The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
I heard a new phrase this morning on R4 - the lunar economy. Apparently the British Space Agency is looking at plans to build a communications network on the moon.
Could we maybe build one around chunks of Edinburgh or Angus first?
Easy stuff first. Then Glasgow.
Slough is presumably Nobel Prize level work.
O/T but was it you who showed an interest in the Wirecard fraud/ BaFin attacking the FT a while back?
If so there is a good documentary film about it on Netflix called Skandal which shows the hell the FT went through amongst others and how the Germans refused to accept Wirecard could be a bad actor.
I wasn’t the first here. Can’t remember who was.
I generally shit on Douche Bank when it comes to German (lack of) regulation in finance.
Wirecard is fascinating in that it showed that the German regulators had become an active problem. Bit like the scene in Boiler Room, where the compliance guy is the nuts-and-bolts guy for the fraud.
I have so many bad stories re DB I can’t tell on here so am no fan either. The doc is well worth watching though as it’s a bit like a doc version of The Big Short with lots of parties independently seeing through Wirecard and it all coming together.
Douche Bank. The bank that lent billions to… Donald Fucking Trump.
When they realised the loans were at risk. They lent more.
I heard a new phrase this morning on R4 - the lunar economy. Apparently the British Space Agency is looking at plans to build a communications network on the moon.
Could we maybe build one around chunks of Edinburgh or Angus first?
Easy stuff first. Then Glasgow.
Slough is presumably Nobel Prize level work.
O/T but was it you who showed an interest in the Wirecard fraud/ BaFin attacking the FT a while back?
If so there is a good documentary film about it on Netflix called Skandal which shows the hell the FT went through amongst others and how the Germans refused to accept Wirecard could be a bad actor.
I wasn’t the first here. Can’t remember who was.
I generally shit on Douche Bank when it comes to German (lack of) regulation in finance.
Wirecard is fascinating in that it showed that the German regulators had become an active problem. Bit like the scene in Boiler Room, where the compliance guy is the nuts-and-bolts guy for the fraud.
I have so many bad stories re DB I can’t tell on here so am no fan either. The doc is well worth watching though as it’s a bit like a doc version of The Big Short with lots of parties independently seeing through Wirecard and it all coming together.
Douche Bank. The bank that lent billions to… Donald Fucking Trump.
When they realised the loans were at risk. They lent more.
OK, the US entity etc. I know
But that is truly special.
I promise you that is way down the scale of their sins.
The DUP are a fxcking disgrace and clearly nothing bar a return to a hard border between NI and Ireland will satisfy them.
They fear the future, whatever it may bring, so spend their time just huddling together assuming that if they prevent anything at all that will be a good result.
The DUP is the political wing of the Free Presybterian Church of Ulster, and while it's true that they fear the future it's also true that they get off on fearing the future. They think they know what the future will bring, because they believe it's all written in the Book of Revelations. The principal factor in everything they say about the border or the Irish Sea is their belief that the Roman Catholic church is the Antichrist, that it owns both the RoI and the EU, and that it's hell-bent on coming to get them. They love "holding out" more than everything. Their whole mythos is based on it. They are far crazier than the IRA ever were. The IRA's mythos was kitsch in comparison.
I don't think a single newspaper has mentioned why it is that the DUP dislike the EU.
This view is about 30 years out of date. But, you know, some people just never move on....
I take it you mean my view rather than the view I am ascribing to the DUP. What was the reason in your view that the DUP opposed Britain's EU membership?
National Sovereignty considered more important than Supranational bodies having greater power, don't think the EU was an honest broker are probably two for a start. Take a long hard look at the make up of the party today, sure it still has its Paisleyite religious types but it is largely dominated by poeople who have fuck all interest in Free Presbyetrianism. In fact the DUP is chock full of fucking technocrats and wonks in the back offices, not people holding prayer meetings. Since Paisley they have had one leader in the deeply religious mould. It didnt protect him from being put out on his arse after a couple of months.
Whats People Before Profits Excuse for its anti EU stance at times? Are they the radical wing of Catholicism and fear the EU is full of Prods?
I hadn't heard of PBP. Three minutes of lookup on the internet suggests they don't seem to think the EU is full of Protestants or anything similar. I doubt they're any kind of wing of Catholicism. They don't seem to be about defending ethnic traditions, let alone any that date back to the 17th century.
National sovereignty considered more important than supranational bodies? That's a legitimate view, but if it's so important to the DUP do they propose that Britain should leave NATO or tell the ECHR and ICJ where to get off? Also they are Irish. I'm not telling them what identity or politics they should have, but Ulster is a province of Ireland. They're British too, and it's their British identity that's far more important to them. Why? It can't just be "because". It's to do with tradition and being Protestant and against rule by evil Dublin.
As for broker, I didn't realise the EU was a broker. Is that how they see it??
NI is a province of the United Kingdom. Its no more a province of Ireland, than Alaska is a province of Canada or Russia.
They have Irish citizenship on top, thanks to the Irish constitution and the Good Friday Agreement, but they're still a part of the UK and not Ireland. Maybe one day there'll be a single country called Ireland spanning the entire island, I hope there will be, but that day is not today.
I said Ulster was a province of Ireland, not that NI was. That's standard usage of terminology by everyone in Ireland.
And you were wrong.
EDIT: Just seen your edit, WTF, the U stands for Unionist not Ulster. 😂
The island of Ireland has four provinces, of which Ulster is one. The governance of Ulster is complicated because three of the counties of the province are in one country and the other six counties of the province are in another, but that didn't change the fact that there is a province in Ireland called Ulster that consists of nine counties.
It has four historical provinces just as England has historical counties. My local town was historically in Lancashire but is now in Cheshire, so would you say it is in Cheshire or Lancashire?
The term is obsolete and has no legal bearing in either the UK or the Republic today. It is of historic interest, but it is no more a fact than the few weirdos who write Lancashire on their post instead of Cheshire are factually correct.
I didn't say it had legal bearing, but it's still in common usage for the rugby team and other sporting competitions, and no new province has been established to replace it as with the county reorganization.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
I heard a new phrase this morning on R4 - the lunar economy. Apparently the British Space Agency is looking at plans to build a communications network on the moon.
Could we maybe build one around chunks of Edinburgh or Angus first?
Easy stuff first. Then Glasgow.
Slough is presumably Nobel Prize level work.
O/T but was it you who showed an interest in the Wirecard fraud/ BaFin attacking the FT a while back?
If so there is a good documentary film about it on Netflix called Skandal which shows the hell the FT went through amongst others and how the Germans refused to accept Wirecard could be a bad actor.
I wasn’t the first here. Can’t remember who was.
I generally shit on Douche Bank when it comes to German (lack of) regulation in finance.
Wirecard is fascinating in that it showed that the German regulators had become an active problem. Bit like the scene in Boiler Room, where the compliance guy is the nuts-and-bolts guy for the fraud.
I have so many bad stories re DB I can’t tell on here so am no fan either. The doc is well worth watching though as it’s a bit like a doc version of The Big Short with lots of parties independently seeing through Wirecard and it all coming together.
