But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
It's interesting that the current Government is actually railing against EU restrictions, in their critique of the bat tunnels, no reservoirs being built since the 90s, etc. They don't mention where such regulations came from, but to be fair, neither do the Tories or Reform. Nice to see them so keen to use our Brexit freedoms.
Every time you say this, which you do a lot, can you quote the actual regulation so we know this isn't just another straight banana claim?
Boris did this a lot, only to find that none of the regulations he quoted ever existed, or didn't apply or had been distorted out of all proportion. I point to his evidence at the Treasury Select Committee. Every single one of his claims were debunked. As per Andrew Tyrie 'All very interesting Boris, but none of it is actually true is it?'
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It is madness.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
On the latter point, it's a quotation from aeons ago. 1992 to be more precise.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It is madness.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even if there is a bit of a feeling of a bit of a shakedown from AZ for a few more quid, it is literally nothing... especially compared to other bad deals the government have been happy to sign off...its not like they came back and asked for billions.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Wasn't "stupid" orginally directed at campaigners tempted to overthink their messaging? But yes- provided Mr and Mrs (and Mx) Voter feel meaningfully better off by 2029, the government gets a second term. Alternatively, as long as Con and Ref continue to tear chunks out of each other, the government gets a second term, almost independently of how well they do.
(My take is that trying to align blue votes, whether explicitly or implicitly, is a non-starter. But let's suspend disbelief for a bit. If there were a RefCon pact, I wonder how many current Conservative supporters would consider that the final straw?)
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It is madness.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Its not just about economics though is it. Its also about mass immigration.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It is madness.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Giving it to Mauritius instead.
How many H100s could the UK buy with all that money....Every top level uni could have a world class cluster, which is the massive limiting factor for STEM research these days.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Wasn't "stupid" orginally directed at campaigners tempted to overthink their messaging? But yes- provided Mr and Mrs (and Mx) Voter feel meaningfully better off by 2029, the government gets a second term. Alternatively, as long as Con and Ref continue to tear chunks out of each other, the government gets a second term, almost independently of how well they do.
(My take is that trying to align blue votes, whether explicitly or implicitly, is a non-starter. But let's suspend disbelief for a bit. If there were a RefCon pact, I wonder how many current Conservative supporters would consider that the final straw?)
Reform and conservative policys hardly swim in the same voter pool,,,,con has more in common with starmers labour and daveys lib dems than they do with reform
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
The second term, ahahaha. It's very bunker stage Third Reich, this 'second term' chat.
Starmer’s approval ratings are way lower than Farage's, and dropping like a stone. People will vote for whoever is most likely to unseat the sitting Labour candidate, not who is most likely to stop the Reform candidate.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Its not just about economics though is it. Its also about mass immigration.
It is and it was. That was probably far more relevant.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
The second term, ahahaha. It's very bunker stage Third Reich, this 'second term' chat.
Starmer’s approval ratings are way lower than Farage's, and dropping like a stone. People will vote for whoever is most likely to unseat the sitting Labour candidate, not who is most likely to stop the Reform candidate.
I note that not one poster on here who says they are in favour of joining the EU has an answer to getting the public to vote for the Euro, Schengen, and a whole list of directives and regulations that newspapers will weaponise. Oh, and the membership fees, which will look even higher because of the Balkan countries that will have joined.
Don’t focus on the EU: focus on a form of Macron’s political community that everyone can live with.
It had wanted to wrap up the deal by August to keep it on track with regard to other investments. The company is putting in $3.5bn (£2.8bn) in the US, and building a $1.5bn site to make next-generation cancer treatments in Singapore – where it has received “very substantial support”, Soriot said pointedly last week.
The cell-based technology to be introduced at Speke – which can make vaccines more effective and easier to produce than the current egg-based process – required clinical trials ahead of regulatory approval. The Financial Times reported it was eventually revised to £78m. But AstraZeneca wanted the government to honour Hunt’s £90m proposal and Soriot said on Thursday the firm had been willing to increase its investment to £500m to seal the deal.
Yes, I posted about that a few times. Insane to crash such a deal over £12m.
The Science Minister’s background is in social charity work. Before becoming an MP the Business Minister worked for the local council.
Lord Vallance, like Prison Minister supposedly hired to bring knowledge and experience, but been totally invisible, and clearly been overruled by others. No way he wouldn't spend £12 million to get a £500m vaccine plant over the line.
It is madness.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Giving it to Mauritius instead.
There are times when I really think they're wrecking the country deliberately.
What the west needs ti do is get its birthrate up so we dont need mass immigration. That means women starting families earlier and also positive discrimination in favour of men in the workplace as they tend to be the main breadwinners.
I note that not one poster on here who says they are in favour of joining the EU has an answer to getting the public to vote for the Euro, Schengen, and a whole list of directives and regulations that newspapers will weaponise.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
Finding a ‘scapegoat’ for the failings of a hospital that was not particularly bad by NHS standards would have been an insanely dangerous gamble for no reward. If fatal medical blunders had occurred, the safest course of action for the doctors would have been to shut up and get on with their job, which is what the NHS managers – who had no suspicions of anyone – wanted to do.
Well yes it is, but not in the sense you think. It is written in a partisan and sarcastic manner, which makes it difficult for me to separate the factual wheat from the rhetorical chaff. I have been staying away from the Letby case because my style of analysis is lengthy and usually wrong in the first instance (it's the interviews and responses from others that improve the paper), so I can't really do much. But I think it's best to say that now it's entered the twittersphere it will be very difficult to analyse as partisans from both directions constantly muddy the water.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
The second term, ahahaha. It's very bunker stage Third Reich, this 'second term' chat.
Starmer’s approval ratings are way lower than Farage's, and dropping like a stone. People will vote for whoever is most likely to unseat the sitting Labour candidate, not who is most likely to stop the Reform candidate.
Also Farage is mild and cuddly compared to Trump.
