UK Politics - summer edition

[Eggegg]

37 minutes ago, Maltaran said:

Not all Brexit voters, but it was such a close result that there's probably enough of them to raise reasonable doubt on the result.

And then what? Half your country is still deeply dissatisfied and you call another referendum proving to all Brexit voters that making any real change is literally impossible and the system is stacked against them. 

I’m just not sure what the point of all these discussion and news stories even is.

[Werthead]

In April David Davis said that Britain could hold onto the EU agencies based in the UK (bizarrely). Today two of them confirmed their movies: the European Banking Agency is moving to Paris, the European Medicines Agency is going to go to Amsterdam, taking over a thousand jobs between them. I'm still trying to work out why on Earth Davis thought they would or could stay.

1 hour ago, Eggegg said:

And then what? Half your country is still deeply dissatisfied and you call another referendum proving to all Brexit voters that making any real change is literally impossible and the system is stacked against them. 

I’m just not sure what the point of all these discussion and news stories even is.

To be fair, the Leave Campaign did say very clearly during the referendum that "52% wouldn't settle the matter and we would continue to make the argument", so they can hardly blame the other side for doing the same thing (not to mention the fact they didn't shut up after 1975 either, so why should anyone else), especially because the economic consequences are considerable and will have a multi-generational impact on the country.

The problem is that the original referendum question was absolutely lacking in any kind of detail for what "Brexit" actually meant. I know many people who took it as read that Britain would remain in the customs union and voted Leave on that basis. It was also extremely bizarre that 16-17 year olds were not permitted to vote (as they had been allowed to in the Scottish independence vote) and long-term European migrants (who'd been here longer than five years and were planning to stay here for the rest of their lives) were not allowed to vote whilst British expats who had abandoned the country for good were allowed to vote. Apparently the government did plan for these people to vote but then decided not to because they couldn't be bothered to sort it out.

The discussions are taking place because they represent the choice between Britain resuming the economic place it had before joining the EU in 1975 - as the sick man of Europe - or forging a successful new independent course as a bridge between the EU, US and other markets. We will still be poorer than we were previously, this is unavoidable (and it is amusing seeing people kid themselves otherwise), but the impact can be lessened if good choices are made, which are not happening at present. Still, it is important to make the attempt and prevent the hardline Tory Brexiteers from wrecking the country any more than they have managed already.

[Maltaran]

2 hours ago, Werthead said:

 whilst British expats who had abandoned the country for good were allowed to vote. 

Not quite true - anyone who’s been out of the country for more than 15 years is no longer allowed to vote, and the expats who challenged that during the referendum campaign lost in court. Neil Gaiman often mentions it on Twitter when elections roll around, because he’s one of those who’s lost his vote

[Werthead]

2 hours ago, Maltaran said:

Not quite true - anyone who’s been out of the country for more than 15 years is no longer allowed to vote, and the expats who challenged that during the referendum campaign lost in court. Neil Gaiman often mentions it on Twitter when elections roll around, because he’s one of those who’s lost his vote

That's correct, although the disparity between the number of people who no longer reside in the UK but living outside being able to vote and the number who were planning to stay here for good but not being able to vote is notable.

[mormont]

13 hours ago, Eggegg said:

It’s all such a pointless distraction and assumes that the only way people could vote for Brexit was if they were tricked into it by foul play. What if Brexit voters had genuine concerns that weren’t being listened to?

We wouldn't want people who have genuine concerns to be ignored. Except of course if those concerns are about leaving the single market, which as noted previously the majority of the country do have. Obviously we won't listen to those.

[Eggegg]

1 minute ago, mormont said:

We wouldn't want people who have genuine concerns to be ignored. Except of course if those concerns are about leaving the single market, which as noted previously the majority of the country do have. Obviously we won't listen to those.

And what if people are concerned about immigration and lack of sovereignty?

[mormont]

1 hour ago, Eggegg said:

And what if people are concerned about immigration and lack of sovereignty?

The idea that those concerns 'aren't being listened to' is hilarious. We are about to wreck our entire economy because politicians are so shit-scared of not being seen to listen to these (largely overblown) concerns. 