Douche Bank. The bank that lent billions to… Donald Fucking Trump.
When they realised the loans were at risk. They lent more.
OK, the US entity etc. I know
But that is truly special.
I promise you that is way down the scale of their sins.
I've done quite a lot of work there. I am just mentioning the publicly available stuff, for Mike's sake.
A number of people were interested in the way that various UK investigations into DB were shelved immediately after BREXIT.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
Which would then see a hard border between England and Scotland, the same as there would be a hard border in the Irish Sea again if Northern Ireland ever voted for a United Ireland (except with maybe county Antrim if the DUP then declared UDI)
I've just saved this to use in my lectures, as an example of a misleading graphic.
Because the Y axis doesn't start at 0, or for some other reason?
It also implies that prices are going down when they are actually going up at a slower rate
I would give this chart a clean bill of health. There is no reason why the x axis has to cross the y axis at zero. As long as the axes are clearly labelled and the graph is drawn to scale then it is fine.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
The votong proportion has nothing to do with it. We voted and left as a unit. I'd like to think there are some exciting opportunities for NI in spanning both. I think the EU will actively oppose any taking advantage of the situation, but who knows
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
Wishful thinking.
The Leavers in my office do wonder why they bothered though. Even less control over immigration than when we were in the EU seemingly. Non existent economic benefits
Er, he is saying that the Russians are about to launch another offensive. A number of people are predicting that - spring quagmire at the moment, followed by the ground drying…
And a lot of people are predicting a Ukrainian offensive as well. Odd how he picks that side, isn't it?
Besides, he doesn't say *may* be coming. He says 'Major Russian offensive coming".
Either he knows something, in which case he should stfu, or he doesn't, in which case he should stfu.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
Who gives a stuff about the Redwall seats? They were solid Labour when Labour or the Tories were winning landslides. It's only at the last general election that they gained some kind of freakish prominence. Before that they were politically irrelevant and will be again. It's Middle England where elections are won or lost. Rishi knows this and is going in for the kill.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
That's the key thing.
There are all sorts of ways that the barriers between the UK and the EU can be reduced. It's just a question of what the UK is prepared to offer in order to reduce those barriers.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
You seem to be rather confused with what's been agreed. What's been agreed is not that NI is subject to the Single Market, its that NI will be in the Single Market with one set of rules, and the UK Market with a different set of rules, simultaneously.
How could GB be on the same terms as NI? You think the EU would allow the entire UK to be in the Single Market, while keeping an entirely different set of UK-specific rules that can differ from EU rules?
You and Scott and other blinkered fools can't seem to see beyond the words Single Market and realise there's more to it than just that.
All this does is remind everyone what a crap and ruinous idea Brexit was in the first place. No credit to Rishi whatsoever. He was one of the Tories who voted against their own leadrship in 2016. Arsonists don't get credit for trying to put out the fires that they start.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
Who gives a stuff about the Redwall seats? They were solid Labour when Labour or the Tories were winning landslides. It's only at the last general election that they gained some kind of freakish prominence. Before that they were politically irrelevant and will be again. It's Middle England where elections are won or lost. Rishi knows this and is going in for the kill.
It isn't. Most Middle England seats are still solid Tory and those Remain seats that aren't are LD not Labour target seats.
Remain London is solid Labour anyway, Remain Scotland was not Tory even in 2019.
The next general election will be decided in the heavy Leave redwall seats which the Conservatives won from Labour in 2019, plus some mainly Leave seats in Essex, East Kent and the Midlands which Cameron won from Labour in 2010
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
Wishful thinking.
The Leavers in my office do wonder why they bothered though. Even less control over immigration than when we were in the EU seemingly. Non existent economic benefits
Yes, I'm hearing exactly the same at my place of work. 'It's not what they promised us' is a verbatim quotation.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
That's the key thing.
There are all sorts of ways that the barriers between the UK and the EU can be reduced. It's just a question of what the UK is prepared to offer in order to reduce those barriers.
Something for something.
Yes. Mr Sunal has opened the enormous tankerload of worms that Mr Johnson et al accumulated over the years.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
The EU has never shown even the slightest interest in separating the Four Freedoms for the whole UK, they have made an exception for Northern Ireland to maintain the free movement of goods alone and keep the border with the Republic open. Obviously we'd love to be able to make such a deal for the whole UK, but if the EU was that flexible we would never have left the EU in the first place.
"The energy secretary says he is "very sympathetic" to suggestions that the government should stop a planned £500 rise in annual energy bills from April.
Grant Shapps said he was working "hard" with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on the issue.
There are warnings that a million more households could struggle if bills go up again.
The government is limiting the typical annual energy bill to £2,500, but this will increase to £3,000 from 1 April.
The Treasury has so far resisted calls to extend the scheme at current levels."
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
So chop off the Kintyre Peninsula and Scotland becomes a country?
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Sunak could see us kicked out the 2026 world cup. Tosser.
Fifa will look into the UK government’s proposals for an independent regulator amid concerns that the new body could breach rules on political interference.
The white paper that was published last week laid out plans for a government-appointed body that would run a licensing scheme for clubs and oversee checks on owners and directors.
Legal experts believe that there are several areas of concern where the regulator could breach Fifa’s Article 15, which states national associations must “be independent and avoid any form of political interference”.
There are numerous cases in which Fifa has suspended national associations for government interference.
"The energy secretary says he is "very sympathetic" to suggestions that the government should stop a planned £500 rise in annual energy bills from April.
Grant Shapps said he was working "hard" with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on the issue.
There are warnings that a million more households could struggle if bills go up again.
The government is limiting the typical annual energy bill to £2,500, but this will increase to £3,000 from 1 April.
The Treasury has so far resisted calls to extend the scheme at current levels."
Given that the cost to the Treasury of the scheme is going to come in far below expectations due to the relative collapse in wholesale energy prices, they surely have the economic headroom to do this, within their original budget.
Its obviously going to happen, its only a matter of when not if it gets announced.
All this does is remind everyone what a crap and ruinous idea Brexit was in the first place. No credit to Rishi whatsoever. He was one of the Tories who voted against their own leadrship in 2016. Arsonists don't get credit for trying to put out the fires that they start.
Every Labour supporter on here gives Gordon Brown credit for spending billions sorting out a mess of his own making.
It's now 17 days since the media first reported on @hannahsbee's book Time to Think, which chronicles in detail the medical scandal that led to the closure of the UK's only child gender clinic, GIDS. It has been covered exhaustively in virtually every paper. Except the Guardian.
The Guardian are being held to ransom by the children who work there aren't they? This may be a stupid question, but does the Observer have a different staff? I've never understood to what extent the Sundays are separate beasts from their weekday equivalents.
Is that the American Guardian you are talking about?
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
As it requires free movement from the EU again which both Starmer and Sunak agree the redwall swing seats have a veto on for now
YOu keep going on and on and on about the Red Wall seats as if you seriously think Mr Johnson will be fighting the next election. You sound like supporters of King Charles III (the original, Stuart, one) rabbiting over their hot chocolate in Rome and saying how assuredly this Highland clan and that Lancashire town will infalliby rise for their king over the water.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
Just like England then..
