EU referendum, brexit and the aftermath

Rumours are that Farage and others "helped" a bit.

Rumours which emanate from Farage no doubt. He’s trying to stay relevant, UKIP is dead, he won’t be an MEP for much longer, saying he has influence on Trump means he might still get asked his opinion. Sadly the U.K. media are prepared to give the Poundland fascist air time.

Saw this on B3ta, and it made me giggle. Thought it might be appreciated here too:

https://youtu.be/BkvEp_B5Kq8

Murdoch has been given permission to buy the rest of Sky he does not currently own. However, due diligence or whatever the CMA call their deliberations meant that Comcast offered more than Murdoch's original bid. Quite easy to see Murdoch running any anti-May/anti-UK story as retaliation for the extra amount he will now need to pay to gain control of Sky.

I'm not sure if it ever really went away, but I wonder if this is a new outbreak and/or connected to the 'Brexit' rubbish in any way:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/jul/14/gerry-adams-home-attacked-explosive-device-sinn-fein-northern-ireland

I don't know how long the 'New IRA' has been active.

I'm somewhat speculating: Brexit makes a local government here even harder (nobody wants to deliver it bar the DUP) this leads to a perceived power vacuum and all sorts of groups that kept quiet pipe up.

The 11th night was not calm in places thanks to the UVF, there have been attacks and unrest in Londonderry / Derry for a week now as well.

The insecurity around brexit won't help remember that NI is a post conflict society, scratch the surface and you find lots of mistrust, hurt and poverty.

So it's all not, I think, directly brexit related but it surely doesn't help!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-44838028

Donald Trump told Theresa May she should sue the EU rather than negotiate over Brexit, she has told the BBC.

Lol 😂 back biting or truth?

Sorry, meant to reply earlier but didn't get round to it.

(I don't want to come across as a total Labour apologist in the following, I just think they've made a good fist out of a bad hand so far.)

andyp:

I get your point, Oliver, and partially agree with it, but voting for the Article 50 notification was a massive mistake and one that history will judge badly.

JWestland:

I would see agreeing with starting a process without any insight on what it will entail and all the warning signs that it will not be good is a bad thing to do. The excuse that they don't know until negotations doesn't work for me, as there wasn't even a clear outline to put to the EU. No whitepapers, no nothing.

Needless to say, I completely agree that invoking A50 was a mistake--but an odd one, as it sprung the trap that it was purportedly designed to spring (according to the British official who wrote it, if I remember correctly), meaning that on the one hand it was attractive to those who might want May's government to get into difficulty over it, and on the other hand attractive to those who thought it opened up the, to them desirable, possibility of Britain crashing out without a deal. (I don't think that Rees-Mogg really believes 'no deal' would be desirable, as no-one could be that stupid, but that he is trying to use it as a negotiating tactic--the latter is also stupid, as the EU is still operating the longer lever (as you say in German)).

I would certainly prefer it if we hadn't been A50'd, but there you go. I do seem to remember, though, that when the decision came about, it was widely seen also as a test for Labour. It was the first big test of commitment to the referendum result (which obviously didn't call for the swift activation of A50 and has been abused and re-interpreted in all sorts of ways), and I think that voting against it wouldn't have worked for Labour (not to mention that Theresa May still had a majority at the time). I think it, too, would have damaged the party. All the smaller policy statements since haven't attracted much anger in the way that I think voting against A50 would have done.

Obviously, I may be wrong about that and yes, I do agree that it was stupid to do A50 without any preparation, but again there I think that it didn't allow May to open up a clear front against Labour on 'Brexit'. Who knows, perhaps she even called the election partly because of how Labour behaved around A50--trying to portray the election as a choice between a good 'Brexit' and a bad 'Brexit'/remaining (or however she put it, I can't remember) may have been a second attempt at creating the same kind of division. That didn't work and having voted for A50 also allowed Labour to essentially ignore 'Brexit' in the election and concentrate on all their other policies which led to electoral advances. Who knows, really, I'm just speculating.

As for keeping your party to help the country, I don't see standing by and not coming up with a credible alternative and cherrypicking to keep your own party together as honourable, but again, others will disagree.

This I don't understand. Labour was under immense pressure both from within and without to become divided and become completely unelectable. It's weathered all of that and is now much stronger, it seems to me. What exactly are you referring to by 'not coming up with a credible alternative and cherrypicking'? They've articulated their policy positions throughout, said early on that they would keep the UK in a customs union, that they'd guarantee the rights of EU citizens, etc. Sure, there's still a lack of clarity on the single market (see below), but as far as I know apart from that they've consistently shadowed the government and in some areas jumped well ahead of it.

