Brexit process

[Little John]

They have done far more than merely not support May's deal. They have made it impossible to leave on WTO in the absence of any deal at all and they are now more or less permanently on the brink of coming fully out on a ticket of a "confirmatory" referendum".

However, even their opposition to May;s deal, or some shitty variant of it, now looks in doubt if rumors circulating in Westminster are to be believed. Given the council election results and the almost certainly worse results due out for both Labour and the Tories in the Eu elections, it seems Labour and the Tories are about to strike a deal that will cause the EU elections to be called off. And you can bet your house on it, if such a deal is struck, it will involve membership of the customs union and single market and jurisdiction of the ECJ. Of course, all of these arrangements will be given shiny new names so as to obfuscate the fact that the UK will not have left the EU.

Labour are no less traitors to this nation and to democracy itself than are the Tories and are now a remain party in all but name and most of the rest of the country knows it.

Oh.... and I see you have now shifted your position.., again... and are now conceding that there is a very reasonable probability of Labour limping into government as opposed to getting in with a comfortable majority as has hitherto been your position of late.

[UndercoverElephant]

However, even their opposition to May;s deal, or some shitty variant of it, now looks in doubt if rumors circulating in Westminster are to be believed. Given the council election results and the almost certainly worse results due out for both Labour and the Tories in the Eu elections, it seems Labour and the Tories are about to strike a deal that will cause the EU elections to be called off.

No, that's just the messaging. It's not actually going to happen.

Oh.... and I see you have now shifted your position.., again... and are now conceding that there is a very reasonable probability of Labour limping into government as opposed to getting in with a comfortable majority as has hitherto been your position of late.

Either are still possible. What is certain is that Labour will end up in a better position than the tories.

[UndercoverElephant]

re: rumours at westminster:

Apparently the "deal" is:

‘customs arrangement til 2022 election...and then may the best team win on fight for hard/soft Brexit.'

Can't see the EU agreeing to that. Might get through parliament though.

[Little John]

It will be done in order to stop the EU election and the Brexit party routing Labour and the Tories which would, in turn provide the springboard for the rout of Labour and the Tories in a UK GE.

The rest of the country knows what is being done, by whom and for what purpose.

[UndercoverElephant]

It will be done in order to stop the EU election and the Brexit party routing Labour and the Tories which would, in turn provide the springboard for the rout of Labour and the Tories in a UK GE.

The rest of the country knows what is being done, by whom and for what purpose.

But that doesn't make any sense. Why would Labour agree to a deal which will accelerate its electoral downfall?

Things are not what they seem. It is in the interests of both the Labour Party and Theresa May to make it look like they are trying to strike a deal - neither side wants to be blamed for the breakdown of the talks. But so long as the tories are losing seats sixteen times faster than Labour are, it is absolutely not in the interests of Labour to actually strike a deal.

The EU election cannot be stopped. It is too late. Even if the tories and Labour were to agree a deal, it would still have to be agreed by the EU, and there is no reason to think the EU would agree to what is being proposed. Why should it? It does not owe the tories or Labour any favours. The EU would quite like to see a LibDem surge at the EU elections, which will almost certainly happen (even though Farage will also do very well). And how could it? There would have to be yet another emergency EU summit just for brexit.

This story about tories and labour being on the verge of doing a deal is just a line we are being fed by elements at Westminster and in the MSM which are themselves desperate to avoid the EU elections - or at least to avoid them meaning anything. It does not mean that the deal is actually going to happen.

The propaganda currently spewing from sources like The Sun and The Times is breathtaking. They know the tory party is on the verge of being locked out of power for a generation, and they know that Corbyn is waiting to walk into Downing Street.

Look at this in today's Sun:

LIKE a punch-drunk boxer, the Tory Party is reeling from the local election disaster and walking into the potential knockout blow of a deal with Labour.

Theresa May is days away from unveiling a soft Brexit compromise, cobbled together in desperation with an equally battered Jeremy Corbyn, which risks infuriating voters even more.

It doesn’t matter what they call it, this will be a customs union in all but name.

Such an arrangement will block Britain from striking its own lucrative trade deals after quitting the EU, leaving us shackled to Brussels for years.

If this climbdown is not enough, weak-willed Mrs May also appears to have bowed to Labour’s wish to keep us tied to EU rules on workers’ rights.

The PM seems willing to cave in to all the Labour leader’s demands, just as she did with Brussels Eurocrats.

Even if this diluted deal does gain Parliamentary and EU backing, there is barely enough time to prevent the £100million European elections on May 23.

So millions of fed-up and furious voters will deliver an even more devastating verdict at the ballot box.

After Thursday’s vote it’s clear people don’t want the wool pulled over their eyes on Brexit. They want a clean break.

Ignoring them will be politically fatal.

