Brexit MEP resigned, they would go to the next on the list to ask them to take the place. I think that did happen when Annaliese Dodd got elected in the 2017 election for Oxford East.

I have to wonder if the school cuts website is wholly accurate. They have listed a local village primary school as being a recipient of a gain under both Tories and Labour, but it won't be getting a penny because it's on the point of formally closing. The pupils are already being shunted to the primary in the next village.

Mockers Its not a Tory Gerrymander. The Boundary Commission are apolitical.

The Commission works to a set of rules given to it by government. The
Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Act 2011 was a Coalition stitch-up. Clegg got his PR referendum, which he thought he was bound to win, and in return agreed to the Tory wish for the number of constituencies and %variation in population per constituency that by pure coincidence just happens to benefit the Conservatives to a greater extent than any other permutation or combination.

It's a gerrymander.

That’s interesting/scary/worrying (can’t tell the difference anymore) about the amount of Brexit MEPs leaving. Do they get replaced by the next on the list for their party? (If so, what happens if there was no other Brexit flavoured candidate?) Or whoever was the second most popular candidate regardless of party?

On a slightly more lighthearted note, someone has graffitied “Fuck Boris” on a sign in our normally Tory area. Can’t work out if it’s local youths, or the local independent candidate who hates the tories. Could easily be either...

Some of you may know that I am in regular email contact with
ItisIleclerc / 54321
He still lurks from France and wanted me to pass on the following

<img loading="lazy" class="inline-flex mumsnet-emoji" alt="Flowers" src="https://www.mumsnet.com/build/assets/flowers-Cn99NuJ3.png"><img loading="lazy" class="inline-flex mumsnet-emoji" alt="Thanks" src="https://www.mumsnet.com/build/assets/thanks-CziME5WC.png"><img loading="lazy" class="inline-flex mumsnet-emoji" alt="Star" src="https://www.mumsnet.com/build/assets/star-Bm6t10PJ.png"> to <strong>Squid4</strong> and in fact all medical staff everywhere 

I am also thinking of the French nurses and support staff, like the couple of ladies who wheeled me in my bed down to MRI and Ultrasound scans, when I was in hospital in late august, attempting to chat when they were asking about the best places to go shopping in the UK. Yes there is a major strike on in France today by some of the unions against some of Mr Macrons intended reforms, for which he manages to back down slightly to restore some sense of stability. Like in so many things it is always counterproductive to have a 'winner takes all' scenario, when with intelligent handling, sensible compromise can mean everyone wins at least partially, something that is being completely lost in the UK.
I was also musing earlier that it is ignorant politicians that are buggering everything up because they only want simple knee jerk solutions. For example the banning of lead in many electronics devices, something Ian would be aware of.  The blanket 'banning' by politicians has caused widespread problems where a well planned restriction would have been far better. Similarly with CO2. Demonising CO2 production is causing all manner of other problems, often more difficult to solve as CO2 is not the only problematic gas but saying 'we are saving on CO2 can be used to cover up huge dispersals of far more dangerous industrial materials. Similarly the wild push for electric vehicles before there is a complete alternative worldwide infrastructure in place. Efforts to improve efficiency and reduce emissions on petrol/diesel vehicles for which the whole world depends and is geared up to use  would be far more beneficial than attempting to use electric vehicles that all have to be built, together with a totally new infrastructure to make them useable by society around the world.
Just the sheer quantity of new power distribution networks and the manufacture of batteries and of course the sourcing of electricity itself.

There was more in the message but he really should stop lurking in the Arms

The defecting BX MEPs stay on as Conservatives. Unlike Westminster they cannot resign and stand in a by-election since they are elected on a closed party list.

And can't help noticing that Skunk Annunzie is with child. Those Moggs can't half breed.

I seem to remember that the production of concrete involves a fair amount of carbon being produced as well; but that doesn't mean we ought to stop building houses for people to live in.

You can't support all the policies all the time.

Rebecca Fewtrell
@RFewtrellUK
·
1h
Just inputting some data from yesterday and we got a 40% Labour promise rate!

This Tory seat could turn red!

Oh thats from a plymouth constituency

That’s interesting/scary/worrying (can’t tell the difference anymore) about the amount of Brexit MEPs leaving. Do they get replaced by the next on the list for their party?

No they don't

That was what I was musing earlier: it's a failing in the way the EP and the d'Hondt system has been set up. The d'Hondt system is supposed to reflect proportionally the votes for the various parties within specific regions/countries (depending on how the individual countries have implemented it). But although if an MEP is subsequently elected an MP (or other elected positions around the EU) , they must resign as an MEP and then next person on their party's list becomes the MEP, the same doesn't apply if they change parties or decide to become independent - or even as in Farage's case create a new party that they then represent

Britain Elects
@britainelects
· 2h
Tory lead now below 10pts according to the Britain Elects poll tracker:

CON: 42.4% (+0.1)
LAB: 32.8% (+1.4)
LDEM: 13.1% (-1.0)
BREX: 3.4% (-0.4)
GRN: 3.0% (-0.2)

Chgs. w/ Friday
britainelects.newstatesman.com/who-leads-in-our-poll-tracker/

Ex-Brexit MEPs will just sit as independents, as Farage has done in the past.

