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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » David Cameron’s popularity – the reason why we are having an EU referendum and the reason why LEAVE is likely to lose
The reason, of course, why we are having an EU referendum is that the Conservatives had such a stunning and surprise victory in the general election. One of the key factors in that, I would argue, is the personality and popularity of David Cameron himself.
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He's very good at politics isn't he?
If trust is lost then they won't listen to him.
Stuart Rose's arguments for staying in are pretty lame. The key determining factor is surely going to be whether enough people who are inclined against the EU project decide that it is nevertheless too risky to leave and the status quo prevails.
If however the "out" side can persuade people that leaving is not a scary option, out could still win.
FWIW (again) I am one of those...and currently leaning to "out".
Just because someone is preferred to Ed Miliband or the Tory party is not quite enough to say that they are popular or liked.
Tories like him. That might be enough.
However, from a betting perspective, I agree with this: Cameron will almost certainly recommend Remain and, unless there's a huge event that gets in the way, Remain will therefore win.
And I think that will be a disaster for the UK.
I expect that they'll go for the former approach.
So Cameron and Osborne's task is to keep the vast bulk of the tory party onside and to avoid gratuitously offending those who are not. They have done that pretty well in the last 10 years.
My mood swings would be colossal.
A big "In" vote, on the other hand, would be a disaster.
I firmly believe that the bulk of people in the UK would be happy with a Swiss or Norwegian deal. British interests would be served, immigration would be dramatically reduced, while retaining much freedom of movement. We would actually have more say over EU legislation. And we'd be able to sign a meaningless "Free Trade" agreement with the Chinese.
However, I don't believe the referendum will be about EFTA/EEA. Instead Farage will promise no diminution of sovereignty (without realising that all trade deals involve at least some diminution), and he'll fight with other people about what "Out" means. Some will talk of closing the borders. And a lot of businesses who would prefer EFTA/EEA will come down on the side of "In", because it is less risky than "Out", if "Out" means genuinely out in the cold.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-politics/11926344/more-women-elle-feminism-politics.html
British people always ALWAYS find a reason to get grumpy with the government/PM of the day mid-term, even if they eventually decide it's the lesser of two evils come a GE.
I think we could blaze a path that could be followed by Sweden, and by various Eastern European countries who want to be part of Europe, but not a part of a European Superstate.
I agree entirely with the rest of your post. I would love EFTA, but Farage is the suicide bomber for Leave.
I think the ideal result for ukip was a weak miliband led coalition that fell early, replaced by a Eurosceptic tory... Oh well, it is what it is ( or S.O.C.K.S as the Spanish say)
At the moment, I would make Remain slight favourites (say 3/2) but no more than that.
Furthermore, whilst Cameron has been careful not to tell anyone the detail of what he wants from these negotiations (including, if the press can be believed, the people he is negotiating with) I seem to recall he has made some public statements about the aim. Something about a fundamental change in our relationship was it not? Again, if the press can be believed, the ragbag of non-legally binding measures reported in the Telegraph barely amount to a minor change. Could Cameron sell that as good enough? I am not so sure that even the most accomplished snake-oil salesman could.
EDIT: At least with a Tory Majority it requires keeping the whole Tory Party on board (which meant retreating on purdah) for it to work. Had Cameron been propped up by the Lib Dems it would have gone in the other direction.
If it was a kimono and somebody else's wife, then you are most definitely posh. or related to the Speaker.
if you received the consideration then you are aristocracy.
FPT:
Mr. kle4, aye, you wouldn't want to be the chap that cocked up and accidentally blinded everyone. One would guess the military discipline of Basil II's army was pretty strict.
Mr. Paris, quite. Unfortunately, after Flavius Phocas (early 7th century) usurped Maurice to become emperor, the Eastern Empire developed a bad habit of mutilating people.
Mr. (Miss?) Kinga, I hadn't spotted that. It's probably been a very long time. I'd check the records, but since the redesign the official F1 website is both horrendous to navigate and only has this and last year's data.
