EU referendum, brexit and the aftermath

Labour are bringing back May's deal in their manifesto as their plan: https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Real-Change-Labour-Manifesto-2019.pdf

Where do you see that?

This is what I've read:

Boris Johnson’s deal is even worse than Theresa May’s: it would leave the UK £70 billion worse off by 2029; it would give the green light to deregulation undermining UK manufacturing; and it would leave our NHS at the mercy of a trade deal with Donald Trump. This sell-out deal is unacceptable to Labour.

Labour will secure a new Brexit deal – one that protects jobs, rights and the environment, avoids a hard border in Northern Ireland and protects the Good Friday Agreement and the peace process. We will also ensure that there is no change in the status or sovereignty of Gibraltar.

Boris Johnson’s deal is even worse than Theresa May’s: it would leave the UK £70 billion worse off by 2029; it would give the green light to deregulation undermining UK manufacturing; and it would leave our NHS at the mercy of a trade deal with Donald Trump. This sell-out deal is unacceptable to Labour.

Our deal will be based on the principles we have set out over the last two years.

It will include:
• A permanent and comprehensive UK-wide customs union, which is vital to protect our manufacturing industry and allows the UK to benefit from joint UK-EU trade deals, and is backed by businesses and trade unions.
• Close alignment with the Single Market – ensuring we have a strong future economic relationship with the EU that can support UK businesses.
• Dynamic alignment on workers’ rights, consumer rights and environmental protections so that UK standards keep pace across Europe as a minimum, allowing the UK to lead the way, not fall behind.
• Continued participation in EU agencies and funding programmes, including in such vital areas of co-operation as the environment, scientific research and culture.
• Clear commitments on future security arrangements, including access to the European Arrest Warrant and shared databases, making people safer at home and abroad.

Labour will secure a revised Withdrawal Agreement that provides legal protection for citizens’ rights, meets our international obligations – particularly with regard to the Good Friday Agreement – and ensures an appropriate transition period to allow businesses and citizens to adapt to any new arrangements.

We will also secure robust and legally binding protections for workers’ rights, consumer standards and environmental protections, and ensure level-playing-field protections are maintained. Labour will never accept an outcome that puts rights and standards at risk.

Once we have secured this new deal we will put it to a legally binding referendum alongside the option of remaining in the EU.

First three are materially identical to May's deal, four and five are ambitions that are likely to be accepted but with strict limits and exceptions, and were in the PD with May IIRC.

It's logical - they had to suggest something that they could get done in the first six months as the manifesto commits them to, so recycling a deal that the EU has already agreed to but with a fresh coat of paint makes sense.

I'm not saying it's a bad thing btw, they didn't really have many options- no FoM means no SM, so the furthest they can go is May's UK wide CU, with NI still in the SM.

Ok. I thought you were saying that it was actually in their manifesto.

May’s deal didn’t explicitly include a customs union, it was implicit in the UK wide backstop should alternative arrangements not be found for the Irish border.

Which they wouldn’t because flying unicorns are hard to find.

Labours Brexit plan is materially identical to May's, with Backstop triggered, is what I'm saying.

What you said was "Labour are bringing back May's deal in their manifesto." What you meant was, you feel what is being proposed it materially identical. They're quite different things. And there is lots of room to argue that you are wrong.

Ok, go for it- where am I wrong?

The self imposed red lines that May lived and died would not be official policy. This means the actual deal could be radically different.

I'm also having a bit of trouble with how "they're quite different things" can be true when the outcomes of both are essentially the same.

The self imposed red lines that May lived and died would not be official policy. This means the actual deal could be radically different.

But it's not - they just described it in their manifesto. That's what they're saying they'll negotiate.

The manifesto is not the deal. It contains their negotiation goals - what any deal must provide. It does not limit closer relationships than what is laid out. It limits harder breaks than what is laid out.

These are very different approaches.

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding your point which is possible.

Maybe, it's possible that they're going to end up travelling a fair distance during the negotiations.

The "we will end FoM" from the 2017 manifesto is gone, now we have praise for what it does, but no mention of it. This could be preparing the ground for FoM-by-another-name, which would allow the SM part to come in.

So - yes, if what the manifesto details are starting points rather than goals, it could end up being BRINO.

Yeah, that's my reading of it. Also, re: what they say about FOM in the manifesto:

"If we remain in the EU, freedom of movement would continue. If we leave, it will be subject to negotiations."

So - yes, if what the manifesto details are starting points rather than goals, it could end up being BRINO.

That's my reading of it. And just maybe that will give them a position to back remain - "here's the least bad brexit, but remaining is actually better".

But all moot as they won't have a majority.

The Labour and TUC members are generally fine with FoM, yet Labour leaders/McCluskey are not.

With the UK making a lot of £ with services to the EU, and the UK people generally supporting FOM once it is explained it is both ways, and 3 years passed with the UK attitudes surve showing people are now -positive- about immigration, I find it amazing Labour can't just go for this.

"which is vital to protect our manufacturing industry " but nobody talks about services, what is this, the 70s? It is a brino if you trash your income after all? Do they know the car industry is also reliant on the SM?

However, maybe this is all just being strategic and Labour will keep FoM and just put the Eu approved controls on it, and rebrand it.

I kept hoping Labour is better than this, and the members are, but here we go again. You expect the Tories to do the worst and so they never disappoint, but Labour leadership... I don't get it.

It's not really important, ultimately, as they're going to get slightly fewer seats than they currently have I suspect, but certainly it gives an interesting window into what they might support as a deal with the EU if/when we leave.

What should I drink on the 12th?
And should I stay off work?

What should I drink on the 12th?

And should I stay off work?

Absinthe
Yes definitely

bleach
immaterial

Bleach and Absinthe Cosmo.

spring for the good stuff though

Harpic

Is a drug fuelled weekend in Amsterdam not a saner idea? You won't remember anything but there'll be fun stories ;)

https://thebrexitparty.com/?fbclid=IwAR0IkjGXXrlNVBYf_ZX0rg3eGHnebs26vCW61PV2teBhMfvEd7lAHgu3tRA

Farage suing the Led By Donkeys team to try to get this site back...using EU law. Hah, the ironing.

If I hear Johnson say oven-ready Brexit just one more time I'm going to get very cross.