Obviously. 👍
England, Wales and Scotland are not countries, though they self-identify as them. The UK is a country.
I want England to become a country, but it isn't one.
People use the word country when they talk about the home nations, like people use preferred pronouns elsewhere, but the reality remains reality.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
The EU has never shown even the slightest interest in separating the Four Freedoms for the whole UK, they have made an exception for Northern Ireland to maintain the free movement of goods alone and keep the border with the Republic open. Obviously we'd love to be able to make such a deal for the whole UK, but if the EU was that flexible we would never have left the EU in the first place.
Which they all know of course - they're just pissed off that Rishi's getting a good press for a while and desperate to avoid asking whether Starmer could have bored UvDL into such a good deal.
So Sunak is saying Northern Ireland is lucky to be in the single market, so I would imagine we must be unlucky, or we just fell for the lies that Johnson, Farage etc told us
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Northern Ireland is still in the United Kingdom. An independent Scotland would not be.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
The DUP are a fxcking disgrace and clearly nothing bar a return to a hard border between NI and Ireland will satisfy them.
They fear the future, whatever it may bring, so spend their time just huddling together assuming that if they prevent anything at all that will be a good result.
The DUP is the political wing of the Free Presybterian Church of Ulster, and while it's true that they fear the future it's also true that they get off on fearing the future. They think they know what the future will bring, because they believe it's all written in the Book of Revelations. The principal factor in everything they say about the border or the Irish Sea is their belief that the Roman Catholic church is the Antichrist, that it owns both the RoI and the EU, and that it's hell-bent on coming to get them. They love "holding out" more than everything. Their whole mythos is based on it. They are far crazier than the IRA ever were. The IRA's mythos was kitsch in comparison.
I don't think a single newspaper has mentioned why it is that the DUP dislike the EU.
This view is about 30 years out of date. But, you know, some people just never move on....
I take it you mean my view rather than the view I am ascribing to the DUP. What was the reason in your view that the DUP opposed Britain's EU membership?
National Sovereignty considered more important than Supranational bodies having greater power, don't think the EU was an honest broker are probably two for a start. Take a long hard look at the make up of the party today, sure it still has its Paisleyite religious types but it is largely dominated by poeople who have fuck all interest in Free Presbyetrianism. In fact the DUP is chock full of fucking technocrats and wonks in the back offices, not people holding prayer meetings. Since Paisley they have had one leader in the deeply religious mould. It didnt protect him from being put out on his arse after a couple of months.
Whats People Before Profits Excuse for its anti EU stance at times? Are they the radical wing of Catholicism and fear the EU is full of Prods?
I hadn't heard of PBP. Three minutes of lookup on the internet suggests they don't seem to think the EU is full of Protestants or anything similar. I doubt they're any kind of wing of Catholicism. They don't seem to be about defending ethnic traditions, let alone any that date back to the 17th century.
National sovereignty considered more important than supranational bodies? That's a legitimate view, but if it's so important to the DUP do they propose that Britain should leave NATO or tell the ECHR and ICJ where to get off? Also they are Irish. I'm not telling them what identity or politics they should have, but Ulster is a province of Ireland. They're British too, and it's their British identity that's far more important to them. Why? It can't just be "because". It's to do with tradition and being Protestant and against rule by evil Dublin.
As for broker, I didn't realise the EU was a broker. Is that how they see it??
NI is a province of the United Kingdom. Its no more a province of Ireland, than Alaska is a province of Canada or Russia.
They have Irish citizenship on top, thanks to the Irish constitution and the Good Friday Agreement, but they're still a part of the UK and not Ireland. Maybe one day there'll be a single country called Ireland spanning the entire island, I hope there will be, but that day is not today.
I said Ulster was a province of Ireland, not that NI was. That's standard usage of terminology by everyone in Ireland.
And you were wrong.
EDIT: Just seen your edit, WTF, the U stands for Unionist not Ulster. 😂
The island of Ireland has four provinces, of which Ulster is one. The governance of Ulster is complicated because three of the counties of the province are in one country and the other six counties of the province are in another, but that didn't change the fact that there is a province in Ireland called Ulster that consists of nine counties.
It has four historical provinces just as England has historical counties. My local town was historically in Lancashire but is now in Cheshire, so would you say it is in Cheshire or Lancashire?
The term is obsolete and has no legal bearing in either the UK or the Republic today. It is of historic interest, but it is no more a fact than the few weirdos who write Lancashire on their post instead of Cheshire are factually correct.
When you're in a hole, stop digging. If you ask Jeffrey Donaldson what province Donegal is in, he will say it's in Ulster, as will every other Irish person or person who knows about the subject.
If you ask him or any other Irish person what kind of entity Ulster is - is it a county, country, province, canton, state, or something else - they will say it's a province.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
OMG what a troll. Are you taking the piss? You sound almost as much of a headbanger as Ian Paisley Snr during his most headbangery moments.
First you say the term "province" is obsolete and has "no legal bearing". Then you say Scotland isn't a country. Scotland undeniably has a legal existence.
Not that that's what makes it a country. A country is an imaginary cultural construct, so it doesn't self-identify as anything. But if people believe they have a country called X, they do. That's a necessary part of what makes a country - people thinking they have it.
This discussion has now been completely derailed. Thanks.
Personally I reckon the DUP are anti-Catholic bigots and that's why they're pro-Brexit (EU ~ Antichrist) and probably also why they find Rishi Sunak easier to deal with than Boris Johnson or Theresa May. I was hoping I might learn something from Yokes. But keep on making points about how people in Cheshire or Lancashire write their addresses and comparing the entity known as Scotland with a gender dysphoric...
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
Its the Scots fault they were taken out against their will, since they rejected the opportunity for self-determination.
Much is being made on LBC of Sunak's speech this morning where he hails NI's unique position of benefiting from being able to trade with both the EU and the UK with minimum friction. It is being taken as a tacit admission that perhaps Brexit has not been optimal for UK trade, and from here on in English, Scottish and Welsh trade with the EU.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Nope, as I said if Northern Ireland voted for a United Ireland a hard border would be put in the Irish Sea again the next day. Only staying in the UK avoids a hard border for Northern Ireland with GB now
The great Brexit fuckdrama is over. Some think it was a rape. Some a meaningless one night stand to be vaguely regretted. For others it was a sublime consummation
But for all of us, it is now over. The post coital heartbeat is audibly slowing. And the normal political pulse resumes. And so we get on with the day
I think Season One is now over. After nearly 7 years (7 years!) of turmoil we've hit another quasi-equilibrium. That will be enough to render it a virtual non-issue at the next election.
But it will be back for more, hopefully no longer called Brexit, because the UK-EU relationship will never stand still. Sometimes it will be fractious, at other times constructive. I expect us to move back closer into the EU orbit in fits and starts and each will be a little mini-drama but nothing as explosive as the original. Switzerland is the closest analogue we have and the EU relationship dominates their foreign policy.