Taxed for going on hols

A FOREIGN holiday is a well-deserved break for many hard-working families.

So it beggars belief that Labour is considering slapping a new tax on Brits who diligently save up their cash so they can fly abroad more than once a year.

Under a frequent flyer levy, anyone will be penalised when they land back in Britain for the second time. The amount would rise for subsequent journeys.

Labour eco-zealots said the plans were aimed at the rich.

But millions of ordinary families will find the cost of their holidays rising yet again.

Jeremy Corbyn and his Marxist rabble plan to use every aspect of our lives to fleece us.''

Article written by The Sun

It is hysterical nonsense. Does anybody seriously believe Jeremy Corbyn is "equally battered" as Theresa May and the tories? The Sun thinks its readers can be brainwashed into thinking so.

They don't know what to do or say. May has run out of ideas, nobody on that side of politics has a clue how to escape from the mess they are in, so all they can do is keep attacking Corbyn. The EU elections will tell a different story. The tories are facing a wipe-out, the libdems and BP will make large gains and Labour will end up with almost as many seats as it started with.

[Lord Beria3]

Eurointelligence latest...

https://www.eurointelligence.com/public.html

We see the main effect of last night's local elections results in the UK as pushing Labour further towards a deal with the Tories on Brexit. Both parties did badly - the Tories as expected but not so badly as some forecasts suggested, and Labour much worse than expected but not as badly as the Tories. It was a night of Brexit protest votes.

Labour lost seats in pro-Brexit constituencies in the north while the Tories were weak in pro-Remain constituencies in the south. In this year's local elections, only the shires and small towns voted, while the large urban areas vote in a different electoral cycle. So the political message is clearly skewed in favour of the pro-Brexit crowd. There were more angry Leavers than Remainers out there able to vent their frustration yesterday. As of early this morning the Tories were down by some 400 council seats. There will be a few more as further councils will declare their results during the day. But since the Tories started out from an unusually large number of seats, this is not a particularly catastrophic result - nothing compared to the 2000 seat wipe-out suffered by John Major in 1995.

But the real focus last night was on Labour. What struck us in particular was an interview by the BBC of a despondent leader of a Labour-run local council who said the main message he received from voters was unhappiness about the the party's unwillingness to respect the referendum result. Labour's subtle position on the referendum does not go down well with voters. Another Labour councillor spoke of spoiled votes with messages of betrayal.

It was interesting to see the reaction of Barry Gardiner, one of the more senior member on Labour's front bench, gradually ending up agreeing with this assessment as the evening progressed. During the course of the night he became increasingly clear that Labour was a party that accepted the referendum result. We expect to hear more of this as we are heading towards the European elections on May 23 that would pitch three versions of Leave against one another: that of the Brexit party which did not stand in yesterday's local election; of Theresa May's and Labour's customs union.

The latest YouGov poll has the Brexit Party far in the lead with 30%, well ahead of Labour. The sudden emergence of the Brexit Party constitutes the perfect political storm for both the Tories and Labour. The new party has a clearly identifiable name - unlike the nebulous and ineffective name of the Change UK party. It was quick off the ground. And Nigel Farage is highly effective as its lead candidate. As UK voters generally do not care about the European Parliament, the Brexit Party will manage to attract support from disgruntled Labour and Tory voters. If the European elections were held, both Labour and the Tories would lose seats relative to 2014. This tells us that May and Jeremy Corbyn have an overwhelming incentive to reach agreement next week. For otherwise they will wake up on May 24 to the same news headlines as they did this morning, like the BBC's: "Main parties hit Brexit backlash in polls".

The main obstacle for a Brexit deal is political. The substantive differences are so subtle that even the main negotiators themselves find them hard to understand. The beginning phase of the negotiation consisted mostly of briefings from civil servants, who got everybody acquainted with the concept of a customs union, and the extent to which the May's version of a future relationship differs from a plain-vanilla customs union. The main difficulty will not be to find a technical compromise, but for both leaders to persuade a large number of extremists in their own ranks - the second referendum evangelists in the Labour Party and the no-deal fanatics among the Tories. We still expect that a majority of MPs would want Brexit no longer to be an issue when they meet voters face-to-face at the next general elections. If the Tories replace their leader this year - as we expect to happen under any scenario - a general election is very likely.

My take, and the Tories ended up doing worse than when the above was written, is that both parties do have an interest in getting Brexit over the line, albeit a semi-soft version.

For Labour, it can allow politics to move on to domestic "bread and butter" issues where Labour have a polling lead (jobs, NHS, crime etc) and for the Tories it offers the possibility that they can stem the collapse in their polling, elect a new leader and come up with their own version of reformist domestic policies prior to the next general election.

