Showing posts with label Brexit. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brexit. Show all posts
Friday, January 31, 2020
Monday, November 18, 2019
You cannot trust Boris Johnson with the NHS
Spread this video far and wide - it’s brilliant: pic.twitter.com/SdeU58pExC— Mike Buckley (@mdbuckley) November 17, 2019
Don't vote Conservative in any constituency. Vote for the candidate with the best chance of defeating the Conservative, which you can discover by entering your postcode at RemainUnited.org. You can talk about policies and plans but the overwhelming priority is to ensure that Boris Johnson is not given five years to sell this country out to the Putin/Trump axis of neo-fascism.
Labour has a sensible moderate proposal that will actually settle the Brexit issue in a steady, sane way with voters given the choice between a workable Brexit deal that comes with a customs union and close market alignment or remaining in the EU. Those are the only two sensible options for this country and the Labour plan is the only way to resolve the Brexit impasse for once and for all, by next Summer.
All Johnson and the Tory B-team offer is another year of threatening "No Deal" and quite possibly ending up with that disastrous and stupid outcome, which they probably secretly want. Unless you're a hedge fund gambler, or offshore tax fiddler like Rees-Mogg, Redwood and the rest of the Tory B-team, your only sensible vote is for the candidate in your constituency most likely to block a Tory.
You cannot trust Boris Johnson.
On December 12th, give him the Order of the Boot!
Sunday, September 15, 2019
Saturday, September 07, 2019
"Toryism Is Not Working"
 |
| Jacob Rees-Mogg's attitude to parliamentary democracy, used to illustrate the collapse of the Tory government's majority |
Saturday, August 31, 2019
Demos today (Saturday 31 August 2019): Stop the Coup
Boris Johnson is trying to bypass parliament and pursue his "gun to own head" national suicide policy over Brexit. Don't let the monkey play with that gun.Here's the main information hub for today's #StopTheCoup protest - https://t.co/AAZUgkhdVX please share...— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) August 31, 2019
Friday, August 09, 2019
Text of phone call from Boris Johnson to Leo Varadkar
Exclusive
Text from a transcript of the first phone conversation between Boris Johnson and Leo Varadkar, as leaked to the Willesden Herald.
Boris Johnson: I want to assure you that we will never put physical checks or infrastructure at the border in Ireland after Brexit, Leo. If I may use a metaphor here, British businessmen - and women - will never wear clothes after Brexit, they will go naked, happen what may. The Irish can wear clothes, if they wish.
Leo Varadkar: Won't you be a bit exposed? No pun intended.
BJ: No, seriously! Do as you will. Cows, sheep, linen, pantechnicons - let them fly back and forth. Ramble where you will, we will not be concerned. You may put some obstacles on your side, if you insist but as for the UK, come one come all, as they say. And come as you are. We're naked, as it were, so anything goes.
LV: Ah now Boris, are you pulling my leg?
BJ: Not at all. By the way, Northern Ireland is in the UK, isn't it? You are aware. I think I'm right about that one. I found out the other day that the Isle of Man isn't. Who knew?!
LV: Ah Boris, you're winding me up.
BJ: Of course. Of course. But they do have marvellous kippers in the old I.O.M., Leo.
LV: And Norman Wisdom. And Nigel Mansell.
BJ: Norman is sadly no longer with us. But look Leo, I'll come to the point.
LV: Go on.
BJ: Rejoin the UK and you can have the Isle of Man.
LV: Nah, you're alright.
BJ: But if you do go through with this EU way of negotiating you're going to have your kippers cut off from Britain, old man.
LV: We're not doing anything, Boris. It's you who are leaving. You will have your olives cut off.
BJ: Right, right. Sounds dreadful! You're right, I completely forgot it's we who are leaving. I must tie a string around my finger. You're kicking us out on October 31.
LV: Not at all, Boris, you're welcome to stay. I know some of the winos in Brussels - no names no pack drill - might have said "Here's your hat" but don't mind them.