[Eggegg]

6 minutes ago, mormont said:

The idea that those concerns 'aren't being listened to' is hilarious. We are about to wreck our entire economy because politicians are so shit-scared of not being seen to listen to these (largely overblown) concerns. 

Sorry I don't understand your point. Peoples concerns were not being listened to, that is why we got Brexit.People were concerned about extremely high and rapid levels of immigration from Eastern Europe. Cameron went to the EU and found out that in fact he couldn't do a damn thing about it, we would have to simply accept those levels. 

In what way were those who were concerned about sovereignty listened to? 

[mormont]

26 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

Sorry I don't understand your point. Peoples concerns were not being listened to, that is why we got Brexit.

No, even then, these concerns were being listened to. Politicians of both major parties discussed those concerns daily in Parliament and nightly on the news. 

There was a narrative abroad that these concerns weren't 'being listened to', where 'being listened to' meant 'being pandered to'. Politicians were expected to pretend to people that there were simple answers to these complex questions and the failure to produce these simple answers was portrayed as mendacity. Liars, bigots and fantasists cynically profited from this (step forward Farage, Johnson et al.) David Cameron foolishly promised them a referendum to shut them up then idiotically went into it completely unprepared. As a result, we are all now fucked. 

26 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

People were concerned about extremely high and rapid levels of immigration from Eastern Europe. Cameron went to the EU and found out that in fact he couldn't do a damn thing about it, we would have to simply accept those levels.

Immigration levels were healthy for the economy and eminently manageable. Every objective analysis agreed on that. 

And Cameron didn't 'find out' anything. Anyone remotely familiar with the law knew that already: we signed up for that many years ago, for excellent reasons. That whole business of him asking for one-sided immigration rules was pantomime done for party political reasons.

26 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

In what way were those who were concerned about sovereignty listened to?

What the fuck is 'sovereignty' anyway? I am going to bet you right now that 90% of those concerned with it, couldn't articulate what the hell it is, or what it means, or how exactly it was being compromised by EU membership. I will double that bet on the fact that leaving the EU will effectively reduce our sovereignty. We will have to enter and be bound by international agreements anyway. Now, we do so from a position of weakness.

Anyone who voted for Leave on the basis of woolly ideas about 'sovereignty' and because of concerns about immigration did so because they were ignorant. That is not their fault, necessarily, but their concerns have now been cynically hijacked by those favouring the harshest version of Brexit. If I were you, I would be a lot more outraged about that, than the idea that they were somehow not being listened to. 'Not being listened to' is when your concerns are dismissed as being disloyalty to your country and not worthy of discussion. 

[Eggegg]

1 minute ago, mormont said:

 

Immigration levels were healthy for the economy and eminently manageable. Every objective analysis agreed on that. 

 

I think this is where I suspect you are out of touch with the average Brit. The levels of immigration were extraordinary, FAR above normal levels. When you are talking about Half a million people arriving a year and you don't expect some sort of kick back from the native population then you are living in cloud cookoo land.  Your attitude is exactly the same as those who didn't listen, that anyone who has concerns about the vast numbers of people arriving in their country is simply ignorant or racist or uninformed. Walk around any town in the South East of England and I think your opinion would change rapidly.
 

4 minutes ago, mormont said:

Anyone who voted for Leave on the basis of woolly ideas about 'sovereignty' and because of concerns about immigration did so because they were ignorant. That is not their fault, necessarily, but their concerns have now been cynically hijacked by those favouring the harshest version of Brexit. If I were you, I would be a lot more outraged about that, than the idea that they were somehow not being listened to. 'Not being listened to' is when your concerns are dismissed as being disloyalty to your country and not worthy of discussion. 

I think the basic principal of being able to directly elect those who govern you and make your laws is pretty simple. The almost inevitable ever closer union will make this more and more difficult without a massive overhaul in the way the EU is structured. 

 

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 'Not being listened to' is when your concerns are dismissed as being disloyalty to your country and not worthy of discussion. 

Which is precisely what you appear to be doing.