He's also very good at being a politician. Can you imagine Sir Adenoids in a televised debate with Farage? It would have to be post-watershed for showing live bloodsports.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
Is there a way we can get Clarkson to move to Iraq?
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
As in "You will be subjected to a Primary, and I will donate $25m to your opponent."
Primarying: noun U.S. Politics. the mounting of a challenge to the incumbent in a primary election: There were many instances of primarying during the last election cycle.
Our traditional Saturday visit from the Kremlin was both later and shorter than usual tonight.
I always find it really bizarre that they do. Of all the places on the internet to come on and try to spread BS, PB seems like one of the worst, as its full of politically engaged people who seem to love checking everything for the smallest of mistakes.
Something that's been building over the past year or so seems to now be coming fast, British big company valuations are breaking through the 10x P/E barrier they've been languishing below for about 10 years. We might finally see the FTSE100 break through the 10k mark this year if risk appetite has finally returned for domestic investors. People are looking for the next Rolls Royce story. So far Barclays and IAG seem to both be on the cusp of much higher valuations than they currently hold. I think if we do see it happen then very slowly London will claw back a lot of market share for IPOs from the US but it rather depends on how much risk investors are willing to take on British companies.
I am confounded how reform can do so well while brexit support is in such radical decline (rejoin and dropping red lines have huge support). I guess even farage has been critical of brexit lately 🤷♂️
45/37 in favour of rejoin in the latest poll
It is widely accepted across politics including by the Lib Dems rejoining is years away if at all
Because it isn’t “rejoining”. It’s joining. And those who know what that means know a ten point starting lead isn’t enough to win a referendum on it.
It'd be lost by over 60:40. This is like Queen Mary trying to overturn the Reformation.
Next.
Or King Charles II trying to overturn Cromwell’s republic?
It was with an acceptance of constitutional not absolute monarchy and that Parliament was now supreme not the Crown.
We may rejoin the single market in time but unlikely the full EU
That was later, after James VII and II tried it on again and got the chop, albeit allowed by mistake accidentally for some strange reason to escape rather than having the hassle of literally chopping him.
James II was mainly removed as he was trying to remove the primacy of the Protestant faith in England and Scotland and his attempt to remove restrictions on Roman Catholics by decree without Parliament. He was not trying to restore Divine Right on a broader basis in terms of his power to raise taxes and an army without Parliament's approval as his father had.
Indeed the strongest support for James II and VII came from Jacobite parts of Scotland and Ireland
The acceptance of constitutional monarchy was, nevertheless, *what you specified*, and that is what happened when James VII and II got turfed out.
Dinner now ready - have a nice time everyone.
Charles II had already accepted constitutional monarchy, 1688 just entrenched it in law via the Bill of Rights (while also after James II banning Roman Catholics from the throne too as entrenched by the 1701 Act of Settlement)
But Charles II didn't sign anything, and went back to RCism as far as he dared. Basically, as I said, kicked the can down the road.
Charles II never raised an army or tried to raise taxes without Parliament's approval unlike his father.
He also unlike his brother backed down on a Declaration of Indulgence and agreed to implement the Test Acts passed by Parliament which required those holding office to deny the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation and take Anglican communion
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
It's also supposed to be temporary, on the assumption that the EU can ever get EES working. EU passport holders (and others) have been able to use our e-gates since 2020.
Our traditional Saturday visit from the Kremlin was both later and shorter than usual tonight.
I always find it really bizarre that they do. Of all the places on the internet to come on and try to spread BS, PB seems like one of the worst, as its full of politically engaged people who seem to love checking everything for the smallest of mistakes.
You mean, these fourth rate amateurs are no match for the might of the Pedantry Bureau?
Our traditional Saturday visit from the Kremlin was both later and shorter than usual tonight.
I always find it really bizarre that they do. Of all the places on the internet to come on and try to spread BS, PB seems like one of the worst, as its full of politically engaged people who seem to love checking everything for the smallest of mistakes.
You mean, these fourth rate amateurs are no match for the might of the Pedantry Bureau?
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
Have you travelled with a film crew and equipment? This is the issue Clarkson is highlighting.
It's happening with other EU countries due to all the new Brexit dividends that British companies are experiencing.
Michael Crick @MichaelLCrick · 1h I hear that scores of screenshots of Andrew Gwynne's Trigger Me Timbers WhatsApp group are likely to emerge in the next few days, which will make life very unconfortable for several local councillors and at least one MP.
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
Rather than trade, the UK and EU should talk about border controls and joining Schengen. I think that's the single biggest issue facing all of Europe (including us) and doing a deal on Schengen membership (something the EU would dearly love) in return for a very tough external border deal and offshore migrant processing and rapid deportation to third party countries etc... makes much more sense to me than joining the single market. There would probably be very wide support across all of Europe to codify a very tough external border and deportation rules, using potential UK membership of it as cover to impose new rules on it is something I think everyone would go for.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Wasn't "stupid" orginally directed at campaigners tempted to overthink their messaging? But yes- provided Mr and Mrs (and Mx) Voter feel meaningfully better off by 2029, the government gets a second term. Alternatively, as long as Con and Ref continue to tear chunks out of each other, the government gets a second term, almost independently of how well they do.
(My take is that trying to align blue votes, whether explicitly or implicitly, is a non-starter. But let's suspend disbelief for a bit. If there were a RefCon pact, I wonder how many current Conservative supporters would consider that the final straw?)
Reform and conservative policys hardly swim in the same voter pool,,,,con has more in common with starmers labour and daveys lib dems than they do with reform
The vast majority of Tory voters would on a forced choice vote for Farage over Starmer, though if the party did not exist nearly half would go LD not Reform otherwise
Something that's been building over the past year or so seems to now be coming fast, British big company valuations are breaking through the 10x P/E barrier they've been languishing below for about 10 years. We might finally see the FTSE100 break through the 10k mark this year if risk appetite has finally returned for domestic investors. People are looking for the next Rolls Royce story. So far Barclays and IAG seem to both be on the cusp of much higher valuations than they currently hold. I think if we do see it happen then very slowly London will claw back a lot of market share for IPOs from the US but it rather depends on how much risk investors are willing to take on British companies.