Wonder what Churchill would say - the UK aspiring to be like Switzerland.
Have you been to Switzerland?
99.9% of the world would like to be Switzerland. Safe, secure, free, democratic and immensely wealthy
If the UK ends up as an offshore version of Switzerland I will be overjoyed. We have global influence from our language and culture anyway. Fuck the rest
It shows a lack of ambition. We are a major European nation who should be at the heart of the continent's politics, not hanging around on the periphery.
But to your question - yes, I've worked in Geneva. No prizes for what sort of client it was. A shadowy private bank run by a snooty family. I helped them get a Bank of England licence to operate in London. This is the sort of thing you get to do if you qualify as a chartered accountant.
I had fondue one night and then afterwards went to gaze at the fountain, thinking of that 60s show The Champions with Alexandra Bastedo. That's quite a vivid memory.
This polling isn't asking people what they would say if there was another vote. It is whether it was right or wrong to leave the EU in 2016, in retrospect.
I would be in the category who thinks that the vote to leave was wrong, but wouldn't want another vote and would probably not vote to rejoin at the moment, if it became an option.
My instinct is that people want Brexit to work, this is why Sunak will get a lot of credit for this.
As have said a few times, if Brexit is a self evident disaster (as it may well be turning in to), then rejoin will become politically possible, I would guess it is 7 or 8 more years to go until we get to this point, but it could be quicker. We aren't there yet.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
The EU has never shown even the slightest interest in separating the Four Freedoms for the whole UK, they have made an exception for Northern Ireland to maintain the free movement of goods alone and keep the border with the Republic open. Obviously we'd love to be able to make such a deal for the whole UK, but if the EU was that flexible we would never have left the EU in the first place.
Which they all know of course - they're just pissed off that Rishi's getting a good press for a while and desperate to avoid asking whether Starmer could have bored UvDL into such a good deal.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Since UK law would cease to apply to an independent Scotland it's a completely different situation.
Or would an independent Scotland be obliged to follow UK regulations, under the jurisdiction of the UK Supreme Court?
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Northern Ireland is still in the United Kingdom. An independent Scotland would not be.
But that does not affect the mechanics. The only reason it would not work is political - the rUK wishing to punish Scots for having the temerity to vote to leave.
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
I think it perfectly illustrates Sunak's strengths (administration) and weaknesses (politics).
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
What part of "best of both worlds" are you lot failing to comprehend?
You can't have "both worlds" without the UK being out of the EU. It is the UK being out of the EU and able to make its own laws which enables there to be another world, if we were all in the Single Market there'd only be one world, with all the flaws that entails which led to us voting to Leave in 2016.
Saw a comment on FB pointing out that if Yousuf becomes Scottish FM and achieves independence while Sunak is still UK PM then we would have a Pakistani heritage FM and Indian heritage PM negotiating the partition of Britain. I'd quite like this to happen solely on the basis of historical irony and lolz.
This is why I love the UK!
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Northern Ireland is still in the United Kingdom. An independent Scotland would not be.
But that does not affect the mechanics. The only reason it would not work is political - the rUK wishing to punish Scots for having the temerity to vote to leave.
The point I'm making is why would the EU allow it? Northern Ireland is an awkward issue and that's why special arrangements have been made. Scotland would simply be another EU member state. The border between England and Scotland would be no different to that between Wales and RoI or between England and France.
The DUP are a fxcking disgrace and clearly nothing bar a return to a hard border between NI and Ireland will satisfy them.
They fear the future, whatever it may bring, so spend their time just huddling together assuming that if they prevent anything at all that will be a good result.
The DUP is the political wing of the Free Presybterian Church of Ulster, and while it's true that they fear the future it's also true that they get off on fearing the future. They think they know what the future will bring, because they believe it's all written in the Book of Revelations. The principal factor in everything they say about the border or the Irish Sea is their belief that the Roman Catholic church is the Antichrist, that it owns both the RoI and the EU, and that it's hell-bent on coming to get them. They love "holding out" more than everything. Their whole mythos is based on it. They are far crazier than the IRA ever were. The IRA's mythos was kitsch in comparison.
I don't think a single newspaper has mentioned why it is that the DUP dislike the EU.
This view is about 30 years out of date. But, you know, some people just never move on....
I take it you mean my view rather than the view I am ascribing to the DUP. What was the reason in your view that the DUP opposed Britain's EU membership?
National Sovereignty considered more important than Supranational bodies having greater power, don't think the EU was an honest broker are probably two for a start. Take a long hard look at the make up of the party today, sure it still has its Paisleyite religious types but it is largely dominated by poeople who have fuck all interest in Free Presbyetrianism. In fact the DUP is chock full of fucking technocrats and wonks in the back offices, not people holding prayer meetings. Since Paisley they have had one leader in the deeply religious mould. It didnt protect him from being put out on his arse after a couple of months.
Whats People Before Profits Excuse for its anti EU stance at times? Are they the radical wing of Catholicism and fear the EU is full of Prods?
I hadn't heard of PBP. Three minutes of lookup on the internet suggests they don't seem to think the EU is full of Protestants or anything similar. I doubt they're any kind of wing of Catholicism. They don't seem to be about defending ethnic traditions, let alone any that date back to the 17th century.
National sovereignty considered more important than supranational bodies? That's a legitimate view, but if it's so important to the DUP do they propose that Britain should leave NATO or tell the ECHR and ICJ where to get off? Also they are Irish. I'm not telling them what identity or politics they should have, but Ulster is a province of Ireland. They're British too, and it's their British identity that's far more important to them. Why? It can't just be "because". It's to do with tradition and being Protestant and against rule by evil Dublin.
As for broker, I didn't realise the EU was a broker. Is that how they see it??
NI is a province of the United Kingdom. Its no more a province of Ireland, than Alaska is a province of Canada or Russia.
They have Irish citizenship on top, thanks to the Irish constitution and the Good Friday Agreement, but they're still a part of the UK and not Ireland. Maybe one day there'll be a single country called Ireland spanning the entire island, I hope there will be, but that day is not today.
I said Ulster was a province of Ireland, not that NI was. That's standard usage of terminology by everyone in Ireland.
And you were wrong.
EDIT: Just seen your edit, WTF, the U stands for Unionist not Ulster. 😂
The island of Ireland has four provinces, of which Ulster is one. The governance of Ulster is complicated because three of the counties of the province are in one country and the other six counties of the province are in another, but that didn't change the fact that there is a province in Ireland called Ulster that consists of nine counties.
It has four historical provinces just as England has historical counties. My local town was historically in Lancashire but is now in Cheshire, so would you say it is in Cheshire or Lancashire?
The term is obsolete and has no legal bearing in either the UK or the Republic today. It is of historic interest, but it is no more a fact than the few weirdos who write Lancashire on their post instead of Cheshire are factually correct.
When you're in a hole, stop digging. If you ask Jeffrey Donaldson what province Donegal is in, he will say it's in Ulster, as will every other Irish person or person who knows about the subject.