[Werthead]

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And what if people are concerned about immigration and lack of sovereignty?

 

Freedom of movement is enshrined in EU rules but countries actually had tremendous freedom in how to interpret those rules. For example, it was possible to ask people who had been here for x number of months without finding a job to leave. It was also possible to say that people needed a job before they came to this country and they could not claim from the benefits system until they had paid in for a certain period.

These rules were not imposed because of the simple fact that the overwhelming majority of immigrants had jobs or were studying, worked hard, paid into the system and did jobs that British people refused to do, and are still refusing to do pointblank, and without those immigrant jobs several sectors (including health and agriculture) are going to be facing serious manpower problems.

Britain is also a western capitalist country and western capitalist countries require rapidly growing working-age populations to solve the looming pensions apocalypse (which is now re-looming ever larger) and to provide the ever-larger customer base for goods and services. If we want to live in a stable economy with a shrinking population that's great (and 100% necessary for the future of the planet), but it is fundamentally incompatible with the form of capitalism used in the country. If we want to change that, awesome, I'm waiting to hear a solution. Oddly, the Leave campaign never addressed this fundamental issue as part of their campaign.

As for "sovereignty"...well, we live in a country where, almost always, the ruling party was voted for by significantly lesser than half the voting population (and sometimes barely a third). The British FPTP system is profoundly undemocratic and unrepresentative, so on the question of if we're being represented by unelected representatives in Brussels or undemocratically elected representatives in London, what's the difference?

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That whole business of him asking for one-sided immigration rules was pantomime done for party political reasons.

 

It was more astonishing because Brtain was a Very Special Snowflake in the UK and got an amazing amount of benefits, financial boosts and remarkable level of subsidies for everything from science to agriculture, not to mention our sweet budget rebate. Cameron going to Brussels expecting even more favours was always going to be futile. The problem was that these benefits were not articulated cogently during the campaign, as many Leave-voting areas discovered when they were promptly told that their new (and in some cases, urgently-needed) infrastructure projects were being cancelled because they were EU projects and not UK ones, and the voting population had no idea.

[SeanF]

15 hours ago, Werthead said:

In April David Davis said that Britain could hold onto the EU agencies based in the UK (bizarrely). Today two of them confirmed their movies: the European Banking Agency is moving to Paris, the European Medicines Agency is going to go to Amsterdam, taking over a thousand jobs between them. I'm still trying to work out why on Earth Davis thought they would or could stay.

To be fair, the Leave Campaign did say very clearly during the referendum that "52% wouldn't settle the matter and we would continue to make the argument", so they can hardly blame the other side for doing the same thing (not to mention the fact they didn't shut up after 1975 either, so why should anyone else), especially because the economic consequences are considerable and will have a multi-generational impact on the country.

The problem is that the original referendum question was absolutely lacking in any kind of detail for what "Brexit" actually meant. I know many people who took it as read that Britain would remain in the customs union and voted Leave on that basis. It was also extremely bizarre that 16-17 year olds were not permitted to vote (as they had been allowed to in the Scottish independence vote) and long-term European migrants (who'd been here longer than five years and were planning to stay here for the rest of their lives) were not allowed to vote whilst British expats who had abandoned the country for good were allowed to vote. Apparently the government did plan for these people to vote but then decided not to because they couldn't be bothered to sort it out.

The discussions are taking place because they represent the choice between Britain resuming the economic place it had before joining the EU in 1975 - as the sick man of Europe - or forging a successful new independent course as a bridge between the EU, US and other markets. We will still be poorer than we were previously, this is unavoidable (and it is amusing seeing people kid themselves otherwise), but the impact can be lessened if good choices are made, which are not happening at present. Still, it is important to make the attempt and prevent the hardline Tory Brexiteers from wrecking the country any more than they have managed already.

That's standard.  It's the Parliamentary franchise, and the one that has been used for every referendum save for Scottish independence.

[SeanF]

15 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Freedom of movement is enshrined in EU rules but countries actually had tremendous freedom in how to interpret those rules. For example, it was possible to ask people who had been here for x number of months without finding a job to leave. It was also possible to say that people needed a job before they came to this country and they could not claim from the benefits system until they had paid in for a certain period.

