Westminstenders: Sleaze. The Return.

[RedToothBrush]

The Brexit Agreement is still not signed. The EU are still pissed off with our bad attitude and how we managed to a have better deal on AstraZeneca's vaccines which they don't seem to like anyway.

The Ireland / NI border is still a mess. Both politically and economically. This is apparently something that wasn't discussed pre referedum, with regular Westminstenders suffering from collective delusions over remembering differently and reading madeup stories which just happen to be dated prior to the referendum. Its a sign of how good fake news has got.

The lying architect of Vote Leave is complaining about the lying of Vote Leave's biggest champion and cheerleader, countered with the pm who cheated on his ex wife multiple times and ran off with a younger woman accusing his former aid of being deeply sexist.

The government is embroiled in numerous accusations of lining its own pockets following the brexit power grab by the right wing of the party. Which of course wasn't a worry pre referendum. As of course accountability generally.

In keeping with taking a lead on the world stage, we have seen through our promises to cut back on overseas aid, instead preferring to spend money on trading. This is well represented by our purchasing of 10million AZ vaccines from India with not much sign of sending aid to help with the unfolding humanitarian crisis there.

Our post Brexit foreign policy looks muddled at best. The new world order is a big confusing. We dont mind trading with regimes which have human rights abuses... As long as they are countries which are smaller than us and we can exploit. We don't particularly like China atm because we aren't getting much out of the shitting on others. Plus its not really proving a great opportunity for Westerners to line their pockets like other dodgy regimes because its generally closed to outsiders and this is even more true in covid times.

But don't worry, we will soon be able to go abroad again on our covid passports. The 17th May beckons when the penny will drop that efforts to integrate medical records with passport data which apparently border agencies are working on, isn't ready yet and that doesn't matter because other countries won't be ready to let us in yet, especially since we are outside the EU and EEA and we haven't been great at talking to them. And we probably will still have to quarantine on return anyway. (End of June is still optimistic but more realistic).

We've still to impose customs checks yet because we didn't want to do it in April in case that meant the shops would be empty when they reopened. So we still have that joy to look forward to. Great for EU exporters. Less great for uk exporters. For now.

Of course we have the May Council elections to look forward to, in which it will become apparent just how fucking useless and invisible Keir Starmer is and how Labour policies are not connecting with voters in spite of all of the above. Mainly due to navel gazing and an inability to get beyond their social circle. Any good ideas they do have are promptly nicked by the Tories.

Post Brexit talk of reviewing the Monarchy are also growing in steam...

If we look back it feels like the sleaziness of the early nineties has returned but with no prospect of joining the Eu, no John Smith or Smiling Tony to inspire, no coming Cool Brittania to cheer us up. Just sleaze tolerated and accepted, rather than rejected. And one massive debt than had been largely repaid.

Its hard to see where we go from here. We seem bewildered by geography and confused by technology. Unwilling to invest in science and no longer aligned with the right people to collaborate effectively.

Instead we are more pre occupied with in fighting.

As a friend said to me this week, they had started to watch alternative news channels to British based ones because she felt we had become so inward looking. She felt like our mentality was increasing like the US which simply was unaware of events and ideas beyond our borders. I think its a comment that has so much ressonnance.

No I don't have a problem with importing drugs from anywhere provided they're judged safe by our own regulator. Agree btw, the idea of one country (specially one the UK size) developing every drug it will ever need all on its own is absurd.

But the EU was our own regulator. If we chose not to take an active part that was a choice. The idea that somehow the EEC/EU dictated to one of the largest EU countries for 43 years while poor little UK sat in the corner saying nothing is a Brexiter fantasy.

However what I will be interested to see play out is what Johnson's Government will say to the small country which was taken out of the EU against its will.

Also important is who makes the rules and to whom are those people accountable.

@LouiseCollins28
Rules made by EU regulators had ample British input. This is because Britain was a member of the EU and British interests were represented on regulatory bodies as well as in the political structures of the EU.

If British businesses want to trade into another jurisdiction then it follows that those businesses need to follow the rules of the destination of their good/services. Equally, anyone wanting to trade into Britain should be following Britain's rules.
Not so fast. You are forgetting that trade is not being conducted among precise equals who all have an equal interest in what the other is offering, and no interest whatsoever in destruction of competitor economies in order to benefit from resulting fire sales.