If you ask him or any other Irish person what kind of entity Ulster is - is it a county, country, province, canton, state, or something else - they will say it's a province.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
OMG what a troll. Are you taking the piss? You sound almost as much of a headbanger as Ian Paisley Snr during his most headbangery moments.
First you say the term "province" is obsolete and has "no legal bearing". Then you say Scotland isn't a country. Scotland undeniably has a legal existence.
Not that that's what makes it a country. A country is an imaginary cultural construct, so it doesn't self-identify as anything. But if people believe they have a country called X, they do. That's a necessary part of what makes a country - people thinking they have it.
This discussion has now been completely derailed. Thanks.
Personally I reckon the DUP are anti-Catholic bigots and that's why they're pro-Brexit (EU ~ Antichrist) and probably also why they find Rishi Sunak easier to deal with than Boris Johnson or Theresa May. I was hoping I might learn something from Yokes. But keep on making points about how people in Cheshire or Lancashire write their addresses and comparing the entity known as Scotland with a gender dysphoric...
"if people believe they have a country called X, they do"
Yeah, right. And if people believe they are a woman then they are?
There are many self-proclaimed countries around the world that people believe they have, which they do not.
The UK is a recognised country, a member of the UN etc - Scotland is not. It self-identifies as one, people use the right pronoun to be polite, but its not a real country and neither is England.
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
What part of "best of both worlds" are you lot failing to comprehend?
You can't have "both worlds" without the UK being out of the EU. It is the UK being out of the EU and able to make its own laws which enables there to be another world, if we were all in the Single Market there'd only be one world, with all the flaws that entails which led to us voting to Leave in 2016.
Don't patronise - it's not pleasant (or appropriate). You're reading things into my post that aren't there, anyway.
Brexit: being in single market and UK makes Northern Ireland ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’, says Sunak – live
So the whole UK could be ‘world’s most exciting economic zone’ if we joined the single market.
Got it...
Yep. And the EU has no interest on letting GB be in the single market on the same terms as NI, and HMG has no way to force it like they did for NI.
I strongly suspect Rishi is working on that. Imagine the political bounty of pulling it off:
Massive economic growth. Remainer Tories come flooding back. Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go. The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
The EU has never shown even the slightest interest in separating the Four Freedoms for the whole UK, they have made an exception for Northern Ireland to maintain the free movement of goods alone and keep the border with the Republic open. Obviously we'd love to be able to make such a deal for the whole UK, but if the EU was that flexible we would never have left the EU in the first place.
Which they all know of course - they're just pissed off that Rishi's getting a good press for a while and desperate to avoid asking whether Starmer could have bored UvDL into such a good deal.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Since UK law would cease to apply to an independent Scotland it's a completely different situation.
Or would an independent Scotland be obliged to follow UK regulations, under the jurisdiction of the UK Supreme Court?
Quite possibly for those issues that pertain to the UK single market.
The great Brexit fuckdrama is over. Some think it was a rape. Some a meaningless one night stand to be vaguely regretted. For others it was a sublime consummation
But for all of us, it is now over. The post coital heartbeat is audibly slowing. And the normal political pulse resumes. And so we get on with the day
I think Season One is now over. After nearly 7 years (7 years!) of turmoil we've hit another quasi-equilibrium. That will be enough to render it a virtual non-issue at the next election.
But it will be back for more, hopefully no longer called Brexit, because the UK-EU relationship will never stand still. Sometimes it will be fractious, at other times constructive. I expect us to move back closer into the EU orbit in fits and starts and each will be a little mini-drama but nothing as explosive as the original. Switzerland is the closest analogue we have and the EU relationship dominates their foreign policy.
Wonder what Churchill would say - the UK aspiring to be like Switzerland.
Have you been to Switzerland?
99.9% of the world would like to be Switzerland. Safe, secure, free, democratic and immensely wealthy
If the UK ends up as an offshore version of Switzerland I will be overjoyed. We have global influence from our language and culture anyway. Fuck the rest
It shows a lack of ambition. We are a major European nation who should be at the heart of the continent's politics, not hanging around on the periphery.
But to your question - yes, I've worked in Geneva. No prizes for what sort of client it was. A shadowy private bank run by a snooty family. I helped them get a Bank of England licence to operate in London. This is the sort of thing you get to do if you qualify as a chartered accountant.
I had fondue one night and then afterwards went to gaze at the fountain, thinking of that 60s show The Champions with Alexandra Bastedo. That's quite a vivid memory.
I would rather be rich than at the heart of the continent's politics.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Northern Ireland is still in the United Kingdom. An independent Scotland would not be.
But that does not affect the mechanics. The only reason it would not work is political - the rUK wishing to punish Scots for having the temerity to vote to leave.
The point I'm making is why would the EU allow it? Northern Ireland is an awkward issue and that's why special arrangements have been made. Scotland would simply be another EU member state. The border between England and Scotland would be no different to that between Wales and RoI or between England and France.
It would - it would be a land border and the only one that Scotland has.
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
What part of "best of both worlds" are you lot failing to comprehend?
You can't have "both worlds" without the UK being out of the EU. It is the UK being out of the EU and able to make its own laws which enables there to be another world, if we were all in the Single Market there'd only be one world, with all the flaws that entails which led to us voting to Leave in 2016.
Too many people think that Northern Ireland is completely in the Single Market, it's only in goods, and even that is a carve out rather than the full thing. This is exactly the kind of cakeist cherry-picking the UK would love to have, but the EU shows no sign of wanting to make an exception for the much larger Great Britain. The EU has only budged because two groups of nutters spent three decades murdering one another.
Saw a comment on FB pointing out that if Yousuf becomes Scottish FM and achieves independence while Sunak is still UK PM then we would have a Pakistani heritage FM and Indian heritage PM negotiating the partition of Britain. I'd quite like this to happen solely on the basis of historical irony and lolz.
This is why I love the UK!
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
Indeed. One even had the good fortune to marry me!
The DUP are a fxcking disgrace and clearly nothing bar a return to a hard border between NI and Ireland will satisfy them.
They fear the future, whatever it may bring, so spend their time just huddling together assuming that if they prevent anything at all that will be a good result.
The DUP is the political wing of the Free Presybterian Church of Ulster, and while it's true that they fear the future it's also true that they get off on fearing the future. They think they know what the future will bring, because they believe it's all written in the Book of Revelations. The principal factor in everything they say about the border or the Irish Sea is their belief that the Roman Catholic church is the Antichrist, that it owns both the RoI and the EU, and that it's hell-bent on coming to get them. They love "holding out" more than everything. Their whole mythos is based on it. They are far crazier than the IRA ever were. The IRA's mythos was kitsch in comparison.
I don't think a single newspaper has mentioned why it is that the DUP dislike the EU.
This view is about 30 years out of date. But, you know, some people just never move on....
I take it you mean my view rather than the view I am ascribing to the DUP. What was the reason in your view that the DUP opposed Britain's EU membership?