What is the implication of this over the next year? On 31Dec2024, will the GBP/USD ratio be higher or lower, and if so by how much? Will the FTSE100 be higher or lower, and if so by how much?
Our traditional Saturday visit from the Kremlin was both later and shorter than usual tonight.
I always find it really bizarre that they do. Of all the places on the internet to come on and try to spread BS, PB seems like one of the worst, as its full of politically engaged people who seem to love checking everything for the smallest of mistakes.
You mean, these fourth rate amateurs are no match for the might of the Pedantry Bureau?
Well also what are they trying to achieve?
In a bar somewhere…
“See the guy in the corner. The one with the 10,000 yard stare? He lasted 14 hours on PB. No, man, you don’t know. You weren’t there!”
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
This government doesn't understand tech, data or finance. Whatever the final Tory government did, they really seemed to get it for these industries that are so important to our economy as well as not penny pinching on £12m on pharmaceutical manufacturing.
Something that's been building over the past year or so seems to now be coming fast, British big company valuations are breaking through the 10x P/E barrier they've been languishing below for about 10 years. We might finally see the FTSE100 break through the 10k mark this year if risk appetite has finally returned for domestic investors. People are looking for the next Rolls Royce story. So far Barclays and IAG seem to both be on the cusp of much higher valuations than they currently hold. I think if we do see it happen then very slowly London will claw back a lot of market share for IPOs from the US but it rather depends on how much risk investors are willing to take on British companies.
What is the implication of this over the next year? On 31Dec2024, will the GBP/USD ratio be higher or lower, and if so by how much? Will the FTSE100 be higher or lower, and if so by how much?
I think that veers too close to financial advice so will steer clear...
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
This government doesn't understand tech, data or finance anything to do with private enterprise.
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
This government doesn't understand tech, data or finance. Whatever the final Tory government did, they really seemed to get it for these industries that are so important to our economy as well as not penny pinching on £12m on pharmaceutical manufacturing.
The tories pushed into the law the online safety bill,,,,cant comment on the other two but tech they neither understood and fucked hard in the arse
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
Rather than trade, the UK and EU should talk about border controls and joining Schengen. I think that's the single biggest issue facing all of Europe (including us) and doing a deal on Schengen membership (something the EU would dearly love) in return for a very tough external border deal and offshore migrant processing and rapid deportation to third party countries etc... makes much more sense to me than joining the single market. There would probably be very wide support across all of Europe to codify a very tough external border and deportation rules, using potential UK membership of it as cover to impose new rules on it is something I think everyone would go for.
So…no border controls between us and France, for example ? Good luck selling that.
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
This government doesn't understand tech, data or finance. Whatever the final Tory government did, they really seemed to get it for these industries that are so important to our economy as well as not penny pinching on £12m on pharmaceutical manufacturing.
What do they understand? What area do they seem to have some good ideas for?
We kind of assumed Labour were tight lipped because they'd want to avoid any pre-election slip-ups, and would rather simply allow the Tories to lose in style. It's now seeming like the cupboard was bare all along, and there really aren't any great new ideas coming from the government.
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
Even better is the Silicon Valley of Europe guff, but we demand backdoors into your cloud services that have a global scope. Absolutely bonkers. It makes the UK perhaps second to only North Korea in terms of the worst place to store or process data.
This government doesn't understand tech, data or finance. Whatever the final Tory government did, they really seemed to get it for these industries that are so important to our economy as well as not penny pinching on £12m on pharmaceutical manufacturing.
What do they understand? What area do they seem to have some good ideas for?
We kind of assumed Labour were tight lipped because they'd want to avoid any pre-election slip-ups, and would rather simply allow the Tories to lose in style. It's now seeming like the cupboard was bare all along, and there really aren't any great new ideas coming from the government.
Our traditional Saturday visit from the Kremlin was both later and shorter than usual tonight.
I always find it really bizarre that they do. Of all the places on the internet to come on and try to spread BS, PB seems like one of the worst, as its full of politically engaged people who seem to love checking everything for the smallest of mistakes.
You mean, these fourth rate amateurs are no match for the might of the Pedantry Bureau?
Well also what are they trying to achieve?
Just trying to poison everything with crass Putinist guff. We can smell the revolting farts a mile off, but they probably go down a treat on various anti-social media groups for very angry red faced people.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
Wasn't "stupid" orginally directed at campaigners tempted to overthink their messaging? But yes- provided Mr and Mrs (and Mx) Voter feel meaningfully better off by 2029, the government gets a second term. Alternatively, as long as Con and Ref continue to tear chunks out of each other, the government gets a second term, almost independently of how well they do.
(My take is that trying to align blue votes, whether explicitly or implicitly, is a non-starter. But let's suspend disbelief for a bit. If there were a RefCon pact, I wonder how many current Conservative supporters would consider that the final straw?)
Looking at the most recent polling on this, and correct me where I misremember, much more conservatives voters wanted the merger, a large amount of Reform voters did not.
Voters are one thing, actual members and activists could produce a different result.
But there are voters out there who have voted Brexit, Corbyn, and Farage in recent elections, and maybe very little else in their lives. To put it like this, how much Reform vote is based on liking Reform on immigration, but would actually prefer economics a little bit more left wing?
Here’s the gist. Look very very carefully for it, and Farage and Reform are repositioning themselves more to the left than they were on economics and public services.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
Rather than trade, the UK and EU should talk about border controls and joining Schengen. I think that's the single biggest issue facing all of Europe (including us) and doing a deal on Schengen membership (something the EU would dearly love) in return for a very tough external border deal and offshore migrant processing and rapid deportation to third party countries etc... makes much more sense to me than joining the single market. There would probably be very wide support across all of Europe to codify a very tough external border and deportation rules, using potential UK membership of it as cover to impose new rules on it is something I think everyone would go for.