These rules were not imposed because of the simple fact that the overwhelming majority of immigrants had jobs or were studying, worked hard, paid into the system and did jobs that British people refused to do, and are still refusing to do pointblank, and without those immigrant jobs several sectors (including health and agriculture) are going to be facing serious manpower problems.

Britain is also a western capitalist country and western capitalist countries require rapidly growing working-age populations to solve the looming pensions apocalypse (which is now re-looming ever larger) and to provide the ever-larger customer base for goods and services. If we want to live in a stable economy with a shrinking population that's great (and 100% necessary for the future of the planet), but it is fundamentally incompatible with the form of capitalism used in the country. If we want to change that, awesome, I'm waiting to hear a solution. Oddly, the Leave campaign never addressed this fundamental issue as part of their campaign.

As for "sovereignty"...well, we live in a country where, almost always, the ruling party was voted for by significantly lesser than half the voting population (and sometimes barely a third). The British FPTP system is profoundly undemocratic and unrepresentative, so on the question of if we're being represented by unelected representatives in Brussels or undemocratically elected representatives in London, what's the difference?

It was more astonishing because Brtain was a Very Special Snowflake in the UK and got an amazing amount of benefits, financial boosts and remarkable level of subsidies for everything from science to agriculture, not to mention our sweet budget rebate. Cameron going to Brussels expecting even more favours was always going to be futile. The problem was that these benefits were not articulated cogently during the campaign, as many Leave-voting areas discovered when they were promptly told that their new (and in some cases, urgently-needed) infrastructure projects were being cancelled because they were EU projects and not UK ones, and the voting population had no idea.

Under FPTP, the public can throw the buggers out, if they get sick of them.

[SeanF]

36 minutes ago, mormont said:

No, even then, these concerns were being listened to. Politicians of both major parties discussed those concerns daily in Parliament and nightly on the news. 

There was a narrative abroad that these concerns weren't 'being listened to', where 'being listened to' meant 'being pandered to'. Politicians were expected to pretend to people that there were simple answers to these complex questions and the failure to produce these simple answers was portrayed as mendacity. Liars, bigots and fantasists cynically profited from this (step forward Farage, Johnson et al.) David Cameron foolishly promised them a referendum to shut them up then idiotically went into it completely unprepared. As a result, we are all now fucked. 

Immigration levels were healthy for the economy and eminently manageable. Every objective analysis agreed on that. 

And Cameron didn't 'find out' anything. Anyone remotely familiar with the law knew that already: we signed up for that many years ago, for excellent reasons. That whole business of him asking for one-sided immigration rules was pantomime done for party political reasons.

What the fuck is 'sovereignty' anyway? I am going to bet you right now that 90% of those concerned with it, couldn't articulate what the hell it is, or what it means, or how exactly it was being compromised by EU membership. I will double that bet on the fact that leaving the EU will effectively reduce our sovereignty. We will have to enter and be bound by international agreements anyway. Now, we do so from a position of weakness.

Anyone who voted for Leave on the basis of woolly ideas about 'sovereignty' and because of concerns about immigration did so because they were ignorant. That is not their fault, necessarily, but their concerns have now been cynically hijacked by those favouring the harshest version of Brexit. If I were you, I would be a lot more outraged about that, than the idea that they were somehow not being listened to. 'Not being listened to' is when your concerns are dismissed as being disloyalty to your country and not worthy of discussion. 

That's a curious question from someone who voted for Scottish independence.  The argument is the same in both cases.  Is one better or worse off in a smaller-self-governing political entity, or a larger one in which one potentially wields greater influence?

[BigFatCoward]

56 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

I think this is where I suspect you are out of touch with the average Brit. The levels of immigration were extraordinary, FAR above normal levels. When you are talking about Half a million people arriving a year and you don't expect some sort of kick back from the native population then you are living in cloud cookoo land.  Your attitude is exactly the same as those who didn't listen, that anyone who has concerns about the vast numbers of people arriving in their country is simply ignorant or racist or uninformed. Walk around any town in the South East of England and I think your opinion would change rapidly.

