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UK Politics: The Overton Defenestration


Hereward

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I'd be willing to bet that most people voted for Brexit because they don't like the EU's direction of travel, and that wanting to kick the government was a much smaller concern.  As you imply, 70% of centre-right voters voted Leave.

58 minutes ago, Hereward said:

No, I don't believe that is true, though I would be happy to see some evidence if you have it. If it were true, the people most opposed to Tory policies, i.e. Labour, SNP, LibDem and Green supporters, would have overwhelmingly voted Leave. They didn't. Certainly some 35% f Labour supporters voted Leave, but that is probably down to two things, anger/bewilderment at the pace of cultural and economic change (as with many UKIP supporters), and, amongst the traditional hard left, opposition to the EU's economic policy, enshrined in law and "constitution". Far more Tories voted to Leave than Labour, and that seems unlikely to be down to opposition to their party's policies. 

 

 

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That's nice and all but the Scottish Parliament explicitly doesn't have any power over foreign policy and the Act of Parliament which created was also pretty clear they have no power to constrain Westminster, plus of course Parliamentary Sovereignty and all that so it couldn't have been given that power anyway. So overall the legal case seemed (and apparently is) pretty baseless and why exactly should Scotland have more say than that given by it's MPs in Westminster?

That is part of the slippery slope argument against devolution. Scotland and Northern Ireland both benefit a huge deal from EU membership and have chosen to remain, so being yanked out of it against their will is certainly a problem for them. Prior to devolution you could just say "Tough," but that's harder now given the greater voice they have.

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I don't see how that's a 'reasonable bone'. That would a massive deal which was absolutely not going to happen. May was just going to follow through on Brexit for the rest of the UK and then let Scotland stay in? How the hell would that even work?

Reasonable from Sturgeon's viewpoint, which is not to reasonable from other POVs. It would be very difficult to make it to work, I agree.

As I said, I don't believe from the polls (oft-quoted here) that Sturgeon is much more likely to win an independence referendum than she was in 2014, perhaps against expectations. For that reason I think her preference would be pretty much anything apart from a hard Brexit which she can sell to her party. Going for a hard Brexit will pretty much force Sturgeon to call for another referendum regardless of the chances for victory.

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2 hours ago, ljkeane said:

That's nice and all but the Scottish Parliament explicitly doesn't have any power over foreign policy

Nobody's ever claimed it has, not even the devolved administrations, so you're beating up a straw man there - unless you're claiming that leaving the EU is a foreign policy issue, which would be one of those situations where a desire to rubbish someone for political reasons leads you to an unsustainable conclusion you wouldn't otherwise defend.

The devolved administrations' case is entirely domestic, resting on the fact that the domestic legislation that set those institutions up explicitly incorporated EU law, which will now no longer apply, changing the foundation of those institutions and giving them a legitimate interest in the process. The issue is whether that interest means they get a vote, and that was always unlikely to be true, for reasons of parliamentary sovereignty, as you note. But foreign policy doesn't enter into it. 

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Brits, stay in the EU! We will work it out. That referendum was built on false promises! 

Learn the lesson of Trump. Out there is a dog eat dog world and only together we are strong! To leave the EU will be a decision for the next 100 years!

edit: great opinion piece. 100% agree 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/24/remoaner-article-50-brexit-labour?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

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24 minutes ago, mormont said:

 unless you're claiming that leaving the EU is a foreign policy issue, which would be one of those situations where a desire to rubbish someone for political reasons leads you to an unsustainable conclusion you wouldn't otherwise defend.. 

Er, what? Leaving the EU is definitely a foreign policy issue, it's the UK withdrawing from a treaty/several treaties with the other countries in the EU and renegotiating it's relationships with those countries and, it appears, quite a few others. Foreign policy issues often have domestic implications and because of the extensive nature of the obligations and interdependence resulting from EU membership this one has significant domestic implications but it doesn't make it not a foreign policy issue.

That may well not have been the focus of the legal challenge of the devolved governments but it doesn't really matter either way.

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On the North British situation this by Blair McDougall (head of the BT campaign) gives a good overview of the problems the SNP will have organizing indyref2 around staying in the EU.

https://medium.com/@blairmcdougall/why-nicola-sturgeon-is-frozen-in-front-of-goal-4618fc79e078#.k1f7oxtur

@Werthead. I could not disagree more with your view that labour understands why people voted for Brexit better than the Tories. Perhaps Labour's biggest problem is that it won't or can't acknowledge that concern over immigration is actually a cultural/identity based issue. It believes, or want to believe, that greater doses of social democracy will win working class and swing voters back and they won't. Polls show that about 70-80% of the public have thought immigration is too high since polling started, so blaming this on the mythical 'six years of Tory austerity' is wrong.

Labour are actually the party with the biggest Brexit related problem. UKIP are second, and the Tories and the liberals will do the best out of the issue.

 

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25 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

Er, what? Leaving the EU is definitely a foreign policy issue, it's the UK withdrawing from a treaty/several treaties with the other countries in the EU and renegotiating it's relationships with those countries and, it appears, quite a few others. Foreign policy issues often have domestic implications and because of the extensive nature of the obligations and interdependence resulting from EU membership this one has significant domestic implications but it doesn't make it not a foreign policy issue.