So…no border controls between us and France, for example ? Good luck selling that.
Yes, but a very strong external border and legally binding deportation deals to third party countries (essentially formalising the Rwanda idea) and third country processing (extending Italy's deal with Albania to all Europe). Essentially fortress Europe gets codified under the guise of bringing the UK into the tent. I don't think it would be a particularly tough sell.
Something that's been building over the past year or so seems to now be coming fast, British big company valuations are breaking through the 10x P/E barrier they've been languishing below for about 10 years. We might finally see the FTSE100 break through the 10k mark this year if risk appetite has finally returned for domestic investors. People are looking for the next Rolls Royce story. So far Barclays and IAG seem to both be on the cusp of much higher valuations than they currently hold. I think if we do see it happen then very slowly London will claw back a lot of market share for IPOs from the US but it rather depends on how much risk investors are willing to take on British companies.
Of course there’s another interpretation which doesn’t end as well, but I hope you are correct.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
On the latter point, it's a quotation from aeons ago. 1992 to be more precise.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
Rather than trade, the UK and EU should talk about border controls and joining Schengen. I think that's the single biggest issue facing all of Europe (including us) and doing a deal on Schengen membership (something the EU would dearly love) in return for a very tough external border deal and offshore migrant processing and rapid deportation to third party countries etc... makes much more sense to me than joining the single market. There would probably be very wide support across all of Europe to codify a very tough external border and deportation rules, using potential UK membership of it as cover to impose new rules on it is something I think everyone would go for.
So…no border controls between us and France, for example ? Good luck selling that.
Trade is the more important issue to me, but I appreciate I am in a minority and migration is the bigger issue for many so I think @MaxPB comes up with an interesting idea there.
As you say though selling it would be a challenge.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Oh, FFS again. I literally just explained to you that this is not what I'm talking about, so why reiterate the same point as if it proves anything?
But let's try another one to see if it helps you grasp the point. Is support for the death penalty currently a negligible factor in British politics or is it a significant one?
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
The second term, ahahaha. It's very bunker stage Third Reich, this 'second term' chat.
Starmer’s approval ratings are way lower than Farage's, and dropping like a stone. People will vote for whoever is most likely to unseat the sitting Labour candidate, not who is most likely to stop the Reform candidate.
Also Farage is mild and cuddly compared to Trump.
He's also very good at being a politician. Can you imagine Sir Adenoids in a televised debate with Farage? It would have to be post-watershed for showing live bloodsports.
Labour well down. Conservatives doing even worse than in 2024. And Reform still behind both of them.
(It does highlight how easy the Socialists are likely to find things, as long as ex-tory wets drift off to the Yellow Peril and hard right wingers stomp off to Reform. Flip knows how you reunite them in an electorally useful way. Starmer being annoying and mediocre isn't going to do it, and neither are Badenoch's charms.)
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
Agreed, but what was significant about it was that the politicians didn't trust us to have our say on it. Perhaps if it had been endorsed by a referendum, Blair and Brown wouldn't have been so keen to waive those opt outs.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The EU never codified the different options, didn’t offer them to new members, and used harmful phrases like “two speed” to imply the same final destination. They didn’t have to, but they chose to.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
I am confounded how reform can do so well while brexit support is in such radical decline (rejoin and dropping red lines have huge support). I guess even farage has been critical of brexit lately 🤷♂️
45/37 in favour of rejoin in the latest poll
It is widely accepted across politics including by the Lib Dems rejoining is years away if at all
Because it isn’t “rejoining”. It’s joining. And those who know what that means know a ten point starting lead isn’t enough to win a referendum on it.
It'd be lost by over 60:40. This is like Queen Mary trying to overturn the Reformation.
Next.
Or King Charles II trying to overturn Cromwell’s republic?
It was with an acceptance of constitutional not absolute monarchy and that Parliament was now supreme not the Crown.
We may rejoin the single market in time but unlikely the full EU
That was later, after James VII and II tried it on again and got the chop, albeit allowed by mistake accidentally for some strange reason to escape rather than having the hassle of literally chopping him.
James II was mainly removed as he was trying to remove the primacy of the Protestant faith in England and Scotland and his attempt to remove restrictions on Roman Catholics by decree without Parliament. He was not trying to restore Divine Right on a broader basis in terms of his power to raise taxes and an army without Parliament's approval as his father had.
Indeed the strongest support for James II and VII came from Jacobite parts of Scotland and Ireland
The acceptance of constitutional monarchy was, nevertheless, *what you specified*, and that is what happened when James VII and II got turfed out.
Dinner now ready - have a nice time everyone.
Charles II had already accepted constitutional monarchy, 1688 just entrenched it in law via the Bill of Rights (while also after James II banning Roman Catholics from the throne too as entrenched by the 1701 Act of Settlement)
But Charles II didn't sign anything, and went back to RCism as far as he dared. Basically, as I said, kicked the can down the road.
Charles II never raised an army or tried to raise taxes without Parliament's approval unlike his father.
He also unlike his brother backed down on a Declaration of Indulgence and agreed to implement the Test Acts passed by Parliament which required those holding office to deny the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation and take Anglican communion
STILL NOT THE RIGHT ANSWER. Not constitional monarchy. Not a formal settlement. No more than temporary weakness (like many a king before him).
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
Me too. But Blair was so convinced that doing the right thing, such as giving up some of our rebate, would impress everyone. It must have given the French a hernia from laughing so much.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
I was in exactly the same place. I wasn’t even fully Leave until after the botched negotiation. And even then I was on the fence a bit during the campaign. On one level I wanted to vote leave, but have it narrowly lose and some reforms flow from that. But then Leave won, Remainers started being unpleasant, and I firmed up my position.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
On the latter point, it's a quotation from aeons ago. 1992 to be more precise.
