Brexit process

[RevdTess]

May must have decided no deal isn't an option. She can't fix her deal, and even if she could then the DUP would make her life impossible. She can't get a referendum bill through parliament. General election is the last option standing.

Oh joy. I guess if the alternatives are either no deal, no Brexit or capitulate to Labour demands then a GE might start to look plausibly helpful, but I wonder what position would go in the Tory manifesto that could command the ERG's support afterwards?

[kenneal - lagger]

May has made the mistake of calling an early election once before and there is no way that she will go down that route again and I doubt that there are many Tory MPs who would disagree. At the moment many are doubtful to be reselected given that 60% of Tory members support a no deal Brexit according to a recent poll, let alone get re elected with a large part of the population fed up with austerity.

We will not have an election before austerity has been bought to an end or at least is announced as on the way to the end and a budget published indicating a move in that direction and "another Tory success" is announced. They are no different from any political party in that way.

[UndercoverElephant]

I wonder what position would go in the Tory manifesto that could command the ERG's support afterwards?

Presumably the tories would have to campaign on ratifying May's deal, which would force the ERG to support it in parliament if the tories win. If they don't like that, they always have the option of choosing not to stand as a tory candidate. Can't see them opting for that.

The only other option for them would be to offer a referendum between no deal and May's deal.

[UndercoverElephant]

May has made the mistake of calling an early election once before and there is no way that she will go down that route again

Looks like she hasn't got any choice in the matter. Her deal is cannot be revived unless the EU changes the backstop, and the EU will not change the backstop (certainly not while May remains in charge, at least). If she pivots towards remain/referendum, her party will split. If she pivots towards no deal, her party will split. She already can't govern. There's no way out for her - she can't even resign, because this too would cause the tory party to split (in a war over whether to replace her with a no-dealer or anti-no-dealer).

and I doubt that there are many Tory MPs who would disagree.

Tory MPs want an election like a hole in the head, but they must also realise that May has run out of road. If brexit has to be cancelled, maybe the least bad option is to let Labour cancel it. Tories need some time in opposition to sort themselves out anyway.

At the moment many are doubtful to be reselected given that 60% of Tory members support a no deal Brexit according to a recent poll, let alone get re elected with a large part of the population fed up with austerity.

We will not have an election before austerity has been bought to an end or at least is announced as on the way to the end and a budget published indicating a move in that direction and "another Tory success" is announced. They are no different from any political party in that way.

Personally I'd now say the chances of a general election are above 95%. I cannot see any other way out of the current situation.

[kenneal - lagger]

Get on with other business and let March march in?

[UndercoverElephant]

Get on with other business and let March march in?

She can't do that. May probably sees no deal as the least bad brexit outcome after her deal, but she has lost control of parliament. Bercow and Grieve will conspire (with help from Rudd and Hammond) to make sure no deal can't happen. They will attach wrecking amendments to whatever legislation May could bring forward on Monday. And as soon as it is clear that parliament can and will block no deal, she's completely snookered.

Brexit is dead, I think. May is going to have to call an election, Corbyn will end up in Downing Street, and he'll be forced, one way or another, to cancel brexit.

[UndercoverElephant]

Telegraph now also reporting Brexit is dead:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/20 ... fficially/

I regret to inform my fellow Leave voters that the Establishment have successfully stitched us up. We may have voted for Brexit, but through a mixture of willful incompetence and orchestrated sabotage, Remainer MPs, are now in the final stages of killing it off.

It is tempting to see the events unfolding as inevitable - a shafting of voters by malevolent, arrogant MPs. But this overlooks a jarring contradiction that characterises the politicians thwarting democracy. The likes of Philip Hammond and Nick Boles have a control freakish fervour for regulated sameness and are allergic to leaps into the unknown. But, paradoxically, they are willing to risk the chaos of own deselection and the destruction of their democracy just to preserve the status quo, and stay in the EU.

So how to square the circle? How to explain the contradictory characters of the people imperiling the future of democracy? It seems that our parliamentarians have been possessed by the cult of managerialism. The latter is a pathological devotion to order, paradoxically grounded in an irrational delusion that the universe can be entirely controlled.

Its adherents view “change� as a malign cosmic force. They believe that only an enlightened bureaucratic dictatorship is capable of manipulating "change" in a way that prevents the flattening modern civilisation. Their determination to keep us in the EU is not some kind of misplaced pragmatism. It is existential and ideological.

The managerialist cult originates in 1950s USA, when the American Dream of peppy, white-picket-fenced entrepreneurialism congealed into paper-rustling Ivy League careers in sprawling corporations. It reached our shores and spread via MBA programs in London and Manchester universities the 1960s. Over the decades, it has ravaged virtually all British institutions, from the church of England to the NHS. But, in particular, it has utterly devastated the mother of parliaments.

Although Britain has sleepwalked into an executive dictatorship slowly over several decades, it in the era of Tony Blair that much of the damage was done.

The controlling impulses and jargonish artificiality of both New Labour and managerialism made them ideal bed partners. Under Mr Blair, politics became a meaningless synthesis of "devolved centralism" and "conservative radicalism", peddled out via a web of control-freakish spin doctors, autocratic departmental tsars and tightly selected focus groups.

Twelve years may have passed since the era of Blair, but our democracy is officially screwed. Our Parliament is peopled with spreadsheet saboteurs like Philip Hammond. The chancellor embodies how a once instinctively creative individual can have all the life in them sucked out by the drab elitism of the bureaucratic system.

