UK Politics: The Edge of Destruction

[Chaircat Meow]

This has not been mentioned but allegedly the DUP were plotting to steal the mace and so usher in no-deal Brexit.

Financial Times twitter

I feel if Brexit really was tv drama this is how it would end, with Parliament desperate to vote for revocation to avert the cliff edge but unable to do so until the mace is recovered. Hundreds of thousands of young eager lefty volunteers join in a great hunt across London, scouring the banks of the Thames and breaking into the houses of the ERG. Alas, the mace never turns up and everyone dies. 

Anyway, carry on. Geronimo over we go ...

[lokisnow]

31 minutes ago, Nothing Has Changed said:

This has not been mentioned but allegedly the DUP were plotting to steal the mace and so usher in no-deal Brexit.

Financial Times twitter

I feel if Brexit really was tv drama this is how it would end, with Parliament desperate to vote for revocation to avert the cliff edge but unable to do so until the mace is recovered. Hundreds of thousands of young eager lefty volunteers join in a great hunt across London, scouring the banks of the Thames and breaking into the houses of the ERG. Alas, the mace never turns up and everyone dies. 

Anyway, carry on. Geronimo over we go ...

I was just wondering what the quorum rules were for the UK, and if various MPs might decamp and force law enforcement to find them in order to avoid participating in an eleventh hour passage of MV4, MV5 or MV∞

[Which Tyler]

19 minutes ago, lokisnow said:

I was just wondering what the quorum rules were for the UK, and if various MPs might decamp and force law enforcement to find them in order to avoid participating in an eleventh hour passage of MV4, MV5 or MV∞

Nothing remotely?

MPs are not obliged* to vote on anything at all, nor to even be present.

 

* Well, obliged by their own party whip, but no-one is going to Benoit checking broom cupboards and toilets looking for absent MPs.

Absent MPs also won't stop a vote going ahead, they'll just count as having abstained, meaning they don't even get to represent their views.

[The Anti-Targ]

Doesn't no deal hurt Northern Ireland the most? Why would the DUP want a no-deal Brexit? Or do they want to tear up the GFA as part of their manifesto?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

22 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

She has to be mentally ill.

 

Or maybe she's just human. People tend to be bad at admitting their errors, and hers has the chance to be one of the worst in her country's long, storied history. Most people simply can't own up to something like that.

[Philokles]

Seems like the first coherent strategy May has had in a while - get a short extension to delay until after the window to participate in European elections has closed. Then there is no chance of a General Election, renegotiation or People’s Vote, just her deal and no deal. Unfortunately for her this is totally transparent and the EU will never agree to a May 22nd deadline without a commitment to European elections.

[Spockydog]

6 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Or maybe she's just human.

You've seen her in public, right? 

[williamjm]

58 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Doesn't no deal hurt Northern Ireland the most? Why would the DUP want a no-deal Brexit? Or do they want to tear up the GFA as part of their manifesto?

The DUP's founder was fond of declaring that the EU was a plot orchestrated by the Pope to create a Catholic superstate, and there was a seat in the European Parliament reserved for the Antichrist. I think their support for Brexit is not based on pragmatism.

[Spockydog]

2 minutes ago, williamjm said:

The DUP's founder was fond of declaring that the EU was a plot orchestrated by the Pope to create a Catholic superstate, and there was a seat in the European Parliament reserved for the Antichrist.

I mean, if the Pope's Audience Chamber is anything to go by, he might have a point. Eek.

[Chaircat Meow]

Aye, patriotic Britons have never been expected to be rational where Popery is concerned. Why start now?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

18 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

You've seen her in public, right? 

Only without my trusty sun glasses!!!

 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

2 hours ago, Nothing Has Changed said:

This has not been mentioned but allegedly the DUP were plotting to steal the mace and so usher in no-deal Brexit.

Financial Times twitter

I feel if Brexit really was tv drama this is how it would end, with Parliament desperate to vote for revocation to avert the cliff edge but unable to do so until the mace is recovered. Hundreds of thousands of young eager lefty volunteers join in a great hunt across London, scouring the banks of the Thames and breaking into the houses of the ERG. Alas, the mace never turns up and everyone dies. 

Anyway, carry on. Geronimo over we go ...

Either you have spent to much time in the board game thread. Or you think there should be more games based on games.