But perhaps it's outworn its freshness, like an Army ration Mars Bar.
I’m not going to use it again. It not my style. It sounds dumb.
I found a snickers in glove compartment of a car I hadn’t driven for at least 3 years. And it tasted fine 😋
THat's very fresh by Army standards. They were feeding their squaddies 20 year old Mars Bars in the 1990s, bought cheap by MoD from a failed contract for Iran thanks to the revolution there.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available
That's the point.
You took the brilliant thing we had and replaced it with shit.
And you haven't worked out why people aren't thanking you for it...
If what we had before was actually brilliant, there wouldn't even have been demand for a referendum, let alone it winning.
Not at all. The Out campaigns won it by promising better times than the membership times, more money for public services, better everything, and kept pointing to what globalisation not EU had done to UK, to win.
Fake promises means fake win, the current Brexit polling is saying.
The Out campaign won because the In campaign didn't have a positive vision for what In meant.
Because they couldn't.
Well, it’s clearly not as bad as out ☺️
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
I've travelled quite a few times to the EU and had no problems anywhere. So this, assuming Clarkson's rant isn't hyperbole, it does seem to be a specific issue with the French.
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
I have actually found my route was quicker in a number of EU airports, because there weren’t many other non-EU travellers, certainly not with e-passports.
I have also once, I think on my last trip, which felt odd and on most occasions it is pretty quick anyway regardless. I have had to queue a few times for 15 - 30 min while people with EU passports could go straight through, however that wasn't any hassle as you usually have a few things to sort out in that short wait. However I did have a nightmare at Lisbon where we queued for several hours because we landed at the same time as 2 US flights. I tried to estimate the queue from the snake and it was well over 1000. I posted here from the queue. All the gates were open and they also funnelled us through the priority gate and EU gate as well. That was frustrating as we would have been straight through with an EU passport (same gate they used for us, but didn't have to queue).
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
Rather than trade, the UK and EU should talk about border controls and joining Schengen. I think that's the single biggest issue facing all of Europe (including us) and doing a deal on Schengen membership (something the EU would dearly love) in return for a very tough external border deal and offshore migrant processing and rapid deportation to third party countries etc... makes much more sense to me than joining the single market. There would probably be very wide support across all of Europe to codify a very tough external border and deportation rules, using potential UK membership of it as cover to impose new rules on it is something I think everyone would go for.
So…no border controls between us and France, for example ? Good luck selling that.
Trade is the more important issue to me, but I appreciate I am in a minority and migration is the bigger issue for many so I think @MaxPB comes up with an interesting idea there.
As you say though selling it would be a challenge.
I really don't think it will, who cares if there's an open border with France when France has the power to deport their illegal immigrants without endless court battles and deals with third countries where they can be deported? It would need reform of the ECHR which again could be done under the cover of the UK joining Schengen and needing tougher external border controls and deportation ability. I think most European countries now want to do it, most are facing far right insurrections so any action to make it easier to deport illegal immigrants, criminals and failed asylum seekers will be widely welcomed. Using our joining Schengen as cover for all of this would be extremely convenient for the EU, it makes us the "bad guy" but everyone gets what they want.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The EU never codified the different options, didn’t offer them to new members, and used harmful phrases like “two speed” to imply the same final destination. They didn’t have to, but they chose to.
They are still saying that everyone has to join the Euro but it doesn’t happen if nation states don’t want it.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I’m GenZ, just, but I know that although lots of voters later confirmed our membership, a great many senior parliamentarians voted against in the 1973 vote that took us in. Labour in the commons had a three line whip not to join Europe, not enough Conservative MPs voted to get their governments flag ship policy over the line, even though their lack of support would have destroyed their own Prime Minister. it needed a sizeable Labour rebellion to take us in.
Later on in the 1970s, it split the Labour Party into 2 parties. So in the 1970s and 1980s it was a very contentious and defining political issue. Into the 1990s, it was a very contentious issue in the Conservative government, destabilising it to the point the leader resigned, and during the 1997 campaign MPs openly disagreed with PM John Major - complete lack of discipline making the party look split.
“Nigel en route to Number 10” 😆 and you call me the loony one?
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
On the latter point, it's a quotation from aeons ago. 1992 to be more precise.
But perhaps it's outworn its freshness, like an Army ration Mars Bar.
I’m not going to use it again. It not my style. It sounds dumb.
I found a snickers in glove compartment of a car I hadn’t driven for at least 3 years. And it tasted fine 😋
THat's very fresh by Army standards. They were feeding their squaddies 20 year old Mars Bars in the 1990s, bought cheap by MoD from a failed contract for Iran thanks to the revolution there.
Mars Bars as well as Challenger tanks?! Deal of the century.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
I was in exactly the same place. I wasn’t even fully Leave until after the botched negotiation. And even then I was on the fence a bit during the campaign. On one level I wanted to vote leave, but have it narrowly lose and some reforms flow from that. But then Leave won, Remainers started being unpleasant, and I firmed up my position.
I wasn't sure how I was going to vote until I was walking to the polling station. What was always clear to me was that, whichever of leaving and voting to remain was better, the worst of all worlds by far would be to vote to leave but be forced by the politicians to remain anyway.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
I was in exactly the same place. I wasn’t even fully Leave until after the botched negotiation. And even then I was on the fence a bit during the campaign. On one level I wanted to vote leave, but have it narrowly lose and some reforms flow from that. But then Leave won, Remainers started being unpleasant, and I firmed up my position.
I wasn't sure how I was going to vote until I was walking to the polling station. What was always clear to me was that, whichever of leaving and voting to remain was better, the worst of all worlds by far would be to vote to leave but be forced by the politicians to remain anyway.