BJ: It wasn't me, it was Mrs May. They haven't said anything to me yet. It's almost as if they can't wait to be shot of us. This is a big mistake they've made, kicking the UK out of the EU.
LV: Well come over to Dublin and drown your sorrows. We'll talk again. Cheers.
BJ: Sláinte.
--
Feargal Mooney
Text from a transcript of the first phone conversation between Boris Johnson and Leo Varadkar, as leaked to the Willesden Herald.
Boris Johnson: I want to assure you that we will never put physical checks or infrastructure at the border in Ireland after Brexit, Leo. If I may use a metaphor here, British businessmen - and women - will never wear clothes after Brexit, they will go naked, happen what may. The Irish can wear clothes, if they wish.
Leo Varadkar: Won't you be a bit exposed? No pun intended.
BJ: No, seriously! Do as you will. Cows, sheep, linen, pantechnicons - let them fly back and forth. Ramble where you will, we will not be concerned. You may put some obstacles on your side, if you insist but as for the UK, come one come all, as they say. And come as you are. We're naked, as it were, so anything goes.
LV: Ah now Boris, are you pulling my leg?
BJ: Not at all. By the way, Northern Ireland is in the UK, isn't it? You are aware. I think I'm right about that one. I found out the other day that the Isle of Man isn't. Who knew?!
LV: Ah Boris, you're winding me up.
BJ: Of course. Of course. But they do have marvellous kippers in the old I.O.M., Leo.
LV: And Norman Wisdom. And Nigel Mansell.
BJ: Norman is sadly no longer with us. But look Leo, I'll come to the point.
LV: Go on.
BJ: Rejoin the UK and you can have the Isle of Man.
LV: Nah, you're alright.
BJ: But if you do go through with this EU way of negotiating you're going to have your kippers cut off from Britain, old man.
LV: We're not doing anything, Boris. It's you who are leaving. You will have your olives cut off.
BJ: Right, right. Sounds dreadful! You're right, I completely forgot it's we who are leaving. I must tie a string around my finger. You're kicking us out on October 31.
LV: Not at all, Boris, you're welcome to stay. I know some of the winos in Brussels - no names no pack drill - might have said "Here's your hat" but don't mind them.
BJ: It wasn't me, it was Mrs May. They haven't said anything to me yet. It's almost as if they can't wait to be shot of us. This is a big mistake they've made, kicking the UK out of the EU.
LV: Well come over to Dublin and drown your sorrows. We'll talk again. Cheers.
BJ: Sláinte.
--
Feargal Mooney
Wednesday, June 19, 2019
On reading "The Empty Promise of Boris Johnson"
The Empty Promise of Boris Johnson (Sam Knight, The New Yorker)
This is a very interesting and educational article, containing a potted biography of Boris Johnson, charting and explaining his political aims, which can be summed up nicely in his own words as "I have nothing." In short, he has no fixed beliefs and doesn't believe in the perfectibility of people or systems and treats life, journalism and elections as a rambunctious game of King of the Castle, which he is determined to win.
His main virtue, if you can isolate any, is that he cheers people up. I think that is very fair, the life and soul of the party but in more ways than one, "not the man you want driving you home afterwards," as Amber Rudd famously quipped. It is hard to be cheered up in the face of an oncoming juggernaut or cliff edge and a driver full of Pimms.
Johnson is portrayed as a real-life version of PG Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster. If the final two in the Tory leadership ballot turn out to be Gove v Johnson, it will be like a contest between Jeeves and Wooster, which does indeed happen from time to time in the books. Hunt, Javid or Stewart as the opponent would merely be one of Wodehouse's frequent unsatisfactory stand-in butlers. When it comes to Wooster v Jeeves, it's always Jeeves who wins but he lets Wooster think he's won. Johnson would be a figurehead and Gove the man with the plan:- and that's where the analogy breaks down.