National Sovereignty considered more important than Supranational bodies having greater power, don't think the EU was an honest broker are probably two for a start. Take a long hard look at the make up of the party today, sure it still has its Paisleyite religious types but it is largely dominated by poeople who have fuck all interest in Free Presbyetrianism. In fact the DUP is chock full of fucking technocrats and wonks in the back offices, not people holding prayer meetings. Since Paisley they have had one leader in the deeply religious mould. It didnt protect him from being put out on his arse after a couple of months.
Whats People Before Profits Excuse for its anti EU stance at times? Are they the radical wing of Catholicism and fear the EU is full of Prods?
I hadn't heard of PBP. Three minutes of lookup on the internet suggests they don't seem to think the EU is full of Protestants or anything similar. I doubt they're any kind of wing of Catholicism. They don't seem to be about defending ethnic traditions, let alone any that date back to the 17th century.
National sovereignty considered more important than supranational bodies? That's a legitimate view, but if it's so important to the DUP do they propose that Britain should leave NATO or tell the ECHR and ICJ where to get off? Also they are Irish. I'm not telling them what identity or politics they should have, but Ulster is a province of Ireland. They're British too, and it's their British identity that's far more important to them. Why? It can't just be "because". It's to do with tradition and being Protestant and against rule by evil Dublin.
As for broker, I didn't realise the EU was a broker. Is that how they see it??
NI is a province of the United Kingdom. Its no more a province of Ireland, than Alaska is a province of Canada or Russia.
They have Irish citizenship on top, thanks to the Irish constitution and the Good Friday Agreement, but they're still a part of the UK and not Ireland. Maybe one day there'll be a single country called Ireland spanning the entire island, I hope there will be, but that day is not today.
I said Ulster was a province of Ireland, not that NI was. That's standard usage of terminology by everyone in Ireland.
And you were wrong.
EDIT: Just seen your edit, WTF, the U stands for Unionist not Ulster. 😂
The island of Ireland has four provinces, of which Ulster is one. The governance of Ulster is complicated because three of the counties of the province are in one country and the other six counties of the province are in another, but that didn't change the fact that there is a province in Ireland called Ulster that consists of nine counties.
It has four historical provinces just as England has historical counties. My local town was historically in Lancashire but is now in Cheshire, so would you say it is in Cheshire or Lancashire?
The term is obsolete and has no legal bearing in either the UK or the Republic today. It is of historic interest, but it is no more a fact than the few weirdos who write Lancashire on their post instead of Cheshire are factually correct.
When you're in a hole, stop digging. If you ask Jeffrey Donaldson what province Donegal is in, he will say it's in Ulster, as will every other Irish person or person who knows about the subject.
If you ask him or any other Irish person what kind of entity Ulster is - is it a county, country, province, canton, state, or something else - they will say it's a province.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
OMG what a troll. Are you taking the piss? You sound almost as much of a headbanger as Ian Paisley Snr during his most headbangery moments.
First you say the term "province" is obsolete and has "no legal bearing". Then you say Scotland isn't a country. Scotland undeniably has a legal existence.
Not that that's what makes it a country. A country is an imaginary cultural construct, so it doesn't self-identify as anything. But if people believe they have a country called X, they do. That's a necessary part of what makes a country - people thinking they have it.
This discussion has now been completely derailed. Thanks.
Personally I reckon the DUP are anti-Catholic bigots and that's why they're pro-Brexit (EU ~ Antichrist) and probably also why they find Rishi Sunak easier to deal with than Boris Johnson or Theresa May. I was hoping I might learn something from Yokes. But keep on making points about how people in Cheshire or Lancashire write their addresses and comparing the entity known as Scotland with a gender dysphoric...
"if people believe they have a country called X, they do"
Yeah, right. And if people believe they are a woman then they are?
There are many self-proclaimed countries around the world that people believe they have, which they do not.
The UK is a recognised country, a member of the UN etc - Scotland is not. It self-identifies as one, people use the right pronoun to be polite, but its not a real country and neither is England.
England and Scotland are both countries. They are not states. Countries do not have to be self-governing.
"Whatever anyone may think or want I believe after today and what he has achieved on the renegotiation of the Irish protocol that @RishiSunak will more likely than not be the Prime Minister at the next General Election …"
It's a view, as they say.
But he will be, at the election, just not afterwards.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
Just like England then..
Obviously. 👍
England, Wales and Scotland are not countries, though they self-identify as them. The UK is a country.
I want England to become a country, but it isn't one.
People use the word country when they talk about the home nations, like people use preferred pronouns elsewhere, but the reality remains reality.
Are going to persist with this 'fake countries are like transgender people' theme for much longer?
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
What part of "best of both worlds" are you lot failing to comprehend?
You can't have "both worlds" without the UK being out of the EU. It is the UK being out of the EU and able to make its own laws which enables there to be another world, if we were all in the Single Market there'd only be one world, with all the flaws that entails which led to us voting to Leave in 2016.
Too many people think that Northern Ireland is completely in the Single Market, it's only in goods, and even that is a carve out rather than the full thing. This is exactly the kind of cakeist cherry-picking the UK would love to have, but the EU shows no sign of wanting to make an exception for the much larger Great Britain. The EU has only budged because two groups of nutters spent three decades murdering one another.
Its not even completely in the EU Single Market for goods either.
Goods that are legal in the UK, but not legal in the EU, can be legally traded in NI. That is part of what was agreed yesterday.
If the entire UK were in the EU, then NI would lose that prerogative.
Why should Belfast get a better deal than London, Cardiff and Edinburgh? Can we just get a straight answer to this.
As I said from day one, Brexit is a calamity and those that voted for it are nothing but cretins.
Sunak has just effusively told the people of NI that being in both the UK and EU single market is the best possible economic positioning in the world.
It just needs people to think a bit, join the dots, and wonder why England, Wales and Scotland (the latter against its wishes) have foregone such a remarkably advantageous position?
Just listened to Sunak on R4. It's almost surreal, as others have said. His Tiggerish, boyish enthusiasm for NI's prospects now it has "the best of both worlds" by being in the UK and the EU Single Market does not sit comfortably with his being in favour of Brexit.
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
He's specifically talking to an audience in Northern Ireland. He realises no one on Great Britain's mainland will hear it.
Has Sunak's deal also solved the problem the SNP have long had about an independent Scotland being in the EU while England was not in it? No need for a hard border now. Just apply the NI solution.
Northern Ireland is still in the United Kingdom. An independent Scotland would not be.
But that does not affect the mechanics. The only reason it would not work is political - the rUK wishing to punish Scots for having the temerity to vote to leave.
The point I'm making is why would the EU allow it? Northern Ireland is an awkward issue and that's why special arrangements have been made. Scotland would simply be another EU member state. The border between England and Scotland would be no different to that between Wales and RoI or between England and France.
It would - it would be a land border and the only one that Scotland has.
If Scotland wants to plead that to the EU, that's their business.
Saw a comment on FB pointing out that if Yousuf becomes Scottish FM and achieves independence while Sunak is still UK PM then we would have a Pakistani heritage FM and Indian heritage PM negotiating the partition of Britain. I'd quite like this to happen solely on the basis of historical irony and lolz.