I think what scared me the most was a Remain vote being used by EU politicians to tell dissenting UK representatives to stfu because the public had voted by a narrow margin to stay. Suddenly we become the whipping boys and our interests are overridden even though no one consented to that new arrangement.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Oh, FFS again. I literally just explained to you that this is not what I'm talking about, so why reiterate the same point as if it proves anything?
But let's try another one to see if it helps you grasp the point. Is support for the death penalty currently a negligible factor in British politics or is it a significant one?
I agree with you on the death penalty argument and I know what you are trying to say and you are simply wrong. Try the following extract:
'Conservative Euroscepticism evolved throughout the 1980s as EEC measures, such as budget contributions, qualified majority voting, and the Single European Act were increasingly scrutinised by ministers committed to developing their technical expertise.Footnote22 During the same period, Rupert Murdoch’s ideological and commercial interests in influencing European policy at the national level led to increasingly hostile, partisan, and sometimes xenophobic reporting of European affairs within the British press.Footnote23 Thatcher’s Bruges speech in 1988 is frequently cited as the turning point when elite, media, and public opinion began to turn against Europe. It has been described as ‘a lightning rod for Euroscepticism within the Conservative Party’ and is commonly associated with legitimising or mainstreaming Euroscepticism within British politics.'
You were mistaken. This was all before Maastricht. You got it wrong.
And you asked where was I in the 1980s and 90s? Well I was living this. I was regularly working across Europe, dealing with all of this stuff so I remember it very, very well.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I’m GenZ, just, but I know that although lots of voters later confirmed our membership, a great many senior parliamentarians voted against in the 1973 vote that took us in. Labour in the commons had a three line whip not to join Europe, not enough Conservative MPs voted to get their governments flag ship policy over the line, even though their lack of support would have destroyed their own Prime Minister. it needed a sizeable Labour rebellion to take us in.
Later on in the 1970s, it split the Labour Party into 2 parties. So in the 1970s and 1980s it was a very contentious and defining political issue. Into the 1990s, it was a very contentious issue in the Conservative government, destabilising it to the point the leader resigned, and during the 1997 campaign MPs openly disagreed with PM John Major - complete lack of discipline making the party look split.
Europe policy did not split Labour into two Parties.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Maastricht wasn’t the problem. It was the closest we ever got to a solution. It allowed the UK to opt out of the bits of Europe we didn’t like whilst opting in to the bits we did. It was a masterpiece of a negotiation.
And then Blair and Brown came. along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
The problem was Lisbon, if the government had given us a referendum as promised then it would have secured our veto power in key policy areas that Lisbon moved to QMV as a "No" vote from one of the big three would have been impossible to ignore as they did with Ireland. After Labour welched on it I think leaving became inevitable. The amount of control Lisbon gave the EU over our nation was very high and we had no way to reject their ideas or force them to rethink with a veto. It got people like myself and others into the Leave camp where before Lisbon it didn't bother me much as an issue.
I was in exactly the same place. I wasn’t even fully Leave until after the botched negotiation. And even then I was on the fence a bit during the campaign. On one level I wanted to vote leave, but have it narrowly lose and some reforms flow from that. But then Leave won, Remainers started being unpleasant, and I firmed up my position.
I wasn't sure how I was going to vote until I was walking to the polling station. What was always clear to me was that, whichever of leaving and voting to remain was better, the worst of all worlds by far would be to vote to leave but be forced by the politicians to remain anyway.
I think what scared me the most was a Remain vote being used by EU politicians to tell dissenting UK representatives to stfu because the public had voted by a narrow margin to stay. Suddenly we become the whipping boys and our interests are overridden even though no one consented to that new arrangement.
Oh, that was definitely a factor. It was obvious that a remain vote would have been taken by the EU as an endorsement of the Project and be used as an argument against us asking for literally anything else ever in future.
I was fully prepared to sign up to the European Movement in the event of a Remain win because in those circumstances, actually going along with the Project would likely have been the best outcome. Being reluctantly half in wasn't working for us and it wasn't working for the 27 either.
But it’s still whinging about what we used to have. What we used to have is no longer available: we’ve taken it from you and you can never have it back...
You spent four decades whinging and moaning before you managed that. Rejoining, should it ever happen, won’t take nearly as long.
In the meantime, just get used to it.
Not true. Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.
That's simply not true.
The highest polling against EU membership was in 1980, and it polled in the 40s quite often in the 1980s.
Salient enough for Her Majesty's opposition to put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.
It was a blooming stupid manifesto, but that's not the point.
Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?
Not relevant. Not for the first time you have come out with a fact that just isn't.
Afraid you've missed the point. Anti-Europeanism being a fringe thing was one reason Foot crashed so hard, as people thought "you're thinking this is one of the most important things?"
Anyone can poll on anything at any time. Given how inaccurate polls on this topic were when it was a live issue, trying to prove anything with polls from when it wasn't is... heroic, shall we say?
You are going off on a tangent. The original point had nothing to do with Foot. You said anti Europeanism was negligible pre Maastricht. Your words. Yet there were polls in the 40%. Hardly negligible. Now you are arguing those polls are worthless. Now I don't see how you can deduce that as polls are carried out using statistical methods, but even if they are, your evidence is just your opinion based upon nothing, absolutely nothing. I tend to rely on facts.
And if you think Foot lost just because of the EU you are deluded. The longest suicide note in history contained a lot more than EU membership. A lot.
Not what I said, so I'll leave it there, as you clearly haven't and won't try to understand what I've been saying.
Good grief. Do you not know what you just wrote?
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
Oh, FFS, I'm going to have to try at least for the benefit of others who might be seduced by your wilful disingenuousness.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
I don't think I have ever come across anyone so stupid. This is the umpteenth time you have stated a fact on PB in the last few weeks that someone has come back and pointed out was factually wrong. Would you like me to go and list them all for you? They are easy to look up.
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
Oh, FFS again. I literally just explained to you that this is not what I'm talking about, so why reiterate the same point as if it proves anything?
But let's try another one to see if it helps you grasp the point. Is support for the death penalty currently a negligible factor in British politics or is it a significant one?