This is a very interesting and educational article, containing a potted biography of Boris Johnson, charting and explaining his political aims, which can be summed up nicely in his own words as "I have nothing." In short, he has no fixed beliefs and doesn't believe in the perfectibility of people or systems and treats life, journalism and elections as a rambunctious game of King of the Castle, which he is determined to win.
His main virtue, if you can isolate any, is that he cheers people up. I think that is very fair, the life and soul of the party but in more ways than one, "not the man you want driving you home afterwards," as Amber Rudd famously quipped. It is hard to be cheered up in the face of an oncoming juggernaut or cliff edge and a driver full of Pimms.
Johnson is portrayed as a real-life version of PG Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster. If the final two in the Tory leadership ballot turn out to be Gove v Johnson, it will be like a contest between Jeeves and Wooster, which does indeed happen from time to time in the books. Hunt, Javid or Stewart as the opponent would merely be one of Wodehouse's frequent unsatisfactory stand-in butlers. When it comes to Wooster v Jeeves, it's always Jeeves who wins but he lets Wooster think he's won. Johnson would be a figurehead and Gove the man with the plan:- and that's where the analogy breaks down.
Sunday, May 12, 2019
Be clear. Vote LibDem to say "Remain!" on May 23rd 2019
Theresa, Boris, Trump, Farage, Corbyn.... they want Brexit.
— Liberal Democrats (@LibDems) May 12, 2019
Liberal Democrats are fighting for Remainers across Britain who want to #StopBrexit.
Vote Liberal Democrat on 23 May > https://t.co/IppSIisDi9 pic.twitter.com/0NizfOYs3m
Saturday, May 04, 2019
Register to vote by post by Tuesday 7th, impossible?
The registration service offered by RegisterToVote.eu, as reported earlier this week, which offered to submit details for people who filled in a form online, has been closed down by the Electoral Commission.
The Electoral Commission said: “We urge EU citizens that [sic] want to vote in the European parliamentary elections in the UK to only apply to register to vote through their local council or official websites. We welcome efforts by campaigners to encourage eligible electors to register to vote. However, our advice to anyone not yet registered is to only apply directly at www.gov.uk/registertovote.” (From: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/04/site-claiming-to-help-eu-citizens-register-to-vote-is-shut-down)
Postal applications must be received by Tuesday 7th, which is difficult at the time of writing, as it's now Saturday May 4th, and Monday is a bank holiday. It is believed that very few of the over 3 million EU citizens in the UK who need to register to vote in the European Parliament elections have done so.
There is still a possibility that the elections scheduled for May 23rd might be cancelled but that becomes ever more unlikely as days go by.
The Electoral Commission said: “We urge EU citizens that [sic] want to vote in the European parliamentary elections in the UK to only apply to register to vote through their local council or official websites. We welcome efforts by campaigners to encourage eligible electors to register to vote. However, our advice to anyone not yet registered is to only apply directly at www.gov.uk/registertovote.” (From: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/may/04/site-claiming-to-help-eu-citizens-register-to-vote-is-shut-down)
Postal applications must be received by Tuesday 7th, which is difficult at the time of writing, as it's now Saturday May 4th, and Monday is a bank holiday. It is believed that very few of the over 3 million EU citizens in the UK who need to register to vote in the European Parliament elections have done so.
There is still a possibility that the elections scheduled for May 23rd might be cancelled but that becomes ever more unlikely as days go by.
Sunday, April 21, 2019
EU elections: 96% of over 65s can vote, only 60% young
Register to vote: https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote. Deadline 7 May 2019.
If the elections to the European Parliament go ahead next month, it will very likely be the last chance to vote to say "Stop Brexit."
The neo-fascist sympathiser Farage and his fellow-travellers in parliament are out to seal Britain's fate of isolation from our European hinterland, at the mercy of ruthless grabbers in the Kremlin and the White House and at the cost of disruption and misery in Ireland.
Thursday, April 18, 2019
What has the ECHR ever done for us?