Labour has a SM position from how I read the tealeaves, they want all the benefits it has but exclude freedom of movement. But they didn't actually call it the SM because that would indeed suggest a clear position, atm there is still a lot vagueness which I can only interpret as cherry picking/faffing about to keep things calm and wait for the Tories to mess up.

No, on the single market their position is clearly undefined because the single market is a mixed bag from Labour's perspective, too. I don't fully understand their position, either (much though it clearly isn't finalised), but I personally don't think the single market as it exists is a good thing without reservations--the hasty introduction of the euro has worsened the discrepancy between smaller and larger economies and shouldn't continue in its current form. I think the rushing in of the euro, even though the pre-defined economic tests were not met, was essentially Kohl's doing, to gloss over his extremely poor and allegedly corrupt handling of German reunification and his unjust economic policies which made the German economy over-reliant on exports, as 36 years of more or less conservative governments (Kohl, the Blairite Schröder, and Merkel in various coalitions) have had the long-term consequence of impoverishing millions of Germans in a way that you wouldn't expect in one of the world's supposedly strongest economies. Needless to say, millions of impoverished people exist in Britain, France, etc., too, and I'm not at all surprised that Labour don't think this is all hunky-dory, though probably for different reasons than the above.

I think I am just massively disappointed in Labour, but if they turn around I'll be very pleased. I am not going to dislike the party forever on this if they turn around. But that is a big IF atm.

On what should they 'turn around'? Announce a second referendum, support remain, support the single market, or what do you mean?

Yes, it's really worrying where NI is going to be left in all this. May's latest plan supposedly solves the problem, but I can't really believe that--it still feels like squaring the circle.

Also, here's a good article on the euro (and other related things):

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jun/06/fix-eu-single-currency-does-not-work

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-44839183

Dup: No deal is better than a bad deal. Deep sigh...

Will reply in depth to your posts later on or tomorrow Oliver. I am not sure the euro works great but as the UK has the £ it's practically not a problem re Brexit?

On what should they 'turn around'? Announce a second referendum, support remain, support the single market, or what do you mean?

They could take up the cause of all the workers who are going to lose their jobs - for e.g. Nissan, who when they leave will inflict substantial damage on the economy of the North East.

The problem with doing this is that their policies (ending FOM, some sort of cake-and-eat-it version of the single market) is identical to Theresa Mays, and therefore they have no answer.

Labour would need to change their current, stated policy positions relative to CU/SM/FOM, or come up with something that no one else has thought of in order to stop manufacturing draining from the UK to Europe over the next 3-5 years.

I haven't followed the industrial side of it that much. They have been very clear about workers' rights and have most certainly courted business, though. I also don't think they want to end freedom of movement so much as to ensure better workers' rights and similar pay everywhere so that they're not exploited because different countries have vastly different standards. However, I don't really understand what policy Labour has at the moment in relation to all that, and that's obviously part of the problem.

How would ensuring similar pay levels work- mandate a set minimum wage for workers based on banding that would be agreed across Europe? You'd have to use a single currency otherwise FX issues would make it problematic I suspect. Anyway!

Here's the statement on the Labour website: https://labour.org.uk/manifesto/negotiating-brexit/

Which reads quite well until you reach the immigration part, and then it turns to nonsense as that section flatly contradicts absolutely everything which has gone before it.

The EU have been absolutely 100% on the indivisibility of the four freedoms, and yet Labour believe that the EU is lying - quite staggering.

Will reply in depth to your posts later on or tomorrow Oliver. I am not sure the euro works great but as the UK has the £ it's practically not a problem re Brexit?

Ironically, I suspect the UK might actually have done better out of the euro, being a large economy, than out of keeping the pound, but I'm no economic expert and that's probably nonsense (as I don't know to what extent the UK could have increased its exports).

How would ensuring similar pay levels work- mandate a set minimum wage for workers based on banding that would be agreed across Europe? You'd have to use a single currency otherwise FX issues would make it problematic I suspect. Anyway!

Well, it would not just be minimum wage but other ways of levelling the playing field. Basically, make it less attractive for people to travel abroad (or, indeed, away from their home inside a country) to work but make it more attractive to stay put, support more evenly spread economic activity, etc. It would obviously require European governments to be of roughly the same persuasion as a potential Corbyn government or he'd just run into brick wall after brick wall.

Here's the statement on the Labour website: https://labour.org.uk/manifesto/negotiat­ing-brexit/

Which reads quite well until you reach the immigration part, and then it turns to nonsense as that section flatly contradicts absolutely everything which has gone before it.