[mormont]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Doesn't no deal hurt Northern Ireland the most? Why would the DUP want a no-deal Brexit? Or do they want to tear up the GFA as part of their manifesto?

The DUP's position makes Theresa May look coherent and sensible. They insist that there cannot be any result that has different rules for NI and the rest of the UK, as this would undermine the Union, but at the same time they want to maintain the GFA, which implies having the same rules as the rest of Ireland. But they also insist on delivering Brexit, which they support, meaning that the rules in the UK and the RoI must inevitably be different. These things cannot be squared, yet they are all part of the DUP position and the DUP refuse to acknowledge that achieving all three is impossible.

The DUP aren't known for their logically consistent political positions, though. Just for being bloody-minded. Sometimes literally.

[The Anti-Targ]

So, people are voting in clowns to the national Parliament who put mutually exclusive policies in their manifesto. No wonder the UK is screwing itself.

[Werthead]

2 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Doesn't no deal hurt Northern Ireland the most? Why would the DUP want a no-deal Brexit? Or do they want to tear up the GFA as part of their manifesto?

It was telling that one DUP member did say a week or two ago that Remain would be preferable to May's deal. I wonder if that was an oblique reference to the fact that it is the only way out that respects all of the DUP's positions. The DUP is Eurosceptic, but I don't think it's quite been as much of an obsession for them, and not as important as keeping a lid on any move to a unity referendum in Ireland and maintaining their own, shrinking power base.

They may also be waking up to the fact that them favouring Brexit when the majority of people in Northern Ireland do not may prove catastrophic for them at the next election and they should perhaps consider doing something about that.

[The Anti-Targ]

2 minutes ago, Werthead said:

It was telling that one DUP member did say a week or two ago that Remain would be preferable to May's deal. I wonder if that was an oblique reference to the fact that it is the only way out that respects all of the DUP's positions. The DUP is Eurosceptic, but I don't think it's quite been as much of an obsession for them, and not as important as keeping a lid on any move to a unity referendum in Ireland and maintaining their own, shrinking power base.

They may also be waking up to the fact that them favouring Brexit when the majority of people in Northern Ireland do not may prove catastrophic for them at the next election and they should perhaps consider doing something about that.

Nothing like self-preservation to focus the mind.

[karaddin]

Re: the thread title, after MV2 I had an image of the Edge of Tomorrow poster in my head with the caption "Edge of Brexit: Present May Vote, Get Destroyed on the Floor of Parliament, Repeat" and people's heads photoshopped onto Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. Obviously May was Tom Cruise but there were too many options for the Emily Blunt character and I can't photoshop anyway. But this title is bringing it back into my head again.

[williamjm]

19 minutes ago, Werthead said:

It was telling that one DUP member did say a week or two ago that Remain would be preferable to May's deal. I wonder if that was an oblique reference to the fact that it is the only way out that respects all of the DUP's positions. The DUP is Eurosceptic, but I don't think it's quite been as much of an obsession for them, and not as important as keeping a lid on any move to a unity referendum in Ireland and maintaining their own, shrinking power base.

They may also be waking up to the fact that them favouring Brexit when the majority of people in Northern Ireland do not may prove catastrophic for them at the next election and they should perhaps consider doing something about that.

I do wonder if they'd be secretly not too unhappy if Brexit fell apart, as long as they can blame someone else for it - preferably Jeremy Corbyn.

9 minutes ago, karaddin said:

Re: the thread title, after MV2 I had an image of the Edge of Tomorrow poster in my head with the caption "Edge of Brexit: Present May Vote, Get Destroyed on the Floor of Parliament, Repeat" and people's heads photoshopped onto Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. Obviously May was Tom Cruise but there were too many options for the Emily Blunt character and I can't photoshop anyway. But this title is bringing it back into my head again.

Since May's new plan seems to be hope that they can conspire together to get Brexit through, I think Emily Blunt has to be Corbyn now (which is not a sentence I ever expected to type).

[Mentat]

7 hours ago, williamjm said:

I do wonder if they'd be secretly not too unhappy if Brexit fell apart, as long as they can blame someone else for it - preferably Jeremy Corbyn.

He's certainly been handed a poisoned gift in May's offer to hold talks to try and find a compromise (which he was happy to accept).

If he has any sense, he'll insist on a confirmatory vote rather than changes on the Political Declaration which will be ultimately non-binding and worthless.

[mormont]

OK, this is just horrific:

These idiots had better face some serious consequences.