It is staggering to think that Mr Hammond was once an aspiring Richard Branson. This man started off running school discos in church halls as a teenager, sold Ford cars out of a plant in Dagenham during his student days, and cut deals in property development. And yet he has, from the start, refused to contemplate Brexit’s entrepreneurial potential.

So infatuated is this man in the oleaginous gloss of corporate status that he is positively ashamed of his buccaneering past. Having failed to land a job in the City in his youth, he is said to regret his lack of experience in the big business world. Ah, how he must now relish assuring the CEOs he is in awe of that they needn’t worry about a no-deal via conference calls. He is Mr semi-detached pathetically drooling as he rubs shoulders with the penthouse men.

Then there are the tragic, nerdy types like Nick Boles, who are putting themselves on course for deselection, in order to preserve the status quo. Mr Boles, despite being a Tory, is your classic New Labourish, Notting Hill type. He is a vapid globalist who always thought he'd wind up as a “international, IMF, World Bank-type civil servant�. Perhaps he the Tory MP is willing to risk his own parliamentary career because he is utterly enthralled with the idea of Britain being rules by an insipid, policy wonkish executive dictatorship - after all, it is a world order that institutionally overvalues clever incompetents such as himself.

Crucially and tragically, Parliament is home to hundreds of Philip Hammonds and Nick Boles. In check-mating the Prime Minister into taking no-deal off the table. They have completely wrecked Brexit in other words. Ultimately therefore, the only way to save Brexit and British democracy is to vote them all out at the next election.

[UndercoverElephant]

More of the same:

https://www.politico.eu/article/why-a-u ... you-think/

Downing Street denies an election is coming but the prime minister may find herself with little choice: Call an election now or have one thrust upon her later.

MPs that have war-gamed the next few phases of the Brexit drama believe that the government is now penned in, unable to move in any direction without stumbling over a trip-wire that triggers a general election.

“Whatever happens, at some point we’re looking at the government losing a vote of confidence,� one senior Tory MP said.

[Little John]

https://www.facebook.com/talkRADIOUK/vi ... 331908869/

[Lord Beria3]

Yawn...

Labour now facing the heat from the public and they are using the race card. Pathetic.

The biggest cheer from the derby audience at qt was for no deal. Says it all.

[UndercoverElephant]

This is how parliament is going to block a no deal brexit:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/amphtml/alexwi ... eal-brexit

Details of a plan to prevent a no-deal Brexit by tearing up the parliamentary rulebook and allowing a minority of MPs to seize control of House of Commons business have been uncovered by BuzzFeed News.

The former Conservative attorney general Dominic Grieve is working with a cross-party group of MPs, including leading Remain-supporting Labour rebels, to draw up a new amendment that would see parliament take control of the Brexit process and let backbenchers introduce legislation to extend or revoke Article 50.

Rebels are now coalescing around a new amendment which would overturn centuries of constitutional rules that give government business precedence in the Commons.

If the amendment succeeds, it would allow a motion put forward by a minority of 300 MPs across five parties – including 10 MPs from the governing party – to stand as the first order of business.

This would let a cross-party coalition of backbench MPs to grab power from the government and allow bills to be brought up and considered by the House.

Legislation could then be tabled by backbenchers to block a no-deal Brexit – something for which there is likely to be a Commons majority.

Previously it has been thought that only the executive would be able to extend or revoke Article 50 to stop the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal.

One of the rebel ringleaders discussed the strategy with colleagues in the Commons tea room this week. A source familiar with the conversation relayed details of the proposed amendment to BuzzFeed News.

The extraordinary plan would override the government’s ability to control parliamentary business, as Theresa May is unlikely to be able to find MPs from five parties who would vote with her on a motion relating to Brexit.

This kills brexit. Parliament can block no deal, and won't vote for May's deal. Game over.

[RevdTess]

This kills brexit. Parliament can block no deal, and won't vote for May's deal. Game over.

May would surely offer a GE to Labour before this could happen though.

[UndercoverElephant]

This kills brexit. Parliament can block no deal, and won't vote for May's deal. Game over.

May would surely offer a GE to Labour before this could happen though.

Either before or after, doesn't make much difference. I think the writing is on the wall now. General election, if the tories win we get brexit, if labour wins it gets cancelled.

here's the leaked text of Grieve's upcoming amendment:

(b) a Motion in connection with the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union in the name of at least 300 Members of the House elected to the House as members of at least five parties and including at least 10 Members elected to the House as members of the party in Government shall stand as the first item of business;

She can't survive that. It basically means that a rainbow coalition of anti-no-dealers can take control of parliament.

[PS_RalphW]

May might go for a general election as another stalling tactic. The Tories are ahead in the latest polls even now. She might need to request an extension to article 50 or she might just call the election anyway and leave the party with no time to regroup before they face a final 'accept the deal or no deal ' vote.

[stumuz1]

However, there is a little matter of the EU withdrawal act 2017. Which is primary legislation

https://www.instituteforgovernment.org. ... egislation

To overturn the act you will need new primary legislation .Remember, you can amend an act but not substantially change it.

It will take quite a lot of time, and 330 MP's will have to completely volt face and state that when they originally voted art 50, they didn't really mean it.

Not forgetting 17.4 million cheesed off voters.

Wouldn't be too sure no deal is off the table.