I don't see it contradicting that at all. For starters, it's pretty vague and quite possibly impossible to achieve, but it doesn't seem contradictory to me in comparison to what they say earlier. I mean, 'fair rules and reasonable management of migration' isn't very clear ('fair' and 'reasonable' being two of the most notorious weasel-words in politics). That doesn't necessarily make it better, but I'm not sure how it contradicts the other stuff? It's pretty difficult to contradict anything with vague flannel. :)

This bit, which doesn't strike me as being vague:

1 Attachment

And it makes literally everything that has been said up until that point impossible - as long as the EU stick to the same negotiating line that they've had since the start.

Of course, Labour may have a secret method of making the EU allow cherry picking, but I don't believe that for one second.

as long as the EU stick to the same negotiating line that they've had since the start

Yes, certainly, that is a contradiction by implication, but not in the text itself.

As I posted a while ago, I've never been sure whether Labour had an actual negotiating wheeze that nobody else had thought of. I'm still not sure. I think their respect for European institutions would get negotations off to a much better start, but I'm not sure how much further it would go from there.

As they're not in power, they can of course afford the luxury at the moment of saying things like that without having them tested in the real world immediately.

Yes, certainly, that is a contradiction by implication, but not in the text itself.

? The text includes this "Freedom of movement will end when we leave the European Union."

Which is incompatible with being a member of the Single Market. This is binary (if you believe everything the EU has said so far).

Yes, it's by implication if you know about the EU's likely resistance to the idea (which is obviously not stated in the text). If you don't know about it, or, like certain people, imagine there's a way around it, the contradiction is not apparent.

True.

http://www.thedetail.tv/articles/the-detail-launches-major-new-project-on-brexit

A small local press page, but they are pretty good. If you want to follow news about NI and Brexit.

hi again

I think we agree that invoking A50 was maybe not the best?

This I don't understand. Labour was under immense pressure both from within and without to become divided and become completely unelectable. It's weathered all of that and is now much stronger, it seems to me.

From the outside they have a front, maybe... inside there still are clear divisions. And there is no policy so if Labour ends up holding the cards, their problems will begin. You see now that May have committed to "something" she is under instant attack. Labour will have to commit at some point.

And BTW just staying in the customs union won't fix NIs woes, Starmer and Corbyn should know that. But OK, maybe it is again a "we sort this later" play.

No, on the single market their position is clearly undefined because the single market is a mixed bag from Labour's perspective, too.

Cha, most of the poverty is due to local policies, and companies moving (globalisation) and even worse money just flowing out to tax havens. Labour is all big on the "evil neoliberalism" OK then, stay in and use your VETO.
Cameron only used his to stop further integration, how awesome would it be if the UK would go together with the small countries? As some things really need to change.

I think I am just massively disappointed in Labour, but if they turn around I'll be very pleased. I am not going to dislike the party forever on this if they turn around. But that is a big IF atm.

What bothers me is what dammit also posted: They mention wanting the benefits of the SM, but instantly started to dump on foreign workers. Before the government report is out (there is a preliminary one) and all this to keep a select few Northern Labour MPs happy. Labour voters and members, as a whole, are on the majority happy with EU FOM and the EU, so I don't get this one.

Again Northern areas come up, but it was the kippers that won the leave vote there. Not labour voters. And what is Labour doing getting in bed with that lot?

And...the EU has said there will be no division of freedom of movement (which technically is FOM for work and family reunification, benefits are restricted and you need to find a job within 3 months. You can also be deported until you have permanent residence which takes 5 years_) so this whole play of all the goods and not the costs is pure smoke and mirrors.

Oh and the much hated banking industry? It will be at least partly lost as France will go to the EJC again to take Euro clearing rights and this time it will win.
There is a lot of unethical behaviour in it, but losing billions is not exactly a walk in the park.

On what should they 'turn around'? Announce a second referendum, support remain, support the single market, or what do you mean?

I read there is to be a vote on staying in the SM. I'd be happy if that happens and passes. A second referendum, cha, the first one was a mistake imho (much too complex an issue) but perhaps it will settle this "will of the people" AKA "the voices in the heads of some politicians" and see if the really IS a mandate for a crappy deal.

I don't want to turn into a "forever hating Labour" type btw, such things don't help. Though I am not sure I can ever forgive the Tory party by now! And the DUP, piss skundering hallions (extremely aggravating and embarrassing idiots)

I get the impression every proposal, every position is a minority position. ie there is no brexit which will please a majority of people, let alone all of them. Anyone who thinks they can "do brexit right" is kidding themselves (and their audience).

5 year transitional deal where nothing really changes and we all yell at each other continuously is my bet. We could all be dead of novichok poisoning by then.