The Brexit Arms: Are We Nearly There Yet? 🇬🇧🚗↩️🇪🇺

[SingingLily]

No, not yet, but soon. Just 24 more sleeps until we legally leave the EU at 11pm on 31 January and finally enter the transition period after what seems like centuries of argument, dither and delay. We do so with hope, optimism and a determination to be a good friend and neighbour to the EU, but for now, no one said it better than Winston Churchill.

“This is not the end, this is not even the beginning of the end, this is just perhaps the end of the beginning.”

The Pub Rule is the same as it always was: all welcome but only if you leave goadery outside. The first drink is on the house.

For most, after January, Brexit can be put to the back of their minds at least for the next year.

Unless your job / company / livelihood / life has any kind of integration with the EU then it very much cannot be ignored 🤔

calmly & without histrionics

Afternoon, Walking, I'm pleased that Sir Lindsay Hoyle is already showing the previous Speaker how it should be done.

In the absence of a functioning opposition under Jezbollah, there are still Labour backbenchers capable and willing of making serious points requiring sensible replies and I welcome them being given the opportunity without the three-ring circus that Bercow so enjoyed orchestrating.

Bit of mangled syntax in the last post. My apologies. I'm blaming the cat.

There will be no more leavers and remainers, just British people and rejoiners.
The suggestion that those who do not agree with leaving the EU will somehow no longer be British after Jan 31st is deeply insulting and alarming.

Apparently Corbyn has promised Bercow a peerage. Does anyone know who gets the final say in that or does Corbyn have the 100% unstoppable right to give him that?

What is the point in wasting money on trying to make a bell ring?

Leaving aside remainers angst. What is actually wrong with private citizens spending their personal money to celebrate the biggest change in our country for 47 years?

We do it annually to celebrate a new year, surely this is at least 47 times more significant to 17.4 million people?

The suggestion that those who do not agree with leaving the EU will somehow no longer be British after Jan 31st is deeply insulting and alarming.

That wasn't how I read it, Auld. My take on it was that once leaving is a legal reality, we have the opportunity to stop defining ourselves as Leavers or Remainers and just get on with being a United Kingdom again.

That doesn't in any way imply that Remainers are not British nor does it mean that they should necessarily be over the moon with it. It's more about the view that we should try to put such divisions behind us and concentrate on what we have in common.

There will be some that will never be reconciled to leaving and they are free to start a Rejoin movement. Good luck to them - that's their democratic right.

It has been so easy over the last few years to take offence where none was intended, Auld. Let's all try to step back from that now.

“There will be no more leavers and remainers, just British people and rejoiners.
The suggestion that those who do not agree with leaving the EU will somehow no longer be British after Jan 31st is deeply insulting and alarming.”

That’s how you interpreted that post?

What does it mean, then?

I think Lily covered it nicely Auld.

The suggestion that those who do not agree with leaving the EU will somehow no longer be British after Jan 31st is deeply insulting and alarming
I was just suggesting that we will no longer be split into leave/remain.

Labour cannot afford to give up on the Red Wall. They could lose a further 36 seats if they do. Their opportunities to pick up seats in wealthy Remain areas are limited. They already hold most in play and are in danger of losing them back to the Tories or LibDems once Brexit is done (Putney, Croydon Central, Canterbury).

In that vein I saw this analysis of the "Youthquake" yesterday.

Fascinating. Of 77 University seats Labour already hold over 50. These seats accounted for 18% of total Labour vote. In younger than average areas without a University Labour are declining faster than average. The Conservatives hold 25 of the 36 analysed.

commonslibrary.parliament.uk/parliament-and-elections/elections-elections/general-election-2019-voting-patterns-in-student-seats/

A lot is made of the influence of woke culture permeating the Uni sector. I tend to think it is good old fashioned self interest. The Labour manifesto pandered to the Uni public sector with everything from ever expanding free places to increasing public sector wages for educators and graduates. The people paying would be non-Uni educated private sector businesses everywhere else.

Don’t worry Walking, it was pretty obvious that was all you meant!

But your post stated that those divisions would give way to two other distinct groups, British and rejoiners.

Apparently Corbyn has promised Bercow a peerage. Does anyone know who gets the final say in that or does Corbyn have the 100% unstoppable right to give him that?

It has to get past the honours committee first, Walking. I nominated someone once for MBE and in addition to the written application, I was contacted and asked to provide evidence that there was nothing past or present about the candidate that might in the future embarrass the Crown. That included any knowledge I might have had about serious or unresolved allegations, past or present.

I'm pretty sure the honours committee is fully aware of Dame Laura Cox's fairly clear report and her written view that meaningful reform and protection for HoC staff would be impossible while Bercow was Speaker.

SingingLily explained it better than me, thank you Lily.

It's a comma thing Auld. SpaG has its own special MN corner.

OK.

Wow Lily! That’s a fascinating insight and what an interesting life you have lead!

just British people and rejoiners.
I'm also a bit WTAF at this, Auld.

What is actually wrong with private citizens spending their personal money to celebrate the biggest change in our country for 47 years?

Spend your money on a party if you must but spending half a million on recommissioning a bell just for this is utter madness

just British people and rejoiners

Sadly I think it’s probably quite representative of how many people think

“just British people and rejoiners.
I'm also a bit WTAF at this, Auld.”

Oh for crying out loud, don’t you ever just fancy a day off? Your Bp must be through the roof!

Auld Define then how you like but I do imagine in the future their will be a group, probably quite small, that will want to rejoin the EU. I did not say or mean to imply that those people would not be British.

I used the word British so as to distinguish us post Brexit as distinct from EU citizens.

You’ve even clarified your point after being asked to Walking, yet, your own explanation for your own comment isn’t even good enough is it? The mind boggles.