This is why I love the UK!
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
The immigrants might be humble. Their offspring, though...
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
Its the Scots fault they were taken out against their will, since they rejected the opportunity for self-determination.
Poor old England, not even having the balls to ask itself if it wanted self-determination.
Why should Belfast get a better deal than London, Cardiff and Edinburgh? Can we just get a straight answer to this.
As I said from day one, Brexit is a calamity and those that voted for it are nothing but cretins.
Sunak has just effusively told the people of NI that being in both the UK and EU single market is the best possible economic positioning in the world.
It just needs people to think a bit, join the dots, and wonder why England, Wales and Scotland (the latter against its wishes) have foregone such a remarkably advantageous position?
It's not complicated. Only one of the four freedoms applies in Northern Ireland. We would never have left the EU if it had allowed such flexilbity for the whole UK. Of course we'd like the same to apply to the UK. Free movement of goods with the EU, and the freedom to do any other trade deal we like? We'll take it. No freedom of movement? We'll take it.
Honestly it's like Remainers have suddenly woken up and understood what Leavers have been saying for years and years.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
Its the Scots fault they were taken out against their will, since they rejected the opportunity for self-determination.
Poor old England, not even having the balls to ask itself if it wanted self-determination.
Not really, we at least took the opportunity before us in 2016 which was more than the Scots did in 2014.
I'm a minority in wanting England out of the UK, I can live with that, it is what it is.
But as a nation you don't get to reject the opportunity to control your own destiny, then bitch and moan that the union you chose to stay in makes some choices different to what you wanted. Had the UK voted to Remain in the EU, then the EU made decisions the UK didn't like, it would have been the UK's fault for choosing to Remain in the EU.
Or to be more technically correct, you do get to bitch and moan - free speech and all that jazz - but it doesn't change the fact its your own responsibility that it happened.
Why should Belfast get a better deal than London, Cardiff and Edinburgh? Can we just get a straight answer to this.
As I said from day one, Brexit is a calamity and those that voted for it are nothing but cretins.
Sunak has just effusively told the people of NI that being in both the UK and EU single market is the best possible economic positioning in the world.
It just needs people to think a bit, join the dots, and wonder why England, Wales and Scotland (the latter against its wishes) have foregone such a remarkably advantageous position?
It's not complicated. Only one of the four freedoms applies in Northern Ireland. We would never have left the EU if it had allowed such flexilbity for the whole UK. Of course we'd like the same to apply to the UK. Free movement of goods with the EU, and the freedom to do any other trade deal we like? We'll take it. No freedom of movement? We'll take it.
Honestly it's like Remainers have suddenly woken up and understood what Leavers have been saying for years and years.
What Sunak has said is that Northern Ireland is a better place to invest in than GB. You set up there and you get everything you'd get anywhere in the UK plus more on top. Politically, he really doesn't want to be taking time to explain to voters in England, Scotland and Wales why that is a good thing.
Saw a comment on FB pointing out that if Yousuf becomes Scottish FM and achieves independence while Sunak is still UK PM then we would have a Pakistani heritage FM and Indian heritage PM negotiating the partition of Britain. I'd quite like this to happen solely on the basis of historical irony and lolz.
This is why I love the UK!
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
The immigrants might be humble. Their offspring, though...
Saw a comment on FB pointing out that if Yousuf becomes Scottish FM and achieves independence while Sunak is still UK PM then we would have a Pakistani heritage FM and Indian heritage PM negotiating the partition of Britain. I'd quite like this to happen solely on the basis of historical irony and lolz.
This is why I love the UK!
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
The immigrants might be humble. Their offspring, though...
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
Its the Scots fault they were taken out against their will, since they rejected the opportunity for self-determination.
Poor old England, not even having the balls to ask itself if it wanted self-determination.
Not really, we at least took the opportunity before us in 2016 which was more than the Scots did in 2014.
I'm a minority in wanting England out of the UK, I can live with that, it is what it is.
But as a nation you don't get to reject the opportunity to control your own destiny, then bitch and moan that the union you chose to stay in makes some choices different to what you wanted. Had the UK voted to Remain in the EU, then the EU made decisions the UK didn't like, it would have been the UK's fault for choosing to Remain in the EU.
Or to be more technically correct, you do get to bitch and moan - free speech and all that jazz - but it doesn't change the fact its your own responsibility that it happened.
I think TUD voted FOR Sindy. Could be wrong but that's my sense of it.
The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too.
Northern Ireland voted Remain and borders the Irish Republic, GB voted Leave and borders the sea
Scotland also voted remain.
So did London, Liverpool and Manchester.
The problem for Scotland is that two years prior they declined to become an independent country so their votes are a subset of UK votes and not counted independently.
The same is true of Northern Ireland. The special arrangements there have the square root of sod all to do with how they voted in the referendum and are purely to do with the Good Friday Agreement. Scotland has no such agreement, so if it wants to be treated as an actual country it needs to actually become one, not go in via another country as NI does with the Republic.
I'm sure many people in Scotland will be drawing that conclusion. Especially now we know that "hard" trade borders can be finessed in various ways.
On current polls there will actually be almost as big a swing from SNP to Labour as Tory to Labour at the next election
None of the polls came after this agreement. You're not thinking it through.
When either the hapless Yousaf or Gilead Forbes succeed Sturgeon you can be sure the swing from the SNP will be even bigger.
Plus Northern Ireland only has an open border with GB as well as the EU now as it is still in the UK
We are talking about Scotland being in the UK as well as the EU. YOu know, if devomax really existed, it's the sort of thing the Scottish Government would jump at.
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
The EU aren't offering it.
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
The trouble is, it is legalistic quibbling and sounds more and more like it. Like your trying to blame the Scots for the lies (with or without mens rea) of the No campaign.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
Its the Scots fault they were taken out against their will, since they rejected the opportunity for self-determination.
Poor old England, not even having the balls to ask itself if it wanted self-determination.
Not really, we at least took the opportunity before us in 2016 which was more than the Scots did in 2014.
I'm a minority in wanting England out of the UK, I can live with that, it is what it is.
But as a nation you don't get to reject the opportunity to control your own destiny, then bitch and moan that the union you chose to stay in makes some choices different to what you wanted. Had the UK voted to Remain in the EU, then the EU made decisions the UK didn't like, it would have been the UK's fault for choosing to Remain in the EU.
Or to be more technically correct, you do get to bitch and moan - free speech and all that jazz - but it doesn't change the fact its your own responsibility that it happened.
I think TUD voted FOR Sindy. Could be wrong but that's my sense of it.
Yes, but the question was collectively who was responsible for the Scots being taken out against their will and the only correct answer to that is . . . the Scots. For collectively rejecting the opportunity for self-determination.
I may be wrong, but I believe that TUD identifies as a Scot. Collectively Scots voted against self-determination, regardless of TUD's vote, just as collectively Scots voted to Remain in the EU even if TUD had voted to Leave.