That may well not have been the focus of the legal challenge of the devolved governments but it doesn't really matter either way.

Saying that being in the EU has 'domestic implications' is like saying that being married changes your sleeping arrangements: true, but not remotely capturing the scope of things. Being in the EU goes far beyond the treaties. So far entwined is EU law with domestic UK law that it makes little sense to me to talk of leaving as a 'foreign policy issue'. Renegotiating trade relationships with other countries is going to be one of the trickiest bits, but there's a huge amount of domestic change to come too.

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My final rational analysis why people voted BREXIT (or for Trump, same mindset, same kind of people): those people are afraid of losing their identity and those people are afraid of the future, especially a future of full globalization. Those fears are justified. There have been many ugly excesses of globalization, the 2008 GFC was just one eruption and more are to come if we do not pro-actively correct the course. 

BUT: Brexit or Trump are not a solution, they are simply the denial of facing the problems. Brexiteers and Trump played with the feeling of nostalgia, offering to go back to a supposed golden past...but here is the thing: those are all lies! You NEVER can turn back time! And the supposed solutions didn't work out a 100 years ago and sure as hell don't work out today and tomorrow! The world IS globalized and what we should and could do is taking measures to change the "few winners, many losers" situation! But that doesn't work with denying reality, those are symptoms of a depressed person (in this case nation)! 

BREXIT will prove to be a major fuck-up, not in a year or two but let's speak again in 10 or 15 years! Your rational thinking politicians in the U.K. have now the one-time chance to correct this mistake! Let's see if they have the personal integrity to decide for what is right and not for what is beneficial for their political career! Learn a lesson from Gerhard Schröder who sacrificed his personal political career for the future of his country (Agenda 2010, not everything was right but many things and Schröders courage is undeniable).

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2 hours ago, Arakan said:

Brits, stay in the EU! We will work it out. That referendum was built on false promises! 

Learn the lesson of Trump. Out there is a dog eat dog world and only together we are strong! To leave the EU will be a decision for the next 100 years!

edit: great opinion piece. 100% agree 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/24/remoaner-article-50-brexit-labour?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

According to TheyWorkForYOU Smiffy voted for the referendum bill in 2015 (something he does not have the courage to mention in this article). As far as I am concerned that means his decision not to vote to leave the EU is dishonourable and brings Parliament into disrepute.

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33 minutes ago, Chaircat Meow said:

According to TheyWorkForYOU Smiffy voted for the referendum bill in 2015 (something he does not have the courage to mention in this article). As far as I am concerned that means his decision not to vote to leave the EU is dishonourable and brings Parliament into disrepute.

Sorry what? Is this meant to be humour? A man who risks is PERSONAL political career because he wants to make a decision which in his mind is the RIGHT ONE, is now called dishonorable? Wow, just wow. We really are living in bizarro world right now...

Call him whatever you like but dishonorable is simply wrong, at least in the real world. 

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Just now, Arakan said:

Sorry what? Is this meant to be humour? A man who risks is PERSONAL political career because he wants to make a decision which in his mind is the RIGHT ONE, is now called dishonorable? Wow, just wow. We really are living in bizarro world right now...

Call him whatever you like but dishonorable is simply wrong, at least in the real world. 

No. If he felt the UK should not leave the EU regardless of a referendum result then he should have voted against holding the referendum. But he didn't. And I think he's only voting against leaving in this case because he knows the majority of MPs will vote to leave and so he won't be faced with the consequences of Parliament trying to set aside the referendum result.  

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39 minutes ago, Chaircat Meow said:

According to TheyWorkForYOU Smiffy voted for the referendum bill in 2015 (something he does not have the courage to mention in this article). As far as I am concerned that means his decision not to vote to leave the EU is dishonourable and brings Parliament into disrepute.

It's only in his dreams that Smith is the chief of anything.

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Getting back to the actual news of the day, the devil is as always in the detail. It seems clear that the government's ideal would be to meet the requirement of parliamentary permission to proceed as minimally as possible, basically by passing a motion that says 'trigger article 50' and nothing else. Labour, and I have to give them credit, appear to be unwilling to stand for that, and the SNP won't either. The Conservatives can still railroad through something, of course.

The Labour response is quite good for a change - see below:

 

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10 hours ago, Hereward said:

Stoke poll has UKIP on 35% with Labour on 25%.and the Tories on 10%. Long way to go, but I wish I'd put my money where my mouth is.

Plenty of room for scepticism about this, I would say.

1. Neither Labour nor the Conservatives have even picked a candidate yet.

2. The poll was commissioned by Labour Leave, a group that has an interest in the poll showing exactly this result.

3. The only report on this poll I can find is in the Express, which spends so much time crowing over how earth-shaking a UKIP win would be that it doesn't have space to provide a link to any actual data about the poll (number of respondents, methodology, dates conducted, etc.) It finds space for a lengthy statement by the head of Labour Leave exhorting the party to pick a Eurosceptic candidate, though. Even he notes that given the large number of 'don't knows' Labour should win if it does this.

Overall, this doesn't appear to be a serious poll but an attempt to twist the Labour leadership's arm on candidate selection.

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