I agree with you on the death penalty argument and I know what you are trying to say and you are simply wrong. Try the following extract:
'Conservative Euroscepticism evolved throughout the 1980s as EEC measures, such as budget contributions, qualified majority voting, and the Single European Act were increasingly scrutinised by ministers committed to developing their technical expertise.Footnote22 During the same period, Rupert Murdoch’s ideological and commercial interests in influencing European policy at the national level led to increasingly hostile, partisan, and sometimes xenophobic reporting of European affairs within the British press.Footnote23 Thatcher’s Bruges speech in 1988 is frequently cited as the turning point when elite, media, and public opinion began to turn against Europe. It has been described as ‘a lightning rod for Euroscepticism within the Conservative Party’ and is commonly associated with legitimising or mainstreaming Euroscepticism within British politics.'
You were mistaken. This was all before Maastricht. You got it wrong.
And you asked where was I in the 1980s and 90s? Well I was living this. I was regularly working across Europe, dealing with all of this stuff so I remember it very, very well.
So by your own quote, you're saying that Euroscepticism was neither legitimate nor mainstream before September 1988. Negotiations for the Maastricht Treaty started in December 1990. Given that there was no general election between the two, this is a distinction with minimal difference.
Edited to add: It's true that politicians throughout the 1980s, and indeed subsequently, often blamed "Europe" for them implementing an unpopular policy. Makes you wonder why they were surprised that people took it to heart.
Comments
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1888325741156118744?s=46&t=bulOICNH15U6kB0MwE6Lfw
Trump in the White House
Elon in the Doge’s Palace
Nigel en route to Number 10
England breaking French hearts at Twickers
This is it, PB. Doesn’t get better than this
Group hug? To give thanks?
I think so. Even for @kinabalu
C’mon kinners, join the hug
*hug*
"That was a commercial decision" droned our pathetic excuse for a Prime Minister at PMQs.
It’s easier to get into Iraq than France, what’s that doing to UK business and GDP? And that’s the boring, unexciting argument for trading deals with near neighbours.
Yes you are right in that, Out won on the far more desirable “extra money” “more control in a globalised world” “better public services and everything” “higher wages”. But you know wins and changes based on lies can’t last for ever don’t you?
Boris did this a lot, only to find that none of the regulations he quoted ever existed, or didn't apply or had been distorted out of all proportion. I point to his evidence at the Treasury Select Committee. Every single one of his claims were debunked. As per Andrew Tyrie 'All very interesting Boris, but none of it is actually true is it?'
Reform aren’t getting anywhere near what they need in commons seats for power or influence. Your seat calcs and MRP’s are hopeless at understanding how hated Reform, Farage and Brexit is. Even the big tractorgeddon rally wouldn’t let Farage on the stage, but let Davey speak for them - that’s the context here.
Even if Reform end up ahead of everyone else, the ganging up on Reform under FPTP constituencies at the election will keep them a long way from any power. Reform not seriously in the game - unless there is a flood of donors and bigwigs from Conservative Party to them, and that ain’t going to happen.
What’s driving politics, UK polls at the moment, also pretty much globally, is, still, the shock to incomes of recent years. If economics picks up in UK over next four and a bit years, enough voters will herd with sitting government for a working majority. And likely the second term is the transformative one, big changes to the Boris Brexit etc.
Take a look at TSE current header for example. If the economic and household finances get better in coming years, then Labours uptick is “It’s the economy, stupid.”
(Why can’t we just say, it’s the economy, without calling doubters stupid?)
The vote to leave was nothing but an enabling action. One of the things it enables is, of course, rejoining. But even the most committed pro-Europeans amongst us don't believe that's likely any time soon. If they did, they wouldn't have fought so hard to overturn the referendum result.
Where is the strategy? The joined up thinking?
We are told it is growth, growth, growth and also security.
Then they blow this deal up for a few pence effectively.
I despair.
https://abcnews.go.com/538/economy-stupid/story?id=110024758
But perhaps it's outworn its freshness, like an Army ration Mars Bar.
(My take is that trying to align blue votes, whether explicitly or implicitly, is a non-starter. But let's suspend disbelief for a bit. If there were a RefCon pact, I wonder how many current Conservative supporters would consider that the final straw?)
If Musk has found spending that is inappropriate then he should use legal means to change that.
In reply to 'Her Majesty's opposition put Brexit in their 1983 manifesto.' You replied 'Yeah, and what happened as a result of that manifesto?'
Now the normal implication from your reply to that statement is one of cause and effect. If not why say it? So it is what you said.
And anyway you are again arguing a tangent. You said the EU wasn't an issue pre Maastricht and you were proved wrong, by you know, actual facts. Your response seems to be that those facts can be ignored. Handy. And come up with nothing else.
Honestly.
The second term, ahahaha. It's very bunker stage Third Reich, this 'second term' chat.
Starmer’s approval ratings are way lower than Farage's, and dropping like a stone. People will vote for whoever is most likely to unseat the sitting Labour candidate, not who is most likely to stop the Reform candidate.
How did that work out then?
Don’t focus on the EU: focus on a form of Macron’s political community that everyone can live with.
Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was unimportant in mainstream politics. The one time a major party mentioned it, it was as part of a very non-mainstream manifesto that got an utter thrashing at the ballot box. It absolutely was not a serious political issue, and saying "but 40% of people answered this way in a poll when it wasn't a live issue" is a laughable rebuttal.
I'm assuming you must be too young to remember the politics of the 80s and 90s. Or old enough to have forgotten them.
Joseph Allen
@j_g_allen
These great research institutions in red states are slated to lose about $1B in NIH research dollars
https://x.com/j_g_allen/status/1888253394025881827
I suspect if you are going to a holiday airport it will be fine, but if you are going to an international airport and land at the same time as a non EU flight you get stuffed.
As in "You will be subjected to a Primary, and I will donate $25m to your opponent."