They'll be replaced in 7 weeks anyway.

R4 pm programme at 1700 - had a good 5min piece calling out the saj's dissembling earlier today.
In earlier interview (lunchtime I think) he claimed that homelessness/rough sleeping had fallen under tories - pm trashed that argument and said it was Labour that had made huge inroads - the only reason it was "lower" was because it had not quite got back to the levels from which labour had reduced it.

Not seen this on main beeb site yet but it was good to hear them calling him out.

Andrew Neil calling out Johnson

twitter.com/i/status/120267716

Love to ItisILeClerc.

By the time of the 2019 EP elections,

UKIP were down to only 4 MEPs after defections to Tory and then to ^BXP,
having started off with 24 elected in the 2014 EP elections^

From Farage to Batten: What happened to UKIP's class of 2014?

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-47934021

and some MEPs went Independent and / or managed to get themselves expelled from UKIP, which takes some doing

Looks like Neil’s tweet’s been deleted Just.

www.bbc.com/news/election-2019-50679252

The BBC's Andrew Neil has issued a challenge to Boris Johnson to take part in a sit-down interview with him before next week's general election.
....
Neil addressed the PM directly at the end of his fourth leader interview at this election, with Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage.

"It is not too late.
We have an interview prepared.
Oven-ready, as Mr Johnson likes to say,"

From the bbc:
The BBC's Andrew Neil has issued a challenge to Boris Johnson to take part in a sit-down interview with him before next week's general election.
Mr Johnson is the only leader of a main party not to have faced a half hour, prime-time BBC One grilling by Mr Neil.
The Conservative leader has denied claims he is avoiding scrutiny.
But Mr Neil addressed the PM directly at the end of his fourth leader interview at this election, with Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage.
"It is not too late. We have an interview prepared. Oven-ready, as Mr Johnson likes to say," he said, in a monologue.
"The theme running through our questions is trust - and why at so many times in his career, in politics and journalism, critics and sometimes even those close to him have deemed him to be untrustworthy.
"It is, of course, relevant to what he is promising us all now."
Mr Johnson has also declined an invitation to be grilled by ITV's Julie Etchingham, as part of her series of leader interviews.
'Hold to account'
Mr Neil said that no broadcaster "can compel a politician to be interviewed".
But he added: "Leaders' interviews have been a key part of the BBC's prime-time election coverage for decades.
"We do them, on your behalf, to scrutinise and hold to account those who would govern us. That is democracy.
"We have always proceeded in good faith that the leaders would participate. And in every election they have. All of them. Until this one."
Mr Neil then listed the questions he wanted the prime minister to answer.
These include whether he can be trusted to deliver on his promises for the NHS - and keeping the health service "off the table" in any post-Brexit trade talks with the US.
Mr Neil said he would also ask the PM about his claim that he has always been an opponent of austerity, another "question of trust".
He ended the monologue by saying: "The prime minister of our nation will, at times, have to stand up to President Trump, President Putin, President Xi of China.
"So it was surely not expecting too much that he spend half an hour standing up to me."
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, the SNP's Nicola Sturgeon, Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage have all faced a grilling by Mr Neil.
ITV interview
Mr Johnson was quizzed by the BBC's Andrew Marr on Sunday, on why he had not yet agreed to be interviewed by Andrew Neil.
He denied avoiding prime-time scrutiny, saying he had done TV debates, interviews and a "two-hour phone-in".
Separately, on Thursday evening, The Labour Party complained about BBC bias, in a letter to Director General Tony Hall.
Labour's co-campaign coordinator Andrew Gwynne highlighted Mr Johnson's failure to be interviewed by Andrew Neil.
The letter claimed the Conservatives were being allowed to "play" the corporation, making the BBC effectively "complicit in giving the Conservative Party an unfair electoral advantage".
In another development, the prime minister's team have confirmed that Mr Johnson will not find time for an interview with ITV before the general election.
He is the only leader of a major party to turn down the request from the channel's Tonight programme.
A spokesman for ITV said the programme had bid for Mr Johnson when the general election was called.
"They have contacted his press team on repeated occasions with times and dates offered to film an interview," the spokesman said.
"Boris Johnson's team have today confirmed he will not be taking part.
"The programme will instead feature a profile of the prime minister using fresh interviews with other contributors and archive footage."
ITV Tonight presenter Julie Etchingham has recorded an interview with Jeremy Corbyn to be broadcast at 1930 GMT.
Labour Party chairman Ian Lavery said: "Boris Johnson thinks he's born to rule and doesn't have to face scrutiny.
"He's running scared because every time he is confronted with the impact of nine years of austerity, the cost of living crisis and his plans to sell out our NHS, the more he is exposed."
Liberal Democrat Leader Jo Swinson said: "Boris Johnson must stop ducking scrutiny. His cowardly behaviour shows why he simply isn't fit to be prime minister."
She said it was "bad enough" that her party had been "excluded" from the BBC's head-to-head debate between Mr Johnson and Mr Corbyn, and "even worse that right now Boris Johnson won't be held properly to account for his lies and extreme Brexit plans".
Mr Johnson will face Mr Corbyn in a prime ministerial debate at 2030 GMT, on BBC One, on Friday.