What I am afraid of is that the EU is on the point of selling us out to the big corporations, usually American.
Obviously, that would be highly attractive to lots of Tory voters who work in the corporate sector, and who are big financial backers of the Tory Party.
But it is not atractive to me and, I suspect, to a lot of traditional Conservative supporters. So it could provide very strong motivation for supporting the LEAVE cause.
Why won't outers come out with an opinion on the EEA? Just where is there a single serious figure willing to say ' leave the EU and join the EEA'?
Just where is there anyone willing to say we can leave the EU, join the EEA but still be risk free from joining Schengen?
Outers do not live in the real world. The dynamic to leaving the EU is be able to transfer to the EEA and still stay out of Schengen.
No Outers are willing to even broach the subject.
chuckle.
No, you would not.
If I were pricing this now, I'd be 4/9 REMAIN and 5/4 LEAVE.
@isam: Nigel Farage has come out saying that while he would prefer EFTA/EEA, his preferred option would be neither EU or EFTA/EEA. So long as the major voice in favour of Brexit does not have EFTA/EEA as his main objective, he is likely to "scare the horses". My view is that there is a good 20% of the population (including most businesses) who have their preferences in the order of (1) EFTA/EEA, (2) EU, and (3) total "independence". This group of people will vote "In" if they think the real choice is between (2) and (3).
PART ONE
The difficulty I have with this issue is that the status quo is not an option. I could live with the EU as is. There are plenty of things that it can do and co-operation across boundaries can be a worthwhile exercise.
But what worries me most about the EU are three things:-
1. The direction of travel - to an effective political union - a single state in all but name. I don't want that and think it untenable in an area the size of the EU with such varied legal, historical and political cultures. A vote for Remain will be taken as a vote for ever closer union with all that that implies.
For instance, what would a single criminal justice system be like? Would we lose the right to trial by jury or, even, the presumption of innocence or the burden of proof? These are English concepts, rooted in our history and culture and not shared to anything like the same extent - if at all - by the majority of our European neighbours. I pick this as one example. There are others.
2. The UK being harmed by the decisions of the eurozone with no effective say in them or to prevent them harming our interests. If that happens we may as well be Out and get such benefits from that as well as the undoubted downsides.
The Germans make a mistake when they think the Outers are harking back to the Empire. Some may. But many feel that the EU itself is far too inward looking and far too cumbersome and far too prone to think that a 1950's model is the way to approach the world in 2020 and beyond. A big bloated quasi-state/federation may not have the nimbleness and agility needed to survive in the world to come. What can seem like a source of strength ("We're big. We can negotiate with China.") can also feel like a straightjacket.
3. The fact that the EU's instincts seem to be fundamentally undemocratic, statist, top down and lacking in transparency. There seems to me to be a fundamental contempt for the ordinary voter at the heart of the EU project as currently conceived. And I don't like the way that reinforces the same tendency which is always present in politicians here. It's hard enough getting our own political class to accept that they are our servants. Many in the EU bureaucracy and in Continental European governments still have a very "l'etat c'est moi" approach to the people. I dislike this intensely and don't want to be governed by such a political class.
The "There is no alternative" approach is both foolish, ahistorical and offputting. I am with Antifrank on wanting an open, friendly, internationalist, modern future. Then I see Hollande lecturing us and I see a hectoring, close-minded, how dare you think differently to us and if you do we'll punish you approach uttered by a President of a Republic which came into its current fifth incarnation in 1958 and who has the nerve to lecture the UK about democracy. The urge to shout back and say that the UK maintained its democracy through exactly the same stresses and strains as France whereas his country fell to bits becomes almost overwhelming.
1 and 2 are potentially curable. 3 could be but is a much longer project and we probably should not be starting from where we are.