Primarying: noun
U.S. Politics.
the mounting of a challenge to the incumbent in a primary election:
There were many instances of primarying during the last election cycle.
He also unlike his brother backed down on a Declaration of Indulgence and agreed to implement the Test Acts passed by Parliament which required those holding office to deny the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation and take Anglican communion
It's happening with other EU countries due to all the new Brexit dividends that British companies are experiencing.
(A progressive who is a bit cross with progressives.)
https://youtu.be/FAJNx1KwPak?t=103
Michael Crick
@MichaelLCrick
·
1h
I hear that scores of screenshots of Andrew Gwynne's Trigger Me Timbers WhatsApp group are likely to emerge in the next few days, which will make life very unconfortable for several local councillors and at least one MP.
UK media covers US stories an awful lot.
I suspect we are not yet at peak reform, but that it will come during this Parliament and then decline by the time of the next election.
“See the guy in the corner. The one with the 10,000 yard stare? He lasted 14 hours on PB. No, man, you don’t know. You weren’t there!”
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/usercode.py?scotcontrol=N&CON=22&LAB=27&LIB=11&Reform=26&Green=8&UKIP=&TVCON=&TVLAB=&TVLIB=&TVReform=&TVGreen=&TVUKIP=&SCOTCON=&SCOTLAB=&SCOTLIB=&SCOTReform=&SCOTGreen=&SCOTUKIP=&SCOTNAT=&display=AllChanged&regorseat=(none)&boundary=2024
You never mentioned Foot or the manifesto in the first place. Someone else did who pointed out you were wrong in your claim. That person also pointed out themselves how daft that manifesto was as have I.
So can we stop talking about that f***** manifesto.
You said 'Before Maastricht, anti-Europeanism was negligible.'
As pointed out to you this was not true as polls regularly put it over 40%. Now regular over 40% polls is NOT negligible. In fact IPSO/Mori polls between 1979 and 1983 were all over 50% for leave. One in 1979 was 60 - 32 and one in 18980 was 65 - 26.
So yep you were mind mindbogglingly spectacularly wrong in your initial statement.
We kind of assumed Labour were tight lipped because they'd want to avoid any pre-election slip-ups, and would rather simply allow the Tories to lose in style. It's now seeming like the cupboard was bare all along, and there really aren't any great new ideas coming from the government.
Voters are one thing, actual members and activists could produce a different result.
But there are voters out there who have voted Brexit, Corbyn, and Farage in recent elections, and maybe very little else in their lives. To put it like this, how much Reform vote is based on liking Reform on immigration, but would actually prefer economics a little bit more left wing?
Here’s the gist. Look very very carefully for it, and Farage and Reform are repositioning themselves more to the left than they were on economics and public services.
I found a snickers in glove compartment of a car I hadn’t driven for at least 3 years. And it tasted fine 😋
As you say though selling it would be a challenge.
But let's try another one to see if it helps you grasp the point. Is support for the death penalty currently a negligible factor in British politics or is it a significant one?
And then Blair and Brown came along saying that we had to be at the heart of Europe and waived most of our opt outs. The path was fairly inevitably fixed from that point forward.
Labour well down.
Conservatives doing even worse than in 2024.
And Reform still behind both of them.
(It does highlight how easy the Socialists are likely to find things, as long as ex-tory wets drift off to the Yellow Peril and hard right wingers stomp off to Reform. Flip knows how you reunite them in an electorally useful way. Starmer being annoying and mediocre isn't going to do it, and neither are Badenoch's charms.)
Georg Rockall-Schmidt (who despite the accent lives in the States) on The Autocoup.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2v2rY9AH6I 12 mins
While Bill Clinton was president, the number of nuclear weapons was cut.
While George W. Bush was president, the number of nuclear weapons was cut further.
While Barack Obama was president, the number of nuclear weapons was cut still further.
While the Loser was president the first time, the number of nuclear weapons was not reduced.
While Joe Biden was president, the efforts to cut nuclear weapons further did not resume.
So, no, this is not my favorite period of history. But, tastes differ.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hNblIGVKgks 17 mins
Later on in the 1970s, it split the Labour Party into 2 parties. So in the 1970s and 1980s it was a very contentious and defining political issue. Into the 1990s, it was a very contentious issue in the Conservative government, destabilising it to the point the leader resigned, and during the 1997 campaign MPs openly disagreed with PM John Major - complete lack of discipline making the party look split.
'Conservative Euroscepticism evolved throughout the 1980s as EEC measures, such as budget contributions, qualified majority voting, and the Single European Act were increasingly scrutinised by ministers committed to developing their technical expertise.Footnote22 During the same period, Rupert Murdoch’s ideological and commercial interests in influencing European policy at the national level led to increasingly hostile, partisan, and sometimes xenophobic reporting of European affairs within the British press.Footnote23 Thatcher’s Bruges speech in 1988 is frequently cited as the turning point when elite, media, and public opinion began to turn against Europe. It has been described as ‘a lightning rod for Euroscepticism within the Conservative Party’ and is commonly associated with legitimising or mainstreaming Euroscepticism within British politics.'
You were mistaken. This was all before Maastricht. You got it wrong.
And you asked where was I in the 1980s and 90s? Well I was living this. I was regularly working across Europe, dealing with all of this stuff so I remember it very, very well.
I was fully prepared to sign up to the European Movement in the event of a Remain win because in those circumstances, actually going along with the Project would likely have been the best outcome. Being reluctantly half in wasn't working for us and it wasn't working for the 27 either.
Edited to add: It's true that politicians throughout the 1980s, and indeed subsequently, often blamed "Europe" for them implementing an unpopular policy. Makes you wonder why they were surprised that people took it to heart.
Yet based on today's numbers under this ceasefire each Israeli is worth ≈30 Hamas prisoners released.
Might be a good idea just looking at the maths to keep Israeli hostages alive and properly fed?