Comments
As OLB said: "The more Sunak extols the virtues of Northern Ireland's single market membership, the harder it gets for him to explain why the rest of the UK shouldn't have it too."
When they realised the loans were at risk. They lent more.
OK, the US entity etc. I know
But that is truly special.
NI is only interesting as being in the EU market and UK market as the UK market is distinct from the EU market.
If the UK were in the EU then there would cease to be a UK market and NI would only be in the EU market once more.
The ERG will split both ways
Ireland is a country in the EU. NI gets the Single Market not due to their votes, regardless of how often HYUFD and others claim that as the reason, but due to Ireland being a member state.
If Scotland wants to be a member state it needs to become an actual country and accede instead of self identifying as a country.
Scotland is as much a country as Isla Bryson is a woman.
Massive economic growth.
Remainer Tories come flooding back.
Sir Keir left blinking in the light with nowhere to go.
The corpse of Boris buried and abandoned.
If Rishi could pull it off he'd go down in history as the first great British politician of the 21st century. He must, must, must be trying to find a way.
A number of people were interested in the way that various UK investigations into DB were shelved immediately after BREXIT.
Whereas PM....
The Leavers in my office do wonder why they bothered though. Even less control over immigration than when we were in the EU seemingly. Non existent economic benefits
Besides, he doesn't say *may* be coming. He says 'Major Russian offensive coming".
Either he knows something, in which case he should stfu, or he doesn't, in which case he should stfu.
The very important outcome from Windsor is that an era of mutual hostility, mistrust, and petty oneupmanship is coming to an end.
A lot of things, including a grown up conversation on asylum seekers can now flow from this.
"Most voters think BREXIT was wrong"
More relevant is who they blame IMO
There are all sorts of ways that the barriers between the UK and the EU can be reduced. It's just a question of what the UK is prepared to offer in order to reduce those barriers.
Something for something.
How could GB be on the same terms as NI? You think the EU would allow the entire UK to be in the Single Market, while keeping an entirely different set of UK-specific rules that can differ from EU rules?
You and Scott and other blinkered fools can't seem to see beyond the words Single Market and realise there's more to it than just that.
Remain London is solid Labour anyway, Remain Scotland was not Tory even in 2019.
The next general election will be decided in the heavy Leave redwall seats which the Conservatives won from Labour in 2019, plus some mainly Leave seats in Essex, East Kent and the Midlands which Cameron won from Labour in 2010
"The energy secretary says he is "very sympathetic" to suggestions that the government should stop a planned £500 rise in annual energy bills from April.
Grant Shapps said he was working "hard" with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt on the issue.
There are warnings that a million more households could struggle if bills go up again.
The government is limiting the typical annual energy bill to £2,500, but this will increase to £3,000 from 1 April.
The Treasury has so far resisted calls to extend the scheme at current levels."
Its obviously going to happen, its only a matter of when not if it gets announced.
England, Wales and Scotland are not countries, though they self-identify as them. The UK is a country.
I want England to become a country, but it isn't one.
People use the word country when they talk about the home nations, like people use preferred pronouns elsewhere, but the reality remains reality.
Whose fault is it the Scots were taken out against their will?
They'll be even more furious.
If you ask him or any other Irish person what kind of entity Ulster is - is it a county, country, province, canton, state, or something else - they will say it's a province. OMG what a troll. Are you taking the piss? You sound almost as much of a headbanger as Ian Paisley Snr during his most headbangery moments.
First you say the term "province" is obsolete and has "no legal bearing". Then you say Scotland isn't a country. Scotland undeniably has a legal existence.
Not that that's what makes it a country. A country is an imaginary cultural construct, so it doesn't self-identify as anything. But if people believe they have a country called X, they do. That's a necessary part of what makes a country - people thinking they have it.
This discussion has now been completely derailed. Thanks.
Personally I reckon the DUP are anti-Catholic bigots and that's why they're pro-Brexit (EU ~ Antichrist) and probably also why they find Rishi Sunak easier to deal with than Boris Johnson or Theresa May. I was hoping I might learn something from Yokes. But keep on making points about how people in Cheshire or Lancashire write their addresses and comparing the entity known as Scotland with a gender dysphoric...
But to your question - yes, I've worked in Geneva. No prizes for what sort of client it was. A shadowy private bank run by a snooty family. I helped them get a Bank of England licence to operate in London. This is the sort of thing you get to do if you qualify as a chartered accountant.
I had fondue one night and then afterwards went to gaze at the fountain, thinking of that 60s show The Champions with Alexandra Bastedo. That's quite a vivid memory.
I would be in the category who thinks that the vote to leave was wrong, but wouldn't want another vote and would probably not vote to rejoin at the moment, if it became an option.
My instinct is that people want Brexit to work, this is why Sunak will get a lot of credit for this.
As have said a few times, if Brexit is a self evident disaster (as it may well be turning in to), then rejoin will become politically possible, I would guess it is 7 or 8 more years to go until we get to this point, but it could be quicker. We aren't there yet.
Or would an independent Scotland be obliged to follow UK regulations, under the jurisdiction of the UK Supreme Court?
Of course I understand why he's doing it, but I can't help thinking that he risks over-egging the virtues of membership of the EU Single Market. If it's so great, then why.......?
You can't have "both worlds" without the UK being out of the EU. It is the UK being out of the EU and able to make its own laws which enables there to be another world, if we were all in the Single Market there'd only be one world, with all the flaws that entails which led to us voting to Leave in 2016.
Look what the children/grandchildren of humble immigrants from India and Pakistan can achieve in this country.
Yeah, right. And if people believe they are a woman then they are?
There are many self-proclaimed countries around the world that people believe they have, which they do not.
The UK is a recognised country, a member of the UN etc - Scotland is not. It self-identifies as one, people use the right pronoun to be polite, but its not a real country and neither is England.
Because I can always pop back later.
Goods that are legal in the UK, but not legal in the EU, can be legally traded in NI. That is part of what was agreed yesterday.
If the entire UK were in the EU, then NI would lose that prerogative.
It just needs people to think a bit, join the dots, and wonder why England, Wales and Scotland (the latter against its wishes) have foregone such a remarkably advantageous position?
Long live the Windsor Knot.
Honestly it's like Remainers have suddenly woken up and understood what Leavers have been saying for years and years.
I'm a minority in wanting England out of the UK, I can live with that, it is what it is.
But as a nation you don't get to reject the opportunity to control your own destiny, then bitch and moan that the union you chose to stay in makes some choices different to what you wanted. Had the UK voted to Remain in the EU, then the EU made decisions the UK didn't like, it would have been the UK's fault for choosing to Remain in the EU.
Or to be more technically correct, you do get to bitch and moan - free speech and all that jazz - but it doesn't change the fact its your own responsibility that it happened.
At this time of year he should be off to Egypt, if he needs something near, or Asia or the Caribbean if he has more flying time
NOT CAPRI
I may be wrong, but I believe that TUD identifies as a Scot. Collectively Scots voted against self-determination, regardless of TUD's vote, just as collectively Scots voted to Remain in the EU even if TUD had voted to Leave.