UK net migration was approx 250,000 last year, and as articulated elsewhere these people were predominantly contributors to the economy. 

The issue of immigration is a massive red herring, the lack of services available for the 'native' population is due to massive cuts under austerity, however its much easier to blame this on immigration, than to accept it was almost entirely of their making. 

If you are in a 50 person queue for a toilet in a pub, you don't blame the person in front of you, you blame the landlord for only having one working toilet.

[Werthead]

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That's standard.  It's the Parliamentary franchise, and the one that has been used for every referendum save for Scottish independence.

 

And it was changed for the Scottish referendum because it was recognised that it was only fair for the long-term future of the country to be decided by those who would be impacted the most (i.e. the young). The same argument applied for the EU referendum.

 

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Under FPTP, the public can throw the buggers out, if they get sick of them.

 

And the same was true of the European Parliamentary elections, which of course many people didn't vote in, didn't know who their MEPs were, ignored the European Elections, and then complained that their voices were not represented. They were, they just chose not to get involved.

 

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That's a curious question from someone who voted for Scottish independence.  The argument is the same in both cases.  Is one better or worse off in a smaller-self-governing political entity, or a larger one in which one potentially wields greater influence?

 

In the case of Scotland, a strong argument is that the rest of Britain is moving in a less progressive, less economically stable and more chaotic direction which Scotland profoundly disagrees with and in which its voice, although heard, is unable to effectively change anything. In the case of the EU, Britain's influence and power within the bloc was actually increasing and growing. We'd supplanted France as the second-most-important voice in the bloc, we were rapidly closing on Germany in key areas such as economic growth and we had a strong network of alliances (particularly with the Netherlands and Poland) which gave us tremendous influence within the European Union. The old Franco-German domination of the union had effectively become a thing of the past and if trends had continued, we could have emerged as the most powerful voice in the EU within a decade or so, giving us tremendous clout on the world stage.

The problem is that Britain does not build anything, does not have a homegrown industry that no other country can replicate and our most successful businesses - in the banking and service sectors - are partially (if not majorly) reliant on our membership of the European Union with passporting services and access to the single market. Without these factors, it is unclear what will keep Britain afloat and our influence on the world stage will be undeniably massively diminished.

[Eggegg]

Just now, BigFatCoward said:

UK net migration was approx 250,000 last year, and as articulated elsewhere these people were predominantly contributors to the economy. 

The immigration levels were approx 500,000. Yes 250,000 left, and many were brits. But that is an enormous level of change. Now whether you want to debate the level of strain it puts on public services or whatever, on any level a native population that sees widespread demographic change in a small space of time is going to react, and probably not in a good way. 

[BigFatCoward]

5 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

The immigration levels were approx 500,000. Yes 250,000 left, and many were brits. But that is an enormous level of change. Now whether you want to debate the level of strain it puts on public services or whatever, on any level a native population that sees widespread demographic change in a small space of time is going to react, and probably not in a good way. 

Its a 0.3% increase in population, this is not why public services are under strain.  Its the lie you and others like you believe because you get your news from sh!t sources.

[Eggegg]

19 minutes ago, BigFatCoward said:

Its a 0.3% increase in population, this is not why public services are under strain.  Its the lie you and others like you believe because you get your news from sh!t sources.

I agree the public services thing is a bit of a red herring, but for both sides of the argument. Its the focus of the argument, but I think many people won't come out and just admit they are not happy that there has been a large influx in immigration into some areas, making them basically unrecognisable from a decade ago. I think that unhappiness is natural and doesn't amount to racism either.

[lessthanluke]

9 minutes ago, Eggegg said:

I agree the public services thing is a bit of a red herring, but for both sides of the argument. Its the focus of the argument, but I think many people won't come out and just admit they are not happy that there has been a large influx in immigration into some areas, making them basically unrecognisable from a decade ago. I think that unhappiness is natural and doesn't amount to racism either.

If there is no logic behind the unhappiness then what is it other than racism?