Re-publishing this as a little reminder about the craziness the UK is subject to under the government of Theresa May. It owes something to Monty Python's "What have the Romans ever done for us?" sketch in The Life of Brian.
* ECHR = European Convention on Human Rights
Thursday, March 28, 2019
Indicative votes: Results in sequence and plan for Monday
Analysis of Wednesday's "indicative votes" on the way forward for Brexit.
Results in the order voted on and announced, For-Against:
160-400 No Deal
188-283 Common Market 2.0 (aka Norway+)
65-377 EFTA & EEA (single market without customs union)
264-272 Customs Union (basic permanent customs union for starters)
237-307 Labour's Plan ("a" customs union and strong single market links, rights etc.)
184-293 Revoke Article 50 (if necessary to avoid No Deal)
268-295 Public Vote
139-422 WTO Terms
Arguably, Speaker Bercow made a mistake in declaring after each verdict "The Noes have it" because no one option "has it" yet. Instead, if you take account of the difference between Yes and No, you get this sequence:
Results in order by "goal difference" (all negative):
1. Customs Union: -8
2. Public Vote: -27
3. Labour's Plan: -70
4. Common Market 2.0: -95
5. Revoke to avoid No Deal: -109
6. No Deal: -240
7. WTO Terms: -283
8. EFTA & EEA: -312
However, it's simpler to forego "goal difference", and you get almost the same sequence by taking number of Yeses for each option, though the top two options swap places, which clearly could be significant*.
By focussing on the number of Yeses, it's easy to see how many votes are to be redistributed, each time the option with the least votes is eliminated. More importantly, the Noes are irrelevant for these purposes, since what we want to discover is the option of which most MPs are in favour. If someone doesn't put a Yes beside an option, that's effectively a No anyway. Therefore let's just count the Yeses from now on.
Results in order by number of Yeses:
1. Public Vote: 268
2. Customs Union: 264
3. Labour's Plan: 237
4. Common Market 2.0: 188
5. Revoke to avoid No Deal: 184
6. No Deal: 160
7. WTO Terms: 139
8. EFTA & EEA: 65
So on Monday, eliminate number 8 (EFTA &EEA) and ask its 65 supporters to vote again for one of the remaining seven options (eight if Mrs May's Deal is added). The next option to be eliminated would be whichever one ended up last out of the remaining options, probably either WTO Terms or No Deal - but we will only know when the votes are recast.
The process of elimination should be repeated, preferably discounting the Noes as irrelevant, till only two options remain. At that point the top one is the most favoured compromise option and should be adopted by the government.
Rearrangement of the ballot paper to separate two procedural options
1. In Wednesday's selected options, the Public Vote option was an anomaly, as it doesn't describe a future relationship. This can be resolved by moving it to a separate section of the ballot paper, to apply irrespective of which option is selected.
2. The same can be said for the Revoke to Avoid No Deal option, as that is not a way forward, simply an emergency brake in the event of no other plan being agreed. That too could have its own separate section on the ballot.
Suggested ballot paper layout & possible wording for Monday's vote
The option "EFTA and EEA" has been eliminated, having received the fewest votes. Additionally, the options "Public Vote" and "Revoke to Avoid No Deal" have been separated from the rest as they are procedural matters, which apply regardless of the other results."
Vote for one only of the following options. The option with the fewest votes will be eliminated and the voting procedure repeated with the remaining options:
1. The government's recommended withdrawal agreement and future arrangement
2. Customs Union basic foundation for a new deal as proposed by Kenneth Clarke
3. Labour's Plan for a form of Customs Union, close single market arrangement, rights etc.
4. Common Market 2.0 aka Norway+ which joins EFTA but not necessarily indefinitely
5. Leave with No Deal
6. Leave on WTO Terms
Answer Yes or No to the following questions:
a) In the event of no deal agreed with two days to go, revoke Article 50?: Yes or No
b) Should the eventual deal agreed be put back to the people with an option to Remain?: Yes or No
* 29/3/2019: Correction: Changed text to show that you don't get the same sequence by taking only the Yeses, rather the top two options swap places. Also added a mock-up of the possible ballot paper as a basis for Monday's votes.
