EU referendum, brexit and the aftermath

Was this speech in Parliament then? On the floor of the house?

If not, she should be dragged in by the speaker for contempt of the house.

Doing my own version of brexit and moving somewhere nicer and less polluted.

No the speech was at Lancaster House where Thatcher gave a speech advocating the transformative value of the single market (source BBC). Oh how things have changed in 30 years.

'No deal for Britain is better than a bad deal'

Much more honest than she imagines

For someone so keen to act on 'the will of the people' she has a strong authoritarian streak and, somewhat alarmingly, a distinct lack of respect for democratic institutions.

It'll be interesting to see how the House of Lords react to all this, the commitment to remain in the single market was in the Conservative manifesto in the 2015 general election, so they have every right to be obstructive.

She sure does.

The question will be whether they'll be able to obstruct. I see two opportunities with their own issues.

1) Post-supreme court decision. They should have an opportunity here. If May puts through the two line bill, they can try to do something. I'm not sure what the outcome of this could/would be. There has already been the threat (Rees-Mogg) to fill the House of Lords to get it through.

2) Vote on deal in two years. Consensus seems to be there is no back tracking from A50. A vote in parliament may be for WTO or May's deal. In this sense her claim that "No deal better than bad deal" may have its real meaning. She purposefully ignored this question after her speech.

Who the hell writes her speeches....

"red, white and blue brexit"
"brexit means brexit"

...and these sort of false equivalences...

My concerns are :

(1) Inflation report has gone overlooked, 1.6%, it is rising faster than the most pessimistic forecasts, Christmas debts might be the first dangerous knocks to UK consumer credit as wage increase won't match it this decade, 2012 might be repeated when bubble gets too big, possibly at same time Canary Wharf has packed up shop for the continent and gov't has to raise income tax to meet shortfall.

(2) The record number of low interest mortgage rates sold last year, on 90%+ LTV, at highest house prices, just as property growth starts to reverse. If people had a 2 year fixed rate that leaves them open to negative equity or default as we officially come out of EU and inflation is 3%. Only exacerbates point (1).

(3) After yesterday, power sharing in Northern Ireland after that speech seems unlikely to return soon. Scotland is going to get very noisy too, maybe Wales will join in. I doubt a break up of UK but devolution might be recalled which will cost more and anger more.

Not to mention the NHS / Social Care time bomb which will persist as low priority in gov't eyes. Pound is surging as dollar weakens in inauguration week, last chance to short sterling as US reflation picks up in first half of year ?

(T.May - "I can confirm today that the government will put the final deal that’s agreed between the U.K. and the EU to a vote in both Houses of Parliament before it comes into force” Bets on for a snap general election forced from strong, decisive opposition led by powerful, virile, populist leader favoured by the press? )

All very good points.

Re this:

I doubt a break up of UK but devolution might be recalled which will cost more and anger more.

May stated she wouldn't withdraw devolved power. A move to do so in Scotland would almost certainly result in another referendum. Which may be on the cards anyway.

May made a lot of noise about listening to what the devolved powers have to say, but I suspect nothing in her speech resembles what was presented to her by Scotland.

Parliament is in need of repair, poor working conditions right? Cold February and maybe pneumonia in the House of Lords, would weed out the grey euro-sceptic vote come single market d-day, return it to less cramped conditions

My summary of the speech:

We want our cake, everyone else's cake, scoff the lot while making a mess then punch the chef and leg it without paying.
It couldn't have gone worse really :(

"i'm going to cancel my gym membership, but i will work out the best deal to still get access to the treadmill"

the netflix analogy resonates more with these filthy millennials

Sturgeon's response:

^^ you can't torrent a treadmill.

good caption for private eye cover

"i'm going to cancel my gym membership, as we just need a treadmill, and we don't need all that other gym nonsense, besides the gym is expensive and not showing the kind of results we expect, given we are fit and healthy, and we don't need to be told how to use the fucken cross trainer"

• buys treadmill from treadmill makers *
  
  

^ Brexit.

Got some strange things going on in my head- little voices telling Sturgeon and Scotland as a whole to shut up. Think it is coming from jealousy that they might have an out in this situation. So, how do we go about making London a distinct region devolved from UK Gov and able to pursue the course as dictated by the electorate and remain?

I like what she stands for and would vote SNP given the opportunity to do so.

In a heartbeat.

Lol excellent :)

If only Labour would take a leaf out of their book on how to run an opposition...

[I do hear grumblings there are not as social as they can be, but Labour got destroyed in Scotland for various reasons, one being useless]

Alas in NI we only have the Greens as anti-Brexit.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/17/why_mays_hard_brexit_might_be_soft_than_you_think/

TheReg adds a bit of context...

Good series of tweets by Jo Maugham on whether A50 can be revoked. He's in the process of trying to have the questions resolved in European court (via Irish courts), I think?

https://twitter.com/JolyonMaugham/status/821382561746341888