At one level I like the idea of Europe. I like the fact that the barriers between West and East have broken down. I think the reunification of Germany was tremendous. The events of 1989 and the earlier events in Poland were so hopeful. But I am beginning to hate what the EU has done with this better and more generous Europe.
If you want to debate ideas lay off the insults.
Which is a shame. I'm a fan of EFTA/EEA + Schengen. (I realise I'm in a minority of one.)
The more interesting part of the poll is the high proportion of Conservative voters who want Cameron to adopt a position of Wilsonian neutrality. In other words, having got the re-negotiation package, he shouldn't then try to sell it.
Curious.
Put another way, I'd put the likelihood of remain at 60%.
Mr. Llama, not sure if you saw it on the previous thread but you may be interested in my ramble about the Battle of Kleidion, which was more notable for what happened after, rather than during, the battle:
http://thaddeusthesixth.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/the-battle-of-kleidion.html
The real point is that out doesn't have someone of similar calibre at this stage. Boris or someone like him could shift that.
None of this on either side is going to get those millions who voted Labour before they got a scum bag as leader to jump in or out. In the past Delors persuaded Labour that the EU was good for the left because it applied minimum standards to working time, maternity, sickness, holiday entitlement and other work related benefits that were better than the UK had or were frankly likely to have. Does that Faustian pact still hold or does the prevalence of centre right governments in the EU make a further tranche of rights unlikely?
For me, this is the key question as to how the vote is likely to go, much more important than the issues that obsess and divide the right which sail over the heads of most voters. And none of those who are currently active in this debate give a damn about these issues or even want to talk about them.
(As I might have mentioned previously, in my ideal (never gonna happen) world we would be much more like Iceland - in Schengen, in EFTA, out of the EU (and hence the monstrosity of the CAP and the CFP) and outside the 'ever closer union' that others in the EU want)
Fundamentally, most Continental European states saw their nation states and their political governance break and collapse in the last century. Hence the understandable desire to create something new and different that didn't lead to war. An admirable aim.
Britain did not see its nation state and political governance fail. Quite the opposite in fact. So at some level Britain does not see why it needs to give up its historically very successful state. What makes sense for Italy, for instance, does not make sense for Britain. Talk of harmonisation of HGV rules or IP etc is really neither here nor there in this context, however desirable the individual measures may be.
It's about who Britain is. Italians like Brussels because (a) they can't be any worse than their own bunch of shysters; and (b) it's another source of patronage and money to be ladled out by said shysters, which is how - largely - the Italians view the state. We do not - yet - have quite the same view of our political system.
Not sure how Mr Cameron's popularity came into it. After all Winston Churchill was VERY popular after the 2nd world war.
Some of what the Byzantines did was tremendously cruel, especially after Phocas became emperor, but it's also worth noting that was partly due to the Zeitgeist. Both Saladin and Richard the Lionheart (who fought within a century of Basil's death) accepted surrenders on condition of mercy, and then killed their prisoners.
And if you've not been reading it much, do check the previous post, which is about why finding signs of water on Mars makes an apocalypse more likely [inspired by/copied from a thread here on the subject].
Miss Cyclefree, a very interesting insight. On a similar note, that's probably why Germany's been so tone deaf on migration and why some eastern countries are so pissed off at having diktats enforced by an Empress of Europe (given the recent memory of the Iron Curtain).
Many of the arguments about the pros and cons of the EU are technical and Remain has a huge advantage in having most of the sensible people on its side. The establishment aren't liked but their judgement is going to be trusted more than that of the flakier ends of the political spectrum. So David Cameron will indeed be a large asset for Remain, assuming that's the way he jumps
Incidentally what are the rules for all this? How much prior warning does Cameron need to give on the date and what's to stop him going for a snap referendum to confuse the outters?
It's Alex Salmond Mk II.
You have a very poor opinion of your elected, and non-elected representatives. Understandably, of course, at the moment, but one day we’ll get back to a body of reps who are determined to a) be there and b) participate sensibly.