Results in the order voted on and announced, For-Against:
160-400 No Deal
188-283 Common Market 2.0 (aka Norway+)
65-377 EFTA & EEA (single market without customs union)
264-272 Customs Union (basic permanent customs union for starters)
237-307 Labour's Plan ("a" customs union and strong single market links, rights etc.)
184-293 Revoke Article 50 (if necessary to avoid No Deal)
268-295 Public Vote
139-422 WTO Terms
Arguably, Speaker Bercow made a mistake in declaring after each verdict "The Noes have it" because no one option "has it" yet. Instead, if you take account of the difference between Yes and No, you get this sequence:
Results in order by "goal difference" (all negative):
1. Customs Union: -8
2. Public Vote: -27
3. Labour's Plan: -70
4. Common Market 2.0: -95
5. Revoke to avoid No Deal: -109
6. No Deal: -240
7. WTO Terms: -283
8. EFTA & EEA: -312
However, it's simpler to forego "goal difference", and you get almost the same sequence by taking number of Yeses for each option, though the top two options swap places, which clearly could be significant*.
By focussing on the number of Yeses, it's easy to see how many votes are to be redistributed, each time the option with the least votes is eliminated. More importantly, the Noes are irrelevant for these purposes, since what we want to discover is the option of which most MPs are in favour. If someone doesn't put a Yes beside an option, that's effectively a No anyway. Therefore let's just count the Yeses from now on.
Results in order by number of Yeses:
1. Public Vote: 268
2. Customs Union: 264
3. Labour's Plan: 237
4. Common Market 2.0: 188
5. Revoke to avoid No Deal: 184
6. No Deal: 160
7. WTO Terms: 139
8. EFTA & EEA: 65
So on Monday, eliminate number 8 (EFTA &EEA) and ask its 65 supporters to vote again for one of the remaining seven options (eight if Mrs May's Deal is added). The next option to be eliminated would be whichever one ended up last out of the remaining options, probably either WTO Terms or No Deal - but we will only know when the votes are recast.
The process of elimination should be repeated, preferably discounting the Noes as irrelevant, till only two options remain. At that point the top one is the most favoured compromise option and should be adopted by the government.
Rearrangement of the ballot paper to separate two procedural options
1. In Wednesday's selected options, the Public Vote option was an anomaly, as it doesn't describe a future relationship. This can be resolved by moving it to a separate section of the ballot paper, to apply irrespective of which option is selected.
2. The same can be said for the Revoke to Avoid No Deal option, as that is not a way forward, simply an emergency brake in the event of no other plan being agreed. That too could have its own separate section on the ballot.
Suggested ballot paper layout & possible wording for Monday's vote
The option "EFTA and EEA" has been eliminated, having received the fewest votes. Additionally, the options "Public Vote" and "Revoke to Avoid No Deal" have been separated from the rest as they are procedural matters, which apply regardless of the other results."
Vote for one only of the following options. The option with the fewest votes will be eliminated and the voting procedure repeated with the remaining options:
1. The government's recommended withdrawal agreement and future arrangement
2. Customs Union basic foundation for a new deal as proposed by Kenneth Clarke
3. Labour's Plan for a form of Customs Union, close single market arrangement, rights etc.
4. Common Market 2.0 aka Norway+ which joins EFTA but not necessarily indefinitely
5. Leave with No Deal
6. Leave on WTO Terms
Answer Yes or No to the following questions:
a) In the event of no deal agreed with two days to go, revoke Article 50?: Yes or No
b) Should the eventual deal agreed be put back to the people with an option to Remain?: Yes or No
* 29/3/2019: Correction: Changed text to show that you don't get the same sequence by taking only the Yeses, rather the top two options swap places. Also added a mock-up of the possible ballot paper as a basis for Monday's votes.
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