The basic conundrum created by the decision to put what is called 'sovereignty' above all other interests and the belief that the UK is a big player on the global scene has been amply illustrated by the failure of fishing negotiations with Norway. What Norway gets from the UK in the fishing sphere is clearly not worth what the UK was asking.

If or when a trade agreement is reached between the US and the UK, rules will be made by the USFDA, which does not answer to anyone in the UK. Size of the economy matters, as does alternatives to trade with the UK. Until the day comes when the US needs the UK more than the other way round, the UK will have to suck up whatever the US tells it to. Right now, the UK would have adjust its standards just in order to trade with the State of California, which has the world's fifth biggest economy.

The U.K. was a large part of the EU drug regulator. That’s why the EMA headquarters were here and not elsewhere in the EU. They quite famously relocated because of Brexit, making a large number of people unemployed in the process.

And I think it’s NICE who do a lot of work recommend which drugs available for use on the NHS and not the EMA or MHRA anyway.

The SNP said no more referendums for a generation. We all know what a generation is. What has the frequency of elections or the tenure of MPs got to do with it? Nothing. These stupid comments lose you credibility. You're better off focusing on Brexit changing the picture and justifying a new ref.

On the whole these threads have the sensible, trustworthy people on them, in contrast to the Brexiters. But you come out with disingenuous nonsense where Scotland is concerned.

Indeed, Brexit did change everything where Indyref 2 is concerned.

So darkpink, unless a name changer, bobs up from nowhere to tell the Scots that her idea of a generation doesn't agree what is generally accepted in political terms. Yes right. How about a productive contribution?

People have roughly a sixty five year voting span so over a ten year period a whole group of 18-28 year olds will have joined the register and a group of 75-85 year olds will have dropped off - making the composition of the electorate sufficiently changed to want different things.

Issues like climate change are much more important for a 20 year old who may well live to see the changes affect them when they are still middle aged. It's not such a pressing need when you are 70.

Sadiq 👍🏼

Math My point regarding a non UK regulator (I didn't mention the EMA) was that they should have no power in Britian to tell our NHS which vaccines are safe and which aren't.

All trade is not conducted between equals no.

If a trade deal were concluded between the UK and the USA presumably the UK will agree with the US which standards will apply to which kinds of goods. You're suggesting that US standards will prevail because of America's relative economic power? You are right, the message to Britain therefore is a clear one, gain more power relative to those you wish to trade with.

Yes, US standards will prevail and tend to be lower, and therefore cheaper because they are the bigger country.

How do you propose that a country of 65 million gains more power when compared with a country of 250 milllion? Furthermore, one which has a huge landmass, crossing climate zones and therefore more likely to be self sufficient.

I imagine that America can feed itself. The UK hasn't been able to for more than a century - and won't be able to, even if we went back to a war time diet where bananas disappeared.

^^ (From the intro to "Scotland's Future" - that strange concept of a White Paper in advance of a Referendum )

"If we vote No, Scotland stands still. A once in a generation opportunity to follow a different path, and choose a new and better direction for our nation, is lost. Decisions about Scotland would remain in the hands of others."

Note the key word: opportunity

Not a "promise" that another referendum would not be held for another generation.

And that's before you even get into the fact that the Unionists made a large part of their case the threat that that the only way that Scotland could remain part of the EU was that of it voted No (one of my friends voted No because of that, although I extracted a promise from her that if, as I predicted, the greater risk was a Conservative Government pulling us out of the EU, she would campaign for Independence - and she has stood by that promise ).

And that, panicked by the late Yes leaning polls, the Unionists promised a "better" federal structure in which Scotland would help lead the UK as an equal partner, and then reneged on the majority of the "promises" in the vow.

And that returning 56 out of 59 MPs made sweet Fuck All difference in the UK (indeed they were overruled when they tried to put in safeguards into the EU Referendum, effectively being patted on the head and told not worry because it was just an advisory referendum ).

Johnson is now preaching to Sturgeon and Drakeford that we must put our differences behind us, and promote a united country. Sturgeon is not buying it - I haven't seen Drakefords comments.

I firmly believe that this ship has sailed. Johnson does not have anything to offer Scotland.

At least Wales has seen the back of UKIP AMs.