Clearly, there is roughly 20% of each side of the Brexit divide, the 2nd Referendum/Remain hard-core and the "No Deal" Hard Brexiteers, who will hate this semi-soft deal but my sense is that the majority of the population will accept it and move on.

I'm more or less in that camp too.

A semi-soft Brexit means we are out of the single market, regain control over our borders, fisheries and the services economy but remain within a custom union and a rule taker for goods.

Clearly plus and minuses but trade was always the least important issue for Brexit voters, after immigration and laws.

Any May/Corbyn semi-soft Brexit deal, more or less delivers on the latter two but is clearly poor in relation to trade.

[Little John]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/20 ... ase-talks/

The treachery of the British political class continues. Sabotage talks, rule out no deal, when an awful surrender deal is the last thing on the table - make the public vote again so they get the answer "right" this time.

You think the British people will stand for this do you? Think again.

[UndercoverElephant]

Eurointelligence latest...

This is tripe, Beria:

As of early this morning the Tories were down by some 400 council seats. There will be a few more as further councils will declare their results during the day. But since the Tories started out from an unusually large number of seats, this is not a particularly catastrophic result - nothing compared to the 2000 seat wipe-out suffered by John Major in 1995.

But the real focus last night was on Labour.

400 seats? The tories lost **1300** seats, not 400, which is every bit as catastrophic as Major's 1995 result.

If the European elections were held, both Labour and the Tories would lose seats relative to 2014.

Yes, but who would lose the most? They are "both in equal trouble", right?

This is the sort of bullshit The Sun is spewing.

This tells us that May and Jeremy Corbyn have an overwhelming incentive to reach agreement next week.

Nope. May has an overwhelming incentive, Corbyn is in a much stronger position. He'll only take an agreement if it is exactly what he wants.

My take, and the Tories ended up doing worse than when the above was written

Much worse.

[cubes]

My take, and the Tories ended up doing worse than when the above was written, is that both parties do have an interest in getting Brexit over the line, albeit a semi-soft version.

A semi-soft brexit deal now will be a hard brexit deal under a new tory leader when they "fail" to negotiate the semi-soft brexit promised.

Clearly, there is roughly 20% of each side of the Brexit divide, the 2nd Referendum/Remain hard-core and the "No Deal" Hard Brexiteers, who will hate this semi-soft deal but my sense is that the majority of the population will accept it and move on.

As far as I can tell, most people no longer give a s**t one way or the other they just want it over with in a way that benefits them the most (which imo is not brexiting at all). Just a hardcore want a true no-deal brexit that will, imo, destroy this country and show us for what we are, a relatively minor player in comparison with the EU, USA and China.

A semi-soft Brexit means we are out of the single market, regain control over our borders, fisheries and the services economy but remain within a custom union and a rule taker for goods.

I'll be honest, who gives a flying f**k about fisheries? They are such a small part of our economy it's a joke that so much media attention is being given to it. The quotas that were sold won't be brought back (unless the govt likes legal fights) and guess who sold the quotas? The very fishermen who are complaining. Taking control of services? You mean, losing an automatic right to sell them in EU? Now that's control!

Clearly plus and minuses but trade was always the least important issue for Brexit voters, after immigration and laws.

Which is why we should never have a referendum in the first place, the public rarely knows what matters the most but will complain when they are poorer because of their own decisions.

Any May/Corbyn semi-soft Brexit deal, more or less delivers on the latter two but is clearly poor in relation to trade.

If Corbyn makes a deal with May, rather than saving his party he will give in 10 years in the wilderness unable to make a government unless it's made up of 2-3 different parties.

Quite simply, stop this farce now and the damage to the country can be limited. There won't be mass uprisings or civil unrest, just some unhappy people who will mainly and eventually see that they were wrong.

[kenneal - lagger]

There will be many, many more disgruntled people when the economic disaster zone that is the EU collapses in a few years time and Remainers think we should stay for that?

[cubes]

Why would it collapse? Howeverr, if it does we'd likely be equally hard hit economically in or out.

[clv101]

Why would it collapse? Howeverr, if it does we'd likely be equally hard hit economically in or out.

Collapse is coming, to the UK, to the EU, to the Western world and globally.

It's poppycock to suggest the UK would somehow be immune from the EU collapse, in or out of the EU matters little.

[Little John]

That is correct. In or out makes little difference economically. However, in or out makes all of the difference politically. This is a political issue, not an economic one.

It always has been.

[cubes]

5 years after brexit the arguments from the pro-brexit masses will be "why are there still immigrants?", "I've lost my job because of the brexit" and "why is the economy not as great as Farage/Rees-Mogg were promising us?".

[Little John]

We've had approximately three years of your kind of pathetic, sneering, class ridden, infantile smears of Brexit voters.

In case you hadn't noticed, they don't work anymore.