If a trade deal were concluded between the UK and the USA presumably the UK will agree with the US which standards will apply to which kinds of goods. You're suggesting that US standards will prevail because of America's relative economic power? You are right, the message to Britain therefore is a clear one, gain more power relative to those you wish to trade with.

Or save yourself a lot of trouble and just stay with the nice, big, well-established bloc you are already in?

One that allows you to influence or even spearhead regulations, legislation, and decisions on growth and direction thereof.

Not good enough? Cut loose, pretend it's Nineteen Aught Six again, and try to play with the big boys by sending in the Navy.

My point regarding a non UK regulator (I didn't mention the EMA) was that they should have no power in Britian to tell our NHS which vaccines are safe and which aren't.

They would if the NHS had already been cut up and sold off piecemeal, with hospitals and doctors' practices becoming part of American healthcare conglomerates, operating for profit.

This is what's already happening to 'our NHS', by the way.
www.gponline.com/us-companys-subsidiary-hold-nearly-1-gp-contracts-england/article/1707557

Operose Health/Centene answer to nobody but their shareholders. Centene is a health insurance company, the second largest publicly traded corporation based in Missouri.

As I believe happens with American health care - your insurer dictates what treatments they will authorise.

Morning, I haven't been on this thread for over a year now but have come back to skulk about a bit . Feeling a bit deflated. And confused about the political landscape and the future, to be honest.

Johnson wants to see unity in the UK

Mark Drakeford summed it up for me:

He said that rather than "flying more Union Jacks at the tops of buildings", they needed to build "proper, respectful relationships" between four parliaments with their own sovereignty that could choose to work together for common purposes.

When you think of the flags which the Welsh and Scots fly by choice, namely the Welsh Dragon and the Saltire, then you know that Johnson's silly flag flying decree shows that he is really out of touch in both countries.

Yes, he could easily suppress Devolution in Wales, but Scotland which has retained its own legal system, will not be so easily crushed. So far from the call for Unity which Johnson has belatedly woken up to the need for, I think the issues will run and run.

As far as the results declared so far go the Tories have gained 239 councillors to Labour's loss of 301 so far, which rather puts a different complexion on the results. Yes they have gained control of a number of councils, so we will need to see if those councils get bungs of money. This is likely to go against the Thatcherite instincts of the Tories, so will be interesting.

Labour has been much more successful in the Mayoral elections, gaining 2 from the Tories and keeping the ones they already held.

It looks like Priti Patel won't get her way on asylum seekers

I am not sure whether this comes in the category of a Brexit bonus or not? I think it's yet another illustration that a country which banged on about Sovereignty has to remember that other countries are sovereign too.

When you think of the flags which the Welsh and Scots fly by choice, namely the Welsh Dragon and the Saltire, then you know that Johnson's silly flag flying decree shows that he is really out of touch in both countries.

Yes, signifiers such as badges and flags are used by choice generally when indicating spontaneous solidarity against something that is an extraneous threat or opponent, and your voluntary inclusion in the threatened group. So you want to wear your football team’s strip or fly the Cornish flag. Used by decree or as a result of societal pressure they indicate the desire of various actors to impose an appearance of homogeneity on the population, so flying the Union flag, wearing a poppy (woe betide you if you read the news on TV without one in November) or succumbing to giving pronouns in your email signature. This second use can breed a lot of resentment in those “forced” to comply.

Of course, the choice can morph into obligation over time.

It's going to be interesting to watch the SNP and Conservative manoeuvres over the coming months. At this stage, the SNP feel more like an opposition than Labour does!

The words "irresistible force and immovable object" come to mind over the independence debate. It's also going to be useful to remember Andy Burnham's statement about English Devolution and more power to the English regions. I think we are at the start of a tremendous pushback against WM centralised control, on all fronts.

@Peregrina

It looks like Priti Patel won't get her way on asylum seekers

I am not sure whether this comes in the category of a Brexit bonus or not? I think it's yet another illustration that a country which banged on about Sovereignty has to remember that other countries are sovereign too.

Yep, pesky things these bilateral agreements......

The poppy fascism annoys me. On one of the 'You have been fired' programmes a couple of years back, every member of the audience was wearing a poppy. Now poppies are normally worn on outdoor clothes or jacket lapels, so why was everyone sporting one on indoor clothes? Because it had been decreed they must. It's now become a November clothing accessory. The idea of choice, that I will choose to commemorate those killed in wars, has been totally lost.